Castle Orchard (28 page)

‘He is wonderful, Papa. I think him the bravest, the most wonderful man there is.’

‘I should much prefer you to look up to a man of a more godly disposition.’

‘And the medicine he has, it is from the bark of the Jesuit tree. Does that make it a Roman Catholic medicine? Roman Catholics are idolatrous. Is that the word? Aren’t they very wicked?’

‘My dear child, what a muddle. Misguided rather than wicked. It can have no bearing on the medicine, which is considered efficacious in the treatment of certain fevers. It is from the bark of the cinchona.’

Robert was mildly disappointed Captain Allington could not add to his glamour by the imbibing of an idolatrous substance. He renewed his entreaties for his father’s prayers which he thought must hold more weight than his own, his father being a clergyman surely having a more direct means of communication with God.

The following Sunday, the rector included Captain Allington in his prayers for the sick, and Allington’s fever abated.

It was the tendency of the fever to return every three to four days. Pride said, ‘He has been ten days free of it but that doesn’t mean it’s finished. It’s never finished. If he were strong enough for the journey, we should go to St Jude for the winter. It’s December now but there’s plenty of winter left.’

‘For the mildness of the climate?’ Mrs Arthur asked him.

‘And the sea.’

Mrs Arthur thought of the journey to Cornwall. The britchka could be made very snug. It was possible to travel night and day and to lie down in it with quite a degree of comfort.

‘He’ll sleep anywhere,’ Pride said. ‘Got used to it, see. Dirty little places in Portugal, filthy, you wouldn’t believe it, the bugs never gave you a moment. The master preferred the bare ground. I never saw nothing pleasant in marching day and night and lying down on a scorpion at the end of it. The Portuguese, they don’t have a notion of comfort – no chimneys, no glass in the windows – miserable, I called it. Now it’s my turn to say what’s what and I want him down in Cornwall.’

A week went by. Allington started to come downstairs and lie on the sofa in front of the drawing room fire. Meg lay on his lap. He occasionally gave her ears a gentle pull. He wore a capacious dressing gown over a loose pair of trousers, and a rug over his knees. He tied a coloured handkerchief around his throat, made no apology for this state of undress and asked Mrs Arthur to read to him, so she read him
Headlong Hall
and
Nightmare Abbey
to make him laugh.

This led them to discuss whether or not they believed so many things could be discovered from an examination of the head, craniologists being in vogue and Mr Thomas Love Peacock making a mockery of it in his novels.

‘We must be made up of our parents and our grandparents, heads and all,’ Mrs Arthur said, ‘but there certainly seems something very arbitrary about it, when one looks at family resemblances.’

‘But when one has no idea of the appearance of one’s relatives, let alone their characteristics, one is left at sea,’ Allington said. ‘There is a mysterious void.’

‘You knew no grandparents?’

‘Neither father nor grandparents. My parents eloped. For all I know, I may have relatives alive.’

‘But have you never been curious?’

‘By the time I was old enough to consider the matter, the one person, my mother, who could have enlightened me, was dead. I should have asked my stepfather. He might have known, but I never did. I have always been curious about my father.’

‘Had you no likeness of him?’

‘No. There was a miniature of my mother . . .’ Allington paused and then he said, ‘I don’t have it. As for my grandparents, they disowned my mother, so I don’t forgive them, if they exist.’

He was lying back against the sofa, his hands behind his head, watching Mrs Arthur, who had closed the book on her lap. He said, ‘If I die now, if I get another bout, my relatives, if I have any, will be none the wiser, and I don’t care in the least. My grandparents must have known of my father’s death but they didn’t bestir themselves to assist his widow and their grandchild. How cold is the heart that never relents. Perhaps mine is equally cold.’

Mrs Arthur said, ‘I don’t think it so very cold. There must have been officers, older officers, who served when your father did.’

‘There were, and I never said a word, and neither did they. I only have myself to blame, but I was shy of it. It seemed safer to know nothing.’

‘Not so courageous,’ Mrs Arthur said.

‘No, not at all so,’ he replied. ‘I never ventured to enquire of him.’

They were both silent for a while. Mrs Arthur worried he would tire himself. He was rake thin and very pale. She said, ‘Are you warm enough?’

‘Yes. I don’t want to go upstairs. I’m perfectly comfortable. Are you?’

