Rustication (29 page)

Wednesday 6
^th
of January, 10 o’clock.

A
fter an early breakfast I went straight out wearing walking-shoes. Climbed the tree and looked through the window and though the light was very dim, I thought I could make out shapes and shadows and believed I saw rugs on the floor and the silhouette of what might have been a divan or sopha. It is as I feared! The disgusting dissolute filthy rake! He has furnished a place to take her. And she. The shameless brazen creature. What does she hope to gain from this? How dare she take that tone of moral superiority towards me!

3 o’clock.

A real facer from the old biddy!

I showed Mother my letter to Uncle T—sealed so that she could not read it—and she was delighted. I took it to the shop and while I was consigning it to the care of Mrs Darnton, I took the opportunity to try out my theory. I asked:
Is anyone regularly handing in a bulky letter? One that is addressed to someone in Thurchester?

She glared at me and said:
I don’t believe you should be posing such a question, Master Shenstone. A body can have no honest reason for asking that
.

I had heard the shop-door open but had not turned around so I was astonished to hear Miss Bittlestone say behind me:
That’s quite unfair, Mrs Darnton. The young man is anxious to find out who is sending these horrible letters. As anxious as any of us
.

It made no difference to the Gorgon and I nodded my thanks to the old creature as I began to leave but she asked me to delay a moment until she had made her purchases. I waited outside and when she came out we began to walk slowly along the street.

I began to say:
I asked that question only because
. . .

She held up a hand and said:
You don’t have to explain anything. I don’t believe you are writing these wicked letters, Master Shenstone. It’s not in your character. You had the insight to see that Mrs Paytress was being wronged by our little society when many of us older heads were wrong
.

I thanked her and said that I had a theory about how the letters are contrived. I explained that I thought that someone living locally could write a hateful letter and then put it inside an envelope and send it to an acquaintance living in or near Thurchester to be posted there. And that second individual might not even have any idea that such letters were being received in this district.

She considered this in silence and then agreed with me that it seemed a possible explanation.

It seemed unfair that she had no idea why Mrs Quance had dropped her. And so in a few words I informed her of what Effie had done that had alienated Mrs Quance: She had recounted at the Greenacres’ dinner-party the story about the Quances told us by Miss Bittlestone. I stressed that she had done it quite without any malicious intention towards Miss Bittlestone. I suppose that is true in the sense that she was thinking only of the harm it would inflict on Mrs Quance.

She stopped walking to consider this piece of information. Then she turned to me and thanked me very graciously for having enlightened her. She heaved a great sigh and strode on saying:
How strange it is that I risked the anger of Mrs Quance by being neighbourly to your mother and sister when they came here, and now your sister’s actions have, quite innocently, exiled me from that lady’s favour
.

Why was Mrs Quance so ill-disposed toward them?

She turned to me in surprise:
Because of what had happened with Miss Whitaker-Smith
.

Maud? I don’t understand. I know that she and my sister and Enid Quance were all rivals for the hand of Mr Davenant Burgoyne. There was bad feeling between the families as a result
.

It was more than that. There was the business with that poor boy. And it has had such dreadful consequences
.

What boy?

She blushed.
I’ve said too much. I thought you must know and it’s not my place to talk about it if you don’t
.

I pressed her but she was adamant.

Rather clumsily changing the subject, she said she would like to do me a good turn as thanks for mine. To my surprise she asked if I was going to the ball on Saturday and when I gloomily confirmed it she smiled and said:
Most young persons find the prospect of a ball very exciting. When I was a girl I went to one once. My Mama’s cousin lent me the most beautiful dress of yellow taffeta and I danced with the same young man three times!

I saw a plain frumpy girl twenty-five years ago standing shyly in the corner of a ball-room wearing her best dress.
I was adored once too
.

Then she frowned and put her hand on my arm:
But I have an ominous feeling about this one. Some of the obscene letters have alluded to it and it strikes me that everyone addressed or mentioned in them is going to be present. I have a presentiment that I can’t justify logically that it is going to be the culminating point of this wicked campaign. There have been so many strange and menacing events and they seem in some inexplicable manner to be weaving you and Mr Davenant Burgoyne together in particular. You will both be at the ball and—call me a superstitious old fool if you like—I can’t help wondering if something is intended to happen that night
.

I laughed and asked:
Intended by whom?

She gazed into my face without speaking and at last she just said:
Be careful
.

We had reached the bottom of Brankston Hill and so we parted and I came home.

· · ·

I don’t see why I should tell Mother anything about Edmund. There are times when she seems like a stranger to me. Someone who might come up to me in the street and make some fearful demand. Why should I care what she thinks? And Euphemia has no claim on me at all after the way she has been behaving.

10 o’clock in the evening.

During dinner Euphemia suddenly asked:
What can this Mr Webster do if the money is not paid back? Is he angry because he blames you for his son’s death? Is it revenge he wants?

How did she know so much? Has she some unknown informant? She is right about his desire for revenge. Hateful, hateful man. He made his son’s life a misery and is now using his death to hound others. It was because Edmund loathed him that he suggested we take from him the only thing he cares about: money.

I kept silent and she said:
Since Edmund Webster was your friend, why didn’t he cancel your debt before he took his own life?
I just shook my head. Then she asked:
What was the poison?

Laudanum
, I had to say at last.

Opium and alcohol
, she murmured.

Seeing that I was going to say no more, she turned to Mother:
I don’t think Richard has told us the whole story
.

How dare she! What a hypocrite!

I said:
I don’t see what right you have to say that. What have you been getting up to? There’s an allegation in that letter. What truth is there in it?

She gasped.

(
You still get fucked by that ariggant brute
.)

Mother said:
That’s unforgivable, Richard
.

