The Roman and the Regency

by Merrie Haskell

Merrie Haskell is scrupulous, yet given to hyperbole. She finds that this paradox of idiosyncrasies is more suited to an annoying minor character in a Victorian novel than a science fiction writer, but nevertheless, she forges on. Her fiction has appeared in Strange Horizons, Fortean Bureau, and Escape Pod, and has been honorably mentioned in The Year's Best Fantasy and Horror. Check out her website: MerrieHaskell.com.

"Malediction!"  Miss Penelope Duncroft exclaimed when the rain came.  "Rain on a spring afternoon in Bath!  How could I be so thoughtless?"

The streets emptied when the rain began; everyone stepped into nearby shops to wait out the cloudburst.  Penelope did not have sufficient time to do the same.  She was already late for the meeting of the Philosophical Society and that very lateness had caused her to depart the house without pattens, spencer, or umbrella.

"Drat, drat, drat," Penelope said.  The "drats" were not as satisfying as actual cursing, but she felt that a feminine restraint was not unbecoming.  A person was best judged on how she behaved in private, when conscience and not society dictated behavior.

The rain became a downpour, and then a deluge. Penelope reached up and felt her bonnet melting.  Her new bonnet, the casquet à la Minerve, the latest in the fashion of the Classical Revival that had swept England, melting, in the rain!

She would sacrifice a lot to see her brother's lecture at the Philosophical Society, but she would not sacrifice her bonnet.  Not when Lord Tarryton would be there, as well.  She had spent a lot of time and effort getting Lord Tarryton to see her in a new light -- a courting light.

Penelope ducked into the first doorway that she came to.

She was familiar with all the shops on High Street -- or so she'd thought -- because she did not remember this one.  She wasn't even certain it was a shop at all.  The dim, rain-filtered sunlight barely illuminated the interior, in spite of the three large windows at the front.  White dust covers glowed in the dusk of the shop.  Was the place out of business?  If so, why was the door unlocked? 

Regardless, it was a fine place to wait out the rain, and to look into the business of her bonnet.

Penelope peered underneath a few of the sheets, looking for a mirror.  The first dust cloth covered a Medusa head whose eyes shone out, green and malicious.  Penelope stifled a gasp and let the cover fall back into place.  She was sure it was just the gloom of a rainy day that made the Medusa seem alive and malevolent.

"Quite sure," she said aloud, to fill the silence.

Nothing as startling waited under the other dust sheets, though everything here appeared to be antiquities of one sort or another.  Finally, she found a mirror of a sort: a polished bronze sheet, which allowed her to make out vague details of her appearance.  Her bonnet was indeed in a sad state, though not quite ruined.

Penelope threw back the dust sheet.  She removed her bonnet, and prodded it back into its proper shape, so that it more resembled the helmet of a goddess than a squashed mushroom.  She put her bonnet back on and then peered into the mirror.

She could barely see her reflection, a mere contrast between dark hair against her pale cheek, and very little detail of either.  What she could see affirmed the worst: every carefully placed curl that tumbled from her temples had fallen flat.

"The utter defeat of the tire-buchons," she moaned. 

Damp, draggled tendrils of hair squirmed down her cheeks from beneath the still-fabulous bonnet, and looked like languid worms attempting to attack her mouth.

It was not a good look.  Not a distinguished look.  Not a handsome look.

She tucked the wormy tendrils of hair up underneath the bonnet -- then froze when she heard a noise from the back of the shop.

"Who -- who's there?" she asked, looking into the dimness beyond the Holland covers.

A muffled noise, explosive, like a curse--

"Irrumabo!"

Penelope tossed the dust sheet back over the mirror with a tiny squeak.  She scrambled toward the front of the shop, where she would be better able to play the innocent passer-by waiting out the downpour.

The voice said, "What's this?  What's going on?"

The voice spoke strongly accented Latin, so thick of an accent, in fact, that Penelope at first had been unable to understand it.

"Who's there?" she asked in Latin, poised to flee.

A muffled thump, a curse, and more Latin.  "It is I, Marcus Cornelius Gaius.  I approach as a supplicant, O holy one."

