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Summer Fair
This story was written for Helen Hollick's Advent series Diamond Tales—The Story Behind The Song
See if you can guess the song.
“I met him, you know.”
“You did what, Oma?” Anna asked incredulously.
Her grandmother smiled and paused the film. “It’s true. In 1959 at the Johanneskirmes, one of the biggest summer fairs in Hesse. People came from miles around, including lots of G.Is from the American barracks, all eager to talk to the Fräuleins.
"My friend Christa and I were both seventeen and had just finished our first year at Commercial College. Next year we would qualify as secretaries. We both had new dresses—hers was pink and mine blue—with white polka dots and white belts, collars and cuffs. We had stiffened our slips with sugar water to support the full skirts—oh, we thought we were the bee’s knees!
“The Amis were very different to the German boys we knew from school and dancing class. They were older, very smart in their dress uniforms and smelled of American cigarettes, spearmint chewing gum and the colognes and pomades they used on their close-shaven cheeks and short hair. They didn’t ask if they might accompany us, but walked beside us, with smiles and “Hi, Fräuleins”, and sort of drifted in among us girls so that before we knew it, we had split up into couples. By the time we reached the fairground, we were a group of twelve—six German girls and six Amis.
“My G.I. was called Hank; he was blonde with broad shoulders, blue eyes and a crooked smile and spoke with a sexy drawl. You could imagine him as a cowboy in a movie. He knew some German—his grandparents were from Germany—and I had worked hard at my English so we could talk together better than most of the other couples.
“As we neared the fairgrounds we could hear the oompah-pah-pah of the brass band and girls shrieking as their boys tugged hard on the ropes so that the swing-boats went right up to the bar. And then there was that fairground smell--Bratwurst, candyfloss, sizzling potato cakes, burnt almonds and sweet fried dough, all mixed with the oily smell of hot engines and the heavy scent of the linden trees that shaded one end of the grounds. Even today, when I smell it I am seventeen again.
“We strolled through the lanes between the booths, talking and laughing. We stopped to watch a puppet show—the Amis laughed as much as the children at the antics of Kasperle and his crew. Of course, they had to have a go at the shooting-stand. They didn’t do too badly, but then Ilse came up and beat them all. They couldn’t believe it. She won a teddy-bear which she insisted on presenting to her G.I., just the way a boy would give his prize to a girl. So he had to carry it the whole time.
“We tried the chair-o’-planes and the swing-boats, and then we all got into the bumper cars and whizzed around the floor, crashing into each other until we were dizzy and our throats dry from screaming. As soon as we stopped, we headed to the tables and benches near the bandstand for an apple spritzer or a beer. I felt so grown-up. It was the first time I had been allowed stay so late. Other years I had to go home once the afternoon band stopped playing.
“I was mortified when Willi got up on the stage. He wasn’t a bad singer, but so old-fashioned. The Amis seemed to like our folk songs though, and clapped and hummed along with everyone else. Willi’s last song was ‘Muss i denn, muss i denn zum Städele hinaus?
“‘What language was that?” Hank asked afterwards. ‘I couldn’t understand a word.’
“‘It’s Swabian dialect’, I told him. ‘An apprentice has passed his journeyman exams and now must leave town to work elsewhere for a year. He is saying goodbye to his sweetheart, promising to remain true to her. They’ll marry if she still loves him when he returns.’
“‘Like us,” one of the G.Is said. “Do you know it? Sing it again.’
“So we girls sang and they hummed along. The second time, they made a stab at the chorus. It was a real tongue twister for them and the people around us laughed, but not unkindly.
“Let’s try that caterpillar ride,” one of the boys said suddenly. So off we went. I was a little nervous because, well, when the hood closed over the little carriages—”
“Hank might kiss you,” her granddaughter offered. “Was it your first kiss, Oma?”
“Ja. He was nice—didn’t try to maul me or anything like that. Afterwards, he bought me a gingerbread heart on a ribbon to hang around my neck. Then the dance music started. They weren’t all used to our sort of dancing—there was no swing or rock and roll, but they soon got the hang of it. Hank was a good dancer, he held you properly, not too tight but firm enough that it was easy to follow him. It grew dark, and strings of lanterns were lit. I didn’t want the evening to end, but I had to be home by midnight and the boys had to be back at the base by then too. So, about a quarter-past-eleven, Christa and her G.I. and Hank and I took a cab to our home—it wasn’t very far but too far for them to walk us home before heading for the base. Christa’s boy started to hum ‘Muss i denn”, and we all joined in.
“They saw us to the door. There was just time for another quick kiss before my father opened it. They said ‘auf Wiedersehen’ and the night was over.”
“And that,” Anna’s grandmother said as she picked up the remote again, “is how Christa Hartmann and I taught your grandfather and Elvis Presley the melody and chorus of Wooden Heart.”
© Catherine Kullmann, 2018
This story is completely fictional, as are the characters except for Elvis himself. He was stationed in Germany between October 1958 and March 1960 during his military service. The melody and original, German chorus of Muss i denn, muss i denn zum Städele hinaus? were used for the song Wooden Heart in the 1960 film G. I. Blues.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=05ZgyoZvhgI Clip from G.I. Blues
See if you can guess the song.
“I met him, you know.”
“You did what, Oma?” Anna asked incredulously.
Her grandmother smiled and paused the film. “It’s true. In 1959 at the Johanneskirmes, one of the biggest summer fairs in Hesse. People came from miles around, including lots of G.Is from the American barracks, all eager to talk to the Fräuleins.
"My friend Christa and I were both seventeen and had just finished our first year at Commercial College. Next year we would qualify as secretaries. We both had new dresses—hers was pink and mine blue—with white polka dots and white belts, collars and cuffs. We had stiffened our slips with sugar water to support the full skirts—oh, we thought we were the bee’s knees!
“The Amis were very different to the German boys we knew from school and dancing class. They were older, very smart in their dress uniforms and smelled of American cigarettes, spearmint chewing gum and the colognes and pomades they used on their close-shaven cheeks and short hair. They didn’t ask if they might accompany us, but walked beside us, with smiles and “Hi, Fräuleins”, and sort of drifted in among us girls so that before we knew it, we had split up into couples. By the time we reached the fairground, we were a group of twelve—six German girls and six Amis.
“My G.I. was called Hank; he was blonde with broad shoulders, blue eyes and a crooked smile and spoke with a sexy drawl. You could imagine him as a cowboy in a movie. He knew some German—his grandparents were from Germany—and I had worked hard at my English so we could talk together better than most of the other couples.
“As we neared the fairgrounds we could hear the oompah-pah-pah of the brass band and girls shrieking as their boys tugged hard on the ropes so that the swing-boats went right up to the bar. And then there was that fairground smell--Bratwurst, candyfloss, sizzling potato cakes, burnt almonds and sweet fried dough, all mixed with the oily smell of hot engines and the heavy scent of the linden trees that shaded one end of the grounds. Even today, when I smell it I am seventeen again.
“We strolled through the lanes between the booths, talking and laughing. We stopped to watch a puppet show—the Amis laughed as much as the children at the antics of Kasperle and his crew. Of course, they had to have a go at the shooting-stand. They didn’t do too badly, but then Ilse came up and beat them all. They couldn’t believe it. She won a teddy-bear which she insisted on presenting to her G.I., just the way a boy would give his prize to a girl. So he had to carry it the whole time.
“We tried the chair-o’-planes and the swing-boats, and then we all got into the bumper cars and whizzed around the floor, crashing into each other until we were dizzy and our throats dry from screaming. As soon as we stopped, we headed to the tables and benches near the bandstand for an apple spritzer or a beer. I felt so grown-up. It was the first time I had been allowed stay so late. Other years I had to go home once the afternoon band stopped playing.
“I was mortified when Willi got up on the stage. He wasn’t a bad singer, but so old-fashioned. The Amis seemed to like our folk songs though, and clapped and hummed along with everyone else. Willi’s last song was ‘Muss i denn, muss i denn zum Städele hinaus?
“‘What language was that?” Hank asked afterwards. ‘I couldn’t understand a word.’
“‘It’s Swabian dialect’, I told him. ‘An apprentice has passed his journeyman exams and now must leave town to work elsewhere for a year. He is saying goodbye to his sweetheart, promising to remain true to her. They’ll marry if she still loves him when he returns.’
“‘Like us,” one of the G.Is said. “Do you know it? Sing it again.’
“So we girls sang and they hummed along. The second time, they made a stab at the chorus. It was a real tongue twister for them and the people around us laughed, but not unkindly.
“Let’s try that caterpillar ride,” one of the boys said suddenly. So off we went. I was a little nervous because, well, when the hood closed over the little carriages—”
“Hank might kiss you,” her granddaughter offered. “Was it your first kiss, Oma?”
“Ja. He was nice—didn’t try to maul me or anything like that. Afterwards, he bought me a gingerbread heart on a ribbon to hang around my neck. Then the dance music started. They weren’t all used to our sort of dancing—there was no swing or rock and roll, but they soon got the hang of it. Hank was a good dancer, he held you properly, not too tight but firm enough that it was easy to follow him. It grew dark, and strings of lanterns were lit. I didn’t want the evening to end, but I had to be home by midnight and the boys had to be back at the base by then too. So, about a quarter-past-eleven, Christa and her G.I. and Hank and I took a cab to our home—it wasn’t very far but too far for them to walk us home before heading for the base. Christa’s boy started to hum ‘Muss i denn”, and we all joined in.
