Escapade, page 3
‘John Thornton can hardly have said that.’
‘He didn’t need to. I understood.’
‘So you refused him.’
‘Yes. And he rode back to Hull, to tell them all, and I thought and thought, and in the end I couldn’t face it. Mother doesn’t much like me, you see. I’m a disappointment to her. Oh, they try to be fair. You can see them trying. But how can they be, when any fool can see it would be better if my brother Mark could inherit Comyn’s rather than me. I can’t even add,’ she wailed.
‘What’s that to the purpose? Just because your mother had to manage things at the bank, and did it so well, it doesn’t mean that you will need to. And as for this talk of her disliking you, that’s the greatest nonsense I ever heard. She adored you, Charlotte, when you were little.’
‘That may be, but she has had a new husband and three sons since. How could she go on liking me? I know all about my father, you see. My grandmother told me, when she was dying. How could my mother help but hate me after what she did to him?’
‘Dear child, what can you mean?’ The candles were burning low and it was getting dark in the room, but Beth would not stir to trim them. This was important. This was the heart of the matter.
‘Didn’t you know? Surely you must have. You were there, weren’t you? That my mother killed my father. Grandmother thought it her duty to tell me; a sacred confidence, she called it. The voice of God speaking through her. What did you say?’
‘Nothing. Go on. What else did old Mrs. Comyn tell you?’
‘About my mother and Sir Henry Etherington. About how I am probably not a Comyn at all. And then you talk about my reputation! The reputation of a bastard! Of course I couldn’t marry John Thornton. Not even if I wanted to. Which I don’t.’ Defiantly.
‘Oh, the wicked woman,’ said Beth.
‘Mother? No, not wicked. I’ve thought about it so much. She must have been terribly unhappy, poor mother, to do such things. Pushed too far. Not wicked. Just unlucky. Like me. Grandmother said my doom was written in my face. I don’t look like anyone in the family. I don’t look like Sir Henry either,’ she admitted. ‘I’ve studied him over and over in church, and there’s not a trace. But I don’t know about his parents.’
‘Fool of a child.’ Beth was sitting close to the chaise longue now, holding the thin hand in hers. ‘Did you never look at your great-grandfather’s portrait at Windover? Lord Eskdale? He used to hang in the study. Over the chimney-piece. A Kitcat; his wife facing him. He’s got your eyebrows. I knew you reminded me of someone, the minute you came into the room. And as for the rest of this nonsense; that’s all it is: nonsense. Your grandmother was a truly wicked woman, I think, and I don’t often think that of anyone. You’re quite right. I was there, when it all happened. And I saw how she worked at poisoning your father’s mind against your mother. I truly think they might have had a kind of practical happiness together, those two, if it had not been for her and that devil, Mr. Jones.’
‘Mr. Jones?’
‘I’d forgotten; you wouldn’t know about him. He was run out of town after your grandmother had her stroke. He’d been extorting money from her; telling her all kinds of tales about your mother. Well, of course, there was talk. Kathryn stood out among the married ladies of Hull like a swan among sparrows. Watching what happened to her, I vowed I’d never marry. She saved the bank, by that dash to London of hers, and all the thanks she got was gossip and enmity. Your Uncle George Comyn meant to have her put in a madhouse if you had been a boy. Lord knows what would have happened to you. That’s why we ran for it to London the second time. She knew she had no chance of facing him out, in the teeth of all the talk. And then, after you were born, it turned out that the will didn’t specify male heirs. One in the eye for George Comyn. But he’s the heir now!’ She realised it. ‘After you. It don’t matter a tinker’s damn whether your mother and step-father would like one of their sons to take over Comyn’s. He has no more right to it than I have. If you don’t marry, George Comyn and his brood — I suppose he has a new wife and children by now — will get the bank, and that is not a day I wish to see. No wonder they are so eager to get you married, up there in Hull. Comyn’s is vital to Hull trade, and we all know how bad things are in business. George Comyn in charge would be a disaster. But I’m tiring you out.’ A quick glance showed her visitor drooping on the chaise longue. ‘We’ll get you to bed. Things will look better in the morning.’
