Mistress of My Fate (25 page)
There she left me, paying me a nod and withdrawing with no more care for my concerns than any other stranger might have.
I lingered for a moment in confusion, looking about me for an answer which I knew I should not find there. I twisted my hands inside my muff, until a clear thought came to me.
I started back down the hill to Orchard Cottage in a fury, my pace matching the speed of my galloping mind. Now I was certain he had quit Herberton in a fit of anger, or else he would have left some instruction, some calming note to explain his absence. Oh friends, what panic came over me! I strode without care through the snow, tripping several times over the hem of my petticoat and upon the fur edge of my cloak. Were I so able, I might have run on all fours like a bolting horse back to the cottage! It is remarkable indeed how simple it is to shed one’s dignity in a time of trouble.
I had resolved to write to him, to beg his forgiveness, and by the time I had arrived at Orchard Cottage, I had already composed the letter in my head. I scrambled through the door and called for Bess to bring pen and paper. This she did, but as she conveyed it to me, I was distracted by something far more promising.
I own that at that moment, I was not entirely of a rational mind. I saw, amid the collection of items that my maid carried, a small purse containing coin for household expenses—postage and the like. My eyes fixed on it, the pieces bulging within either end.
“What amount is here?” I asked, reaching for it like a desperate beggar.
“One pound, fifteen shillings and threepence.”
I had no sooner clasped my hand around the knitted pouch and felt the weight of coin in my palm than I understood what peace of mind spending it would bring me. As much as I loathed the idea that I should embark upon another journey, I knew I should never have a night’s rest till I had seen Allenham’s face and, if necessary, thrown myself at his feet and cleansed them with my tears. This was all I required, this small sum to carry me to my beloved’s side.
I asked that Bess prepare us for a journey and collect for me a change of linens and my small things in a bundle, for I had not even a box with which to travel and, in my haste, I cared not for what items I brought. I wished only to set out as soon as I might in order to catch that day’s mail coach. I feared even then that I would be too late for it. I had not even paused to consider from where I might board the vehicle, or how to convey myself there.
“Lechlade, madam, at the Crown,” said Bess, who then set about arranging a cart to take me there.
It was near midday when the cart, which regularly ferried the servants into town, arrived for me. Bess watched it roll to a stop and lingered near the door sheepishly.
“I mean no disrespect, madam, but… there ain’t enough coin in that purse for two fares.”
I had not applied my mind to this, and indeed I felt as dim-witted as I had when I first climbed upon the mail coach at the White Hart.
“I have travelled unaccompanied before, Bess,” I announced, raising my head haughtily as if that admission should be some matter of pride for a genteelly bred young lady. “And I am to return shortly with his lordship.”
Her expression was unmoved by that pronouncement.
One never knows what servants think, or for that matter the nature of the secrets to which they are privy. As she dropped a curtsey at my departure, I believe she held an altogether different view as to what I might encounter and for how long I might be gone.
I had been too late for the mail, and therein lay my first misfortune. To make up the time I had lost, I boarded the stage—when it eventually made its appearance. My intention was to join the next day’s mail coach at Oxford, but the snow came so hard that day that the roads became impassable, and we were forced to weather the night at an inn not six miles short of my destination. So disappeared the day, for had I managed to depart from Lechlade upon the mail, I would have found myself in London in ten or twelve hours. So also diminished what little funds I possessed, and I felt again all the discomfort and dread I had known on my previous flight. I ordered refreshment, but could hardly touch it for my nerves. The road, too, caused me no end of sickness.
When at last I stepped into the mail’s carriage at Oxford, two days had passed since I had set out. “What folly was this!” I had now begun to chasten myself. Indeed, had I sent a letter it might have reached London long before me, and at far less expense. Each hour of delay spelled another hour in which my dear love thought ill of me. I could hardly tolerate it!