“They saw us to the door. There was just time for another quick kiss before my father opened it. They said ‘auf Wiedersehen’ and the night was over.”
“And that,” Anna’s grandmother said as she picked up the remote again, “is how Christa Hartmann and I taught your grandfather and Elvis Presley the melody and chorus of Wooden Heart.”
© Catherine Kullmann, 2018
This story is completely fictional, as are the characters except for Elvis himself. He was stationed in Germany between October 1958 and March 1960 during his military service. The melody and original, German chorus of Muss i denn, muss i denn zum Städele hinaus? were used for the song Wooden Heart in the 1960 film G. I. Blues.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=05ZgyoZvhgI Clip from G.I. Blues
Twelfth Night at Malvin Abbey
A Perception & Illusion Intermezzo
Catherine Kullmann
!!!CONTAINS SPOILERS!!!
This episode was deleted from the original draft of Perception & Illusion. It takes place between Chapter Twenty-Eight and the Finale of P&I and, I repeat, contains massive spoilers. I strongly advise you to read Perception & Illusion first.
If you have already read P&I, and enjoy revisiting the characters and learning more about ‘what happened next’, this is for you.
Catherine Kullmann
January 2021
A Perception & Illusion Intermezzo
Catherine Kullmann
!!!CONTAINS SPOILERS!!!
This episode was deleted from the original draft of Perception & Illusion. It takes place between Chapter Twenty-Eight and the Finale of P&I and, I repeat, contains massive spoilers. I strongly advise you to read Perception & Illusion first.
If you have already read P&I, and enjoy revisiting the characters and learning more about ‘what happened next’, this is for you.
Catherine Kullmann
January 2021
Chapter One
Tamm, December 1814
“Clarissa has invited us to Malvin Abbey for Twelfth Night,” Hugo said. “What do you think, Lallie? Would it be too much for you?”
Lallie Tamrisk shook her head. “From what I understand, at six months, one is still quite comfortable. It must depend on the weather, of course, but she will know that. Do you wish to go?”
He handed her his sister’s letter. “She writes she is very anxious to welcome us to Malvin now that they have returned from Brussels, but—”
“Don’t you wish to go?”
“Yes. No. I don’t know.”
Lallie eyed her husband who had lost his usual composure at the thought of seeing his eldest sister again. “You parted in Brussels on very bad terms. I thought you had resolved your differences after she sent you that very handsome apology, but you seem still to harbour some resentment—or reservations, at least?”
He shrugged. “Sometimes I think I owe her an apology—not for what I said, but how I said it.”
“I doubt if she expects one. If you had not spoken so forcefully, she might not have been compelled to reconsider her treatment of you. But I think we should go, Hugo. It will be good for both of you to meet on more amicable terms. Besides, I should like to see them all again, and the Halworths too. It will be my last opportunity to get away from Tamm for some months.”
“Very well. We’ll go, weather and your health permitting. Clarissa will understand when I tell her you are increasing.”
She looked up from his sister’s letter. “There is to be a fancy-dress ball at Malvin. I must talk to Nancy about a costume.”
“Nancy thinks I should be able to do something with the Grecian dress,” Lallie told her husband later that day.
Hugo jerked upright from his relaxed sprawl beside the music room fire. “Clio’s dress?”
Before he could say anything more, Lallie rushed on. “The fabric is very finely pleated; there are yards and yards of it, held in place with cords. If they were not so tight, and knotted more under my breast than at my waist—oh, it might be easier to show you.”
She disappeared. leaving Hugo to gaze after her, wondering how the devil he was to extricate himself from this trap. He had bitten back an instinctive and incisive “absolutely not; I forbid it,” but still felt that the gown was anything other than proper.
With a mental appeal to the heavens for inspiration, he followed her over to their bedroom, where, Nancy in attendance, she was experimenting with different ways of catching the gown with the cords.
“You’d get away with it now, Miss Lallie,” Nancy said, “but there’s no doubt you’ll be showing more in six weeks’ time. Are you going to wear the mask as well?”
“No, nor the wig,” Lallie answered, to her husband’s relief. “They’re hot and uncomfortable. I thought we could contrive a Grecian style for my hair.”
“I can let out the seams – we could even insert a contrasting colour at the sides, and it drapes nicely at the breast. But won’t it be too cold in January? You’ll need some sort of shawl.”
Lallie turned to see the back of the gown in the mirror and noticed her husband leaning against the doorframe. “What do you think?” She revolved slowly in front of him.
She looked delectable, but to his faint regret, without the other accoutrements of Clio’s costume, the gown didn’t evoke his mysterious muse of Burlington House. “If you only wear the gown, I don’t think anyone will connect you with Clio, especially if you eschew that white paint.”
Lallie shuddered. “Dreadful stuff! It took so long to get it off the last time.”
"Nancy is right—you will need a shawl. Malvin can be draughty. Wait here–I won’t be long.” He left the room and soon returned bearing two large portfolios. “I don’t think I’ve even shown you these; I purchased them in Rome – they are depictions of antique vases and marbles.” He started to leaf through the first one. “There was one statue in particular from Herculaneum—of Athena. She’s wearing a loose over-garment. Could you contrive something of that sort? It need not be white, they used quite strong colours as well.”
Lallie scrutinised the engraving. “I like the way the tunic is cut. It reaches to the knee on the one side but only below the hip on the other. That slit on the long side would make it easy to move.”
“The pleats and upside-down vee at the waist would make it drape flatteringly over the babe,” Nancy said.
“I wonder could one adapt the idea for an overdress for every day,” Lallie said. “It would be more becoming and comfortable in the final months of a confinement than a short, tight spencer.”
“I don’t see why not, Miss Lallie,” Nancy said. “I’ll tack something together so that we can try the effect.”
Lallie shot her husband a teasing smile. “Everyone will be trying to find out the name of my new modiste. But help me out of this now, Nancy, it’s almost time to go down for dinner.”
Lallie watched appreciatively as Hugo took off his dressing-gown and got into bed beside her. “What will you wear on Twelfth Night? The dreary domino that gentlemen tend to fall back on?”.
“I suppose so. Though they are deuced uncomfortable.”
“It’s not a masquerade, but fancy dress. You could complement me and wear something from the antique world, a toga perhaps or just a tunic and cloak. We might get some ideas from your books of engravings.”
His look of horror was too much for her and she collapsed laughing against her pillows as he said firmly “I refuse even to consider any costume that requires me to bare my legs in society.”
“I have always thought them very well-shaped legs,” she murmured, turning on her side to face him and running her hand over his hip and down his thigh as she spoke.”
“Do you? Such approbation is praise indeed. Now, if you were to move your hand a little more—just there—I should feel doubly appreciated.”
“Mmm, aren’t there some portraits of your ancestors whose garments accentuate this part of the body? I seem to remember seeing a likeness of Henry VIII as well that emphasized his—manliness. Do you mean you would prefer such a costume?”
“Wear a codpiece? You little minx!”
She measured him with her hand. “It would have to be very large, of course.”
“I see I shall have to stop thy mouth,” he groaned and rolled over to kiss her deeply while at the same time settling himself between her legs. She raised her knees and clasped him with her thighs while her arms held him close.
Now they moved together to the oldest of rhythms. Not two but one, Lallie thought, as a wave carried her upwards towards a starburst of sensation that held her suspended for long moments before disintegrating into a shower of sparks. Like fireworks over the sea, she thought languidly, smiling as she met her husband’s eyes and raised her hand to brush his hair back from his forehead. He bent his head to kiss her tenderly before gently lifting himself from her to lie by her side and pillow his head on her breast.
Tamm, December 1814
“Clarissa has invited us to Malvin Abbey for Twelfth Night,” Hugo said. “What do you think, Lallie? Would it be too much for you?”
Lallie Tamrisk shook her head. “From what I understand, at six months, one is still quite comfortable. It must depend on the weather, of course, but she will know that. Do you wish to go?”
He handed her his sister’s letter. “She writes she is very anxious to welcome us to Malvin now that they have returned from Brussels, but—”
“Don’t you wish to go?”
“Yes. No. I don’t know.”
Lallie eyed her husband who had lost his usual composure at the thought of seeing his eldest sister again. “You parted in Brussels on very bad terms. I thought you had resolved your differences after she sent you that very handsome apology, but you seem still to harbour some resentment—or reservations, at least?”
He shrugged. “Sometimes I think I owe her an apology—not for what I said, but how I said it.”
“I doubt if she expects one. If you had not spoken so forcefully, she might not have been compelled to reconsider her treatment of you. But I think we should go, Hugo. It will be good for both of you to meet on more amicable terms. Besides, I should like to see them all again, and the Halworths too. It will be my last opportunity to get away from Tamm for some months.”
“Very well. We’ll go, weather and your health permitting. Clarissa will understand when I tell her you are increasing.”
She looked up from his sister’s letter. “There is to be a fancy-dress ball at Malvin. I must talk to Nancy about a costume.”
“Nancy thinks I should be able to do something with the Grecian dress,” Lallie told her husband later that day.
Hugo jerked upright from his relaxed sprawl beside the music room fire. “Clio’s dress?”
