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Love Only Knows ch. 7

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"Elise?"

Hearing her brother's voice, the young woman bounded down her stairs after putting Feliciano's painting in her room. She quickly made her way into the parlor before her brother noticed she had been preoccupied.

"Elise?"

"I'm here, Basch!" She called, sitting down on the sofa. She tried to steady her breathing and compose herself.

He came into the parlor and saw her sitting by the fireplace as if waiting for him.

"I hoped you weren't too bored being left alone like that."

"Oh no, I was fine," she replied as he sat down next to her. Her time alone meant she was able to spend time with Feliciano. She hadn't been bored at all.

"Good. I'm sorry you couldn't come, but you know, we can't risk your health."

She smiled and laid her hand on her brother's arm. "I know you were just looking out for me, Basch. It's all right."

He nodded and patted her hand. "Well... Are you all right?" He suddenly asked. "Your cheeks are flushed."

"Oh!" She touched one of her cheeks and sheepishly smiled. "I'm afraid I overexerted myself earlier in the garden. There was a rabbit, you see..."

Her brother actually smiled amusedly. "We don't need you falling down rabbit holes," he teased a little.

"I know, I know." She giggled. "I promise I'll be more careful from now on."

"You always say that but I'm starting to think you don't really mean it." Basch ruffled her hair a little.

They exchanged smiles together but Elise was starting to feel a little guilty that she lied to him about what she had been really doing. But after all, if she had told him the truth, he would ask to see her painting and she wouldn't be able to say no. Plus, if he did see it, he'd recognize it being someone else's work and she'd have to tell him about Feliciano. Truthfully, she didn't want Basch to know about her possible romance; not yet, at least. She knew he wouldn't like it. He seemed determined to have her wedded to someone who could take care of her; someone with money.

She tried not to think about that for the moment and decided to change the subject.

"So did you see the Beilschmidts?" She asked Basch.

He sighed and nodded. "Yes. They're doing fine. Gilbert Beilschmidt is still a royal pain in the - ah, neck." Basch tried to watch his tongue around his sister.

She weakly smiled. "Oh. But, Ludwig is nice, isn't he?"

"I suppose so. He's become quite respectable, unlike his brother. But he keeps that rogue in check."

Elise amusedly nodded. "He's a good man," she replied, referring to the younger Beilschmidt brother.

"I was glad we were able to have visitors.." She said after a minute.

He glanced at her. "We don't have many visitors over, do we?" He mused.

She was quiet for a while and merely shook her head. "You are so busy though. It would be hard to entertain.."

"Yes, but that doesn't mean you should be lonely because of me.." He murmured thoughtfully. "Listen.." He looked back at her. "From now on, if you ever want some friends to visit, go right ahead and invite them over. You can entertain anyone you want."

She was taken by surprise. "Oh! Thank you very much, Basch! Do you think I could go visiting someday as well?"

He frowned a little. "Not right now. You're still recovering. When you're better, yes."

That made her sigh a bit in frustration. Her shoulders sagged. "But I'm better now. Can I at least go see Miss Edelstein?"

He glanced away. "All in good time, Elise. You shouldn't push things."

She shook her head a little. "Very well. I think I want to go to my room."

He nodded. "And I need to get some work done." He rose up and kissed her cheek. "I love you, Elise."

She blinked and smiled a little. "I love you too."

Another smile now appeared on his face. "I'll let you know when it is time for dinner."

"Thank you!" She gave him a brighter smile now and went upstairs to her room.

Once alone, she again began thinking about the time she spent with the young Italian man recently. She found that it was quite easy to think about him, and fondly recalled all the times they had interacted together. She remembered the look of warmth that had been in his amber eyes as they talked and the way his hair curled at the ends. He was definitely a handsome man. She had never really thought about how men looked until now, and she knew she probably wasn't much of a judge on beauty, but she did like the way he looked. He didn't tower above her like others; he was shorter and she didn't get a neck ache from looking up at him. She liked that.

Elise sighed. She wanted to see him again. She picked up the painting of the rabbits he had given to her and took a moment to admire it. It really was a lovely work of art. She thought the rabbits looked so real. It was hard to believe that he only painted as a hobby. Why wasn't he a commercial painter with sponsors or commissioners? She figured he would certainly be able to make plenty of money if he painted for a living...

After studying the painting for a few seconds, she got a bit of an idea. She went over to her small writing desk and pulled out some sheets of paper.

