Hi Everyone,
It’s February! And of course that means Happy Valentine’s Day and (for me) Happy Birthday as well! In celebration of this month of Love and Romance, I am pleased to share a joyful scene of young love from The Fair Incognito, my work in progress, which hopefully in the next few months will find its way over the “second draft” line.
Chapter 10
April 5th, 1808
The invitation seemed to take an age to arrive, and it seemed to take even longer for William Bakewell to répondez s’il vous plaît. After all, the head of the Bakewell family had doubts, unable to detect the real difference between a dandy and merely a man with a bit of Gallic charm.
“Yes,” he had trumpeted at breakfast one morning, “it seems our kindly French neighbour Monsieur Audubon has asked for our presence at dinner. Mill Grove.”
“Wonderful.” Mrs Bakewell smiled. “Pleasing news, indeed.”
“Mr Audubon has further proposed we bring our skates.”
“Skates,” the children murmured amongst themselves. Tom mulled over which blades he would bring, long and thin for racing or jagged and short-edged for dancing, jumping, while Lucy foresaw a trip into Philadelphia with Mama for a new muff, a skating costume, blue velvet trimmed in fur, short enough to show off her stout new boots lined and edged in fleece from their own herd of Leicester Longwool sheep.
“Lucy, un nouveau chapeau?”
“Oui, Mama, merci.”
“What do you think, my darling? Russian sable?”
“Yes, please,” Lucy said. “That would be splendid.” Mother and daughter both saw the elegant figure Lucy might cut on the ice, with, of course, their lovely neighbour Monsieur Audubon at her side.
Mill Grove shone brightly on the hill above the drive as the Bakewell family arrived, despite a light snow falling, in two horse-drawn sleighs. Jean-Jacques without hat or cloak met them half way down the private road, swinging a lantern, waving, with cheers all around.
Upon entering the low-ceilinged farmhouse, Jean-Jacques presented the Bakewells to the Thomas family, whom he called his Quaker tenants, and his father’s friend François Dacosta, who after a hasty bonne soirée departed, hat, coat and gloves in hand. Only William Bakewell had extended himself to the quiet man, whom he thought he had met before, perhaps a mineral man, looking into mines, lead veins, along the Perkiomen, and whom members of his club in Philadelphia had introduced as an overseer. Hadn’t they mentioned Mill Grove, and François as guardian to a young French lad?
While not taller than Lucy, Jean-Jacques appeared so in his calf-high boots, the lift of his walk, the throw of his arms and the gaiety of his talk. Hardly able to contain himself, he whirled Lucy into the dining room, where upon the table sat the most stunning display of a cock pheasant. Feathers in flight, tail uplifted, head as if alive, beckoning for all to be seated and eat from the braided, bejewelled pasty floating neatly on its back.
“My word, Mr Audubon,” William Bakewell tutted, “I’d have thought you had taken up taxidermy.”
“I welcome Thee,” Mrs Thomas cut in, wringing her hands on her full-length apron. “Pheasant and marzipan, it be.”
“Thank you,” Mrs Bakewell answered, as she handed her gloves and cloak to Mr Thomas, motioning to the children to do the same.
Jean-Jacques, already with Lucy’s blue coat in hand, lifted the soft sable turban from her head. As he did so, Lucy froze, the gesture unexpected, and was grateful when Tom elbowed the Frenchman, asking whether his skates were short or long.
“Long,” he replied. “Thee?”
“Thee?” Tom laughed.
“Quiet,” Mrs Bakewell cautioned. “The Thomases are Quaker. What you are hearing is Plain Speech — equality. Another plus of being American, yes?”
“Oui,” Jean-Jacques said. “So please forgive ye my English.” And as the group sat, he hit upon an idea. “Madame Bakewell. Do you think Thee might instruct me in English?”
“Certainement.” She smiled at the ruse right under William Bakewell’s nose. “And young Lucy of course will assist me.”
“Merci,” said Jean-Jacques. He took his seat with his guests and began to regale them with tales Mr Bakewell thought more than overdone. In fact, most likely outright lies. “Oui, mon papa, Admiral Audubon… at the Battle of Valley Forge with George Washington.”
“Really?” Tom asked wide-eyed, before asking his father for say-so to leave the table, put on his skates and descend to the creek.
“Wait. See ye first my musée,” said Jean-Jacques.
“Your museum?” Lucy laughed, as if her neighbour’s English and swagger did indeed need work.
“Laboratoire, peut être?” he offered, swinging open the door for the family that remained.
“Are you sure it is not the cuisine?” Mr Bakewell snorted before Mrs Bakewell shot him a look.
Forgetting her family and the Thomases, Lucy only saw Jean-Jacques, thrilling in his workshop. Here he stood even taller. Despite the high-heeled boots, the ballooning silk breeches, old-fashioned stockings and leather vest, Lucy once again found him the most fetching man she had ever met. The brunette curls spilling down his back, tied up with a blue silk ribbon the same colour as her skating cape, caught her eye. His face shone and his fingers, a stretch of more than nine keys on the pianoforte might rival her own.
He had not lied, he would, he could easily play Beethoven’s Moonlight Sonata.
While Mr Bakewell huffed, wanting to draw a line, when Jean-Jacques floating around his laboratoire mentioned Jacques Louis David, the famous French artist, as a friend and mentor, Lucy and her mother stopped him. Together they nodded, enjoying their host’s indiscreet pomposity, as they studied the drawings tacked to the wall, pencilled birds so delicate, so fine, that nests and feathers lost distinction between the real and the unreal. Lucy reached out to touch them. A piping plover wired in some fashion against a wall of squares sat centre stage on an overflowing workbench.
Charadrius melodus.
Jean-Jacques let out a string of short, sharp, low whistles.
Charadrius melodus.
Mark Catesby’s Chattering Plover, Lucy thought, but said, “It is a shore bird.”
“An island bird.” Jean-Jacques cocked his head.
“I think we were meant to skate?” Mrs Bakewell offered, bustling the young folk out of doors. Eliza, Sarah, Anne and Wills dashed down to find Tom and were soon chasing each other across the frozen Perkiomen.
“Je suis désolé. I forget Thee. My Lucy. I have a special chair for Thou on the ice.” Jean-Jacques helped Lucy wrap up, put on her cloak, her turban, as he did the same. Then offering his arm, he said, “Shall Thee?”
“We,” Lucy tweaked, then, taking his arm, they stepped out the front door together, and made their way down the steps and onto the creek.
After they left, William Bakewell turned to his wife in horror, and repeated, “My Lucy?” Mrs Bakewell placed one hand on her husband’s, gently hindering him from following. Then turning to Mr Thomas, Mrs Bakewell suggested, “Perhaps a brandy for Mr Bakewell while we wait here by the fire for the children to come in.”
From the front window, in the moonlight, Mrs Bakewell and Mrs Thomas could see the children speeding over the ice, snowballs arcing high, but most charming proved to be Jean-Jacques, hair loosed now from its ribbon, racing behind Lucy, pushing her skating chair first forward and then back, then round and round.
Laughter rang up the hill in the clear air, as the children vied for their host’s attention, but that night on Perkiomen Creek just off the Schuylkill River the very handsome Jean-Jacques Audubon had eyes only for one young girl of sixteen whom he twirled and twirled around: Lucy Green Bakewell from Crich Village, Derbyshire, England.
© Marlene Hauser 2025