The MUDLARK Chapter 1

In which a kitten produces mayhem through no fault of her own.
England, March, 1816


When the sun came out from beneath dense clouds, Izzy Daventry threw her shawl over her shoulders and set off from the manor across meadows that were still slick from the last downpour. Within moments, the collection of children commonly known as Izzy's Urchins gathered around her, warbling like the first larks of spring, eager to see what adventure she had prepared for the day.

She had plenty of time before her father arrived from Town. Even though he was expected by supper, Izzy knew her miscreant parent well. At his best, he wouldn't arrive before midnight. And even at that, he would need no more than the mere mention of some Arthurian manuscript unearthed in Wales, and he would be off in that direction, forgetting he had ever meant to come home.

Today, she proclaimed to her followers, was the first day of polliwog season. With the practiced eye of an expert polliwog hunter, Izzy paced along the bank, searching for a quiet pool with the characteristics for the proper breeding of tadpoles. Finding her spot, she set the children to searching the water.

"There's some!" said Tom Watkins, whose eagerness always delighted her. "Oh, Izzy! There's lots of 'em! Look here!"

"Ye're s'posed to call her Miss Daventry, ye nodcock!" Jake Watkins gave his younger brother a shove. "Move over, ye hog, ye're takin' all the room!"

"Jake, mind your manners," Izzy scolded, knowing she had little effect on the boy. Yet when the younger girls came closer, even Jake made room. With a manly huff of authority born of a ten-year-old's greater knowledge and advanced years, Jake pointed out the elusive creatures that paddled about by their tails.

Izzy chuckled quietly to herself as she listened to Jake's explanation of tadpole development, a verbatim account of the one she had given the previous year. She was proud of her urchins, and of all the learning she had squeezed into them between their chores and gleaning. She could never hope to equal the schoolmaster they desperately needed, but she taught what she knew, be it reading or polliwog-watching.

Tommy, in his enthusiasm, leaned closer to the water. Her suspicions aroused, Izzy frowned, then spotted Jake preparing to give Tommy a shove. Izzy grabbed his arm and shook her head at the boy, who looked only slightly chagrined. Jake wasn't a cruel child, only one whose mischief was unending. Nor would he think of the danger the icy water posed to his brother.

Intent upon the tadpoles, Tommy had not noticed. He looked up at Izzy, his blue eyes shining. "Can I have some, Izzy? I mean, Miss Daventry? I could get a jar somewheres."

"No, Tommy, they'll die if you take them away."

"How come they like it in there, Izzy?" asked Judith. "The water's so cold. I wouldna like it."

"That's 'cause ye're a girl," snorted Jake. "And ye're forgetting to call her Miss Daventry."

Izzy noted Jake's manly swagger and the haughty way he demanded respect for her, as if in so doing he acquired some respect for himself. The boy had learned just about everything she knew to teach him, and needed to move on. It was a shame his keen mind would have no opportunities for scholarship, but perhaps she could persuade her father to find him an apprenticeship.

She turned back to Judith. "As they have never been anywhere else, Judith, I doubt they know the difference. And if you put them in warm water right away, they would probably die."

"Honest?"

From upstream, Izzy heard sharp shrieks, and turned toward the commotion. Beside the rocky bank of the roiling stream stood Hank Trumble, who raised something into the air above Daisy Samples, while the little girl jumped helplessly after it. It was nothing uncommon for young boys to tease smaller girls, but wherever Hank Trumble went, he took trouble with him, often more than mere teasing. Frowning, Izzy raised her skirts to step around the muddy bank and marched toward the squabble.

"Give her back, Hank!" cried the girl. "Hank, don't ye dare! She's mine! Give her back!"

Hank dangled Daisy's yellow kitten tantalizingly close, just beyond her grasp, as Daisy jumped and clawed at her tormenter. As he spotted Izzy and her troop, Hank's face brightened with malicious glee and he flung the kitten into the stream.

With a scream, Daisy dashed toward the water, but Izzy lunged, snatching Daisy by her arm before she jumped in.

"Hold her, Jake." She pushed Daisy to the boy.

