Page 43 of The Seaside Homecoming
“Not a bit. We’re both fit as fiddles.” He put his arm around his wife’s slender shoulders and pulled her close. “Are we not, my love?”
“We are indeed.” The two gazed at each other with such ardent affection that it was almost painful to witness. Claire owned to a kernel of longing and perhaps even jealousy at this display of obvious devotion.
She swallowed it down. “Excellent. The bed-and-breakfast rate for that room is two shillings, if that suits. Dinner is extra, I’m afraid, but Mrs. Ballard makes a generous breakfast. It will easily keep you most of the day.”
Apparently doing some quick calculations in his mind, the man brightened. “That will suit us nicely, with a bob or two to spare. Thank you, missus.”
Claire retrieved a key from the drawer. “Then allow me to show you to your room.”
The next morning, not long after they had breakfasted, the laundress’s boy arrived at the basement door with a load of clean laundry for Mr. Hammond. Claire thanked the lad, gave him a coin for his trouble, and carried the clean shirts upstairs.
She did not find Mr. Hammond in the morning room, nor in any of the other public rooms, so she braved the passage to his apartment above the old stable block. Finding the outer door open, and hearing voices within, Claire stepped through and onto a small landing that led to two inner doors—one closed, one open. She tentatively followed the voices to the open doorway.
Inside, she saw Mr. Hammond seated at a desk, Mira on his lap. Claire tried not to be obvious as she surveyed his private study but could not help noticing books with foreign titles on the shelves, maps on the walls, and a painting of a white building with golden domes.
Spread out on the middle of the desk were several small piles of coins.
Mira held out her palm, upon which sat three shiny silver coins. “What’s these called?”
“What are those called,” he gently corrected. “These two arepiastresand that one is abeshlik.”
She set them onto a pile of other silver coins, then held up a gold coin. “And this yellow one?”
“That is gold, my little pumpkin seed. Afoondook.” He picked up another. “And this ahalf-myseer, coined in Egypt and rather rare.”
“Pretty,” the girl murmured.
Claire hesitated in the doorway, then feigned a smile she did not feel. “Goodness! Look at all those coins. Where did they come from?”
He looked up with a frown, then answered somewhat vaguely, “Oh, I have been collecting them for years.”
She said, “Reminds me of the strange coin I found in the hall. The one I put in the desk downstairs?”
“Ah. I forgot you mentioned that. Wondered how it got there.”
To his daughter, he said, “These will all be yours one day. But for now, let’s put them away for safekeeping.” He rose, set Mira on the chair, and moved to the door, effectively blocking Claire’s view.
Hand on the latch as if preparing to close it, he said, “Was there something you needed?”
“Only to deliver your laundry, which just arrived.”
“Thank you.” He accepted the pile. “In future, please leave it for me belowstairs. I shall carry it up myself.”
“Very well.” Claire walked away, feeling unaccountably chastised by the mild reproof.
12
John Taylor, a local cobbler, made [Queen] Victoria’s first pair of shoes and received a Royal Warrant.
—Nigel Hyman,Sidmouth’s Royal Connections
That afternoon, Miss Patel and Mira returned from some outing, the woman all but dragging the child behind herself in her hurry to enter the house.
With eyes like hard jet beads and her mouth cinched tight, the woman appeared, if possible, even angrier than usual.
“What is it?” Claire asked. “Has something happened?”
Nostrils flaring, Miss Patel replied, “That Mr. Taylor would not make shoes for Mira.”