Before he could say anything more, Lallie rushed on. “The fabric is very finely pleated; there are yards and yards of it, held in place with cords. If they were not so tight, and knotted more under my breast than at my waist—oh, it might be easier to show you.”
She disappeared. leaving Hugo to gaze after her, wondering how the devil he was to extricate himself from this trap. He had bitten back an instinctive and incisive “absolutely not; I forbid it,” but still felt that the gown was anything other than proper.
With a mental appeal to the heavens for inspiration, he followed her over to their bedroom, where, Nancy in attendance, she was experimenting with different ways of catching the gown with the cords.
“You’d get away with it now, Miss Lallie,” Nancy said, “but there’s no doubt you’ll be showing more in six weeks’ time. Are you going to wear the mask as well?”
“No, nor the wig,” Lallie answered, to her husband’s relief. “They’re hot and uncomfortable. I thought we could contrive a Grecian style for my hair.”
“I can let out the seams – we could even insert a contrasting colour at the sides, and it drapes nicely at the breast. But won’t it be too cold in January? You’ll need some sort of shawl.”
Lallie turned to see the back of the gown in the mirror and noticed her husband leaning against the doorframe. “What do you think?” She revolved slowly in front of him.
She looked delectable, but to his faint regret, without the other accoutrements of Clio’s costume, the gown didn’t evoke his mysterious muse of Burlington House. “If you only wear the gown, I don’t think anyone will connect you with Clio, especially if you eschew that white paint.”
Lallie shuddered. “Dreadful stuff! It took so long to get it off the last time.”
"Nancy is right—you will need a shawl. Malvin can be draughty. Wait here–I won’t be long.” He left the room and soon returned bearing two large portfolios. “I don’t think I’ve even shown you these; I purchased them in Rome – they are depictions of antique vases and marbles.” He started to leaf through the first one. “There was one statue in particular from Herculaneum—of Athena. She’s wearing a loose over-garment. Could you contrive something of that sort? It need not be white, they used quite strong colours as well.”
Lallie scrutinised the engraving. “I like the way the tunic is cut. It reaches to the knee on the one side but only below the hip on the other. That slit on the long side would make it easy to move.”
“The pleats and upside-down vee at the waist would make it drape flatteringly over the babe,” Nancy said.
“I wonder could one adapt the idea for an overdress for every day,” Lallie said. “It would be more becoming and comfortable in the final months of a confinement than a short, tight spencer.”
“I don’t see why not, Miss Lallie,” Nancy said. “I’ll tack something together so that we can try the effect.”
Lallie shot her husband a teasing smile. “Everyone will be trying to find out the name of my new modiste. But help me out of this now, Nancy, it’s almost time to go down for dinner.”
Lallie watched appreciatively as Hugo took off his dressing-gown and got into bed beside her. “What will you wear on Twelfth Night? The dreary domino that gentlemen tend to fall back on?”.
“I suppose so. Though they are deuced uncomfortable.”
“It’s not a masquerade, but fancy dress. You could complement me and wear something from the antique world, a toga perhaps or just a tunic and cloak. We might get some ideas from your books of engravings.”
His look of horror was too much for her and she collapsed laughing against her pillows as he said firmly “I refuse even to consider any costume that requires me to bare my legs in society.”
“I have always thought them very well-shaped legs,” she murmured, turning on her side to face him and running her hand over his hip and down his thigh as she spoke.”
“Do you? Such approbation is praise indeed. Now, if you were to move your hand a little more—just there—I should feel doubly appreciated.”
“Mmm, aren’t there some portraits of your ancestors whose garments accentuate this part of the body? I seem to remember seeing a likeness of Henry VIII as well that emphasized his—manliness. Do you mean you would prefer such a costume?”
“Wear a codpiece? You little minx!”
She measured him with her hand. “It would have to be very large, of course.”
“I see I shall have to stop thy mouth,” he groaned and rolled over to kiss her deeply while at the same time settling himself between her legs. She raised her knees and clasped him with her thighs while her arms held him close.
Now they moved together to the oldest of rhythms. Not two but one, Lallie thought, as a wave carried her upwards towards a starburst of sensation that held her suspended for long moments before disintegrating into a shower of sparks. Like fireworks over the sea, she thought languidly, smiling as she met her husband’s eyes and raised her hand to brush his hair back from his forehead. He bent his head to kiss her tenderly before gently lifting himself from her to lie by her side and pillow his head on her breast.
Chapter Two
Malvin Abbey, January 1815
Clarissa must have given instructions that she be alerted as soon as their carriages were in sight, for she came down the steps just as the travelling chariot drew up at Malvin Abbey. Hugo alighted, astonished by this public, almost formal welcome. On his previous, infrequent visits, he had been received by the butler who had then announced his arrival to his master or mistress if either had been there to receive him.
He helped Lallie step down before turning to greet his sister, a sarcastic comment on this unprecedented honour honed and hovering on the tip of his tongue. She appeared unusually nervous and his brother-in-law who stood almost protectively beside her was looking from her to him in concern.
Clarissa held out her hand and swallowed visibly. “Welcome, brother,” she said, with a tentative smile.
Lallie glanced at him, her quick minatory frown and slight shake of the head cautioning him against, against what? Pokering up, he thought. He had accepted his sister’s comprehensive apology for past slights, yet here he was about to revert to the old habits that must be cast off if they were to build a new, more affectionate relationship. Clarissa had led the way and his instinctive response had been to disparage her gesture. Ashamed, he opened his arms to her.
“Clarissa.”
She hesitated for a moment and then came into them; he felt more than heard her choked sob and her arms came around him in a warm embrace.
“Oh, Hugo.” Her voice wobbled.
“Ssh. It’s all right, now, Clarrie.”
“You’re very generous,” she said reaching up to kiss him.
“No more than you,” he said gently and hugged her again before releasing her to shake hands with Tony Malvin.
“My dear Lallie, I’m so sorry to keep you standing in the cold.” Clarissa embraced her sister-in-law. “Do come in. It’s your first real visit to Malvin, isn’t it?”
“Apart from your soirée last year, - no, now it’s the year before last,” Lallie agreed with a smile.
“When you and Hugo met? I shall have to set up as a matchmaker, although indeed I am having so little success with my own children that you would be my only recommendation.
“Arthur and Matthew are young yet,” Hugo said indulgently.
“Matthew, perhaps, at twenty-three, but Arthur will be twenty-eight this year. And Arabella has had two seasons.”
“She doesn’t want for admirers,” Lord Malvin said. “For my part, I’m delighted to have my daughter at home a while longer.”
We’re just a family party tonight,” Clarissa said as she escorted Hugo and Lallie to their rooms. “Julian and Mattie are here, of course, and Henrietta and Amabel arrived earlier. All have brought their families. The other guests come tomorrow and we must be more formal, but tonight the children may come down to the large parlour for an hour before dinner.”
As they left their room later to seek out the large parlour, Lallie could not but smile at the memory of how she had found her ladyship so daunting at that previous soirée. Hugo quirked an eyebrow but was distracted by Henrietta and Charles Forbes who joined them at the head of the stairs in a flurry of exclamations and embraces.
Clarissa as materfamilias was a different person to the Viscountess Malvin, Lallie quickly discovered. The stately matron was transformed into an indulgent mother, grandmother and aunt, who did not complain when interrupted to admire a new doll, but caught the proud owner in a loving arm, saying seriously, “Just let us finish this game of spillikins, my love and then you may tell me all about Dolly. She is very pretty.”
Lallie at first experienced some difficulty in sorting out the numerous children who blithely addressed her as Aunt Lallie, especially as she was soon surrounded by the younger girls while she demonstrated an intricate form of cat’s cradle. Two of her pupils were called away to perform a song they had been practising for the occasion just before they could master the tricky transfer from one pair of hands to another, but not without extracting a promise that she would come up to the school-room the next day to resume her lessons.
Lord Malvin benevolently applauded the pretty rendition of Early One Morning, but not without muttering to Lallie “I can’t for the life of me understand why even children must bewail deceived maidens. You will have something more cheerful for us, will you not, my dear?”
She smiled at him. “Why, yes, my Lord, Hugo and I have discovered a song that is much more to your taste—the deserted maiden finds another swain and decides ‘to put off her dying to toy and to play’.”
“That’s much more the thing,” he said approvingly. “But what’s this ‘my Lord? Call me Tony—we’re all family here. I hope I may be permitted to say Lallie?”
“Of course,” Lallie agreed, wondering if she would ever find the courage to address him as he wished, for he was almost forty years older than she, and a peer besides.
“I’m very grateful to you, dear Lallie,” he said seriously, “I had never thought to see such a rapprochement between Clarissa and her brother.”
“I had very little to do with it, and if so, inadvertently. Indeed, I think it was your wife’s courage and honesty in writing to him as she did that brought about the change. One would have had to have a heart of stone to resist such an appeal.”
“She was horrified when she realised what she had done. I am convinced however that it was Hugo’s love for you that brought him to a stage where he could break the silence of years. Both Arthur and Clarissa told me how distraught he was when he discovered you gone. But I see you two have put things to rights between you.”
Lallie looked at him in surprise, flushing slightly at this reminder of her precipitate flight from Brussels. It seemed so long ago, not only in time but also when she considered the growing bond that now linked her and her husband and made it difficult to remember the arid months of their early marriage.
