Devil Water (50 page)

“You can hear the music from here,” he said opening the window. “Not that I consider it suitable for a maiden’s ears!” He shrugged and laughed, as he recognized a raucous rendition of “The Jolly Tinker and the Landlady.” He pulled the bell rope, ordered roast goose and claret. After supper he cracked walnuts for her. She took a nut, and toyed with it a moment.

“When will you leave London, Papa?” she asked carefully. “I can’t bear to have you go, yet I’ve learned in how much danger you are!”

“I must leave at once, sweetheart,” he said sighing. “Ann’s death means that there’s a lot I must do for the children -- especially my nephew, the little Earl, who’s not strong. As soon as -- as all my affairs are settled, I’ll send for you at once.”

“Yes, Papa,” she whispered. She bent her head over the nuts, knowing that he could always read her face and would see dismay there. She longed to be with him, longed to see some of the wonderful sights he had promised her, yet she did not want to leave England. Why not? She asked herself sternly. Nobody in England really loved her except Lady Betty. Yet -- if there
should
be a letter, if someone
should
try to find her, and she were on the Continent . . . You idiot! cried Jenny to herself. That’s finished. All finished -- while underneath she heard the echo of her own voice saying, “ ‘Tis not so easy to cut love out, and throw it away.” Not so easy to dislodge a long, long loyalty, even in favor of a new compelling one.

She glanced sideways at her father, wanting to tell him something of her doubts, hoping he might help her rid herself of them, and was startled to see an odd expression on his handsome face. He was leaning back in his chair, absently cracking nuts in his strong fingers, while he gazed through lowered lids, past her head towards the doorway. Jenny turned and saw a coarsely attractive young woman standing there. She was well, if garishly, dressed in orange taffeta and a green velvet mantle. Her black pomaded hair was piled up elaborately, her black eyes were returning Charles’s stare with bold and obvious pleasure. “Is this the parlor?” asked the woman sweeping in. “I trust I don’t intrude?” Her voice was rather mincing, it had a hint of cockney.

Charles got up and made her a low bow. “Indeed
not,
madam. My daughter and I were wishful of company, though dared not hope it would appear in so lovely a form!”

“La, sir!” said the woman, airily tossing her head. “How too kind you are! My coach has broken down, and forced me to stay in the midst of these rustic revelries.” She waved a dirty hand loaded with cheap rings towards the street. “I presume your plight is somewhat similar?”

“Somewhat,” said Charles. “We must console each other, madam!” Their eyes met in a long look, which made Jenny go hot and bewildered. When the woman quitted the parlor for a few minutes, Jenny said incredulously, “Papa, do you
like
this lady? I don’t.”

“She’s not a lady,” he said in a cold, tense voice. “She’s a slut, and I believe an actress.”

“Then why ... do you . . .” She could not finish.

Why indeed? thought Charles. Why, because I haven’t had a woman since London, that’s why. “Go to bed, Jenny,” he said. “You could not possibly understand.”

She went upstairs, rebuffed and puzzled. Later she heard noises through the wall which divided her room from her father’s. High-pitched giggles, the creaking of a bedstead, once an excited cry, “La, sir! You are so bold!” Then quiet.

Jenny still did not understand, though she nonetheless suffered a variety of miseries. There was jealousy and embarrassment, there was sharp disappointment that their last evening alone together should be marred like this; yet running through these dark feelings, like a silver streamlet, was a curiously maternal pity for her father.

Four days later, Jenny was back at the Hackney School, and found it nearly impossible to believe she had ever left it. Miss Crowe and her singing lessons were the same. The dancing master and the French master were the same. The sour smells, and draughts and tasteless food were the same. But Evelyn was not.

It was as well for Jenny, that she had Evelyn Byrd’s heartache to distract her from her own, for she missed Charles desperately. She even missed Alec, and the journey to Northumberland now seemed a radiant dream, of which nothing remained except a kaleidoscope of poignant impressions -- and Coquet. The school allowed her to keep Coquet, since most of the young ladies had their own horses; Jenny spent many an hour in the stables, stroking the mare and talking to her, and sometimes weeping into the glossy mane.

Evelyn did not weep. She had hardened since Jenny had seen her last in July; the beautiful dark eyes held a defensive, almost cynical look. Her voice had acquired an edge, but that she suffered deeply Jenny knew, though it was some days before the older girl would tell her what happened. When she did, it was one night in their bed, before they blew the candle out.