Basch said I could invite anyone over to visit, so I'm going to do just that! She thought. She didn't think about the fact that she was inviting not only a man that Basch didn't know, but a servant as well. She could only think about how close they had just been, how nice his smile was and how kind he treated her every time they met. If she sat back and was honest with herself, she would admit the truth: she didn't want anything half as much as she wanted to see Feliciano. It made her smile and she hoped he felt the same.

Elise wrote her letter, folded it and prepared to seal it with her own personal seal - until she realized someone could find it odd that the sister of Captain Sebastian Zwingli was sending a letter to a working boy. So instead of using her own letter seal, she poured the wax and pressed down on it with the butt of a spoon. She also did her best to write the addresses on the front of the letter in the blockiest handwriting she could muster. She made sure it looked extremely un-ladylike.

It was frustrating that she had to be so subtle about all of this. But being undercover was the only way she could be able to see Feliciano. She was sure her brother or Mr. Edelstein or even Emil would seize the letter otherwise, and who knows what would happen to Feliciano?

As she thought about all of this, she then realized she had to come up with a way to get the letter delivered. Perhaps she could deliver it on the next trip to town? She could slip it to the post and leave it to find its way to the Edelstein manor, but she could only guess the next time she would be going into town.

Suddenly as she stared dejectedly at her desk, the answer to this dilemma came to her. When Emil went to mail the letters from her and Basch, she could slip the letter in amongst the other letters! it was a small envelope so it surely must get mixed in with the rest. It was Saturday, the day before Emil was allowed his Sunday off to go home and see his family. He usually went to deliver the last-minute week's mail before he left. She didn't have much time before he would stop by to check if she had anything to deliver.

She had to come up with other invitations to use as decoys for her letter to Feliciano. She thought of the people she knew - any female acquaintances she could invite over for tea. After a minute, she realized she didn't really know so many after all. Being of a weak constitution whose paranoid brother kept shut-in half the time, her social life wasn't very developed.

Well, she knew she could always invite Miss Edelstein over. There was also the young Mrs. Williams, an English lady recently widowed who had decided to move back to the town after living abroad in India for several years. The two had never really talked, but Elise was curious to meet her. There was also Mr. Bonnefoy's cousin, Miss Cardea who was visiting from the coast of France. She could send her an invitation before the lady's visit ended.

By the time Emil knocked on the door for his usual request for any letters to post before he left, Elise had at least five letters written and sealed, plus the anonymous one to Feliciano, which she slipped to the back of the pile. She quickly trotted up to him and placed them in his hand.

Emil was admittedly surprised. Elise usually never had any letters to send. He knew better than to look at each letter to see who she was writing to, though. The last thing he wanted was to be inconsiderate to the lady's private business.

"You seem surprised," Elise amusedly noted.

He cleared his throat. "I am a little, I'll admit."

She shook her head. "It's all right, I understand. I know with the state I'm usually in, sending letters isn't a usual pastime for me."

"Perhaps not, but I think it's a good thing..." Emil gave her a shy smile. "I'm glad to know that you can be able to see people and make friends."

She was the one who looked surprised now and he felt like he was beginning to blush, which mortified him.

"I'm sorry," he muttered.

"No! No, there's no need for you to be." She laid a friendly hand on his arm. "I appreciate the concern, Emil. You are very kind."

He nodded bashfully and looked away. Once again, he wasn't sure what to say next. Elise just smiled and tried to hold back a giggle.

"You probably should go," she said, patting his arm again. "Thank you for taking my letters by the way."

The young man took a deep breath and nodded. "Yes, you are right. Goodbye, Miss Elise, and take care."

Elise gave him a smile and bit him a friendly goodbye. She was glad she was able to keep her amusement in check. She didn't want to hurt Emil by making him believe that she was laughing at his discomfort, but he had been so embarrassed, it was a little amusing - and kind of cute.

Afterwards, she decided to go down to the library and find a book to amuse herself until dinner. She hoped that her letter to Feliciano would reach him. Soon she was immersed in reading about the arts and culture of the country of Italy, the home of the Renaissance.

________________________________________________________

Emil was soon hitching his horse and heading out for his short weekend off. He had to mail the letters first, though, so he headed into town and dropped the letters off at the post. Then he headed out past the town and away from the country estates towards home. Home for him was actually a little further away, towards the coastline. Of course, he wasn't a native of these parts, but he did have family in the small fishing village near the shore.

It took an hour or two before he could smell the familiar scents of salt and fish in the air. Soon he could hear the cries of the seagulls and the crashing waves on the shoreline below. Emil sighed and slipped off his jacket. It was always a relief to come out to the sea. He missed it. Plus the constant running back and forth for Basch Zwingli got tiresome. He lived for these short weekend holidays.

