The Age of Witches Read online

  “A great compliment,” she said, grinning.

  He shook his head. “Pretty sure your papa would point out that a stud fee is good money. Lots of folks want a Black Satin foal.”

  “I know Papa loves money, Robbie, but this is about Bits’s reputation. That filly’s awfully highly strung. You saw her, rearing and stamping over nothing.”

  “That’s as may be,” he had answered. “But if the filly’s owner complains to Mr. Allington, it’ll be me pays the price.”

  “Don’t worry, Robbie. I can handle Papa.” She had patted his arm, the only affectionate gesture he would allow. He invariably pulled away, aghast, if she tried to hug him. He had done that even when she was small. He didn’t say that such a display wasn’t seemly, but she understood it just the same.

  As to her breeding program, she was sure her father didn’t notice what she did or didn’t do. He never asked her about the horses. He hadn’t ridden in years, but Annis made certain Chessie got his exercise and that all the horses were properly fed, shod, and groomed. The stables were her domain. Frances took no interest, except for wanting the carriage horse ready when she needed him. This arrangement suited Annis perfectly.

  She had felt from the beginning that horses were easier to understand than people. They made their wishes clear. They bestowed their affection without conditions. They didn’t love you for a time, then stop loving you for no apparent reason.

  Annis knew Bits loved her. She sometimes thought the two of them must be connected by an invisible ribbon of emotion, one that drew her to the stables every day, to be in his presence, to savor the warmth of his big body, to breathe in the peppery scent of his hide, to bask in the trust shining in his eyes. Mounted on his back, she became one with his power and speed and beauty. No one scolded her while she was seated high in the saddle. No one nagged about her clothes or her hair or her manners. Riding Bits set her free.

  She released Bits’s hoof, and he put it down gingerly. She patted his shoulder in sympathy. Robbie said, “Walk him a bit, and I’ll watch.”

  Annis led Bits down the aisle of the stables and into the paddock for a turn inside the fence. When they stopped, she stood stroking his neck. “What do you think, Robbie?”

  “Not sure yet. Let me have a look.”

  Annis stood back, the lead rope slack in her hand, as Robbie lifted Bits’s forefoot and inspected it. When he released the hoof, he ran his hand from the horse’s shoulder to his knee, on down the cannon to the pastern. “Ah,” he said. “Feel this, Miss Annis. See how warm it is?”

  She reached past him to touch the back of the horse’s leg with her fingers. “Oh, it is,” she said. “I didn’t notice that.”

  “Aye. It ain’t that bad. Bit o’ tendinitis, I’m guessing. Just need to wrap it and rest him for a few days. No canter or gallop.”

  “Should we ask the farrier to come? Or the veterinarian?”

  “Only if it don’t get better.”

  Annis straightened, and Bits dropped his head to bump his chin against her shoulder, asking for his treat. She dug a chunk of apple from her pocket and fed it to him. “It’s going to be all right, Bitsy,” she told him as he munched. “Robbie says it will be all right.”

  “A poultice should do it,” Robbie said. He took off his flat cap to scratch at the gray bristle of his hair. “You can make that, lass, right?”

  “Yes. I’ll do it now.” She handed off Bits’s lead. “Will you put him in his stall? I’ll be back in fifteen minutes.”

  Robbie touched the brim of his cap, then spoke a soothing word to Black Satin as he led him away. Annis picked up her hat from the ground and slapped it against her thigh to shake off the sawdust before she went indoors.

  She let herself into the house by the door nearest the kitchen and hurried down the short hall to the pantry.

  Robbie was her favorite servant outside the house. Indoors, Mrs. King, the cook, held that honor. She had been with the Allingtons since before Annis was born, and when Annis’s mother died of a fever when Annis was not yet two, Mrs. King stepped in, though she was a servant. She always had a handkerchief for a little girl’s tears or a plate of cookies to quiet her when she was anxious. She saw to it that Annis had clothes that fit, and she ordered new shoes as Annis outgrew the old ones. She listened to Annis’s tales of triumphs and disappointments at school and helped her with her homework on the rare occasions that she needed it.