“You will think me an interfering old woman,” he said ruefully, “but Hugo is more like a son or nephew to me than a brother-in-law and I am pleased to see him happy. I always regretted that I could not do more for him, but Clarissa was so sorely wounded by her father and her defences are very strong. And of course, initially Hugo followed Tamm’s example in his disdain for females—well, it was to be expected I suppose and one should not blame him, but she could never see that. Once he was old enough, I had a word with him, explained that it was not at all the way a gentleman behaves. He made a handsome apology for his cutting remark, but the damage was done and he could never retrieve his position. And to be fair, she never let up either.”
“Now that their wounds have been lanced, I think their relationship must improve,” Lallie said. “Only look how well they are getting on together now. And he was very affected by the way she came out to welcome us. Previously, he said, he might not have seen either of you until dinner on the day he arrived.”
Malvin looked taken aback at this, but the clock then struck the half-hour and his wife clapped her hands.
“Time for everyone who is not yet sixteen to return upstairs,” she said “except for Roderick. Roderick, you may dine with us tonight, for you will be sixteen next month.”
Lallie was amused to note that the boy seemed equally gratified and appalled by this pronouncement.
Once the children had departed, the adults split naturally into two groups, the gentlemen gravitating towards the decanters set on a table near the window while the ladies sank into the sofas and chairs near the fire. Noticing Roderick hovering uneasily near the men as though unconvinced of his entitlement to join them, Hugo, who remembered how awkward he had felt on similar occasions in his youth, turned slightly so as to open the circle to include him.
“Did you bring the dogs, Hugo?” Arthur, who had managed to get a couple of weeks’ furlough, enquired as they discussed the possibility of taking the guns out the following day.
“Just Virgil. Horace is getting too old and Mam’selle ‘Ubertine is not fully trained. Besides she has taken a liking to my father and frequently keeps him company.”
“Mam’selle? Oh, the bitch you acquired in the Ardennes in September—an intriguing little thing.”
“With a damn good nose for following a scent. I was thinking of breeding her, but the St. John’s may be too big for her.”
“You could try a spaniel or a setter,” Roderick volunteered. “We have a new litter of setters, don’t we Papa?”
“They’re just ready to leave the mother,” Malvin agreed and cocked an eyebrow at his brother-in-law. “Interested?”
“I’ll take a look at them tomorrow,” Hugo answered. “If it should prove successful, I’ll send one of the pups back in due course, a bitch if possible.”
“Dinner is served, my Lady.”
“We won’t stand on ceremony tonight,” Clarissa declared, “as long as you gentlemen don’t insist on congregating at one end of the table. You will have time for that afterwards.” She took her husband’s arm. “For once, you may take me in, Tony, and Millicent will take my place. The rest of you may do as you please; we have too many gentlemen in any case.”
Laughing, they sorted themselves into couples; Hugo offering his arm to his sister Amabel while Arthur squired Lallie. She found herself sitting between him and Roderick, with Hugo opposite her.
“It’s the first time we have all been together since your wedding, Hugo,” Amabel stated once the polite bustle of serving one’s neighbours and oneself had died down. “How long ago that seems. I’m sure you feel it particularly, Lallie, for it is such a big change for a girl; those first months of marriage, I mean.”
“What of Hugo?” Matthew asked slyly. “He positively exudes uxoriousness.”
“What a well-turned phrase,” his eldest brother commented mockingly. “We’ll see if you can repeat it as fluently after a few glasses of Papa’s port.”
“While I deplore the verb, I readily admit to the noun.” Hugo raised his glass in silent salute to his wife, who slanted her cat’s eyes at him in return, a secret smile flirting on her lips.
At the head of the table, Lord Malvin signalled to the butler to fill up the glasses. “Let us drink to Hugo and Lallie, for it is the first time they have dined here since their marriage, and to a strong and enduring amity between our two families.”
There was very little left of St Anthony’s Abbey at Malvin save the cloisters which had long since been incorporated into a serene walled garden and it was here that Clarissa took Lallie the next morning for a quiet stroll.
“Anthony’s mother had this new wing built so that she could walk in almost all weathers, she explained as she led her sister-in-law through the long orangery. “A pretty colonnade links it with the garden and a door leads directly into the cloisters. They provide shelter in winter and shade in summer. The ballroom is above us and that staircase at the end links the two.”
“That must keep the chaperons occupied,” Lallie remarked.
“One would think so, but in fact so many people stroll through the orangery that it remains quite proper. We don’t have a proper circuit of rooms, so it is the only way to leave the ballroom without retracing one’s steps.” As she spoke Clarissa opened a wooden door set in an old stone wall and gestured to Lallie to precede her.
Stepping through, Lallie paused to admire the covered walk enclosed in grey stone; the roof was vaulted and open arcades in the inner wall led the eye to a large, square lawn that was sprinkled with snow-drops. A fountain in the centre was surrounded by neatly trimmed rose bushes with more roses growing at the four corners of the lawn. “How lovely. And it must be really beautiful when the roses are in bloom.”
“It is. The snowdrops will be followed by daffodils and then come the roses.” Clarissa pointed towards a door on the opposite side. “Through there is a bigger garden, with trees and shrubs as well as flower beds, but we thought to keep here simple.”
“It is so peaceful,” Lallie said as they slowly paced along the flagstones, stopping every so often to admire the intricately carved capitals and columns.
“You must come here whenever you wish. If I had realised you were expecting, I should never have sent an invitation, but I am so glad you came. Pray do not tire yourself, my dear; I shall quite understand if you wish to withdraw at any time.”
“Thank you. I feel very well at the moment; much better than I did in the first months.”
“That is often the case, but I remember how fatiguing I found such house-parties when I was increasing. And another twenty guests arrive today and tomorrow.”
They embarked on a second perambulation of the cloisters. “It’s wonderful to see Hugo so well and so happy,” Clarissa confided, “but I must confess, Lallie, that it only increases my guilt at my previous treatment of him. I feel quite wretched at times. And I owe you an apology, too, for my behaviour must have contributed to the estrangement between you.”
“That’s all behind us now,” Lallie said firmly, “and indeed, Clarissa, if we are to be frank, I have to tell you that I quite understand how your father’s treatment of your mother and you three sisters could have tainted your perception of your brother. At times Tamm is inclined to ramble, as if he is reliving the past, and some of his comments—I must bite my tongue so as not to respond. Sadly, he cannot change what was. Neither can you. But you had the courage to try and change what is and what will be. I can’t tell you how much I admired you for writing that letter to Hugo. It can’t have been easy for you.”
Clarissa shook her head. “I was so dismayed by my behaviour that writing the letter was a relief. I suppose the old nuns would have said I felt better for owning my fault. Do you know, Lallie, it was as if I had laid down a burden. Dear Tony encouraged me—he said my behaviour showed that I was still subject to my father’s influence and I would be much happier if I could only shake it off. He was right. I feel liberated somehow and so much lighter, especially since I received Hugo’s reply.”
“I’m so glad,” Lallie answered simply. “It helped Hugo very much, you know. You showed him, showed us that it was possible to change.”
The two women walked on in silence. “Who are your other guests?” Lallie asked curiously after some time. “You mentioned you were expecting some twenty more.”
“The most important are the Bentons. Matthew and Marfield were at school together and Lady Anna and Arabella became friendly during their come-out year, so the two families see quite a lot of one another.
“Are the Earl and Countess coming too?”
“Yes. Do you mind? Henrietta said you and she had got on very well.”
“She was very kind. I just hope that she no longer makes such a fuss about how I was ‘found—as if I had been abandoned on the church steps! After all, it was they—the Martyns, I mean, who cast off Grandmama, not the other way around.”
Clarissa gasped. “I never thought; Mr and Mrs Grey are staying with the Halworths again and I invited them all for Twelfth Night. Would that create any difficulties?”
“Not at all. I would have called on the Halworths anyway, and I shall be delighted to see my brother and sisters again.”
Malvin Abbey, January 1815
Clarissa must have given instructions that she be alerted as soon as their carriages were in sight, for she came down the steps just as the travelling chariot drew up at Malvin Abbey. Hugo alighted, astonished by this public, almost formal welcome. On his previous, infrequent visits, he had been received by the butler who had then announced his arrival to his master or mistress if either had been there to receive him.
He helped Lallie step down before turning to greet his sister, a sarcastic comment on this unprecedented honour honed and hovering on the tip of his tongue. She appeared unusually nervous and his brother-in-law who stood almost protectively beside her was looking from her to him in concern.
Clarissa held out her hand and swallowed visibly. “Welcome, brother,” she said, with a tentative smile.
Lallie glanced at him, her quick minatory frown and slight shake of the head cautioning him against, against what? Pokering up, he thought. He had accepted his sister’s comprehensive apology for past slights, yet here he was about to revert to the old habits that must be cast off if they were to build a new, more affectionate relationship. Clarissa had led the way and his instinctive response had been to disparage her gesture. Ashamed, he opened his arms to her.
“Clarissa.”
She hesitated for a moment and then came into them; he felt more than heard her choked sob and her arms came around him in a warm embrace.
“Oh, Hugo.” Her voice wobbled.
“Ssh. It’s all right, now, Clarrie.”