‘They look better now.’ Charlotte pulled herself upright. ‘I’m not a bastard, I’m a fool. And I’m going to be sick again.’
* * *
In the morning, the sun shone. Charlotte, waking in the tiny sliver of a spare room found her hostess standing over her with an armful of clothes. ‘These won’t fit,’ Beth said. ‘Nothing I have will. But they’ll do for the moment. You are my friend Miss Pennam, up from the wilds of the Welsh border. I expect I met your family when I was on tour in those parts, don’t you? We’ll think of a story when we’ve more time. For the moment, I want you to eat what you feel like of your breakfast and get ready to see my doctor. You’ll like him; he’s a sensible fellow and doesn’t think all women hysterical fools. Whatever we decide to do, we can’t have you being sick all the time. It’s too tedious. And besides I can’t afford the washing bills.’
It made Charlotte laugh, which was what Beth had intended, and she was glad to see her dispatch the toast and tea she had ordered for her. ‘You don’t get any more,’ she said, noticing a wistful gleam in her guest’s eyes. Not till the doctor’s been.’
* * *
‘Quite right.’ Alone with Beth after examining Charlotte, Dr. Soames had listened with interest to what she had told him of her young visitor’s story. ‘Less to eat than she wants, but regularly. I hope you aren’t thinking of launching her in society, Miss Prior; she’s not fit for it. I can’t think what her people have been thinking of, to let her get into this state. And any talk of marriage is absurd. She’s a child still, in every way. Distraction, she needs, exercise, rest, fresh air. A change of scene but not into the London season.’
‘That’s just what I thought.’ Beth looked at him with friendly approval. ‘It should be the south of France, shouldn’t it, or Italy, perhaps.’
‘All quite out of the question, of course, with that madman loose in Europe, but, yes, that is precisely what I meant. So — Buxton, perhaps, or Scarborough? One thing,’ more cheerfully, ‘she tells me she has not been sick today. Perhaps the change of scene and your bracing company are doing her good already. I’ll send round a tonic draft for her and call again in a week or so to see how she goes on in your wise hands.’
* * *
Beth had cancelled all her engagements for the day, congratulating herself on having established it that no one, be he however exalted, might call at her house uninvited. This went for her women friends too, such as they were. She had never fraternised with professionals like Harriet Wilson, though they met amiably enough in the haunts of the demi-monde. Mrs. Siddons had become a good friend, and so had Mrs. Inchbald, when both these ladies realised that she would never push herself in when she was not wanted. Those two had managed to retain their position in the eyes of the world, despite being visibly independent and self-supporting females. Mrs. Inchbald’s husband had died; Mrs. Siddons’ hung around her like a bad debt, but husbands they had, or had had, so they were socially acceptable.
‘I’d rather die,’ Beth told herself, and went back to wondering, as she had been all morning, what she was going to say to Mark Weatherby when he came. She had written a note to Kathryn the night before, and seen to it that it caught the night mail to Hull. They must be distracted with worry up there, and she was a little surprised not to have heard from them already. They would surely be exploring every avenue in search for their lost child. But then, she remembered, Kathryn thought her daughter ignorant of her own adventures in London. How extraordinary to think of such a gap developing between the mother she remembered as entirely devoted to her baby, and her only daughter. But then, childless herself, and grateful for it, how was she to understand the feelings of parents?
She might not know what she was going to say to Mark Weatherby, but she was very sure she was not going to let him take Charlotte back to Hull. Their meeting was going to be awkward enough, though. He had thought himself in love with her once, asked her to marry him, just when Kemble had offered her a start in the theatre. She had laughed at him, and he had not liked it much, but, later, she thought he had taken her side when Kathryn had come out suddenly and surprisingly so strait-laced. Not that one could really blame Kathryn, she had been too close to the abyss herself. Of course she was afraid of being pulled down again.