"My kitty!" the girl screamed, fighting against Jake's grip.

Izzy couldn't let Daisy go into the water. The fragile child would be swept off her feet instantly.

Tossing a glare at Hank, Izzy kicked off her slippers and stepped into icy water that tugged at her ankles as she groped along the slippery stones. She focused on the yellow kitten, alternately sinking and bobbing as the current swept it closer to Izzy, over the rocks, down into a deep pool, throwing it up again. Exhausted, the little creature hardly struggled, and soon would cease its fight. Izzy lunged against the numbing water. In one stroke, she scooped up the kitten.

Cheers rose from the banks.

Then the kitten remembered its terror. With renewed strength and desperate wails, the squirming mass of thrashing claws hooked its razor talons into her soaked dress and the skin beneath, and climbed her like a tree.

She clenched the cat against her chest, and fumbled her bare, frozen toes along the precarious bottom, reminding herself she did this for Daisy, who was obviously more deserving than this ungrateful wretch.

Suddenly squeezing out of her grip, the kitten clambered up Izzy's sodden dress to her shoulder, shredding both fabric and skin as it climbed her hair. Grimly, she pinned the yowling kitten to her scalp and plowed her numb feet through the icy water, at last reached the calm shallows. The very second she reached Jake's outstretched arm, she peeled the screeching cat from her bedraggled hair and tossed it to him.

Her ordeal at last at its end, Izzy just stood, shivering, letting the soft mud ooze between her toes. Only one more step to dry land. Trembling, she shifted one foot. She slipped, shrieking, tumbling backwards, and landed on her backside in the mud.

Izzy glanced about her in the furtive hope that no living soul above the age of ten had witnessed her fall, and breathed a sigh of relief on seeing none but the gaggle of children surrounding her. At least children could be bribed into silence.

They, however, were giggling. She suspected it would take more than the usual amount of bribery this time.

"Don't ye know how to wade in a creek, Miss Daventry?"

Izzy looked up to Jake's cheeky grin. "I suppose you think you could have done better, with a wildcat peeling your skin off, Jake Watkins."

"No, ma'am. Not at all." Jake gallantly extended his hand to help her out of the mud.

"Thank you, Jake." Izzy rose from the mud, shivering. "Daisy, wrap the kitten in my shawl. I'd mislike learning it died from the cold after all this effort."

"Shall I help ye home, Miss Daventry?" Jake asked. His smirking mouth was so wide, Izzy thought she could probably drive a hay wain through it.

"I shall deal with that, myself. Please see that Daisy gets home without Hank bothering her."

With a cheerful nod, Jake ran off after Daisy.

Izzy trembled so fiercely, she could hardly walk. Clenching her shuddering jaw so tight it hurt, she plodded, one frozen foot in front of the other, to the top of the hill and Daventry Manor.

The closest door was near the stables. She didn't see anybody around, and hoped that meant no one saw her. With luck, she could reach the steps and be up them before anyone was the wiser. If word got out, she would never live this down.

She gathered her remaining strength and hurried to the terrace door and turned the knob. As she pushed, the door pulled away from her hand. There stood Tibbets, his eyes bulging with more than their customary dismay.

"A small accident, Tibbets," she replied to his stunned silence, and rushed past him before he could recover his composure and suggest she not drip on his finely polished floors.

Tibbets followed after her, wringing his hands. "Miss Daventry, perhaps you should avoid going through the foyer."

Hardly the time to be fastidious, she grumbled to herself, and trudged toward the stairs. "I know I am dripping, Tibbets, and I assure you, I am most sorry for the mess, but I am in a bit of a hurry at the moment."

"But, Miss Daventry, you really should..."

Muttering, Izzy slogged over the freshly polished pink marble toward the grand staircase in the foyer, which was much closer to her chamber than the servant's stairs Tibbets no doubt wished she would use, but she was too cold to care.

Just as she passed her father's study with its door ajar, she began to recognize something unusual in the high pitch of Tibbets' voice. And in her desperate haste to be warm again, she barely realized the significance of that open door as she rounded the corner from the corridor to the grand foyer, and collided, face first, with the handsomest man she had ever seen.