It took a few moments for the meaning of the Latin to filter through her mind.  A man crept forward from the shadows into the light from the windows, and stood before her.  He was not particularly tall, but he was well-muscled, and wore...armor.

Penelope stared, too surprised to run away.  He had a perfectly fashionable haircut, short and tousled coiffure à la Titus.  And he was clean-shaven, with a handsome, square jaw that made her realize that Lord Tarryton's chin was actually rather receded.

A town buck, perhaps, on a lark?  Wearing...Roman armor?

Speaking Latin?

And not pure Oxford-trained Latin, either.  Something about his way of speaking seemed...

As she stared at him, he said, "Blessed Lady Minerva, forgive me."  He threw himself prostrate.

"Good heavens!" she said.  "Don't call me Minerva."

"I apologize, Lady.  Tell me what I must do, Lady -- Athena," he said, switching to Greek.  Penelope stared at him.  "This is a ridiculous prank," she said in Greek.  Then, "Your Greek is even worse than your Latin."

He looked up, affronted.

"I tire of being the butt of every joke in Bath," she said, and turned toward the door.

"Lady...I do not speak your gods' language," the man said.  "If you have given me an order, I do not understand it."

"I tire of being the butt of every joke in Bath!" she said in Greek, then repeated it in Latin.  "Is it so much to ask?  For a little respect?"  She opened the door of the shop and slammed it behind her as she went into the street.

The rain had stopped.  People emerged from their hidey holes and continued about their business.  A small flood of people emerged from Creighton's Confections -- including Lord Tarryton.

Quickly, before he saw her, she dodged back into the shop.

"Damn, damn, damn," she said, panting slightly as she leaned against the door.  "He wasn't supposed to see me like this."  She plucked at the still-wet fabric of her high-waisted gown.

The man in armor was kneeling, no longer prostrate, and he half-smiled at her, looking hopeful.

"You do me great honor, appearing twice to me," he said.  "My sacrifice to you," he added, holding out a spectacular necklace decorated in citrines.

"Stuff it," she said shortly.  "You're just going to have to go back to your friends and tell them that your little joke didn't turn out so well."

He looked disappointed.  "I'm sorry if I have offended," he said.  "Please, tell me how I can rectify this matter."  He looked down at the necklace in his hands.  "It was my mother's, and is the only offering I have."

Penelope looked at him again, this time, really looked.  The hand offering her the necklace was callused and scarred.  The sword at his waist, the corded muscles in his calves and thighs, all told a story of a life different than that of an average English gentleman.

"Who are you?" she asked.

"Marcus Cornelius Gaius, o holy one, if it pleases you."

"It doesn't please me that you keep calling me holy one," she sniffed.  "I'm not a holy one."

He paused.  "You are the priestess, then?"

"Noooo," she said, drawing out the word.  "I am Miss Penelope Duncroft of Bath.  A philosopher," she added.

A pucker of perplexity rose on his forehead.  "Philosopher," he said.  "A woman philosopher?  Not a priestess?  Not a ... goddess?"

"No, just a woman, late for a meeting of the Philosophical Society," she said.  "But you ... you are something rather unusual, aren't you?"

"I do not think so," he said.  "I am a legionary.  I came to the temple..."

"Why?"

"To sacrifice to the goddess, for help in my career."

"I see."

They stared at each other for a moment.

"You've stumbled a bit," she said at last.

"I admit it was foolish to mistake you for a goddess.  But since she must know how beautiful you are, she will not hold it against me.  And she is a lover of wisdom herself."

Penelope shook her head.  "No, I'm afraid your stumble as a bit bigger than that.  Come here and look outside."

He rose to his feet, came to the windows and peered out.

Marcus faced her, ashen and unhappy.  "What strange land is this?"

"You were in Aquae Sulis?  You were in the temple there?"

"Yes.  I went in to pray, and after a time, the priestess pointed me down a long tunnel.  It went on forever -- I thought -- until it finally came up, to here, and to you.  I thought..."

"I know what you thought," she said.  "It seems that you have come more than fifteen hundred years into your future."

His eyes bulged.  The antiquated mind probably couldn't comprehend that number of years, Penelope thought sympathetically.