Evelyn suddenly sat bolt upright, clutching the blankets around her, and said sharply, “Would you like to see the letter my father wrote me about Wilfred?”

“Of course, Evie,” said Jenny. “I’ve been longing to know.”

Evelyn jumped from bed and unlocked her gilt jewelry box. She took out a letter and thrust it at Jenny; then she climbed back in bed and lay rigid, staring up at the tester.

Jenny held the letter near the candle and read, skipping some of the pompous phrases, as she grew more appalled at the content.

The letter was headed “To Amasia, July 20, 1723.”

Considering ye solemn promise you made me, first by word of mouth, & afterwards by letter, that you wou’d not from thence forth have any Converse of Correspondence with the Baronet, I am astonisht that you have violated that protestation in a most notorious manner. The gracious audience you gave him the morning you left ye Towne, & the open conversations you have with him in the Country have been too unguarded, to be deny’d any longer. Tis therefore high time for me to reproach you with breech of duty & breach of faith, & once more to repeat to you, my strict and positive Commands, never more to meet, speak or write to that Gentleman, or give him an opportunity to see speak or write to You. I also forbid you to enter into any promise or engagement with him of marriage or Inclination.

I enjoin you this in the most positive terms upon the sacred duty you owe a Parent. .. And that neither he nor you may be deluded afterwards with Vain hopes of forgiveness, I have put it out of my power, by vowing that I Never will.

Jenny made a shocked sound, and put her hand on Evelyn’s arm. The girl did not move, she said through clenched teeth, “Have you finished it?”

Jenny shook her head and returned to the letter.

And as to any Expectation you may fondly entertain of a Fortune from me, you are not to look for one brass farthing, if you provoke me by this fatal instance of disobedience.

Nay, beside all that I will avoid the sight of you as of a creature detested.

Figure then to yourself my Dear Child how wretched you will be with a provokt father, & a disappointed Husband. To whome will you fly in your distress, when all the world will upbraid you with haveing acted like an Ideot? . . . For God’s sake then my dear child, for my sake & for your own, survey the desperate Precipice you stand upon . . . The idle Promises this man makes you will all vanish into smoke, & instead of Love he will slight & abuse you, when he finds his hopes of Fortune disappointed. Then you & your children (if you shou’d be so miserable as to have any) must be Beggers, & then you may be assur’d all the world will deservedly dispise you, & you will hardly be pity’d so much as by Him who would faign continue -- &c.

Jenny put the letter on the table, her cheeks blazing. “It’s cruel!” she cried. “Cruel! I thought Mr. Byrd was fond of you!”

“He considers this a proof of fondness,” said Evelyn in a toneless voice. “He can make himself believe anything he wants to.”

“What are you going to do?” cried Jenny, flaming with sympathy.

“Nothing,” said Evelyn. “There’s nothing
to
do. He wrote an even worse letter to Wilfred, and made me read a copy. I’ve not heard since from Wilfred, and I believe he’s gone to Cumberland.”

“Oh Evelyn,” Jenny said shocked, her eyes widening, “you mean Sir Wilfred gave you up? Oh, that isn’t
worthy!”

“And when does one love a man, because he’s
worthy?”
said Evelyn.

Jenny was silenced, for she now knew that this was true.

“Wilfred loved me, he still does,” Evelyn continued in the toneless voice. “But he’s not a romantic fool, he has his career to think of, he’s not well off either. The dowry and inheritance Father always promised me would have been sufficient, Wilfred and I talked about it. But to marry a penniless Colonial whose father’s rage would be bruited all over a jeering London -- that’s another thing. And as for me --” she said suddenly turning and burying her face in the pillow, “perhaps I couldn’t stand to have my father view me as ‘a creature detested’ -- perhaps I couldn’t!”

She gave a shudder and began to weep quietly into the pillow. Jenny hugged her close, searching in vain for words of comfort. After a few minutes Evelyn raised her head. “I’ll love Wilfred ‘til the day I die. Father may think he’s won, but he hasn’t. For he’ll never be able to marry me off in accordance with his own stupid dreams, nor shall I ever in my deepest heart forgive him!”

THIRTEEN

On the morning of King George’s official birthday, May 28, 1725, Jenny joined Lady Betty Lee at breakfast, and exhibited such a serious face that Betty put down her chocolate cup, and said, “What’s the matter, dear? The doleful dumps?”