Prue brought her a note from Gareth Forde. ‘Lord Amherst is here, back from Sicily,’ he wrote. ‘Government think he has been too easy on them there. They talk of sending Lord William Bentinck, a man of iron if ever there was one. I know him a little; it would be easy to arrange to go out with him. Dear Beth, think again. When did you ever refuse a challenge?’ There followed two closely written pages of persuasion; not one word of marriage.
Well, why should he? He had had her without. But there was no word about money either, and this was something else again. Another handful of bills had arrived that morning; something drastic would have to be done soon. And she began to think she saw what it would be. She sat down and wrote a temporising answer to Forde and sent a footman to deliver it and buy her a copy of Mr. Brydone’s useful book on Sicily.
* * *
Mark Weatherby arrived two days later, just as Charlotte was getting impatient at being confined to the house. She was looking much better, Beth thought, but she still meant to see Mark alone first.
‘It’s been a long time.’ She held out a friendly hand to him and thought how much older he looked, his nabob brown faded to yellow.
‘Too long, dear Beth. It’s good to see you at last. And best of all that you have Charlotte safe. We have been sick with worry about her, as you can imagine.’
‘A little late in the day.’ Dryly.
‘I know. It’s been a mismanaged business, one way and another. There’s been no way to get through to the child since her grandmother died. We’d never have thought, Kathryn and I, that she would take it so hard.’
‘No.’ Beth had promised to say nothing about that last scene. ‘When it was such a relief to you.’
‘Quite so. We had high hopes of John Thornton’s proposal. They were the best of friends as children.’ How very odd to find himself justifying their actions to Beth, who had once been Kathryn’s maid. ‘We truly thought it would be the answer for her.’
‘As well as for the Comyns. Tell me, has George Comyn children?’
‘Oh yes, he remarried soon after we did. A raft of boys.’ ‘I’m surprised you hadn’t thought of marrying Charlotte to one of them.’
‘Cousins? And with that father?’ And then because it was somehow difficult not to tell the truth to Beth. ‘We did think of it, of course, but they are a set of good-for-nothings. George wanted us to take the eldest into the bank, but there was no way we could, not on his record.’
‘And what is not good enough for Comyn’s is not good enough for Charlotte. I’m glad you see that at least, you and Kathryn.’
He flushed, unused to criticism. ‘We have acted always for the child’s best, as we saw it. The question is, what is best for her now? Kathryn thinks she should come back to Hull, face out the talk.’
‘Kathryn would. And I might even agree with her if the child were stronger. I have had my doctor to her. He prescribes rest, fresh air, exercise, a change of scene — a trip to the sunshine, in fact.’
‘And where do we find that?’
‘In Sicily.’ Beth surprised him. ‘I have been considering an offer to appear at the Theatre Royal in Palermo. The snag is: the money’s not right. I did not think I could afford to indulge myself in the trip. But if you and Kathryn were prepared to put up something towards it, I think I might really be tempted to go, and take Charlotte with me. I like her very much, Mark.’ She had been meaning to call him by his Christian name, as he had her, and was amused to see how this surprised him. And she was even more amused as she watched him consider her proposal, both as he reacted to it, and as his wife would. An ideal solution: the difficult child taken off their hands. If only her own circumstances were otherwise. She took pity on him. ‘She wouldn’t come as herself, naturally. I don’t suppose you know, but she arrived in your son’s clothes, sensible child, calling herself Charles Pennam. And a very nice boy she made too. I have given it out that she is the daughter of friends I made when I was on tour in the west. And I have kept her strictly at home, which is beginning to bore her very much, now she is feeling better. But she could come with me as Charlotte Pennam, and nobody the wiser.’ She could see how it tempted him.
‘But what would we say in Hull? We’ve managed to cover the wretched business so far. They think at Windover that she has come home to Hull and in Hull that she is still at Windover. But we can’t keep that up for ever. There’s young Thornton, to start off with. It’s a funny thing, but her refusal seems to have made him more eager.’
‘Well, of course,’ said Beth. ‘Tell me. Are the two ladies still going strong down at Ross?’
‘They were at Christmas.’