‘Yes, of course I am,’ she said, laughing at him. ‘It is you that are the invalid.’

‘I will have to go to Cornwall as Pride suggests. It’s odd to think of a father and absolutely no image spring to mind. I know what he wore, for I know his regiment and I don’t believe it has altered much, though the jacket has been shortened. The differences would be in the hat – and of course, officers and men wore their hair in a queue which, I am glad to say, was cut off the moment I joined up, for they took half an hour to dress, all rolled and powdered and greased. So, what is he to me? A red coat, a cocked hat and a queue.’

‘But did your mother not talk of him?’

‘No. She might say, “Such and such would have pleased your father”, or, “Your father would be proud of you”. Such things are easily said. I once, and only once, was vouchsafed a view of his most intimate and innermost thoughts, but it was as a page of a book, opened for me, read, and slammed shut; gone for ever, destroyed.’

Allington paused and then he said, ‘Now, I’ll tell you something. When my mother told me she was to marry Lord Tregorn I knew I was to live at the Big House and have every advantage of education and position. He had promised her he would be a father to me and I should want for nothing. I said, “You will have a maid and two footmen and never have to worry for money or that your gloves are darned. I shan’t be any use to you at all.” My mother hugged me tightly and cried a little, but I could see the logic of her marrying and was ashamed of my own tears.

‘There was a week or so of great change and preparation. On the eve of my mother’s wedding day I went to bed as usual. It was winter, just after Christmas, and very cold. My mother was accustomed to come up to bed shortly after me. I lay awake, listening for her, aware of the great closing of one door and the uncertain opening of the next. I suppose I was very uneasy. I listened and listened for her footsteps on our narrow staircase. After half an hour or so I got out of bed and stood on the little landing at the top of the stairs. Then I heard these terrible, wrenching sobs, such as I had never heard before. I tore downstairs in my nightshirt and bare feet. My mother was bent forward in her chair, crying and crying. One by one she was burning letters in the grate and I knew it was my father’s letters she was burning and they were nearly all gone. I snatched the last one from her and I shouted at her, I shouted, “They’re mine, you can’t do that!” and flung myself into her arms and we both wept and wept.

‘After a while I made her come upstairs. I put that last letter into my little trunk that was packed ready for our move. I then fetched my mother warm water to wash in and I heated a brick for her bed. She undressed and put on her night-gown. I got into bed with her and struggled to put my arms round her and we cried ourselves to sleep.

‘The following morning she dressed herself and, with all appearances of composure, married my stepfather.’

Allington relapsed into silence. Mrs Arthur got up and hastily went to draw the curtains across the windows, for darkness was coming on and she did not want him to see how much this tale had distressed her. When she turned back to him, he had closed his eyes. She pulled the rug up round him and after a while she could see he slept.

Allington insisted on spending time at his desk in the morning room before leaving for Cornwall. He reminded Mrs Arthur of a leaf, etched by winter to the bare bones – but courage, or the discipline of a soldier, kept him upright.

On the day of his departure he came downstairs dressed for the journey. He had the boat cloak over his arm.

Mrs Arthur said, ‘Captain Jameson’s.’

Allington sat down on the old settle in the hall. He said, ‘Pride tells you too much. I shouldn’t allow you to assist him in making curtains. We were mess mates, John Jameson and I.’

The room was filled with portraits of Johnny Arthur’s ancestors. Of the man himself, there was none, and had there been, Allington thought he would have had it taken down. It made him think of Phil. Would he, eventually, want to know more about his father, and what could be said of him?

He turned back to Mrs Arthur. ‘To be practical, if I have another bout of fever it will probably kill me. Pride, who sets great store by my funeral, will be stowing my uniform into the britchka despite my contrary instructions. He wishes me equipped with a coffin and some clothes. If Pride has his way I shall be six foot under, dressed in all the splendour of a captain of the Light Dragoons. Saint Peter will have no difficulty in recognising my profession. My affairs are in perfect order, such as they are, which is more than can be said of yours. However, they’re in hand and it is just a matter of waiting. You don’t have to worry. I give you my word no final catastrophe awaits you. I’m leaving Dan here. He will take care of things. Don’t go away. Look after Castle Orchard. If I return, it will be with the swallows.’