The mail shook us all night upon the road to London, entering it in the darkness of the morning hours, at that time when the night’s lamps had begun to burn out and sun had hardly reared its head. Beggars huddled beneath the bulks of shops, a shadowy, slumbering pile of bodies in the dirty snow. The criers were just emerging on to the streets with ballads and quinces, scissors and fish. Servants wrapped
against the chill skittered by in wooden pattens. The wheels of the mail slowly churned us through a paste of slush, straw, animal waste and mud. London had never before seemed a place of menace to me, and yet at this early hour, not quite eight o’clock, it appeared drab, washed with mud and soot. Its sounds were louder, the grins of the urchins wider and more sinister. As I alighted in the yard of the Swan with Two Necks, I could think of nothing but racing to Allenham, to Arlington Street in St. James’s, where I knew his warm, well-lit townhouse to be.
“Oh my love!” thought I, shivering with cold and anxiety. I imagined that I should find him there, still in his bed, that I should request his butler to rouse him, that I should wait impatiently for him in his drawing room, and that my beloved would appear, swathed in his wrapper, his hair undone. There would be a scene, I understood this. I should beg his forgiveness, throw myself upon my knees. I should weep piteously and declare my love for him, and swear I should do whatever penance he required of me to contradict the evils of my mistake. Then he would lift me from the floor and look upon me with grace. He would take me into his arms and heal my heart with kisses. That was how it would play out, I was certain of it.
For all the visits I had made to London, never before had I seen this strange corner of the city. The great dome of St. Paul’s rose from behind the inn, which was indeed the only sight I recognized. From where I stood, I had not the slightest inkling of how I might make my way to St. James’s. I enquired of a groom, who laughed insolently at my request for directions and said he would procure a hackney cab for me, for a sum. In the course of my travels, I had come to learn that a young lady unaccompanied attracted nothing but slights and insults. Her protectors are few, and those who come to her assistance more often than not wish to extract some other sort of fee for their kindness. You see, most understood that which I did not: a young lady who travels without a servant or a chaperone is no lady at all.
I presented the rogue with twopence for his trouble, which was half
the contents of my small purse, and he set off in search of a hackney cab. When at last one arrived, I eagerly climbed inside its curtained carriage. We had travelled no more than a few streets before the driver brought us to a stop at the mouth of a mews. I could not imagine what was the matter, until the man dismounted and came round to the window.
“St. James’s is a great distance from here,” spat the driver, his mouth nearly void of teeth. His gloves were black with filth, his red neckerchief as well. “I would have some of the fare now, if you please, miss.”
Startled, I felt for my purse. I did not recall such a thing happening when I travelled in a hackney cab with Lord or Lady Stavourley. Indeed, I never once saw coin exchanged at all. That was usually left to servants, but as I had no one to attend upon me, I was forced to partake in this ugly bit of commerce.
I swallowed. “What is the fare?”
“I should think, miss, that necklace you have about you should pay well enough for the distance covered.”
I reached up and felt the modest gold and pearl cross at my throat. It was but a small thing, the only jewels I ever received from my father.
“The eardrops too, miss,” said my driver, “for Arlington Street is a long ride from here.”
I was too cowed and inexperienced to do anything but hand them to the thieving swine. I was being robbed and did not even know it!
He climbed back aboard his box with my girlhood tokens in his grime-lined pocket and proceeded down Ludgate Hill, west. Although I was saddened by the loss of these objects, at that moment I would have given up any of my personal effects to arrive safely at Allenham’s door. Nothing I owned was of any consequence beside the possession of his good favour and love.
We continued through a knot of carriages and carts, down the Strand, where at last the scenery grew familiar, and then through the Haymarket into St. James’s Square. The streets offered the comfortable spectacle of home: the drapers, the booksellers, the vintners, the large bowed shop
fronts I had known and, indeed, that I had not seen since this summer past. All the while my heart raced at our anticipated reunion.
Although I had never before seen his lordship’s London residence, I knew the address from his correspondence. We had hardly rounded the corner from St. James’s Street when I rose to my feet within the carriage and directed that robbing devil to stop. Gathering my skirts and cloak into one hand and my bundle under the other, I sprang from the cabin, not wishing to waste so much as another moment.