“You’re very generous,” she said reaching up to kiss him.
“No more than you,” he said gently and hugged her again before releasing her to shake hands with Tony Malvin.
“My dear Lallie, I’m so sorry to keep you standing in the cold.” Clarissa embraced her sister-in-law. “Do come in. It’s your first real visit to Malvin, isn’t it?”
“Apart from your soirée last year, - no, now it’s the year before last,” Lallie agreed with a smile.
“When you and Hugo met? I shall have to set up as a matchmaker, although indeed I am having so little success with my own children that you would be my only recommendation.
“Arthur and Matthew are young yet,” Hugo said indulgently.
“Matthew, perhaps, at twenty-three, but Arthur will be twenty-eight this year. And Arabella has had two seasons.”
“She doesn’t want for admirers,” Lord Malvin said. “For my part, I’m delighted to have my daughter at home a while longer.”
We’re just a family party tonight,” Clarissa said as she escorted Hugo and Lallie to their rooms. “Julian and Mattie are here, of course, and Henrietta and Amabel arrived earlier. All have brought their families. The other guests come tomorrow and we must be more formal, but tonight the children may come down to the large parlour for an hour before dinner.”
As they left their room later to seek out the large parlour, Lallie could not but smile at the memory of how she had found her ladyship so daunting at that previous soirée. Hugo quirked an eyebrow but was distracted by Henrietta and Charles Forbes who joined them at the head of the stairs in a flurry of exclamations and embraces.
Clarissa as materfamilias was a different person to the Viscountess Malvin, Lallie quickly discovered. The stately matron was transformed into an indulgent mother, grandmother and aunt, who did not complain when interrupted to admire a new doll, but caught the proud owner in a loving arm, saying seriously, “Just let us finish this game of spillikins, my love and then you may tell me all about Dolly. She is very pretty.”
Lallie at first experienced some difficulty in sorting out the numerous children who blithely addressed her as Aunt Lallie, especially as she was soon surrounded by the younger girls while she demonstrated an intricate form of cat’s cradle. Two of her pupils were called away to perform a song they had been practising for the occasion just before they could master the tricky transfer from one pair of hands to another, but not without extracting a promise that she would come up to the school-room the next day to resume her lessons.
Lord Malvin benevolently applauded the pretty rendition of Early One Morning, but not without muttering to Lallie “I can’t for the life of me understand why even children must bewail deceived maidens. You will have something more cheerful for us, will you not, my dear?”
She smiled at him. “Why, yes, my Lord, Hugo and I have discovered a song that is much more to your taste—the deserted maiden finds another swain and decides ‘to put off her dying to toy and to play’.”
“That’s much more the thing,” he said approvingly. “But what’s this ‘my Lord? Call me Tony—we’re all family here. I hope I may be permitted to say Lallie?”
“Of course,” Lallie agreed, wondering if she would ever find the courage to address him as he wished, for he was almost forty years older than she, and a peer besides.
“I’m very grateful to you, dear Lallie,” he said seriously, “I had never thought to see such a rapprochement between Clarissa and her brother.”
“I had very little to do with it, and if so, inadvertently. Indeed, I think it was your wife’s courage and honesty in writing to him as she did that brought about the change. One would have had to have a heart of stone to resist such an appeal.”
“She was horrified when she realised what she had done. I am convinced however that it was Hugo’s love for you that brought him to a stage where he could break the silence of years. Both Arthur and Clarissa told me how distraught he was when he discovered you gone. But I see you two have put things to rights between you.”
Lallie looked at him in surprise, flushing slightly at this reminder of her precipitate flight from Brussels. It seemed so long ago, not only in time but also when she considered the growing bond that now linked her and her husband and made it difficult to remember the arid months of their early marriage.
“You will think me an interfering old woman,” he said ruefully, “but Hugo is more like a son or nephew to me than a brother-in-law and I am pleased to see him happy. I always regretted that I could not do more for him, but Clarissa was so sorely wounded by her father and her defences are very strong. And of course, initially Hugo followed Tamm’s example in his disdain for females—well, it was to be expected I suppose and one should not blame him, but she could never see that. Once he was old enough, I had a word with him, explained that it was not at all the way a gentleman behaves. He made a handsome apology for his cutting remark, but the damage was done and he could never retrieve his position. And to be fair, she never let up either.”
“Now that their wounds have been lanced, I think their relationship must improve,” Lallie said. “Only look how well they are getting on together now. And he was very affected by the way she came out to welcome us. Previously, he said, he might not have seen either of you until dinner on the day he arrived.”
Malvin looked taken aback at this, but the clock then struck the half-hour and his wife clapped her hands.
“Time for everyone who is not yet sixteen to return upstairs,” she said “except for Roderick. Roderick, you may dine with us tonight, for you will be sixteen next month.”
Lallie was amused to note that the boy seemed equally gratified and appalled by this pronouncement.
Once the children had departed, the adults split naturally into two groups, the gentlemen gravitating towards the decanters set on a table near the window while the ladies sank into the sofas and chairs near the fire. Noticing Roderick hovering uneasily near the men as though unconvinced of his entitlement to join them, Hugo, who remembered how awkward he had felt on similar occasions in his youth, turned slightly so as to open the circle to include him.
“Did you bring the dogs, Hugo?” Arthur, who had managed to get a couple of weeks’ furlough, enquired as they discussed the possibility of taking the guns out the following day.
“Just Virgil. Horace is getting too old and Mam’selle ‘Ubertine is not fully trained. Besides she has taken a liking to my father and frequently keeps him company.”
“Mam’selle? Oh, the bitch you acquired in the Ardennes in September—an intriguing little thing.”
“With a damn good nose for following a scent. I was thinking of breeding her, but the St. John’s may be too big for her.”
“You could try a spaniel or a setter,” Roderick volunteered. “We have a new litter of setters, don’t we Papa?”
“They’re just ready to leave the mother,” Malvin agreed and cocked an eyebrow at his brother-in-law. “Interested?”
“I’ll take a look at them tomorrow,” Hugo answered. “If it should prove successful, I’ll send one of the pups back in due course, a bitch if possible.”
“Dinner is served, my Lady.”
“We won’t stand on ceremony tonight,” Clarissa declared, “as long as you gentlemen don’t insist on congregating at one end of the table. You will have time for that afterwards.” She took her husband’s arm. “For once, you may take me in, Tony, and Millicent will take my place. The rest of you may do as you please; we have too many gentlemen in any case.”
Laughing, they sorted themselves into couples; Hugo offering his arm to his sister Amabel while Arthur squired Lallie. She found herself sitting between him and Roderick, with Hugo opposite her.
“It’s the first time we have all been together since your wedding, Hugo,” Amabel stated once the polite bustle of serving one’s neighbours and oneself had died down. “How long ago that seems. I’m sure you feel it particularly, Lallie, for it is such a big change for a girl; those first months of marriage, I mean.”
“What of Hugo?” Matthew asked slyly. “He positively exudes uxoriousness.”
“What a well-turned phrase,” his eldest brother commented mockingly. “We’ll see if you can repeat it as fluently after a few glasses of Papa’s port.”
“While I deplore the verb, I readily admit to the noun.” Hugo raised his glass in silent salute to his wife, who slanted her cat’s eyes at him in return, a secret smile flirting on her lips.
At the head of the table, Lord Malvin signalled to the butler to fill up the glasses. “Let us drink to Hugo and Lallie, for it is the first time they have dined here since their marriage, and to a strong and enduring amity between our two families.”
There was very little left of St Anthony’s Abbey at Malvin save the cloisters which had long since been incorporated into a serene walled garden and it was here that Clarissa took Lallie the next morning for a quiet stroll.
“Anthony’s mother had this new wing built so that she could walk in almost all weathers, she explained as she led her sister-in-law through the long orangery. “A pretty colonnade links it with the garden and a door leads directly into the cloisters. They provide shelter in winter and shade in summer. The ballroom is above us and that staircase at the end links the two.”
“That must keep the chaperons occupied,” Lallie remarked.
“One would think so, but in fact so many people stroll through the orangery that it remains quite proper. We don’t have a proper circuit of rooms, so it is the only way to leave the ballroom without retracing one’s steps.” As she spoke Clarissa opened a wooden door set in an old stone wall and gestured to Lallie to precede her.
Stepping through, Lallie paused to admire the covered walk enclosed in grey stone; the roof was vaulted and open arcades in the inner wall led the eye to a large, square lawn that was sprinkled with snow-drops. A fountain in the centre was surrounded by neatly trimmed rose bushes with more roses growing at the four corners of the lawn. “How lovely. And it must be really beautiful when the roses are in bloom.”
“It is. The snowdrops will be followed by daffodils and then come the roses.” Clarissa pointed towards a door on the opposite side. “Through there is a bigger garden, with trees and shrubs as well as flower beds, but we thought to keep here simple.”
“It is so peaceful,” Lallie said as they slowly paced along the flagstones, stopping every so often to admire the intricately carved capitals and columns.
“You must come here whenever you wish. If I had realised you were expecting, I should never have sent an invitation, but I am so glad you came. Pray do not tire yourself, my dear; I shall quite understand if you wish to withdraw at any time.”
“Thank you. I feel very well at the moment; much better than I did in the first months.”