He was also the most shocked gentleman she had ever seen. As he backed away, his horror-stricken eyes tracked over her dripping hair, muddy gown, downward all the way to her wet, bare feet, and widened even further at the brown streaks of mud freshly garnishing the dazzling white breeches of his Coldstream Guards uniform. Jaw agape, he stared at her as if he'd just witnessed the destruction of England and all that was English.

Izzy had never thought of herself as beyond the pale. But now, as she stared down at her fingernails and realized there was indeed mud beneath them, she suspected that she had likely just been labeled as such. She glanced about, seeking support, but her father, for once caught without words, only stared. So did both of the men in his company.

She decided to make the best of it. She squared her shoulders and lifted her chin to a very proper angle. "Good afternoon, Papa, so nice to see you and your guests. You'll excuse me?"

With a wobbly smile, she turned and walked away with dubious grace, belatedly recalling the probable condition of her clothing when viewed from a posterior angle.

"You'll straighten yourself for supper, girl!"

Papa's voice carried to her as she took to the stairs, one absurdly elegant step at a time, until she was certain she was beyond their sight. Then she fled down the corridor to the safety of her chamber.

***
"Devil take it, what was that?" The words were out before Tristan could stop them. Although the girl was already up the stairs and gone, the image stuck in his mind of soaked, mud-streaked muslin clinging indecently, revealing just about every asset the girl had. Particularly the upper ones.

"Not sure," said his father, whose own gaping jaw seemed to be just recovering. "Been using her for trout bait, Daventry?"

For the first time since Tristan had met Daventry in London the day before, the man was struck dumb. That fact, coupled with the word 'Papa' from the creature's own lips, likely meant Tristan had just been given his first view of Daventry's only child. And knowing what he now knew of Daventry, he couldn't imagine why he'd always pictured the girl as a lady.

"A minor mishap, no doubt," Daventry said at last. "Girl's a bit prone to them."

"I'd say. She is a bit damp," Trowbridge admitted.

"Damp?" Tristan said, frowning at the brown streaks on his uniform. "Undress whites do have an uncanny affinity for mud, but I never expected a mud puddle to sprout legs and personally hunt me down."

"Now Tris, no call to be so particular. Ain't as if you never saw mud, what with the Peninsula and all."

"That was the Peninsula, and we lived in mud there. This is supposed to be England, where one may expect some form of gentility." Bloody Hell. He had spent four hours in a coach with his drunken father and equally drunken Daventry, both men two sheets to the wind and ready to hoist the third hours before they reached Daventry's country seat. And now, here was Daventry's incomparable hoyden of a daughter, trouble if ever he had seen it, when all he wanted was peace. This visit was turning into a nightmare. It was almost enough to send him back to Waterloo.

He squeezed his eyes closed to shut out the sudden rush of bloody images. No, never that. Never again.

Tristan hadn't wanted to come at all, but he'd had no choice, for Daventry had been his father's lifelong closest friend. Even after Daventry had left India to assume his deceased brother's title, the two had continued their crusty debates over Camelot and King Arthur by mail, month after month, year after year. Those letters had been the highlights of his father's life.

He should have known Daventry would be as exasperating as his own father. How else could they be such fast friends? Like his father, completely irresponsible. Although somebody ran this manor with obvious efficiency, it certainly wasn't Daventry. Nor had the man shown the slightest sensitivity to his daughter, who had clearly suffered a mishap and must be frozen to the bone.

Perhaps Daventry simply knew the girl well enough not to give encouragement to her hoydenish ways.

No, he was probably right the first time. The man didn't have the sense to notice. Tristan shuddered, but he gritted his teeth, determined to be polite.

At least, it was to be a short visit, surely short enough that he could manage to conceal his problem from this strange family. Nothing had happened for some time, and for all he knew, perhaps wouldn't again. And if his own father had not been sufficiently sober to notice something was wrong with his son, he could hope Daventry and his daughter were no more observant. With any luck, he'd soon be safely back in his own London town house, and none the wiser. A solution had to come about sometime.