There was a small fishing shack near the docks that boasted to have the best catch of fish; the ripe smell of fresh cod seemed to justify that claim. Emil rode up to that shack and once his horse was tethered at a railing and taken care of, he peered inside.

"Anybody home?"

A voice answered. "Yeah! Be right with ya!"

Then a middle-aged man came out from the back of the shack, wiping his large chapped hands with a cloth. He was tall, with bright blue eyes and a shock of golden hair peeking out of his bandanna. When he saw Emil standing in the doorway, a wide smile appeared on his friendly face.

"Emil! You're back!" He exclaimed.

A small smile appeared on the younger man's face. "Hello Matthias."

"Well don't just stand there! Can I at least get a hug from my own cousin?"

Emil sighed and slung his bag off his shoulder before walking up to his cousin and hugged him.

"There. Happy now?" He muttered.

Matthias laughed. "Oh yeah! I'm glad to see you, man!" He ruffled Emil's head.

"Yeah.." He smacked the man's hand away. "It is good to see you as well.." He admitted.

"Of course it is!" Matthias laughed again. "We've missed you around here! How is it up there with the spoiled and privileged?" He chuckled.

"The same as ever. Nothing really changes unless someone hosts a party or they decide to take a trip to the city or abroad." Emil shrugged. He didn't really want to talk about his rich employer or his neighbors.

"Ah. Well, what do you expect? I still hold by my opinion that being that wealthy would be boring." Matthias grinned and patted Emil on the back.

"Well, come on in. You can get your cot set up upstairs and then we can talk some more over a warm cup of grog. I can get you something to eat too."

Emil followed him past the shelves of nets and fishing lines and towards the back where the fish were kept and stored in a storage room and where the kitchen was located. There was also a steep and narrow staircase that led to a second floor where everyone slept. Emil entered one of the bedrooms where he usually slept on a small cot next to another bed.

"Is Lukas out fishing?" Emil asked.

"Yep. He's been out for the past month. But he wrote a couple weeks ago and said they should be coming in today. You're lucky! You'll get to see him this time!"

Emil nodded and thanked Matthias before the man left him to get situated. He was inwardly happy at the news Matthias told him. His brother Lukas was usually out on the boats fishing when he visited. It would be nice to see him again.

Once he got his cot set up, he went back down to see Matthias warming up some water, adding rum and lemon juice to it. There was some bread and salted fish on the table and Emil began to eat as Matthias brought him a tankard of the grog over.

"Here ya go." Matthias smiled at the way his cousin quickly gobbled down the food. "Poor lad. You must have had a tiring trip, eh?"

Emil tried to slow down his eating and nodded. "Yeah. I didn't really stop except for a couple instances where my horse grew tired."

Matthias nudged his shoulder. "Well, if you want to take a quick nap, I'll let you know when the boats begin coming in. You know they all head over to the nearby pub to drink and eat, so we can go see them there!"

"Yeah, all right." The young man downed a gulp of his grog and finished off the food. "Thanks Matthias."

"Don't mention it, lad! It's just good to see you again! Now go get some rest! I'll wake you when it's time to go."

Emil nodded and went back upstairs to take a nap. Even though the bed was small and he was in a humble fishing shack by the docks that stunk of damp wood and fish, he felt far more relaxed than he did sleeping in the servants' quarters in a grand house.

A couple hours later, he was awoken by his cousin who told him to get up so they could head out to the docks. The boats were coming in. The two men left the shack - Matthias putting a makeshift "closed" sign on the door - and they went to walk on the worn, wooden docks. From a distance several fishing boats could be seen heading in from the sea. There were many other people waiting by the docks too, waving and cheering as their family members and friends came sailing in.

"I hope they caught a lot this time!" Matthias remarked as he waved to the fishermen. It was always a little celebration when the men came back from being out at sea. They were all happy to see that no ships were lost and no one was injured or missing.

Emil could see his brother's ship was one of three that were returning. Soon the anchors were lowered and the planks were dropped. Matthias and Emil were among those that helped the weary fishermen unload their catches, dragging the nets over to the many insulated crates that were brought up. They would soon begin preparing the fish for the preservation process.

"Not a bad load!" Matthias exclaimed as he hauled one of the nets. "I see you didn't bag any sharks this time."

A thin, wiry man with pale blonde hair and violet eyes dropped down onto the docks. He scoffed and punched Matthias on the arm.