Allenham’s broad townhouse, at 5 Arlington Street, stood before me. The lantern outside had only just been extinguished, and the faint, telling glimmer of occupation could be seen through the fanlight above the door. I could hardly breathe as I came up the steps and drew the brass knocker down.
I heard the calm approach of footsteps against the floor. My throat was tight, my hands clenched within Allenham’s muff.
“I should like to pay a call on his lordship,” I stated with a quiver in my voice.
The butler, dressed in a green and grey livery, stood before me. His face was as impassive as stone.
“His lordship is not at home.”
“But I know him to be,” I stated with determination. “I was informed by his housekeeper at Herberton that he is in London.”
The servant looked beyond me into the road.
“I am afraid his lordship is not at home.”
“Please inform him that Miss Lightfoot wishes to call upon him.” I was now shaking a good deal. “It is a matter… of urgency.”
“I am afraid I cannot inform him, miss, for he is not here.”
“But when… when will he return?”
“I am not at liberty to reveal that.”
“I pray, sir,” I now began to beg, “it is of great importance that I should see him. I shall wait until he returns, if you permit me… I…”
“I am under express orders to admit no one, miss.”
“Whose orders?” I demanded. “Who ordered that?”
The butler declined to answer. The dramatic tenor of my voice was now beginning to draw the curiosity of the house’s other servants. In the corridor behind him, I noticed that a freckle-faced maid had stopped to listen.
I felt as if I might choke. My tone became even more desperate.
“I beg of you, sir, I have travelled a great distance at tremendous expense. If he is not here… if you will be so kind as to inform me where he may be found…?”
“This I cannot reveal, miss,” he reiterated. There was no sympathy in his expression. No care whatsoever.
“Is there no note for me here? No instructions addressed to Miss Lightfoot from his lordship?” I trembled.
“None, I am afraid.”
“Dear God!” I exclaimed as my words gave way to sobs. I held my hand to my face in distress. “I beg of you, sir…” I wept. So stunned was I by this turn of events that those were the only words I could utter. I repeated them again and again, yet they and my agony failed to soften this wooden man’s resolve.
“My apologies, miss,” said he at last, before he pressed the door shut against me.
I stared at the black door in disbelief. Surely, surely there had been some error? My beloved Allenham, my angel, my protector, the husband who had pledged himself to me, would never have turned me out. I could not grasp it. Or perhaps the situation was truly as the butler described it, and my lover was not at home and nowhere to be found.
At that moment, I turned my back on the door, and fairly fell down the steps. So dismayed and confounded was I that I believed I might collapse. I steadied myself against the railing as my stomach heaved forward, and I spilled what little contents were in it upon the snowcovered street. The violent motion came again and again, as if my soul were purging the last of its hope.
When I had finished, my cheeks felt as cold inside as they were without. My brow was beaded with sweat. I looked up and back at the house. I might have noticed before that the shutters were drawn against the windows, so that it appeared unoccupied. I did not know what to make of this, or of anything. I own that I could hardly form a thought. I had not figured on this setback, nor could I imagine beyond this calamity as to what I should do next, or whom I should call upon for assistance. “Perhaps I should linger here, near the house, to see if he returns,” I reasoned, but already my feet were moving and carrying me elsewhere. I was in a fog. I stumbled, moving this way and that. I stepped out on to the thoroughfare of Piccadilly and looked with blind eyes at the carriages, chaises, horses, the coloured clothing, the mix of hats. My ears were deaf to the roll of noise, the brays of animals, the calls of vendors. Indeed I was nearly had by a man in a phaeton. His team reared and he shouted at me, but I heard none of his curses.
I walked as if in a dream, I do not know where, towards Berkeley Square at first, until I could see my father’s house in the far corner. It too was shut up—and even if it were not, it would be to me, for I could never again repair there. I had fled. I had left my father’s protection for that of a clandestine amour: my sister’s fiancé, my sister whom the whole of Melmouth believed me to have murdered for love.