***
Izzy burst through her chamber door and slammed it behind her, gasping as if she had been chased by a bear. Marie, pausing in her puttering about, lifted her eyebrows, shook her head, called for a hot bath and began stripping the ruined dress from Izzy's body. As Marie appraised the garment that she held by her fingertips at as great a distance as she could manage, Izzy felt chagrined in a way her father could never provoke.

"A pity," said Marie, and tossed the sodden rag into a corner of the dressing chamber.

Izzy wrapped a woolen blanket about her and huddled in the yellow chintz wing chair by the fire grate, waiting the eternity it took for the halftub to be filled. Then she slipped into the gloriously warm water.

"'Tis a handsome young man his lordship's brought home," said Marie, patiently working the tangles from Izzy's wet hair while Izzy soaked.

"I didn't notice," she answered, knowing Marie would see through the lie. "I didn't take the time for introductions."

"Made a cake of yourself, did you?" Marie yanked the tangled strand, emphasizing her point.

There was no fooling Marie. "It matters little, as I'm already promised to Mr. Landerholme."

"He's a mite better prize than that Mr. Landerholme, I'm thinking."

Izzy frowned at Marie's usual lack of enthusiasm for her choice. "Mr. Landerholme is the second son of an earl, you know."

"Might as well be the twentieth."

Izzy held her tongue. She and Donald had been promised to each other since they were children, and she would happily accept him even if he had no chance of inheriting the title.

"Whatever were you about this time, miss?"

There was no point in ignoring her maid's questions, for Marie would learn anyway. So she explained about the polliwog expedition and Hank Trumble's cruel stunt.

Marie shook her head again, no doubt weary of reminding Izzy that proper ladies did not go hunting for tadpoles. "The cat left you some awful marks, it did. We'll have a time finding a dress to hide them. Mayhap, the robin's egg blue."

Izzy grimaced as she studied the evenly spaced rakings the kitten had made in its desperate climb up her body.

"Could've been dangerous, miss. The stream's awful high."

"Oh, nothing would have happened to me, Marie. The water is not all that deep, except in a few holes, and I know where those are." Where the trout are, she thought privately, but this was no time to mention that other favorite improper activity. Marie looked with special disfavor on Izzy's fishing, particularly when she noodled with her fingers instead of using a pole.

Marie huffed. "That Hank Trumble's as worthless as his father. Your father should get rid of the both of them."

For all that Marie had a sharp tongue and was about as respectful as a puppy that had outgrown its mother, she was a caring person. Izzy tried to remember that. "Unlikely, as long as Papa finds Trumble useful in the stables," she replied. "And he does quite well with Rapscallion."

Sitting before her dressing table, Izzy watched in her usual amazement as the expert flicks of Marie's wrist coaxed a delicate fringe of dark curls in just the perfect places to turn her into some approximation of a lady. Izzy would have been satisfied merely to tie her hair back at her neck, allowing the curls to flow down her back. But proper ladies did not leave their hair loose, and she had a strong desire to amend the impression she had previously given her father's guests. The modest neckline of the robin's egg blue dress, however, did not quite cover the tiny scratches, and all Izzy's tugging could not complete the job.

"A fichu, or a shawl, perhaps," Marie suggested.

Izzy sighed. "No." There would be no explaining that she was only occasionally a reckless hoyden, who this time had the best of justification for her actions. She would, therefore, not explain herself at all.

Marie drew her lips tight, looking patient. "Very well, miss. Try not to make a cake of yourself again."

Izzy quelled a sudden desire to bury herself beneath the covers on her bed. But she breathed in slowly, reminded herself that she was to be an elegant lady tonight, and walked with regal grace down the corridor to the grand staircase that led down to the manor's foyer.

At the sound of slippers on the smooth marble steps, Tristan glanced up, then away. Almost as fast as the recoil of a cannon, his head snapped back again. Devil take it! Could that be the same creature that had dripped her way through here barely an hour before?