“That is often the case, but I remember how fatiguing I found such house-parties when I was increasing. And another twenty guests arrive today and tomorrow.”
They embarked on a second perambulation of the cloisters. “It’s wonderful to see Hugo so well and so happy,” Clarissa confided, “but I must confess, Lallie, that it only increases my guilt at my previous treatment of him. I feel quite wretched at times. And I owe you an apology, too, for my behaviour must have contributed to the estrangement between you.”
“That’s all behind us now,” Lallie said firmly, “and indeed, Clarissa, if we are to be frank, I have to tell you that I quite understand how your father’s treatment of your mother and you three sisters could have tainted your perception of your brother. At times Tamm is inclined to ramble, as if he is reliving the past, and some of his comments—I must bite my tongue so as not to respond. Sadly, he cannot change what was. Neither can you. But you had the courage to try and change what is and what will be. I can’t tell you how much I admired you for writing that letter to Hugo. It can’t have been easy for you.”
Clarissa shook her head. “I was so dismayed by my behaviour that writing the letter was a relief. I suppose the old nuns would have said I felt better for owning my fault. Do you know, Lallie, it was as if I had laid down a burden. Dear Tony encouraged me—he said my behaviour showed that I was still subject to my father’s influence and I would be much happier if I could only shake it off. He was right. I feel liberated somehow and so much lighter, especially since I received Hugo’s reply.”
“I’m so glad,” Lallie answered simply. “It helped Hugo very much, you know. You showed him, showed us that it was possible to change.”
The two women walked on in silence. “Who are your other guests?” Lallie asked curiously after some time. “You mentioned you were expecting some twenty more.”
“The most important are the Bentons. Matthew and Marfield were at school together and Lady Anna and Arabella became friendly during their come-out year, so the two families see quite a lot of one another.
“Are the Earl and Countess coming too?”
“Yes. Do you mind? Henrietta said you and she had got on very well.”
“She was very kind. I just hope that she no longer makes such a fuss about how I was ‘found—as if I had been abandoned on the church steps! After all, it was they—the Martyns, I mean, who cast off Grandmama, not the other way around.”
Clarissa gasped. “I never thought; Mr and Mrs Grey are staying with the Halworths again and I invited them all for Twelfth Night. Would that create any difficulties?”
“Not at all. I would have called on the Halworths anyway, and I shall be delighted to see my brother and sisters again.”
Chapter Three
Lallie caught sight of her husband in the long mirror and turned to inspect him. Following animated discussions that were punctuated by his refusal to wear skirts (as he described any form of robe, gown or tunic) or wigs (which effectively ruled out the preceding two centuries, as he also declined to appear as a round-head), they had settled on Elizabethan doublet and hose which, as she had acerbically pointed out, would be no more revealing than today’s silk knee-breeches or clinging pantaloons.
He cut a very dashing figure in dark burgundy that had been slashed to reveal the gold lining which was pulled through in puffs. The cut of the doublet emphasized his broad shoulders and harrow waist, while a puffed trunkhose served to spare his blushes. His netherhose were also burgundy, but with elaborate gold clocks. A white ruff set off his dark, aquiline features and a short cloak, again lined with gold, hung from his shoulders. Heeled burgundy shoes with gold buckles gave him additional height so that when Lallie stood, she found herself looking up more than usual to meet his eyes.
“You look truly splendid, Hugo. It’s fortunate that we are at your sister’s and not a more public assembly, for you would be besieged by all the females.”
He made an elaborate leg. “My eyes would only be for you, Clio. I had forgotten how delectable you looked in that gown.” He traced the neckline with a caressing finger. “It is even more enticing now. “He bent to kiss her and inhaled deeply. “I remember that perfume.”
“It’s called Les Fleurs du Parnasse’ Do you like it?”
“It’s intoxicating, Clio” he muttered, going on one knee to nibble a line of kisses from her throat to between her breasts.
“Behave, sir, or I’ll never be ready,” she protested, but softened her rebuke by holding him to her for a moment and gently ruffling his hair. He raised his head and captured her in one arm a more satisfying embrace before presenting her with a flat leather box. Lallie opened it to reveal a half-wreath of leaves and flowers cunningly fashioned in beaten gold.
“I asked Henrietta to find something appropriately classical for you to wear tonight,” Hugo explained as she stared at it, spellbound. “I didn’t think I would find the right thing in Exeter.”
“Hugo, this is ravishing. Thank you so much! You spoil me.”
“That is my privilege.”
She twined her arms around his neck to kiss him sweetly. “Thank you,” she said again, “it’s so beautiful and how clever of you to think of it. You must be reconciled with naughty Clio if you purchase her such treasures,” she added with a provocative smile.
“Very reconciled,” he murmured against her mouth. “I think you must wear that gown some evening we’re dining in our apartments.”
Lallie glanced at the clock, “It’s almost time to go down. I must ring for Nancy to help me. She will have to redo my hair without the bandeaux. This will be much prettier.”
“We’ll put on the tunic first, Miss Lallie,” Nancy said, very carefully setting down the wreath. “This is so delicate; only see how each leaf and petal is barely attached so that it seems they might be carried away by the slightest breeze. I’m afraid we’ll damage it if it catches on something as we put it over your head.”
The tunic was a soft pink, made of finely pleated linen that was cleverly cut to skim the swell of Lallie’s abdomen, its asymmetric line cunningly leading the eye away from the evidence of her pregnancy. Instead of sleeves, dropped shoulders, loosely gathered at the seam, covered her upper arms. All the edges were trimmed with entwined green and gold braid, the slight weight of which held the pleats in place.
“You won’t have the matching green in your hair now,” Nancy remarked as she removed the bandeaux and artfully settled the wreath in her mistress’s newly-styled hair
“We still have my grand-mother’s ear-rings.”
Hugo, lounging on the sofa as he watched his wife put the finishing touches to her toilette, caught his breath when she rose from the stool and turned to face him. The sparkle of her green eyes matched that of the peridots suspended from her delicate ear-lobes. The leaves and flowers of her head-dress trembled as she slowly revolved in front of him, the floating, pleated layers of her gown lifting to display golden sandals whose straps circled her pretty ankles and criss-crossed up her lower legs.
“If Proserpina looked like this, who could blame gloomy Dis for snatching her away,” he said huskily, holding out his hand. “I want to keep you here, all to myself.”
Lallie drifted over to him and bent to kiss him quickly but danced away before he could pull down onto his lap.
“Later, sir,” she promised.
The rich aromas of beeswax candles and burning apple wood, overlain by the scents of countless lotions and distilled, waters pervaded the long ballroom at Malvin Abbey. It was illuminated by four immense crystal chandeliers reflected in numerous gilt-framed pier glasses and over-mantel mirrors that provided infinite glimpses of the swirling throng. A babble of animated conversation vied with the energetic strains of a country reel as Lord and Lady Malvin’s guests joined enthusiastically in the Twelfth Night revels.
“I declare people are so ingenious,” Lady Halworth commented. Clad in the garb of a Contadina—‘I bought the costume in Naples, my dear, so flattering with the waist in its natural place and so easy to wear’—she scrutinized the passing parade. “I’m sure it would never have occurred to me to trick a gentleman out as a knight in armour. It must be very uncomfortable. And look at that mermaid. I daresay she will find her tail an encumbrance if she wishes to dance. Now you, dear Mrs Tamrisk, have combined ingenuity with comfort, and it is most becoming besides, particularly for a lady in your circumstances.”
“Thank you, ma’am,” Lallie murmured. She sat to one side with Lady Halworth and her stepmother, an imposing figure in wimple and veil who looked ‘as if she had modelled herself on an effigy and risen from her tomb,’ according to Hugo’s irreverent comment.
“Yes, one would hardly guess,” Mrs Grey said “and it must be so convenient not to be constantly draping and redraping your shawl.”
“I have Tamrisk to thank for the suggestion of the over-gown. He had the idea from some engravings of antique marbles he purchased while on the grand tour.
“Well, marriage seems to suit you on all fronts,” Mrs Grey said. “You are positively blossoming,” she added with a gentle touch of the gold wreath. “This is so pretty. Where did you find it?”
“Tamrisk presented it to me this evening. I don’t know from where he had it.”
“A paragon among husbands, indeed,” Lady Halworth cried, “and he displays an excellent leg to boot. Now, I see Mrs Ferraunt over there. I must have a word with her.”
“Are you indeed happy, Lallie?” Mrs Grey asked when stepdaughter and stepmother were alone.
“Yes. And I must thank you again for your swift action that night at the inn. And your gift the next morning.”
Mrs Grey looked a little embarrassed. “It was all I could think of. I could not condone forcing you into a distasteful marriage. As for your father’s threat to turn you out! I was horrified. I am glad that everything turned out so well.”
“Aren’t you dancing tonight, Hugo?” Arabella came up to where he stood talking to Clarissa. “The next is a waltz.”
“Lallie finds it too tiring now. But if you are in need of a partner, I should be only too happy oblige.”
“Thank you, but it is too fusty to dance with one’s uncle, no matter how elegant he may be. It would be as bad as dancing with one’s brother. That is for wallflowers.” She smiled coquettishly. “I am promised to Captain Harris.”
“How could I have doubted you! And what of you, Clarissa—did you also take lessons in the waltz last season?”