  Mrs. King kept Annis as close as she could on the day of her father’s remarriage, despite being needed in the kitchen and the dining room. That had been a hard day. Papa acted strangely, laughing at odd times, gazing at his new bride in a way that confused and embarrassed his little daughter. The people who came for the wedding breakfast cast such pitying glances at seven-year-old Annis that she thought something terrible must be happening.

  But now she was seventeen. She had graduated from Brearley with good marks. She no longer wept into Mrs. King’s handkerchief, and she didn’t need cookies for comfort. What she needed from Mrs. King was her own corner of the pantry to make remedies for her horses, and Mrs. King provided it with good humor.

  Annis wished she knew more about how to heal injuries and wounds. Her poultices and salves helped, but they hardly worked miracles. She would make the poultice for Bits with witch hazel and comfrey, but it was going to take time for him to heal. In the meantime she would content herself with riding Chessie or her old pony. Chessie was all right, but Sally was dull, with a slow, swinging trot and no canter to speak of. What Annis liked best was to gallop Bits around Central Park under the scandalized glances of passersby.

  She had been startled that morning to see the dark-haired woman nodding politely to her as if there were nothing shocking in a young woman riding astride in Central Park.

  Mrs. King came pattering toward the pantry while Annis was gathering her ingredients. She was quick and slight, not like any of the other cooks Annis had met, who bore the marks of their profession in full bosoms and generous hips. Mrs. King was no older than Frances herself, with a cloud of brown hair and bright brown eyes. When she was small, Annis had sometimes pretended to herself that Mrs. King was her mother.

  “Miss Annis?” the cook said, peering around the corner. “Did you know Mrs. Frances is looking for you?”

  Annis paused in the act of pouring dried witch hazel leaves into a clean mortar. “Oh no. Do you have to tell her? I need to make this poultice. Bits strained a tendon.”

  Mrs. King clicked her tongue. “Dear, dear. Poor Bitsy. You’ll set him right, no doubt.”

  “I think so. Could you put the kettle on? I’ll need hot water.”

  “I will, but if Frances comes in, don’t tell her I saw you.”

  Annis said, “I would never do that!”

  “I know, dear, I know. Just making sure.” Off she went again, and as Annis ground the witch hazel leaves with her pestle and added comfrey and a bit of bay laurel, she heard the clatter of the kettle against the stove.

  An Allington stove, of course. The Allington Iron Stove Company was the reason the Allingtons lived in this great stone house on Riverside Drive, with its gables and cornices and mansard roof dwarfing the more modest houses nearby. Annis was well aware how lucky she was to be able to afford her own horses, a private stable, even a suite of rooms all to herself. She was grateful for those things, because they set her free to pursue her ambition.

  Her friends at Brearley had all planned grand marriages, with their pictures in the papers and their names in the society pages. They often invited Annis to their tea parties and shopping excursions, but Annis considered those things, and the constant flow of gossip that accompanied them, a waste of her time. She had gradually drifted away from her school chums. She focused all her energy on her ambition, which was to create a bloodline of fine horses. The line would bear Black Satin’s name and bring honor to her beloved stallion. It was going to be respected everywhere.

  Bits himself was a Thoroughbred, but neither as high-st
rung as other horses of his breed nor encumbered by the common fault of a ewe-neck. Annis constantly searched for mares and fillies with dispositions and conformation equal to his, Thoroughbreds or Arabians or one of the other light breeds. She had heard that the Spanish horses, sometimes called Andalusians, were calm and intelligent, but they were impossible to find. She didn’t know anyone who owned one, and she had no one to escort her to the horse markets downtown. It was one thing Robbie refused to do, and she didn’t dare ask her father.

  She hurried the preparations for her poultice, wary of Frances coming in search of her. She thought it would be wise to avoid her stepmother until the heat of their argument had cooled.

  Frances, clearly in a bad mood, had stopped Annis as she was on her way out to the stables and demanded she change her clothes. “How are we going to become part of the Four Hundred if you dash around looking like a hoyden?” she snapped.