The Creature descended in fluid motion, her hand trailing along the brass rail, a pile of dark curls framing her delicate face. Too slender for his taste, yet he couldn't stop staring at the assets he had previously noticed, which were further enhanced by her simply cut blue gown, a gown the exact color of her eyes. He had never seen eyes quite that color before.

Those mesmerizing eyes met his with an overt appraisal that set him back as much as her stunning transformation. Brassy chit. Uncontrolled heat rose in his cheeks as her gaze raked over him. With all the dignity he could muster, Tristan bent over her extended hand, debating just how much deference such a creature was to be given. Lady, hoyden, baron's daughter? He hesitated in mid-bow, perhaps a shade sooner than was proper.

Izzy bit her lip, feeling like she was dying inside. Doubtless the gentleman recalled at the last second the mud that had previously been lodged beneath her nails. It was to his credit that he did not altogether fling away her hand, but merely flared his nostrils and dropped it rather precipitously.

She winced at the introductions. She should have known. Viscount Trowbridge, her father's life-long friend, balding, red-faced, and round as a ball. And son, Captain Tristan Trowbridge. Tall as his father was round, with dark hair and a devastatingly handsome face with features that ought to be chiseled into Carrara marble.

Just her luck. Not just any old viscount. Good Old Trowbridge, her father always called him, who had been her papa's boon companion in his India days, equally as obsessed with King Arthur and Camelot. Papa had talked so incessantly about the man over the years that Izzy felt she should have recognized him on sight.

She'd done it this time. Effuse apologies would only make things worse. She just mumbled her gratitude at finally meeting the man after all these years.

"Now, there's a gel for you," said the viscount, chuckling. "Cleans up nicely, Daventry. Pretty thing, ain't she, Tris?"

Izzy flinched. She had envisioned a bit more gentility from a viscount, but then, what else would she expect of a friend of her father's? After all, neither of the two men had ever expected to be anything more than soldiers.

The younger man's cheeks reddened again and he gave a grudging nod, while his father prattled on. She accepted the older man's arm to lead her into dinner, and sat across from the younger Trowbridge, who glared fiercely whenever she caught his eye. Her transformation had obviously not impressed him.

"Thought we'd go up into the Dales, check out the Pendragon Castle," said the viscount as he inspected his already empty wine glass. The footman promptly noted its lack and filled it.

"No, no, no," Daventry said. "Waste of time. We've been there, ain't that so, Izzy, my dove?"

Izzy opened her mouth, but closed it as Papa continued.

"Lots of caves thereabouts, though," said Papa. "Tales of Arthur's Hill everywhere. Seems every dale has its hidden hill with the king and his knights slumbering away."

"That many tales, there's got to be something."

Papa gave a dismissing shake of his head. "Ain't nothing but a grand pile of rocks, no older than the Angevins."

Trowbridge frowned and upended his goblet. "A shame."

"Didn't expect much from something so obvious," said Papa, and drained his own. "No telling when some fool took it into his head it was Arthur's. But the fishing's good, thereabouts. Izzy's idea, that. Made the trip worthwhile, after all."

The captain's eyelids lifted. "Fishing. More commonly a man's activity, is it not? Or has England changed in my absence?"

It was the delicate suggestion of a sneer in his voice that raised her ire. Her lips stretched thinly over her teeth, but Izzy said nothing. Watching the wicked glint that was forming in his eyes, she suspected she knew the content of his next question, and that he was debating whether or not to give it voice. Had she been fishing this afternoon?

The urge seized her to explain not only the manly art of fishing, but the exact process of noodling- precisely how to dangle one's fingers into the water so as to resemble tasty worms. But no. Let him draw his own conclusions.

Now they were discussing Glastonbury Tor. She had been there, too. Papa insisted it must be King Arthur's burial site, but Trowbridge wouldn't hear of it. And just how Offa's Dike got into the discussion, she wasn't sure. This could go on all night. Izzy knew perfectly well the whole argument was outrageous, but that didn't bother the two old sots a bit, as glass after glass of wine slid down their gullets and fueled their debate.

The young captain quietly studied the dregs of wine he swirled within his goblet, sipping only occasionally. A strange mixture of horror and boredom lurked in his dark eyes. They had a common dilemma. Perhaps she should give him another chance.