“I suppose so, my lady,” said the girl trying to smile. “It’s raining again,” she added inadequately. She curtsied to Lady Betty and nodded to the children, then seated herself and toyed with a rasher of bacon. She knew that the depression she had awakened with was not caused by the rain; it arose from a dream she had had last night. A dream about Rob Wilson in which she was blissfully lying in his arms on a bank of heather, while the sky above them shimmered gold and violet, and from somewhere came the music of the pipes playing a love song. She had awakened crying out “Robbie -- stay with me!” so vehemently that she frightened herself. What a stupid dream, when she seldom thought of Rob, and had received only one laconic note from him since their strained parting in Coquetdale nearly two years ago.

Betty had been studying the girl’s face across the table, and said, “Well, cheer up, Jenny, you’ve treats in store. A holiday for one!”

Betty’s little girls, Bess and Caroline, let out squeals of joy. They loved Jenny, who had now become their semi-governess, and toiled daily in the nursery to teach them reading, writing, and figuring, but on a holiday they could go to the kitchens, where Mrs. Prouty, the cook, let them mess about making sweets.

Harry, whose lessons with his Latin master were not affected by any maternally granted holiday, continued to eat stolidly.

“Jenny--” said Betty, “I’ve been thinking about you, how you have so few distractions, and that you’re fifteen now. I’m going to take you to the King’s Birthday Drawing Room today. You’re old enough to be presented.”

Jenny raised startled eyes. “Why, my lady,” she said. “Do you mean it? Why, I didn’t know
you
were going, you haven’t been out in so long.”

“I know,” Betty interrupted. “I’ve grown to be a dull dog. ‘Tis hard to be anything else without money. Yet it’s only right we pay respects to the King, who has himself shown some interest in my poor husband -- and the diversion will be good for both of us.”

Jenny’s spirits did rise, she gave Betty her singularly sweet smile, then she frowned. “But, my lady, I’ve nothing to wear that wouldn’t disgrace you, and you --” She stopped for fear of being rude.

Lady Betty had not bought a single new gown during the past year since Jenny had left school and come to live on George Street. True, Colonel Lee had partially recovered and held a small honorary Court appointment; he could walk a little, he could speak in a halting way, but he had not recouped his fortunes. The Lees lived on Lord Lichfield’s bounty, which had become smaller since the rebuilding of Ditchley Park, and the punctual production of heirs by the Catholic Lady Lichfield.

“I’ll wear my old yellow tabby,” said Betty, “and I’ve borrowed my Lady Palmerston’s diamond necklace, since she is ill and can’t attend, so I’ll be quite fine enough -- as for you, Jenny, I told you there were several treats in store!” Betty rose and opening a cupboard in the passageway reappeared with a rustling mass of rose over her arm. “Stand up,” she said. “Let’s see how it looks!”

It was some time before Jenny could believe that this beautiful gown was hers, a grown-up lady’s dress of rose taffeta, with lace ruffles and sapphire velvet bows, the full skirts spread over enormous hoops disclose a white satin petticoat, embroidered with forget-me-nots. There were brocaded slippers too. They had red heels and brilliant paste buckles.

Betty produced them with a conjurer’s flourish from behind her back.

“But
how?”
Jenny cried, smoothing the shining taffeta folds. “Lady Betty, you mustn’t give me anything like this!”

“I couldn’t, child,” said Betty, sighing. “Can’t you guess who sent it? It came from France,” she added as Jenny shook her head.

“Father?” whispered Jenny incredulously. From Charles she had not heard in nearly a year, not since he had married Lady Newburgh, and sent a hurried though affectionate letter enclosing a draft for ten pounds. After that her own little letters brought forth no reply, and the last ones came back “unclaimed.” Jenny had learned to live with this particular hurt, and was wise enough to know that Charles would always be immersed in whatever he was doing at the moment, and that for him it would be often a case of “out of sight, out of mind,” though she had felt forsaken all the same.

“There’s a letter,” said Betty, handing it to her, “brought by the same messenger who brought the dress.”

Jenny tore open the seal and saw her father’s sprawling, almost illegible hand. “My dear Jenny -- This gowne is to be fine in for your birthday I wish I c’ld see you in it, however [here a line was heavily crossed out] we are liveing near Paris, my lady expects a child soon, I do not wish to trouble her just now. If you write send to M. Jones, vis-a-vis La Fontaine de Carmelites, Rue et Fauxbourg St. Jacques -- my homages etc. to Lady B. Your affct. C.R.”