“She did,” confirmed that lady’s daughter.
“Then, unless of course you would find it too fusty to dance with your brother,” he grinned teasingly at his niece, “perhaps you would do me the honour of standing up with me?”
Clarissa was for once lost for words. She had never waltzed outside the dancing class and Hugo had never before asked her to dance.
“Do, Mama,” Arabella urged her. “Why, we practised the steps only this morning and you were most proficient.”
At that moment Captain Harris arrived to claim his partner and Hugo offered his arm to his sister. With a smile she took it and allowed him to escort her onto the dance floor. At first, they danced silently but then Clarissa gained more confidence.
“It’s different at a ball,” she admitted, “I can see why the young people find it exhilarating, but I must remind Arabella to be particular about the gentlemen to whom she grants a waltz.”
“I don’t think you need worry about her, Clarissa,” Hugo said, “she knows where to draw the line.” He surveyed the gay multitude revolving around them. “My compliments on a most successful evening. What made you think of fancy dress?”
“I wanted something different, but don’t like masquerades – some gentlemen are inclined to take liberties and most of them just throw a domino over their dress clothes. This way everyone must make an effort.”
“There is certainly a great variety of costume. Is that Matthew in the armour? He hasn’t quite got the hang of his sword.”
“It’s only until after the pantomime. It is to be Sherwood Frolics and he is Sir Richard of Verysdale.”
“And Malvin the friar of orders grey, I see. And you? I couldn’t place your character beyond that you are dressed as a peasant woman from the middle-ages.”
“Oh, I’m the Witch of Nottingham Well,” she explained complacently. “I bring Robin back to life after he is killed.”
He laughed as he turned her under their raised arms. “You have made a happy family here, you and Tony.”
“Yes. It’s very much due to him, for I was not used to a home where respect and affection were common currency. I learnt a lot from him.”
“So did I,” Hugo said unexpectedly. “He took me aside at Tamm one time when I had made some obnoxiously cutting remark to you in imitation of my father, and explained to me that one must treat all women with courtesy and respect. Indeed, these characteristics should mark all the dealings of a gentleman, he said. I did apologise to you but I fear it was too late to improve things between us. However, he made me realise that Tamm’s was neither the only, nor perhaps the best example for me to follow.”
The music stopped and they exchanged bow and curtsey. Clarissa sighed. “He tried to get me to see that you had changed and shouldn’t be blamed for yielding to Papa’s early influence, but I was unable to let go. I am so sorry, Hugo.”
“It’s over, Clarrie,” he said. “Please don’t go on punishing yourself; you have suffered enough. We have, both of us, so much more than Tamm ever had and we shouldn’t let him spoil it for us by constantly harking back to the past. Lay it to rest.”
“You’re right. Thank you, Hugo.” She took his arm and they walked off the dance floor. “Lallie mentioned that her connection to the Greys is not as close as it was. I must say I think her father behaved abominably. When I think that she might have had a proper come-out! Those first seasons are so important for girls, you know. They may try their wings and learn a little of the world, make new friendships as well, before settling down.”
“You didn’t have that either, Clarrie, nor did Amabel,” he said sympathetically.
“No. I think I enjoyed bringing out Henrietta, Mattie and now Arabella all the more because of it. I had to muddle through so much, and I was determined they should not have to.”
“I understand, but at least you had Tony to support you.”
“His mother was very kind, too. I had hardly been in society before we went to Bath, for Papa never permitted Mama to go anywhere and Mama-in-law helped me find my feet.”
“Lallie’s other grandmother, Lady Grey, would have brought her out at her own expense, but Grey wouldn’t permit it and never let on that Lallie herself had more than enough money to fund a season if it came to that.”
She laughed shamefacedly. “Do you remember me complaining about her lack of fortune? With that dowry, she might have had her pick of suitors. Not that I think she could have found a better husband than you,” she hastened to reassure him, “and I can see that you are very happy together now, but her father took so many choices from her.”
“She took his deception very hard,” Hugo said, “she felt it as a sort of betrayal.”
“Which it was,” Clarissa stated. “It is the duty of the parent to support the child, not vice versa, unless of course the parent is in genuine need or is old and feeble. Neither can be true of the Greys and I can quite see why Lallie wishes to keep them a little at a distance now. But I know she has no other close family—the Martyn connection is very new to her—and I was wondering if she would like me to come to Tamm to be with her during her confinement.” She spoke hesitantly, as if unsure whether such an offer would be welcome.
“I think she would. It’s very kind of you to offer, but would you not find it difficult to be at the Manor again in such circumstances? I don’t remember it of course but Henrietta has told me of your difficult experiences with Mama.”
“Since then I’ve given birth to four healthy children,” she pointed out. “That might comfort Lallie if she is worried as might only be expected. I’m sure Anthony would come too—you’ll need someone at your side as well. They were the longest hours of his life, he always says, the days his children were born.”
“I should be very grateful,” Hugo said sincerely, “but let me mention it to Lallie.”
“I see I’ll have to learn to waltz,” Anthony Malvin greeted them with a warm smile. “Arabella has been teasing me to do so, but now that I’ve seen you dance it, my lady, I’m determined you shall dance it next with me.”
Lallie caught sight of her husband in the long mirror and turned to inspect him. Following animated discussions that were punctuated by his refusal to wear skirts (as he described any form of robe, gown or tunic) or wigs (which effectively ruled out the preceding two centuries, as he also declined to appear as a round-head), they had settled on Elizabethan doublet and hose which, as she had acerbically pointed out, would be no more revealing than today’s silk knee-breeches or clinging pantaloons.
He cut a very dashing figure in dark burgundy that had been slashed to reveal the gold lining which was pulled through in puffs. The cut of the doublet emphasized his broad shoulders and harrow waist, while a puffed trunkhose served to spare his blushes. His netherhose were also burgundy, but with elaborate gold clocks. A white ruff set off his dark, aquiline features and a short cloak, again lined with gold, hung from his shoulders. Heeled burgundy shoes with gold buckles gave him additional height so that when Lallie stood, she found herself looking up more than usual to meet his eyes.
“You look truly splendid, Hugo. It’s fortunate that we are at your sister’s and not a more public assembly, for you would be besieged by all the females.”
He made an elaborate leg. “My eyes would only be for you, Clio. I had forgotten how delectable you looked in that gown.” He traced the neckline with a caressing finger. “It is even more enticing now. “He bent to kiss her and inhaled deeply. “I remember that perfume.”
“It’s called Les Fleurs du Parnasse’ Do you like it?”
“It’s intoxicating, Clio” he muttered, going on one knee to nibble a line of kisses from her throat to between her breasts.
“Behave, sir, or I’ll never be ready,” she protested, but softened her rebuke by holding him to her for a moment and gently ruffling his hair. He raised his head and captured her in one arm a more satisfying embrace before presenting her with a flat leather box. Lallie opened it to reveal a half-wreath of leaves and flowers cunningly fashioned in beaten gold.
“I asked Henrietta to find something appropriately classical for you to wear tonight,” Hugo explained as she stared at it, spellbound. “I didn’t think I would find the right thing in Exeter.”
“Hugo, this is ravishing. Thank you so much! You spoil me.”
“That is my privilege.”
She twined her arms around his neck to kiss him sweetly. “Thank you,” she said again, “it’s so beautiful and how clever of you to think of it. You must be reconciled with naughty Clio if you purchase her such treasures,” she added with a provocative smile.
“Very reconciled,” he murmured against her mouth. “I think you must wear that gown some evening we’re dining in our apartments.”
Lallie glanced at the clock, “It’s almost time to go down. I must ring for Nancy to help me. She will have to redo my hair without the bandeaux. This will be much prettier.”
“We’ll put on the tunic first, Miss Lallie,” Nancy said, very carefully setting down the wreath. “This is so delicate; only see how each leaf and petal is barely attached so that it seems they might be carried away by the slightest breeze. I’m afraid we’ll damage it if it catches on something as we put it over your head.”
The tunic was a soft pink, made of finely pleated linen that was cleverly cut to skim the swell of Lallie’s abdomen, its asymmetric line cunningly leading the eye away from the evidence of her pregnancy. Instead of sleeves, dropped shoulders, loosely gathered at the seam, covered her upper arms. All the edges were trimmed with entwined green and gold braid, the slight weight of which held the pleats in place.
“You won’t have the matching green in your hair now,” Nancy remarked as she removed the bandeaux and artfully settled the wreath in her mistress’s newly-styled hair
“We still have my grand-mother’s ear-rings.”
Hugo, lounging on the sofa as he watched his wife put the finishing touches to her toilette, caught his breath when she rose from the stool and turned to face him. The sparkle of her green eyes matched that of the peridots suspended from her delicate ear-lobes. The leaves and flowers of her head-dress trembled as she slowly revolved in front of him, the floating, pleated layers of her gown lifting to display golden sandals whose straps circled her pretty ankles and criss-crossed up her lower legs.
“If Proserpina looked like this, who could blame gloomy Dis for snatching her away,” he said huskily, holding out his hand. “I want to keep you here, all to myself.”
Lallie drifted over to him and bent to kiss him quickly but danced away before he could pull down onto his lap.
“Later, sir,” she promised.