"The year is 1810," she said.  "You are still in Aquae Sulis, yes, but the Roman Empire fell over a millennium ago.  The ruler of our land is King George."

"Fell?"

"Yes, fell," she said agreeably.  "Visigoths.  And Ostrogoths.  Well, just Goths in general."

He stared at her.  "How can you be so sanguine about it?" he cried.

"Well," Penelope said, "because Rome withdrew from this island fourteen hundred years ago and just left it wide open to the barbarians.  As it happens, that worked out pretty well for us but for the occasionally tiresome Corsican who rears his ugly head now and again."

The expression on his face was a combination of confusion and sadness.  Penelope realized she had been callous.

"I'm sorry," she said. 

He shook his head slightly.  "No.  I came, a supplicant of the gods.  This is their lesson to me."

That was an interesting way of looking at it.

"Can you ... can you return home?" she asked.

He looked back into the darkness of the shop.

"I do not know.  Perhaps, if the gods are kind."

Penelope smiled.

Marcus inhaled deeply and looked stricken.  "By the gods, you are beautiful, my lady.  I have never seen the like."

Penelope's heart stopped beating for a moment.  "You must call me Miss Duncroft," she said, retreating to the safe haven of etiquette.

"Muss Duncroft," he said obediently.

"Close enough."

"Why did you smile, Muss Duncroft?"

"What?"

"When I said, if the gods are kind, why did you smile?"

"I was just thinking ... that there is a problem I have, that I am suddenly glad to have."

"What is it?"

"Oh ... well, in this modern day, a woman who speaks Greek and Latin, a woman who can contemplate the worship of a pantheon of gods without fainting ... such a woman is not valued."

Penelope was dissatisfied when Marcus just continued to look confused.

"Very well, then," she said.  "Maybe you should try to go back."

Marcus stood.  "You are right, Muss Duncroft," he said.

"Of course I am."

Clutching the necklace of citrines, Marcus nodded grimly, turned and headed into the darkness at the back of the shop.

Penelope waited by the door, hands clasped.  Outside, it started raining again.  She didn't hear anything for a long moment but the sound of the rain.  "Good," she murmured.  "He's gone."

There was a loud thud from the back.

"Marcus?" she called.

"I am all right," Marcus said, his voice strained.  "It is just that it is dark, and the stairs are not where I left them."

Penelope stifled a laugh and hurried to the back of the shop to see if she could aid him.

The darkness was complete once away from the windows.  She couldn't see anything, not the gleam of his armor or the whiteness of his linens.  So it was that she tripped and went sprawling.

"Oof!"

She had landed on something.  Someone.

Strong, corded arms circled her, held her tight.

"Are you all right, my lady?" he asked.

"Miss Duncroft," she snapped.

"Muss Duncroft, are you all right?"

"Yes," she said, striving for a normal tone.  "I would be better if you let me up."

"Yes," he said, and dropped his arms.  She reached out -- looking for a solid surface -- and connected with his armored chest.  With only a second's hesitation, she used him for leverage and pushed off.  It was his turn to grunt uncomfortably.

"Are you injured?" she asked, once she had regained her feet.

"No."

"Then stand up!"

"Yes, Muss Duncroft."

Clanking and creaking accompanied a groan of discomfort.

She sighed.  "You cannot get home."

"I do not think so, Muss Duncroft," he said regretfully.

"Then you'll have to come home with me," she said.

#

"Really, Penelope!"  Henry Duncroft exclaimed, picking up her hairbrush and slamming it back down on her dressing table.

Penelope tried not to cast a nervous glance at the closed dressing room door where the Roman was hiding.

"I do not wish to attend, Henry," she said.  "I have ... I was caught in the rain and I have the headache."

"How does being caught in the rain give one the headache?" he asked.  "I'm depending on you tonight!"

"You do not need me," she said.  "Not in the least."

"Penelope!"  Henry said, with a perfectly pitched little brother whine.  "I cannot get close to Isabel Montgomery without you.  You are her best friend.  I will never be able to dance with her if you do not go."

That was true.  Penelope just didn't see how it was her problem.

"You skipped my lecture at the meeting of the Philosophical Society," he said.  "I needed you then, as well."

