The Widow's Confession (33 page)

Delphine looked at him coolly.

‘I wish I did know your story,’ he said. ‘I will not harm you, for not telling me. I am only trying to get your attention, to make you see the truth. For all my courting of
convention, the truth is I will never be accepted, not really. When I went to the Royal Academy, saw all the grand gentlemen grouped together – did you believe that was easy? You think me a
proper swell now, don’t you? Easy in my words and manners. But then it was forced. And the real Ralph Benedict remains within me – an outsider, like you. I am sorry for wounding you. My
darling!’

A child had come barrelling out of the group, a little girl in a white dress, running at him, her arms outstretched. Mr Benedict caught her up and swung her around. They were both laughing, and
Delphine saw that some of the onlookers thought them vulgar.

‘This is my best girl,’ said Mr Benedict to Delphine. ‘This is my Daisy. Does she not look like her mother?’

Delphine managed a weak smile for the little girl. ‘She does,’ she said. And Daisy smiled at her with perfect confidence, utterly secure in her father’s arms.

Only a week before, Mr Benedict told them, the boatmen had been dragging in the carcasses of over a hundred dead sheep, drowned in a wreck, for which they had the right of
salvage. But now such a scene was unimaginable, the sea glittering with sunlight as the boats bobbed in the harbour, the boatmen brown-faced and smart in their best clothes. There was the smell of
burnt sugar and the salty sea breeze; there was colour all around, and talk of fireworks, later.

The group took lemonade on the harbour arm, a long, picturesque walk built of grey stone, and when Julia tucked her hand in the crook of her cousin’s arm and bade her stop, Delphine framed
the view with her hand. ‘It is so beautiful,’ she said, ‘but I will not be sorry to leave, I admit. And neither will you, my dear – for you have your new life ahead of
you.’

She could see Julia’s pensive expression beneath her veil, and continued, wanting to rouse her into happiness. ‘I am so glad for you,’ she said. ‘I cannot tell you how
full my heart is at the thought that you have found joy. You should never think otherwise, you know. I am truly happy for you.’

‘I must ask something of you,’ said Julia, so softly that her words were almost carried away by the sea breeze.

‘Anything,’ said Delphine, savouring the bitter sweetness of the lemonade on her tongue.

‘That you listen to what I have to say, and once I have said it, you let me return to Mr Steele’s table; and that you will think on what I have said before you make any judgement,
for it will have a bearing on our future relations with each other,’ said Julia.

The smile faded a little on Delphine’s face.

‘I did not wish to spoil today,’ said Julia, ‘but I cannot bear to speak to you in the cottage, where we have been so happy in our quiet moments together, and I have, for
weeks, been trying to find a way to tell you what I have to say. I have spoken to Mr Steele of it, and he agrees with me that I can only begin my new life with my old one quite clear of all its
debts. I have lived in the shadow of this too long. Now I must speak to you, before my courage fails me.’

She tugged on Delphine’s arm and led her a little way from the group, to a bench where they sat down together. Julia pulled the veil back from her face. She was wearing lilac, a colour
that usually suited her and brought out her golden hair and blue eyes, but today it made her look drawn and ill, her pallor alarming once the veil had been lifted. Delphine almost exclaimed at it,
but something in her cousin’s expression stopped her.

‘You used to ask me why I travelled with you,’ Julia said. ‘In truth, it was not because I was bored of life as a New York old maid, nor was I merely being dutiful to my
parents. You said – when you were disgraced in New York, that night – you thought it was one of your parents’ enemies who saw you speaking with that man, from their carriage, and
spread the gossip. The truth is, it was not. It was me.’

Delphine let go of Julia’s gloved hands. Julia continued, the words crowding from her lips.

‘I had been to the theatre with Aunt Rose and I saw you from the window of her carriage, walking alone with Mr Clare. I told Mrs Moulin, the next day, when I visited her for tea, knowing
full well that it would damage you.’ Her voice failed; she put one hand over her mouth, as though to stifle a sob. ‘I am sorry,’ she whispered.

Delphine kept her gaze on the wooden slats of the bench. She felt sweat glisten on the back of her legs; it had only been a few moments, but now the sun seemed unbearably hot, the contrast of
the cold sea breeze sickening to her, as though the juxtaposition of heat and cold had been designed to torture her.