"Just be grateful we got what we did!" He scolded his cousin. "This time of year, some were hard to catch!"

Emil shook his head and smiled a little. "At least you all came back safely.."

"Yeah. We ran into some storms a couple of times, so I am extremely grateful for that." The fisherman chuckled and put his arm around Emil's shoulders. "How's my little brother these days?" He asked.

Emil shrugged. "I'm all right; can't complain."

"Lukas! Emil! Help me with this fish and then we can join the rest of the boys and celebrate!"

The two brothers helped their cousin take Lukas's share of the catch and went to the fishing shack they owned to store and preserve the fish. It wasn't an easy task. It made their hands red and chapped since they had to handle the rough fish and preserve it with ice and salt. They packed it all into insulated crates and put them in a storage room.

Once finished, Lukas urged his brother and cousin to join him at the local pub. There, all the fishermen were gathered, drinking, eating and celebrating their latest catches. Many of the men on Lukas's ship praised their captain for deciding to go north to fish for cod, their big catch of the day. Their captain, a short but tough English fellow named Kirkland just waved their praises aside.

"It wasn't my idea. It was thanks to Lukas that I made that decision at all. If it wasn't for him mentioning his home country, I wouldn't have thought of it." He waved Lukas over and handed him a drink.

"Let's all cheer for Lukas!" Captain Kirkland exclaimed.

Emil couldn't help but feel proud for his older brother as the men cheered for him. He was glad to see that Lukas was respected and liked by everyone. Hopefully Lukas would be appointed to a higher position, maybe even get his own ship someday!

The men all drank and sang together merrily. Soon they were joined by some of the local women and things started to get wilder. Emil couldn't help but chuckle when his rather forward cousin got slapped in the face by one of the ladies. There were no gentlemen or cultured actions here. The sailors and fisherman were a rough and rowdy bunch.

As Emil sat and listened to Lukas and his shipmates talk about their ventures, he noticed a familiar black head with red ribbons among the crowd.

"Michelle?" He went over to see if the woman was indeed the fellow servant who worked at the French plutocrat's house.

"Oh! Emil!" Sure enough, it was her.

"How are you?" Emil asked. He hadn't expected to see her here of all places.

"Oh, I'm fine. I came here to see if--" She glanced around at the crowd and smiled a little. "Well...And how are you? I'm sure you're glad to see your brother safely returned!"

"Oh yes." He turned to look at her brother and his crewmates. "So how were things when you left them?" He was referring to their employers back at their mansions.

She shrugged . "Everything's normal, except..."

"Except?"

She sighed. "Well, there's been some...talk."

He frowned a bit, confused. Michelle looked a little nervous and leaned in closer to him so she didn't have to talk as loudly.

"Apparently several different workers are forming a group in secret. They plan on making a union to protest and go on strike."

Emil's eyes widened. "What are they doing that for?"

"They're feeling the same way we do: they're tired of working eighteen hours a day with little pay. They want longer holidays.."

That sounded very interesting. "So they're going to protest against the nobles?"

"That's the general idea," she said, shaking her head. She glanced over at the crowd again. Someone seemed to catch her attention.

"I don't like it. It'll only lead to trouble," she muttered.

Emil couldn't really agree with her. This had been the type of thing he was hoping would happen. He decided to ask how she'd found out about this and she told him that a couple of her fellow housemaids knew people who were participating. Emil asked for their names for reference.

"I don't think it's a good idea to get mixed up in all that, Emil," she warned. "What good will it do?"

"It will at least send those people a message," Emil answered. "We can only do so much before it becomes too much to bear."

"And what about your own master?" She pressed. "Zwingli is a Captain, in the militia. Doesn't that worry you?"

"It's not like I'll be committing any crimes if I join in on this!" He argued. "I'll be fine."

Michelle sighed and nodded. "If you say so..." She glanced over again at the crowd and Emil noticed that they were being watched.

"I'll see you around, Emil," she said and gave him a smile. Emil bid her goodbye before Michelle made her way upstairs, still smiling over at a certain person in the group of men - a particular captain that she hadn't seen in many a month.

"Everything all right?" Lukas asked Emil once he sat back down with him and Matthias.

Emil was quiet for a moment. Then he looked at his brother and cousin. There was an odd sort of smile on his face.

"Yes. I think so.." he said. "I get the feeling that things are going to get interesting in these next few months, brother," he said before he sipped his glass of rum.

Lukas and Matthias were confused but Emil didn't feel like explaining. Instead, he had a great deal to think about once he returned back to the Zwingli house on Monday.