Guilt.  Oh, the sneaky ways of little brothers.

"Fine," she said.  "I'll go."

"Thank you, Penelope," he said, pressing her hand fervently and then running away to get dressed.

Once he left the room, before she could even turn to look at the dressing room door, Marcus popped out into her bedroom.

"Your brother is angry?" he asked.

"Yes.  I suppose you could tell because of the yelling."

"Yes..."

"I missed his lecture," she said.

"Because of me?"

"Yes," she agreed, and turned to survey her work.

They had run through the downpour, Penelope cursing inwardly each step of the way over her melting hat.  Greaves, the family's butler, had not batted an eye when he let Penelope and "Henry's friend Mr. Cornelius" into the house.

She had taken him upstairs and sneaked him into Henry's room.  Dodging Henry's valet had not proven difficult; he was wooing one of the chambermaids, and spent much time downstairs.

Dressing Marcus, however, was a challenge.  Penelope barely understood the intricacies of male dress, and miming how to don a pair of breeches was extremely damaging to the sensibilities.

But now Marcus wore buff breeches and a blue coat, and looked every inch the English gentleman.  His hair was already styled to perfection, thanks to the modern classical revival.  And Henry's high collar and gleaming white stock suited him well.

"Unfair," Penelope said in English.  And at Marcus' inquiring look, said in Latin, "It's unfair that you are more comfortable in the clothes of my time than I am."

Marcus shrugged and smiled.

"You'll have to stay here tonight," Penelope said.  "I must attend the Assembly Rooms; my brother..."

"Commands you?"

Penelope snorted.  "I'd like to see him try.  But he needs me."

Marcus' eyebrows rose.

Penelope sighed.  "My brother is in love with my friend, Miss Montgomery, and believes that my presence will help him to advance his courtship."

Marcus looked impressed.  "Are you a matron?"

Penelope laughed.  "No, of course not.  'Miss' means I am unmarried."

Marcus, of a sudden, looked shocked.

Penelope did not have enough time to delve into this, so she shut him back in the dressing room (after hastily choosing a ball gown), and summoned Jeanette, her not-quite-French maid.

"Oh, miss, the casket ala minervy is ruined!"  Jeanette entered the room, holding the sodden mess of the casque before her.

"It does not matter," Penelope said absently, twisting her draggled hair up onto her head in front of the mirror.

"It doesn't?"

"Of course not," Penelope said, raising her voice to obscure a rustling from within the dressing room.

This was the standard position of Miss Penelope Duncroft. Jeanette had long despaired of Penelope actually appreciating her efforts to not just assist her in being presentable, but to in fact help her render herself lovely ... until recently:  until Lord Tarryton.  Then, Penelope had taken to the study of La Belle Assemblé with the same ruthless, scientific intensity she reserved for her brother's Latin lectures or Greek architecture.

"Hurry up, Jeanette!" Penelope said fearfully, afraid she could no longer her guest's cover ill-time noises.  "If you finish this by eight o'clock, you may have the night off!"

"Yes, miss," Jeanette said, and moved more quickly.

#

Penelope chatted amiably with Miss Montgomery, but without much interest in the conversation.  Fortunately, Miss Montgomery did not possess such a great wit that conversation with her took much of Penelope's attention.

Or so Penelope thought.

"Are you looking for someone?"  Miss Montgomery asked.

"Oh ... I ... yes, my brother."

"Your brother?  Not Lord Tarryton?"

"No, not Lord Tarryton," Penelope said, feeling a stab of irritation at the mention of his name.

"No?  But I thought..."

"Yes, well, it was very silly of me to set my cap for a lord, and one of the most eligible men in Britain," she said.

"If you say so, dear," Miss Montgomery said. "But I think he should have been very lucky to have you."

"That was kind, Isabel, but..." She stopped, her eye caught by something across the room.

"What?  What do you see, Penelope?"  Miss Montgomery asked.  "You're blushing!"  And then Miss Montgomery turned to look at what sight had enthralled her friend so.

"How did he know?"  Penelope murmured, and then realized.  "Of course.  I told him.  I said that in the evening, gentlemen wear black."

"Who is that?"  Miss Montgomery breathed.