‘Why?’ she said.

Julia took a breath, a deep, conscious breath, as though she wished to take in enough air to say all of her words in one go. ‘I was jealous of you. You were fêted your whole life,
sure to make one of the finest matches. Beautiful, elegant, clever. Thoughtless. And you had him – Edward Clare – hanging from your every word. I told you once I had known someone I
thought I could marry. It was him. I would watch him at the parties and breakfasts; handsome, gifted, so full of confidence in the world. If I had the love of such a man, I thought it would save
me. But he wanted you.

‘So I told Mrs Moulin when I took tea with her the next day, and made her swear never to tell it was me. But even as I walked out of her house, I regretted it. There was no taking it back,
however. I would ask you to believe me when I say that I had no real idea of how bad it would be; how comprehensively you would be disgraced. I did not know that Clare would turn against you,
too.’

‘I rejected him that night,’ said Delphine.

‘I know,’ said Julia.

‘That is why he said what he did. Telling our family that I had asked for the meeting, that I had begged for an elopement. And the gossip spread fast; the number of callers dwindled to
nothing. My mother would sit and wait, the tea-table set, and no one would come. Father kept himself to the office, but our grandfather – he could not look at me; he would not listen. He said
that I had disgraced the family, that it would have been better if I had died.’

‘I know,’ Julia said again.

‘Of course you do,’ said Delphine. ‘Because I have told you it again and again as we travelled – on mountain ranges, high seas, across continents – and yet you
never thought to say – to mention – that you helped to destroy my life?’

‘I truly did not know what the consequences would be,’ said Julia, her voice wavering a little. ‘There was a whole storehouse of jealousy towards you in our New York circle
which was waiting to be ignited like gunpowder. A woman can be clever, or elegant, or beautiful: she cannot be all three. And you were; you were. I made a mistake that could never be undone. When
you made arrangements to go, when that became necessary, I knew then that I should go with you, to serve you and protect you as best I could. I owed you that.’

Delphine raised her hand to silence her. She felt numb, and was grateful for it. The two women sat in silence, side by side, the whole world of the seaside moving around them, the sights and
smells and sounds a world away from where they were in their minds; the large rooms of a New York mansion.

After a few moments, Delphine could bear it no more. ‘Please go,’ she said.

‘I am sorry,’ said Julia. She leaned over and kissed Delphine lightly on the cheek. Then she quietly rose, flattened down her skirts and walked back to where Edmund Steele was
sitting, watching them.

That afternoon, the hovellers raced each other in their luggers, in a sailing match that was watched with much joy by the spectators, excepting Delphine, who managed to keep
herself a little way apart from them. Whenever Alba tapped her, and pointed out one of the boats – ‘Look, Mrs Beck, it’s the
Petrel
from Broadstairs!’ – she
would nod, and she soon learned that was enough to satisfy Alba, or anyone else who spoke. Julia kept away, leaning on Mr Steele’s arm, and if Delphine ever looked, she saw that her
cousin’s head was lowered and her gaze bent downwards, so different from her normal, graceful carriage.

The boats were abreast for many miles, so that the crowd whipped itself up into a high pitch of excitement – those who cared, who were not looking about for different entertainment –
and Mr Benedict remarked that the Broadstairs hovellers were doing so well on account of all the butter they had salvaged from another recent wreck, earning a reproving look from his wife. In the
end the
Petrel,
sailed by Joseph Miller, came third and the
Fame
came fifth, its yellow flag fluttering in the wind.

As the cheers rose in the crowd, Delphine walked away, weaving through some of those standing at the harbour-side, and found a bench where there was a space to sit down. Her head was weighted
with a heavy ache, as though the air itself was pressing down on her skull. She tried not to draw attention to herself but sat upright, with a fixed expression, attempting to look pleased at the
outcome of the race. After a moment the pain was too much and she pressed her fingers to her brow. When she looked up, Theo was standing there, having emerged from the crowd. He looked awkward,
leaning on his stick, as though he was actively thinking how to stand. ‘Miss Alba said you looked unwell,’ he announced, a little too loudly and formally. ‘But she wanted you to
know the
Little Western
will be arriving soon.’

