I burst out laughing at the transparent falsity of this excuse.
“Have I not given you steeds?” Mr. Thornfield demanded, rubbing his temple. “Have I not given you fine frocks and an English mansion? Have I not given you a governess—”
“Please, Charles.” Her smile meant she expected to get her way. “Sardar said yes.”
“Sardar spoils you so obscenely it’s all I can do not to throw myself in the nearest river.”
“Please?” I interjected, grinning. “It would be so educational.”
Mr. Thornfield’s glower was fast losing strength; finally he gave a martyred sigh, finished his whiskey with a snap of the wrist, and said, “I’m no match for the pair of you martinets.”
“Hurrah!” Sahjara exulted, taking his gloved hand and delivering a peck to it. “Tomorrow?”
“Oh, certainly, supposing you prefer me headless. I’ve not practised with the aara in years.”
She swung the hand she still held. “Next week.”
“You’ll be the death of me yet. Fine.”
“It really is a marvellous idea,” I said, smiling at her.
“It’s a ridiculous idea.” Pushing himself to his feet, Mr. Thornfield brushed a wisp of hair off Sahjara’s brow. “Go back to bed, darling, and thence to sleep, so that you’ll be unable to hatch any fresh schemes to gall me.”
“Insufferable gaffer,” she said affectionately.
“Impertinent brat.”
Sahjara disappeared with a toss of her head. Mr. Thornfield returned our empty glasses to the sideboard, looking contemplative. I had begun to better cherish his silences, for he possessed many shades of stillness and sharing them with me meant he was at ease in my presence; this was a blue quiet, as deep as his eyes.
“I wish that whatever you are thinking, you did not have to dwell upon it,” I told him.
“You’ve a generous nature, Jane.” He stopped, turning back to me. “Apologies, I don’t know how that slipped, only I’ve come to think of you . . . Blame it on my upbringing, if you please.”
A sting pierced my chest; hearing my actual name was meaningful, as if he had taken my mask off and glimpsed my real face.
“You may call me Jane if you like.”
He cocked a brow. “You don’t find it overfamiliar?”
“Not from you.”
Had he been anyone else, I should have dreaded making so bold a declaration; as it was, my heart thrummed major chords within my ribs as I watched him blink.
“Thank you—as you might gather from the Young Marvel’s example, you may call me anything you damn well please.” The empty expression he affected did not hide the fact his mouth was pinched at the corners. “Jane, I’ve apparently a deal of unnecessary physical training to undergo tomorrow—shall we retire?”
Breathlessly, I agreed; but he only carried me up to my room and bid me the usual polite Good night, then, Jane, and I pretended the strange sweetness upon my tongue when I bid him the same was due to expensive whiskey. I then assured myself that my symptoms merited a diagnosis of simple lust, and I fell asleep repeating that Charles Thornfield had stolen nothing more serious than my attention.
• • •
The air crackled and clawed the afternoon of Sahjara’s demonstration; it had snowed again, and an inch of powder lay glimmering upon the grounds, awaiting the performers as the pale January sunlight bent down to kiss the top of the trees. I sat in my wheeled chair wearing my cloak as well as two blankets, hot-water bottles at my lap and feet, upon the terrace at the side of the house; surrounded by Singhs and Kaurs, who spoke excitedly to one another in Punjabi and stamped their feet against the cold, I awaited the performers.
I will not attempt to describe the dexterity with which Sahjara on Harbax navigated the jumps the grooms had built and strewn about the lawn. She was dazzling, and Mr. Thornfield’s face as he watched her mirrored Sardar Singh’s in a potent combination of glad mouths and strangely anguished eyes. Neither can I conjure the impassioned cries of “Khalsa-ji!” from the Sikh household as Mr. Singh, left arm loaded with serrated metal circles and right forefinger spinning a disc in the air, threw ten chakkars in rapid succession, cutting ten distant poles into splintered halves. His servants screamed their approval, and I thought I glimpsed a tear in Mrs. Garima Kaur’s eye, reflecting sunlight just as her scar did.
Should I not at least essay to capture the spectacle of Mr. Thornfield wielding the aara outside my childhood home as the sun sank, however, I should consider