Evening dress suited Marcus even better than the blue and buff.  His lustrous dark hair and lean face stood out in the crowd -- would stand out in any crowd -- and he wore Henry's clothes better than Henry himself, filling the shoulders of the coat perfectly.

"Quite a leg on him," someone said behind Penelope.

Someone else said, "He looks a bit foreign; an émigré, perhaps?"

"Devilishly handsome, either way."

He made a beeline to Penelope.

She had no idea what to do, but the blush staining her cheeks was threatening to throw her into a faint.  She fanned herself for all she was worth, until he stopped before her and made a perfect bow.

"How did you know how to do that?"  Penelope asked in a low voice, returning the grace.

"I watched."

"Oh," she said faintly.

Miss Montgomery poked Penelope lightly, out of sight of most of the assembly.  Penelope shook herself and said to Marcus, "I'm going to perform the ritual of introductions.  Just smile, take her hand and say her name.  Her name will be the last thing I say to you," she added.

Marcus smiled placidly.

"Miss Montgomery, may I present, uh, Mr. Cornelius. 

Miss Montgomery simpered.

"Mr. Cornelius," Penelope said, slowly and clearly, "This is Miss Montgomery."

"Muss Muntomerie," he murmured.

It could have been worse, Penelope decided.

Miss Montgomery began an instant string of chatter, fortunately requiring Marcus to do no more than nod slightly from time to time, while Penelope looked around wildly for an out -- any out.  Dancing was impossible; he may have been able to pick up a bow just by watching, but not dancing!

Promenade.  That was their only hope.

When Miss Montgomery paused to breathe, Penelope exclaimed brightly, "Oh, of course I remember your invitation to promenade, Mr. Cornelius!" and leaped forward to grab his arm.  "He's all yours when we return, Isabel!" she shrilled, leaving Miss Montgomery behind, mouth open.

"I apologize," Penelope said, "but I had to remove you before she discovered you don't speak English."

"And why would she not simply use Latin then?"

"Because women in this time don't generally speak Latin."

"But you do."

"I am a rarity," she said.

"Yes," he said in a tone deep with meaning.

But she did not have a moment to decipher his tone, for Lord Tarryton had planted himself in their path, his eyes narrowing.

"Miss Duncroft!  Who do we have here?"  Lord Tarryton asked.  "Another Latin speaker?"

Penelope gripped Marcus' arm in fear, then straightened her spine.  She would brazen through this.  "Yes, another Latin speaker," Penelope said, in Latin.  "Mr. Cornelius has recently left the army."

"An army man," Lord Tarryton said in the same language, "and a scholar?"

"No scholar," Marcus said easily.

Penelope watched a sneer rise on Lord Tarryton's lips at Marcus' accent.

"No, indeed," Lord Tarryton said.  "Carry on; I did not mean to interrupt your promenade."  He gestured them forward.

Once they were out of earshot, Penelope permitted herself to grumble beneath her breath, "Oh, yes, you did so mean to interrupt it!"

"Why did he?"  Marcus asked.

"He has his hand in every pie in England," she said.  "Every pie related to the antiquities.  If he'd decided you were a scholar, he would have tried to figure out who you were and where you come from, and see if there was anything you knew about the Roman Empire that he does not."

"I imagine there are quite a few things that I know about the Roman Empire that he does not," Marcus said.

"True!  Too true," Penelope said.

"So, why did you not just tell him?"

Penelope cast a look over her shoulder at Lord Tarryton who appeared engrossed in conversation with Miss Montgomery.  "I don't know," she said slowly.  "I think, mostly, people would not believe you had traveled through time.  It hasn't been that many years since we moved from superstition to the light of rationality again.  The rational people would say that you are an impossibility and the superstitious ones would say that you are a witch.  Or that I am."

"And which is Lord Tarryton?" he asked.

"Neither.  I think Lord Tarryton would simply use you.  Lock you in a vault and put you on display."

"Those two things are not congruent," Marcus said.

Penelope just shuddered.

"But that is not why he took a dislike to me," Marcus said.

"No.  I think if he realized what you were, he would like you a great deal too well."

"But he does not right now?"

"No."