Thursday 7
^th
of January, 11 o’clock.

I
can’t imagine how I failed to see what a handsome creature that little governess is. It is no common “prettiness” that she has but a rare inner beauty that shines from her face.

Euphemia said at breakfast that she was going to Lady Terrewest this morning. Mother suggested that she and I accompany her some of the way. I agreed, just to show I don’t bear a grudge about last night.

At the top of Brankston Hill we ran straight into the entire Greenacre family—the parents striding along in front and behind them the little governess and all the children. We slowed down and prepared our social faces but Mr and Mrs Greenacre marched straight past as if they had not noticed us.

While the rest of the party walked on, the governess turned and let go the hand of the smallest child and ran back and grabbed me by the arm pulling me away from Mother and Effie who were ahead of me. In a hoarse whisper she said:
I don’t believe what is being said about you, Mr Shenstone
.

What is being said?
I demanded.

I saw that the little baggage—Amelia—had turned to watch us. She tugged her mother’s arm and Mrs Greenacre also looked round.

Helen gazed at me in surprise.
Everyone believes that you are writing those hateful letters and doing those terrible things at night
.

I must have stared at her like an idiot. Does
everyone
believe that? Not just Mrs Quance and Lucy’s parents?

Mrs Quance has received another letter and believes it was written by you because it makes the most dreadful threats against Mr Davenant Burgoyne. And the boy
.

I said:
What boy?

She did not answer and before I could ask her any more questions, she ran back to her party. Mrs Greenacre was still watching us.

Mother had at first strode on without noticing but Euphemia had turned round and looked at us and then touched Mother’s arm. She too stopped to watch my brief conversation with the girl.

So the whole district is convinced that I am a deranged monster! Everyone believes it: Enid and Guinevere, Mrs Darnton, Old Hannah. But not Miss Bittlestone! And not Lucy if she is the guilty person herself!

How can I clear my name? Only, I believe, by exposing the true perpetrator of these outrages and I believe I am close to that.

If Lucy is writing those foul letters and sending them to a friend in Thurchester to put in the post, that still leaves the question: Who is going around at night blinding cattle and stabbing pregnant horses? There is one obvious answer: Her father. I glimpsed the anger and cruelty of the man in that display of violence with the whip. I can’t imagine what their motive for doing these things can be, but I now believe that the allegation of a wicked relationship between them must be at the heart of it.

But what on earth could that charming girl have meant? What boy have I been accused of threatening and for what imaginable reason? Both Mother and Miss Bittlestone have mentioned some boy so are they all talking of the same one?

The little governess risked the wrath of her employers to warn me and that can only be because she loves me. How deeply, how profoundly gratifying it is that that little being, that pale-faced little creature, has faith in me. I value that a thousand times more than if some potentate of the hamlets like Mr Greenacre had assured me that he knows me to be innocent. I can’t imagine how I failed to see the girl’s beauty. Those lovely greyish-green eyes with their beguiling obliqueness of vision. That sweetly curved little mouth and the small chin. Very different from the brassy allure of a hussy like Lucy.

6 o’clock in the evening.

Mother came back full of the news from the village that Mrs Paytress’s house is being shut down and everything inside it removed. She said there were wagons and closed vans outside and men carrying carpets and furniture into them. The rumour is that Mrs Paytress’s creditors have sent in bailiffs and that her ostensible prosperity was a sham based on fraudulent credit. Euphemia failed to rise to her defence and I said nothing. But I don’t believe it.

10 o’clock in the evening.

At dinner Euphemia asked me:
What did that girl, that governess, have to say to you that was so secret? What have you been doing to her, Richard?

I said:
She had the decency to warn me that people think I am writing these filthy letters
.

Instead of expressing outrage at that, Mother said calmly:
I’ve heard that Mrs Quance has received another
.

I said:
And she is accusing me of having written it. Aren’t you indignant that people believe that, Mother?

She didn’t reply, but Euphemia said:
You haven’t explained why Mr Webster blames you for his son’s self-destruction
.

I was caught by surprise and foolishly I said:
It was your fault, Mother. You should have
written to me to say that Father had died
.
I was shown it in a newspaper. I was furious with Edmund about something and I was so upset that I didn’t think properly. I sent him a letter that I shouldn’t have
.

Euphemia said:
It drove him to take his own life?

I don’t know if he died on purpose or by accident. But the Dean found my letter lying beside him
.

Euphemia asked:
And what was in it that was so reprehensible that the College rusticated you?

I just told her it was the sort of letter you write to a friend when you think you’ve been badly treated. I suppose that’s more or less the truth.

· · ·

Mother went up to bed early and so I found myself alone with Effie. I said:
By questioning me about Cambridge you’ve broken your promise and so I am not bound by my undertaking and therefore I will not go to the ball
.

She said very calmly:
Richard, I’m not asking you to do it to please me but for Mother’s sake. She has set her heart on seeing me there. She wants to relive her own youth while she can
.

I said:
She doesn’t want to go to the ball. It’s you who are forcing her
.

She replied:
How little you understand Mother. How completely self-absorbed you are. I suppose you think her constant coughing is just because of a winter chill?

What do you mean?
I demanded.

Letting Mother see me at the ball is one of the few things left for you and me to do for her
.

I said:
I don’t know what you’re implying, but I’ve made up my mind. I’m not going
.

½ past midnight.

Extraordinary. Until about 11 o’clock I was reading in front of the dying fire after Mother and Effie had gone up. I was on my way to bed when I saw Betsy carrying a jug of hot water upstairs and remembered that Effie had asked her to make ready her bath. So I was astonished when, about five minutes later, Betsy tapped at my door and said my sister wanted to see me immediately.