He stood up as briskly as he could. His stick was to hand. Mrs Arthur accompanied him outdoors. The britchka awaited him, a groom standing holding the hired horses.

Pride appeared with the offending uniform wrapped in a sheet and his glass jar of sixpences.

Mrs Arthur struggled for words but none came. It was unbearable to see Allington so weak, to hear him speak of his funeral with half-cheerful levity and to watch him clamber into the vehicle. He neither looked back nor spoke. In a moment the groom was up on the box and the horses were stepping out.

Dan was in charge of the stables. The outdoor staff at Castle Orchard learned to interpret Dan and viewed the punching bag, which hung in a spare loosebox, with respect. Dan might be diminutive, silent and deaf, but he always had his own way. Mrs Arthur suspected him of exploiting his disabilities in order to do exactly as he saw fit. He brought the long-tailed grey round to the front door and escorted her out for a ride on the days he considered the weather to be suitable. He showed her a piece of paper on which was drawn a clock with the hands at half past one; the grey, distinctive with its long tail; the side-saddle; and a cloud with rain coming from it, the latter with a cross over it. From his sickbed Captain Allington had ordered her life. He knew she spent the morning giving Emmy lessons and then took a little luncheon with her. At half past one she had often ridden out with him. Dan, meticulous in his duties, hastened home with her at the merest drop of rain.

Annie gave her a glass of wine with her dinner. ‘He said you was to have it, ma’am. He said, “Annie, look after your mistress and see she has no economies.” He mayn’t drink it himself, but you are to have it.’

‘And how many glasses am I to have, Annie?’

‘Now that he didn’t say,’ Annie replied, ‘though he’s a managing gentleman.’

‘Will he get better?’

Annie sighed. She really couldn’t say.

Mrs Arthur reflected on the subject of economy. She and Cook used to struggle with saving the pennies, but as Cook said, they now never had no need to bother their heads, though she wouldn’t countenance waste. Mrs Arthur recalled Allington telling her of his weighing the sugar for his mother. Sugar was expensive. He would have known of the scrimping for sugar. She thought of her long hours with the account books and how nothing, now, was required of her but to look after her children, yet she found her life without purpose. When life had been a struggle she had been occupied with the battle of it. The management of the household now ran smoothly on, needing but minimal assistance from herself. Women in her position were, she supposed, used to occupying their time with visiting, but to be ignored by the thin sprinkling of what could be described as society within the vicinity, none of it immediate, she had been long accustomed. She had had no time for making a choice from her scanty wardrobe in order to take tea or play a genteel game of whist in the carefully regulated houses of her far scattered neighbours, all of whom seemed to have viewed her with apprehension and astonishment, either for her temerity in marrying Johnny Arthur in the first place, his reputation being more than poor, or for the scandal of his abandoning her. Only the Conways doggedly persisted in visiting her, one from inclination, the other from duty, but she was alone and their visits did not make her less so.

She received no letters and supposed if Captain Allington wished to communicate he would, unless he was not well enough to write. She thought about it as she clopped along on the grey, the silent Dan half a pace behind her. Dan knew his place. He lived in one silent world and she lived in another. There was Annie and Phil and Emmy, to whom she gave words and attention, but she was solitary, elsewhere, in a sea of nothingness. She was not wretched as she had been when first married, racked, miserable, desperate – that is, until she had learned to manage, to recognise her husband for what he was and to desist from grieving over it. Now she was sad, as if she had been given a glimpse of another world, another sort of life, a door opening halfway before banging shut.

As for money, she chose to accept Captain Allington’s word. Had he not said there was no cause for concern on her part? So she assumed, all in good time, she would receive the jointure. When that happened, she must ask Mr Westcott if he had some little house she could take, something less than the Dower House he had already offered. With this in mind she occupied herself in remaking her wardrobe and also the children’s. There was an advantage in the delay. By the time she was living elsewhere, there would be no need for her to be wearing more than halfmourning and certainly no need to put Phil and Emmy into black. She asked Louisa to send her cloth in shades of grey and lilac, white for Emmy, with appropriate patterns, dipping into the hundred pounds to pay for it. Mrs Arthur knew how to sew. She had taken apart many an outworn garment to see how it was made. As for the pink silk Louisa had sent her, she still could not see she would have any occasion for it.