"Why not?  I am a pleasant fellow."

"For one, your accent."

"My accent is Roman," Marcus said.  "I was born on one of the Seven Hills."

"I'm sure you were," Penelope said.  "But it isn't how we speak Latin now.  It makes you sound less educated.  And if you were uneducated, and in the army, you might be less than a perfect gentleman."

"My family is not patrician," Marcus said.  "But I have long been planning to advance through my career."

"That might work in Rome," Penelope said, "But it won't work in England."

"Where are we going?"  Marcus asked, clearly trying to change the subject.

"Technically, we aren't going anywhere.  To promenade just means we walk up and down the room.  To see and be seen.  The room is getting crowded, though; there won't be enough space to do it soon.  But that doesn't matter.  We're leaving."

"For where?"  Marcus asked.

"Back to the shop," Penelope said.  "We need to try to send you home again."

#

Marcus was silent on their walk through the streets of Bath.  Penelope couldn't shake the feeling that he was upset with her.  Finally, on High Street, she asked.  "What's wrong?"

"You ... assume that I cannot fit in here," he said.

She was quiet for a moment, before saying, "I don't think you can."

"Why?  Because of my education, or birth?"

"Those would only keep you from Society," Penelope said.

"What is Society?"

"The gentry and the nobles.  The landowners.  And the circles they move in."

"And you move in these circles."

"I'm not noble, but yes.  My grandfather was a baronet, and if my cousin does not produce an heir, my brother will be one, too."

"I see."  He blinked.  "And this is why you speak Latin?"

Penelope wondered if they had passed the shop in the dark, and slowed to peer longer into shop windows.

"What?  No.  I doubt you saw ten women tonight who can speak Latin."

"But education enters into it -- into what makes Society."

"Yes, of course.  Though if a woman is too educated..."  She trailed off.

"Then what?"

"Well, then she's a bluestocking, and unmarriageable."

"And has to leave Society?"

"No!  She just...isn't desirable to men in Society."

"So it is for marriage then?"

"What is?"

"Society."

Penelope decided they'd gone too far, and stopped.  "It doesn't matter," she said.  "I think we missed the shop." 

She turned around and walked right into him.  He took her hands in his, holding them gently.  In the weak light filtered down from some shopkeeper's apartment, his eyes were pools of darkness.

"Are you desirable to the men in this Society?" he asked.

"No."  She didn't hesitate.  She didn't lie.  It was the plain truth.  No.  She wasn't desirable to them, because she was too educated, and would not hide it.

He lowered his mouth to hers and kissed her then.  It was a masterful kiss, caressing and slow -- though her judgment of its masterfulness was in doubt, as it was her first kiss.

He stopped and pulled his head back.  She stayed where she was, leaning against him slightly, convinced she would fall if he moved away.

"In my society, you would be desirable," he said.

"You mean in Rome?"

"My society -- right now -- contains only me."

"Oh."

"Which is not to say that others would not find you desirable.  But I wanted to speak for myself alone."

"Oh," she said again.

He stepped away, and amazingly, she stayed upright.

"What else?" he asked.

"What else what?"

"Even if I can't be in your Society, you seem to think I would not fit in anyway."

"You'd have no profession.  Soldiering has changed a lot since Rome."

"How so?

"Well," she said, trying to wrap her mind around military matters, "guns, for one thing."

"Guns," he said slowly, as though tasting the English word.

"And you don't speak the language," she said, starting forward again and leading him back down High Street.

He grunted.

"And you probably aren't, well, don't take this the wrong way, but you probably aren't a Christian."

"And you are?"

"Yes."

"Christianity is not loved in Rome," he said.  "Though there hasn't been a persecution in decades."

"Reassuring thought, that," she said.  "Whereas here, no one has worshipped your gods in ... in a long time."

"How long?" he asked.

"It's hard to say.  But Christianity became the Roman state religion after the battle of Milvian Bridge."

He was silent for a moment.  "I know that bridge."

"And I know this shop," Penelope said.  "I think this is it." She pushed on the door, expecting it to be unlocked and was not disappointed.

"Why do you think it will work this time?"  Marcus asked.

"I don't.  But we have to try." 