"You are with the Coldstream Guards, Captain?"

His gaze shot up from the goblet as if she had stomped on his toe. "Yes." Nothing more.

The elder Trowbridge, eyes suddenly keen despite his wine, grinned and thrust out his chest. "Fought at Waterloo," he announced. "Peninsula, too."

"Indeed?" she responded. At least the older fellow would talk. "I understood the duke of Wellington had very few Peninsula veterans with him in Belgium."

"There were exceptions," the captain man grumbled.

Ah. He could talk. "I see. You recall the battle, then?"

He met her question with a silent scowl.

"Was at Hougoumont," the viscount interjected, and chortled proudly. "Got himself cut up a bit."

The captain glared with fury at his father.

"I am sorry," she said, feeling a sudden stab of empathy, both for the wounds and the father's blatant broadcasting. "I understand the casualties were very high at Hougoumont."

"They were higher at La Haye Sainte," the man replied tersely. His jaw had a hard set to it.

Indeed, she thought, as the soldiers at La Haye Sainte had almost been annihilated. "Yes, of course. I did not mean--"

"It is hardly a fit subject for the table, Miss Daventry."

Izzy stared, speechless. He was scolding her for the topic? She had not raised it. She had merely made a polite inquiry about his career.

"Tris, there's no call to be abrupt," his father scolded, unexpectedly alert.

Izzy gritted her teeth and forced a smile. "It is quite all right, my lord, it is not at all the thing. But I do hope you are enjoying your return home, Captain."

He looked as if it was the most inane remark he had ever heard. Izzy opted for silence. He was certainly not the most congenial man she had ever met.

She returned to the quiet observation of the viscount who was of such importance to her father, having developed a preference for that man over his son. Izzy focused on the droning debate and ignored the silent, imperious toad who sat across from her.

Something was wrong here. Something just a shade too typical of her father. She would have bet all the horses in the stable her father and Good Old Trowbridge were up to something.

Captain Trowbridge stole a wary glance at Izzy, then quickly looked away to re-engage with his fork. Did he, too, suspect something was in the air?

Beyond the window, the last light of day faded as Izzy watched the parade of courses and picked delicately at her plate. While their two offspring sat like hostages, the two older men launched into full-fledged drinking, grew louder, words slurring, and slowly slipped back into the distant past.

"'Member when your boy was born," said Daventry, punctuating his slurred words with a throaty chuckle.

"Oh that was a day, wa'n't it?" responded the viscount, just as jolly. "'Member when this little one come into the world, too," he added, and threw a hazy look in Izzy's direction. "We used to talk about marryin' 'em off t'each other, too. 'Member that, Daventry?"

"Was a grand scheme, too, wa'n't it? I say, Trowbridge, there's a thought! Could still do it, couldn' we? M'girl's old enough. So's the boy."

Izzy gaped at the captain across the table, who stared back in open dismay. She'd best do something, fast. "Papa, perhaps you've had a bit too much--"

But Papa continued, oblivious to his daughter. "Be a good match, wouldn' it, Trowbridge? Just imagine, my little girl a viscountess. Got a good portion, y' know. Had an aunt left her a size-sizea--lots o' money, too."

Good Old Trowbridge nodded slowly, with a grand and somewhat exaggerated attempt at a meditative scowl. "'S'true." He continued the overblown nodding of his head. "Suit well, I'd think. Make a grand pair. Let's do it."

"Suit well! You cannot be serious, father!" shouted the younger Trowbridge.

"'S'all right, boy. You'll come around," said the viscount, his words sliding together like they were greased. "'S'for the best, y'know. Time you settled down. Yes, tha's the trick, Daventry! Jus' what m' boy needs. Let's do it!"

Izzy's eyes grew huge. Her jaw gaped open so far she could not force it shut.

Across from her, Captain Trowbridge had precisely the opposite problem, for his jaw clenched so tightly that if he'd had a spoon in his mouth, he would have bitten off the bowl.

Go to Chapter 2: http://dellejacobs.blogspot.com/2009/11/murlark-chapter-2.html