  Annis’s own temper had flared at her being delayed. She pulled on her gloves as she answered. “Frances, that will never happen. The Allingtons are new money. We’re shoddies. Arrivistes.” She ignored Frances’s growing frown, her mind already on her morning ride. “Mrs. Astor would turn a somersault in the park before she would invite us to one of her ridiculous balls, and even if she did invite us, I wouldn’t go. I doubt Papa would, either.”

  Frances’s cheeks turned pink. “Well! I will never agree with you about that, young lady. I don’t know how you can be so selfish!”

  “Selfish? Why is that selfish?”

  “Because you think of nothing but your horses. You never consider how your behavior affects this family. I insist you stop parading through the park in that vulgar old riding habit, and for pity’s sake, use a proper sidesaddle! I know you have one!”

  “No, thank you. Sidesaddles are silly. Dangerous.” A sidesaddle hung in the tack room, gathering dust, but Annis had never touched the monstrous thing, and she never would. As she turned toward the staircase, she had tossed a final remark over her shoulder. “Actually, I’m thinking of wearing trousers to ride.”

  “You will not!” Frances had stamped a foot, and Annis had laughed, which was not tactful. She had dashed down the stairs, leaving her stepmother fuming on the landing.

  Frances had called, “I’ll speak to George about this, young lady!”

  It was true that Annis would have loved to wear trousers, and had even thought of talking Robbie into giving her one of his old pairs, but she didn’t do it. Her divided skirt was as far as she dared go. She had meant the remark about trousers as a joke, but she should have held her tongue. Frances was not known for her sense of humor. She was better known for her hot temper.

  Papa took no more interest than she did in Frances’s longing to climb higher in New York society. He had no inclination to exchange his Riverside Drive mansion for a Fifth Avenue palace, and he would loathe summering in Newport as the members of the Four Hundred did. He might, however, object to such a public offense as his daughter riding astride like a man. So far he had not noticed, but if Frances pointed it out, he might put his foot down. Annis hardly knew her father anymore. It was hard to predict how he might react.

  She worried over that as she finished the mixture for her poultice, then transferred her worry to the poultice itself. She had the feeling something was missing from it, but she didn’t know what. It was frustrating to know so little. What there was of her herbal knowledge came from one slender pamphlet she had found in the library of Allington House.

  Annis guessed the pamphlet had belonged to her mother. Mrs. King hadn’t recognized it. Frances said she thought it was an odd thing for the first Mrs. Allington to have saved. Annis asked her father when she first discovered it, but he said only, “Throw it away. Looks like some kind of advertising.”

  It wasn’t advertising. It was a marvelous little book, with pen-and-ink illustrations of herbs that grew wild in New York. There were descriptions of their uses and instructions for preparing various remedies.

  Annis had nearly worn the pamphlet out reading and rereading it. She imagined her mother holding the little book, running her finger down the pages. The pamphlet convinced Annis she had inherited her passion for herbalism from her mother, though the little booklet was her only evidence.

  Mrs. King begged Annis to take care using the remedies. Annis wouldn’t use anything on her horses she hadn’t first tried on herself, but she didn’t want to upset Mrs. King, so she attempted them in secret. Sometimes they burned. Often they itched or stung, but the poultice for pain had felt marvelous when she applied it to her own arm. She was making that now.

  She stirred drops of hot water into her mixture until she had a thick slurry, then spread the warm paste on a piece of old flannel. She folded it, wrapped it in a towel, and rushed back to the stable to apply it before it cooled.

  Robbie helped her wrap it around Bits’s foreleg and secure it with a strip of wool. “There you are, laddie,” he said to the horse, patting his shoulder. “Miss Annis will let you rest now.”

  “I will, of course,” Annis said. “How long do you think, Robbie?”

  “Couple days, at least. Tomorrow you can ride one of the others.”

  “I guess I could take Sally out. She needs the exercise.”

  “That she does. Growing a belly, that one.”

  Annis kissed Bits’s nose, fished in her pocket for another slice of apple, and gave it to him. It had gone brown, and it was fuzzy with lint, but Bits wasn’t particular. She loved the feel of his soft, thick lips against her palm. She whispered, “I’ll be back later. Don’t you rub off that poultice, now, you.”