Marcus took her hand, placed it on his waist, stepped in front, and walked slowly forward.  They both kept one hand on the wall.

"I think, maybe, you need to think about what you did when you came through," Penelope said.

"I was praying," he said.

"For guidance in your career, right?"

"And in my life."

"You didn't tell me that part."

He didn't answer, but began to chant in Latin:  "Minerva Sulis, Minerva Sulis, I invoke you, I invoke you..."

They walked a long time in the dark, it seemed, and eventually came to a stair leading down.

"I should turn back," she whispered.

"No, please ... stay with me a little longer," he said, touching her hand where it rested at his waist.  "We haven't yet left your time -- the wood on the walls is the same texture."

"True," she murmured, running the pads of her fingers over the grain of the wood.

They descended the stairs, and could hear the faint dripping of water.  Penelope saw a pale glow illuminate the room ahead of them.  It seemed much like the room above: ghostly shapes of items draped in Holland covers.  This reassured her somewhat though she could not make out the source of the glow.

Now that it was lighter, Marcus took the hand at his waist and drew her forward to walk beside him.  They went hand in hand, towards the dripping, towards the glow.

A doorway loomed before them; beyond it, the source of light.  Penelope stopped before they reached it.

Marcus turned to look at her.  The pale light caught in his hair.  She stared at him with regret.

"You are very handsome," she found herself saying.

"I?" he said.  "No, I'm not very handsome at all."

"You called me beautiful," she reminded him.

"That was not a lie, or even a pleasant half-truth."

"Perhaps, for our own times, we do not possess conventional looks."

"That could be," he said slowly, as though struck by her thought.

She slid her hand out of his.

"No," he whispered.

"I can't.  I would no more fit into your world than you would fit into mine."

"It is not true," he said, coming closer to her and catching her hands in his again.  "You speak the language.  And you would have a profession."

"I would?"

"That of my wife."

It did not register, at first; then a thrill of happiness pulsed through her, only to be crushed by the cold return of rationality.

"No," she said.  "It cannot be."

"Is it because you know something about my time that makes you fear it?"

"I fear it, for certain," she said.  "I fear my own time as well.  I've never told you about la révolution, though I may have mentioned Bonaparte."

"Is it because it cannot be, or because you do not wish it?"

She looked at him for a long moment.  "Oh, I wish it," she said.

"Then..."

She leaned forward and kissed him.  She closed her eyes and opened her mouth to him, trying to feel every texture, to uncover every detail, so she would remember it always.

Then she forced herself to pull away.  He looked at her for a long moment, then sighed.  From his pocket, he pulled the necklace of citrines.

"The goddess is mysterious," he said, "but I think she wants you to have this."

Penelope took the necklace from him and watched as he turned and walked through the doorway, into the pale glow beyond.

#

On a rainy afternoon in Bath, Lord Tarryton knelt on a velvet pillow in front of Sir Henry Duncroft's sister.

"Miss Duncroft," he said, clutching his hand over his heart.  "It would do me great honor if you would accept my proposal of marriage."

She blinked at him.  "Why?  Did you just make one?"

Lord Tarryton's demeanor deflated considerably after this.

"Miss Duncroft," he said, "surely you know how, over these past months, I have grown to esteem you."

Penelope leaned against the back of the settle in a shocking display of bad manners and sighed.

"Lord Tarryton, the least you could do is look at my eyes when you say that, and not at my necklace."

His eyes met hers, guiltily.

"Now," she said, "I'm willing to accept the proposal of marriage if only I can discern the spirit in which it was intended."

Lord Tarryton looked confused.

"Was it for my wit or my beauty that you decided to pay your addresses to me?"

"Your beauty?" he hazarded, blinking rapidly.

She shook her head.  "Tsk.  The answer -- if you have been at all paying attention -- is my wit.  Though, of course, you could only end up being jealous of my wit, so perhaps you did propose for my beauty, what there is of it."

"Miss Duncroft, you are making a mockery of marriage -- and of me!"

"It's not that hard, I find," she said.  "Now, Miss Montgomery is not at all particular, and is twice as lovely and only half as educated as I.  Half as educated is still probably three times as educated as you'd be comfortable with...though I'm quite certain you've done none of these maths and are only proposing marriage so I'll entrust the necklace to your study and care."