‘You may go back to the group,’ she said. She glanced at the couple next to her on the bench – a gaily dressed local girl with her swain. They had been laughing and talking
about the race, but Theo’s appearance had silenced them.

‘Go,’ repeated Delphine. ‘I will return directly.’ She made to rise, and he looked as though he might turn away, when there was an immense noise – the firing of one
of the cannons on the harbour. It drew cries of delight from the crowds, but neither Delphine nor Theo acted so. She flinched, violently, and sat back down suddenly on the bench, overwhelmed with a
burst of pain in her head, and he moved to her side in a moment, dropping his cane as he did so. The girl and her swain giggled, glancing at each other.

‘Are you ill?’ He did not pick up the cane, only stood over her, his shadow over the back of her neck. ‘Mrs Beck?’ he said hesitantly. Delphine, sheltering her face with
her hands, did not see his hand rise, then fall away without touching her shoulder.

She did not look up at him. ‘Do not speak to me as though you are making a recitation. I have a headache, and if you come here to be Alba’s envoy I would rather you did not come to
me at all.’

He moved closer to her, crouched down so when she looked up, his face was improperly close, his eyes level with hers. She met his gaze; breathed in sharply, as though in pain. He could not stop
himself; he reached out and took her hand. His skin was cool, hers burning hot. ‘What is wrong?’ he said, his voice so low only she could hear. ‘Tell me.’

She looked at him. ‘I do not want to see the ship,’ she said. ‘I sailed here from New York on the
Great Western
.’ She saw her distress mirrored in his eyes. She
did not take her hand from his, nor could she explain the magnitude of the memory, emphasized by Julia’s words. ‘It took fourteen days,’ she whispered, and a single tear fell from
her lashes.

‘Don’t lose your cane, Vicar,’ dared the girl beside Delphine. Theo shook his head, as though batting away an irritant, his eyes never leaving Delphine’s face.

There was the distant sound of a ship’s horn; the bubbling excitement of the crowd rose. The cry went up: ‘It’s the
Little Western
!’ and the girl beside Delphine
stood up, pulling at her man’s arm.

‘I’d kiss her, if I were you,’ called the man over his shoulder to Theo as he was led away, and Delphine heard the burst of their laughter as they merged into the crowd. She
leaned back on the bench and looked up at Theo, for he had stood up again at the man’s words, and picked his cane up from the ground.

‘You wouldn’t dare, would you?’ she said, and she felt the sickly smile cross her face.

He did not look at her as he replied. ‘If I began,’ he said, ‘I would not be able to stop. I do not know what would become of us.’

There was no time to say any more. Alba was coming for him, wanting to bring him to the edge of the harbour so that dear Mr Hallam might see the arrival of the
Little Western,
belonging
to the General Steam Navigation Company. He went with her, Delphine following at a few steps’ distance, and Alba, with a touch of pique in her voice, described how it had sailed from London,
its decks laden with passengers and its colours flying. Salutes were fired, the great roar of gunfire thrilling the crowd.

Standing near Theo, Alba and Miss Waring, Delphine saw Alba tilt her head and smile at Theo. ‘There will be fireworks this evening,’ she said. ‘I am so excited.’

Delphine could not bring herself to speak to anyone, to keep up the pretence of good manners any more. She prayed only that she could stay, standing upright, and that the day would soon be
over.

I was unprepared for betrayal when it came, on that summer afternoon. I could have heard dark words from anyone and brushed them away – apart from she who said them.
Julia, my poor Julia, carrying the weight of her guilt all those years, the knowledge that she had set fire to my life and watched it burn. As I moved through the crowds, I thought of Amy Phelps
and Catherine Walters, their bodies washed clean by the sea, and I wondered if they had fought, as Bessie Dalton did, as Martha’s eldest niece surely did. When I saw a woman in a veil I would
examine her closely, but no one looked as though they could kill. Then I realized how hopeless it all was. Because, for those ten years we had travelled, when I looked at Julia I had seen only
innocence.

We write stories for other people and yet we are blind to the truth until it hits us, as suddenly as a stranger’s hand on our neck, pushing us into dark water, holding our heads under
until we are finally free from the reach of cruelty.