  She moved along the aisle to Sally’s stall, scrounging in her pocket for another bit of apple. She gave one to the carriage horse, too, a thickheaded creature called Andy. Andy took her offering with no particular show of gratitude, but she patted him anyway. In the opposite stall, Chessie, named for his rich chestnut color, extended his neck in expectation of his own treat. Robbie’s stolid gelding stood drowsing next to Chessie. Robbie called him Tater, for his dull brown coat, and he was even older than Sally. Robbie was supposed to accompany Annis when she went riding in the park, but once she had started riding Bits, poor Tater, with his lumbering trot, couldn’t keep up. Annis told Robbie he didn’t need to chaperone her, that no one could bother her when she was riding Bits. He had given in, lamenting as always that he would lose his job.

  Bits was four now, and Annis had been riding him since he turned two. Under Robbie’s guidance she had trained him in the classical fashion, the longe line first, with just a halter, then bits of tack and an empty saddle, and then, finally, Annis on his back. Robbie said he never saw a horse take so easily to a rider, but Annis wasn’t surprised. Bits always understood what she wanted, from a slow walk to a trot, from a canter to a gallop. He was as eager as she for their more daring rides, the ones they made when no one could see them. He loved to run, and they both loved jumping. He sailed effortlessly over fallen trees, mane and tail rippling. He popped over rows of shrubs as easily as a leaping deer, making Annis feel as if she could fly. She definitely didn’t want to take such jumps in a sidesaddle.

  As she started toward the house, she reflected on her good fortune. She had her horses, and Robbie, and Mrs. King. Frances had been cross that morning, but maybe she had been right to accuse Annis of being selfish. It was true she thought of her horses more than she thought of anything else. Or anyone.

  Whom did Frances have? Her husband spent no time with her. She didn’t seem to have friends, not real ones. It could be that Frances, for all her airs and bad temper, was lonely. Impelled by a stab of compunction, Annis hurried her steps. She would explain to her stepmother that she had been joking about wearing trousers. She would clean up a bit before luncheon, perhaps get Velma to do something about her hair.

  Frances would like that. Perhaps she would forget about complaining to Papa.

  4

  Frances

  Frances didn’t know how Harriet kn
ew what she had done to George. Harriet did know, though. She often knew things she shouldn’t. It was exactly like her to make an issue of it, to act superior, to pretend she had Frances’s interests at heart.

  Frances’s mother had been a Bishop, like Harriet and her grandmother Beryl, but their familial connection was a distant one, traced over two centuries through the two lines of Bishops.

  Harriet’s upbringing had been as different from Frances’s as could be. Harriet had lost her mother when she was five and had gone to live with her grandmother in a comfortable house in St. George. They employed a housekeeper and a cook, and a woman came in every day to clean. They had no idea what it was like to be poor.

  Frances knew it all too well, and she bore the scars on her soul to prove it. Her mother had married badly, against her family’s wishes, and her husband had abandoned her when Frances was an infant. She had worked as a laundress, or as a seamstress when she could get the work. She had barely kept a roof over her daughter’s head, and there were times when they had no money left over for food. Frances had grown up in uncertainty and want. It was unfair for Harriet to criticize her desire for a better life.

  Her wedding to George had been a quiet event, as befitted a second marriage, and that suited Frances well enough. Until her allowance began, she had no money for anything like a Worth wedding dress, such as one of the wealthy Manhattan brides would have worn. She had no trousseau to speak of, either. She had scraped together enough to order a traveling suit of blue silk with leg-of-mutton sleeves and a matching cape. For the ceremony she wore a modest gown of cream brocade with ecru lace on the sleeves and neckline. She decided it was best to go without jewelry until George put the heavy ruby-and-diamond ring on her finger. George’s housekeeper arranged the wedding breakfast. The invitations were handwritten on the Allington engraved stationery.

  After the wedding breakfast, Frances had gone up to her boudoir to change. Her brand-new maid, hired a week before the wedding, was pinning up her hair as she sat before the mirror.