Lord Tarryton looked like a particularly unattractive species of carp when thwarted.

Penelope saw the interview through to the end and faced the music when her brother came home from a day of shopping with his wife.

Amelia, Lady Duncroft, was lovely enough to have distracted Henry from Miss Montgomery and was wise enough to keep Henry guessing for years to come.  Penelope adored her, though her perspicacious new sister was sometimes a little too wise for Penelope's own good.  Amelia had discerned, in the short months of her betrothal and subsequent marriage to Henry, that there was a Marcus-shaped hole in Penelope's life.  Amelia didn't know the particulars, but she did understand that Penelope yearned for someone that she could not have.

After Henry yelled at Penelope for a few moments about letting a big fish like Lord Tarryton slip away, Amelia persuaded him to find another project for the afternoon.  She then called for tea and sat down across the table from Penelope to pour for them both.

"Your mysterious suitor," Amelia said without preamble, "is probably pining for you just as you are for him."

"I'm not pining," Penelope said.

"No?  Well, I would not say that you are pining in the traditional manner.  I doubt that even the object of your mockery knows that you are pining.  Poor Lord Tarryton."

"Don't worry, he won't be pining for me," Penelope said.  "He's just after my necklace."  She reached up and fingered the center citrine.

"The man who gave you that," Amelia said, "will still be pining.  I assure you."

Penelope just stopped herself from saying, "He thought his goddess intended it for me."

"Now, I don't know what you thought you were going to accomplish by dividing yourself from him..."

"There were circumstances!"

"...but I suspect it was from worry for Henry more than anything else.  But Henry, as you see, is just fine.  He now has me to yell at."

"Amelia..."

"Do not mistake me.  I am more than happy to share the yelling," Amelia said wryly.  "Lord knows that every little thing causes more.  Acquiring the baronetcy so suddenly for one thing.  And now that I'm increasing..."

"You are?" 

"...you shouldn't fear for me, either.  There will soon be an heir, God willing, to share the burden of Henry's snits."  Amelia smiled dotingly at the closed study door where Henry was translating a passage of Virgil.

"I thank you, Amelia, for being so kind.  But it's really more complicated than that, and I sleep well with my decision," Penelope said, and then swiftly and firmly changed the subject.

But that night, she did not sleep at all.  When the streets grew silent, Penelope found herself dressing in a plain white gown with pretensions of Greek elegance, and lightening her brother's Roman coin collection significantly.

#

"Now, there's a sight you don't see every day," Urbanus said.

Marcus frowned at the wild, desolate countryside on the other side of the Wall.  "I don't see anything," he said.

"No, on the road."

Marcus turned to look.  A litter crawled slowly down the military road -- a fancy litter, the kind that ladies rode in -- accompanied by a few men on horseback, none of them legionaries.

"Hell of a long way from civilization," Urbanus said, picking a nit from his hair and crushing it with his fingernails.

"Yes, we are," Marcus said, and returned to watching the countryside.  Vigilance was necessary.  The barbarians were everywhere.  The Wall was merely a hindrance to incursion, not a barrier.

Urbanus sniffed.  "It's comin' here," he said.

"Odd," Marcus said.

"That's what I'm saying!"

"I'd best go down."  Marcus sighed.

"I'll go," Urbanus offered.

Marcus gave him a look and Urbanus returned to picking nits.

At the tower door, the litter halted.  Three servants were helping a lady to descend.

Marcus' heart raced.

It couldn't be.

It was.

"Penelope?" he croaked.

She came forward, wreathed in smiles.

"Marcus," she said. "You idiot."

"What?"  His steps faltered, shocked.

"I came looking for you, and you weren't even in Aquae Sulis anymore!"

"I ... I asked to be posted to the Wall, hoping that the action of the frontier would keep me from thinking of you.  But there hasn't been enough action for that.  I didn't think you'd..." 

He kissed her, then.  Her small hand searched for his, and placed into it a necklace of citrines.  Marcus pulled back and looked at her, and it.

"It doesn't matter," she said.  "I found you."

© 2006 Merrie Haskell