‘Well, there’s your answer. Tell the gossips that Charlotte has gone to them on an extended visit. I suppose everyone in Hull will know she turned young Thornton down. What more logical than that you should send the child away for a change of scene? Specially granted her state of health, which you all seem to have taken so lightly.’ But she must not make him angry. ‘I know how busy you must be, you and Kathryn, with that splendid newspaper of yours. I have watched its success with the greatest pleasure. It’s no wonder if domestic affairs have had to take something of a second place. Specially now, with all the turmoil of the poor King’s madness, and the Regency. Tell me, do you think, you and Kathryn, that the Prince of Wales is going to continue the present government in power?’
‘It begins to look like it. Certainly for the year that the restraints on his actions continue.’
‘And what a fuss that was! I went to hear his royal brothers speak up for him in the House of Lords; such a field day for the press!’
‘Are you acquainted with them?’ He felt himself blushing as he asked the question. For himself? Or for her?
‘Oh, a little. Mrs. Jordan is a friend of mine, so naturally I see something of Billy Clarence.’
‘And Mrs. Clarke?’
‘That shabby woman has never darkened my doors. Selling commissions and involving the Duke of York!’
‘So you were glad when he was reinstated as Commander in Chief ?’
‘So should everyone be who has the good of our army at heart. Arthur Wellesley says York’s done more for the poor bloody man in the line than a thousand royal commissions.’
‘You know Wellesley?’
‘Oh, yes.’ Smiling to herself. ‘We all know Arthur Wellesley.’ But if she must not make him angry, still less must she shock him, though she was glad to have impressed him with her knowledge of the Royal Dukes. ‘This has happened at a good moment for me,’ she told him. ‘You see before you a reformed character, Mark. I know Kathryn will be pleased to hear it. I have decided it is time to turn over a new leaf and concentrate my talents on the stage. But it’s not an easy thing to do, not here in London. Old habits die hard. Specially other people’s. That’s why, when this Sicilian offer came along, I found myself thinking about it seriously, even though the money was so miserable. It would be a break, do you see; a chance to make the change. When I came back, everything would be different.’ And the surprising thing is, she thought, that this is all perfectly true. Or almost. ‘And having young Charlotte with me would be a kind of guarantee, do you see?
I promise you, and you can promise Kathryn, that if you let her come, we will live the blameless lives of two lady tourists.’ ‘But you would be appearing in the theatre?’ The fact that he was even discussing it was surely encouraging.
‘Oh, yes. But that is not in itself an impropriety, except with the most rigid of Evangelicals. Look at Sarah Siddons.’
‘Yes.’ He thought about it for a few minutes, and she could see him working out the pros and cons of her proposition and Kathryn’s reaction to it. ‘Beth.’ He surprised her at last. ‘Are you by any chance thinking of marriage?’
‘Oh, my dear creature! We all think about it all the time. But it doesn’t happen to many of us, and, frankly, if it does, not much good seems to come of it. Look at poor Dorothy Jordan, working as hard as ever, at her time of life, to support all Clarence’s children. If she were not so devoted to them, I’d say she would be better on her own. No, what I am thinking of is an independent future. And the snag about this easy come, easy go life of mine, is there always seems in the end to be more go than come about it. Look there.’ She opened her little writing table. ‘All bills, Mark, that would have to be paid before I could leave town. It will cost you and Kathryn a pretty penny if I take Charlotte abroad with me, but I promise you, I will see to it that you get value for your money. I like the child: I wouldn’t offer if I didn’t. I think I could maybe give her life the new turn it needs. And I’ll tell you something else, very much to the purpose. I don’t think she dislikes that young Thornton at all. If you ask me, a lot of the trouble was that she did like him, but felt his proposal was a mere matter of business. Something like her mother’s first marriage.’
‘Oh, I see. And if being refused has made young Thornton more eager, not less —’
‘The best thing we can do is separate them for a while. I can see that the match would be an admirable one from all kinds of points of view, if they should find they like each other enough. And you know about absence —’
