“You might want to look at the front of your gown before you do,” he said smugly. “You haven’t laced it correctly, and that wouldn’t have happened if you’d asked for my help.”
* * *
The following day Ivy stayed true to the pact she had made with herself to let nothing distract her from her work. Her charges, in turn, appeared to have made a pact with each other to drive her to distraction. At the start of their morning lesson, she motioned to Mary, whose wide-eyed innocence Ivy was soon to discover hid the strategical genius of the ancient general Hannibal.
“Come to my desk, dear, and read aloud this passage pertaining to the Reformation.” She cast a pained look at the row of mounted plaster busts representing the English monarchy that sat in the front of the casement windows. “Master Walker, please don’t dance around those busts with that letter opener. You’re liable to scratch one of our monarchs with your reckless play or, worse, knock a king or queen out the window.”
“I’ll do more than that. I’ll—” He paused before the bust of an austere-faced Queen Anne. “She’s ugly. I’ll execute her first.”
Ivy swallowed a gasp. “You shall do no such thing in my presence.”
“He will, Lady Ivy,” Mary said with certainty. “That’s why our father won’t allow him near a foil yet.”
Walker leveled the letter opener to his chest and wheeled on Mary. “On your knees, Mary, Queen of Scots. Your head will roll like a turnip when I’m done!”
Mary hopped up onto her chair, clenched her hands to her chest, and bellowed at the top of her voice. “I am betrayed by the fickle Elizabeth, blackhearted witch of England!”
“Good gracious,” Ivy muttered. “You’ll have everyone thinking there’s a murder being committed up here.” She sprang from her chair and strode forward to take possession of Walker’s weapon, Mary shrieking the entire while.
“Give me that opener right now,” she said, sprinting around the globe after Walker. “You’ll kill one of the gardeners if a bust goes out the window and lands on his head.”
“Catch me!” Walker taunted.
Mary jumped off her chair. “I’ll catch the traitor for you, Lady Ivy.”
“Master Walker, sit down this minute!” Ivy shouted.
And to her amazement he did.
Mary pursed her lips. “He won’t stay.”
“He will.”
Mary stared at her. “Uncle James told us that you lived in a house as old as the king who chopped off heads.”
“I still live there,” Ivy replied, feeling a prickle of apprehension. Were Mary’s words a foreboding that the house would be sold off, after all? “The king your uncle was speaking of wasn’t the only monarch to order a beheading. My house was built during the reign of King Henry VIII.”
“That king!” Mary said, snatching the heavy ruler from Ivy’s desk. “He’s the one who lopped off his wives’ heads.”
“He didn’t do the lopping—the chopping—an executioner did.” She went down on her knees to gather the papers Mary had sent flying from the desk. When she stood up, the girl was charging across the room toward the bust of Henry VIII. The schoolroom ruler rose in the air like an executioner’s ax and then descended to take a sudden swing like a golf club.
“No. Stop right now. Stop her,” she said in panic to Walker.
Walker set aside the pile of threads he’d begun to pull from the carpet and lumbered to his feet. Ivy realized the burden fell on her to take action. She set forth across the room as if the future of the English monarchy hung in the balance.
“Mary, don’t,” she said, dodging the globe.
But Mary did.
And Ivy extended her arm from its socket as far as it could reach, her fingers glancing Henry’s plaster beard, her hand shattering glass and making history as it did. She felt a stinging pain in her wrist and found herself curiously detached from the events that followed. Rivulets of blood the color of poppies flowed to her fingertips. A distressing sight, really.
The plaster bust crashed down to the garden below and by great fortune did not take another victim in its descent. She rested against the windowsill and wondered absently why she felt giddy and why the duke was standing in the doorway, his face frightening to behold. She felt Mary tugging at her skirts before she closed her eyes and sighed, floating into darkness.
* * *
James was passing through the hall when he heard the commotion from the upstairs drawing room where Ivy was giving the children their lessons. His pride urged him not to interfere. He believed enough in her abilities to handle his niece and nephew without his interference. She hadn’t hesitated to put him in his place. She could take care of Walker and Mary. Besides, if he did interfere, she would only accuse him of seeking an excuse to see her again.