The rich aromas of beeswax candles and burning apple wood, overlain by the scents of countless lotions and distilled, waters pervaded the long ballroom at Malvin Abbey. It was illuminated by four immense crystal chandeliers reflected in numerous gilt-framed pier glasses and over-mantel mirrors that provided infinite glimpses of the swirling throng. A babble of animated conversation vied with the energetic strains of a country reel as Lord and Lady Malvin’s guests joined enthusiastically in the Twelfth Night revels.
“I declare people are so ingenious,” Lady Halworth commented. Clad in the garb of a Contadina—‘I bought the costume in Naples, my dear, so flattering with the waist in its natural place and so easy to wear’—she scrutinized the passing parade. “I’m sure it would never have occurred to me to trick a gentleman out as a knight in armour. It must be very uncomfortable. And look at that mermaid. I daresay she will find her tail an encumbrance if she wishes to dance. Now you, dear Mrs Tamrisk, have combined ingenuity with comfort, and it is most becoming besides, particularly for a lady in your circumstances.”
“Thank you, ma’am,” Lallie murmured. She sat to one side with Lady Halworth and her stepmother, an imposing figure in wimple and veil who looked ‘as if she had modelled herself on an effigy and risen from her tomb,’ according to Hugo’s irreverent comment.
“Yes, one would hardly guess,” Mrs Grey said “and it must be so convenient not to be constantly draping and redraping your shawl.”
“I have Tamrisk to thank for the suggestion of the over-gown. He had the idea from some engravings of antique marbles he purchased while on the grand tour.
“Well, marriage seems to suit you on all fronts,” Mrs Grey said. “You are positively blossoming,” she added with a gentle touch of the gold wreath. “This is so pretty. Where did you find it?”
“Tamrisk presented it to me this evening. I don’t know from where he had it.”
“A paragon among husbands, indeed,” Lady Halworth cried, “and he displays an excellent leg to boot. Now, I see Mrs Ferraunt over there. I must have a word with her.”
“Are you indeed happy, Lallie?” Mrs Grey asked when stepdaughter and stepmother were alone.
“Yes. And I must thank you again for your swift action that night at the inn. And your gift the next morning.”
Mrs Grey looked a little embarrassed. “It was all I could think of. I could not condone forcing you into a distasteful marriage. As for your father’s threat to turn you out! I was horrified. I am glad that everything turned out so well.”
“Aren’t you dancing tonight, Hugo?” Arabella came up to where he stood talking to Clarissa. “The next is a waltz.”
“Lallie finds it too tiring now. But if you are in need of a partner, I should be only too happy oblige.”
“Thank you, but it is too fusty to dance with one’s uncle, no matter how elegant he may be. It would be as bad as dancing with one’s brother. That is for wallflowers.” She smiled coquettishly. “I am promised to Captain Harris.”
“How could I have doubted you! And what of you, Clarissa—did you also take lessons in the waltz last season?”
“She did,” confirmed that lady’s daughter.
“Then, unless of course you would find it too fusty to dance with your brother,” he grinned teasingly at his niece, “perhaps you would do me the honour of standing up with me?”
Clarissa was for once lost for words. She had never waltzed outside the dancing class and Hugo had never before asked her to dance.
“Do, Mama,” Arabella urged her. “Why, we practised the steps only this morning and you were most proficient.”
At that moment Captain Harris arrived to claim his partner and Hugo offered his arm to his sister. With a smile she took it and allowed him to escort her onto the dance floor. At first, they danced silently but then Clarissa gained more confidence.
“It’s different at a ball,” she admitted, “I can see why the young people find it exhilarating, but I must remind Arabella to be particular about the gentlemen to whom she grants a waltz.”
“I don’t think you need worry about her, Clarissa,” Hugo said, “she knows where to draw the line.” He surveyed the gay multitude revolving around them. “My compliments on a most successful evening. What made you think of fancy dress?”
“I wanted something different, but don’t like masquerades – some gentlemen are inclined to take liberties and most of them just throw a domino over their dress clothes. This way everyone must make an effort.”
“There is certainly a great variety of costume. Is that Matthew in the armour? He hasn’t quite got the hang of his sword.”
“It’s only until after the pantomime. It is to be Sherwood Frolics and he is Sir Richard of Verysdale.”
“And Malvin the friar of orders grey, I see. And you? I couldn’t place your character beyond that you are dressed as a peasant woman from the middle-ages.”
“Oh, I’m the Witch of Nottingham Well,” she explained complacently. “I bring Robin back to life after he is killed.”
He laughed as he turned her under their raised arms. “You have made a happy family here, you and Tony.”
“Yes. It’s very much due to him, for I was not used to a home where respect and affection were common currency. I learnt a lot from him.”
“So did I,” Hugo said unexpectedly. “He took me aside at Tamm one time when I had made some obnoxiously cutting remark to you in imitation of my father, and explained to me that one must treat all women with courtesy and respect. Indeed, these characteristics should mark all the dealings of a gentleman, he said. I did apologise to you but I fear it was too late to improve things between us. However, he made me realise that Tamm’s was neither the only, nor perhaps the best example for me to follow.”
The music stopped and they exchanged bow and curtsey. Clarissa sighed. “He tried to get me to see that you had changed and shouldn’t be blamed for yielding to Papa’s early influence, but I was unable to let go. I am so sorry, Hugo.”
“It’s over, Clarrie,” he said. “Please don’t go on punishing yourself; you have suffered enough. We have, both of us, so much more than Tamm ever had and we shouldn’t let him spoil it for us by constantly harking back to the past. Lay it to rest.”
“You’re right. Thank you, Hugo.” She took his arm and they walked off the dance floor. “Lallie mentioned that her connection to the Greys is not as close as it was. I must say I think her father behaved abominably. When I think that she might have had a proper come-out! Those first seasons are so important for girls, you know. They may try their wings and learn a little of the world, make new friendships as well, before settling down.”
“You didn’t have that either, Clarrie, nor did Amabel,” he said sympathetically.
“No. I think I enjoyed bringing out Henrietta, Mattie and now Arabella all the more because of it. I had to muddle through so much, and I was determined they should not have to.”
“I understand, but at least you had Tony to support you.”
“His mother was very kind, too. I had hardly been in society before we went to Bath, for Papa never permitted Mama to go anywhere and Mama-in-law helped me find my feet.”
“Lallie’s other grandmother, Lady Grey, would have brought her out at her own expense, but Grey wouldn’t permit it and never let on that Lallie herself had more than enough money to fund a season if it came to that.”
She laughed shamefacedly. “Do you remember me complaining about her lack of fortune? With that dowry, she might have had her pick of suitors. Not that I think she could have found a better husband than you,” she hastened to reassure him, “and I can see that you are very happy together now, but her father took so many choices from her.”
“She took his deception very hard,” Hugo said, “she felt it as a sort of betrayal.”
“Which it was,” Clarissa stated. “It is the duty of the parent to support the child, not vice versa, unless of course the parent is in genuine need or is old and feeble. Neither can be true of the Greys and I can quite see why Lallie wishes to keep them a little at a distance now. But I know she has no other close family—the Martyn connection is very new to her—and I was wondering if she would like me to come to Tamm to be with her during her confinement.” She spoke hesitantly, as if unsure whether such an offer would be welcome.
“I think she would. It’s very kind of you to offer, but would you not find it difficult to be at the Manor again in such circumstances? I don’t remember it of course but Henrietta has told me of your difficult experiences with Mama.”
“Since then I’ve given birth to four healthy children,” she pointed out. “That might comfort Lallie if she is worried as might only be expected. I’m sure Anthony would come too—you’ll need someone at your side as well. They were the longest hours of his life, he always says, the days his children were born.”
“I should be very grateful,” Hugo said sincerely, “but let me mention it to Lallie.”
“I see I’ll have to learn to waltz,” Anthony Malvin greeted them with a warm smile. “Arabella has been teasing me to do so, but now that I’ve seen you dance it, my lady, I’m determined you shall dance it next with me.”
Chapter Four
“Clarissa has offered to come and stay at Tamm when you are confined,” Hugo told his wife as they strolled through the orangery.
She laughed. “So have Henrietta and Amabel. It’s very kind of them. What would you think about suggesting that they all come if they wish? I would prefer not have to pick and choose between them. I don’t want any of them to feel slighted.”
“We could offer it, I suppose. Let them decide—God knows there’s room enough,” Hugo said, slightly disgruntled at the prospect of having all three of his sisters under his roof at the same time, but he supposed he must bow to the feminine mysteries. “If I thought they would support you, I should even welcome the patronesses of Almack’s, thought I doubt that they would be of much use.”
Lallie chuckled at the vision of Ladies Esterhazy and Jersey, supported by Mrs Drummond-Burrell in the role of assistant midwives. “I think their presence would throw me into raving hysterics. Your sisters will be much more useful.”
In the ballroom above them heavy crimson curtains shot with gold shimmered in the candlelight but the orangery windows were left uncovered and the long room was flooded by moonlight. Soft lamps burned at intervals, conjuring an enthralling nightscape of dim light and shadow where pale blossoms gleamed against dark leaves and scented the air with a subtle blend of sweet and spicy scents. Sofas and small groups of chairs seductively suggested the possibility of a tête-à-tête, but the offer of privacy was deceptive, the participants being seen if not heard by fellow-guests seeking a respite from the over-heated ballroom.
“This is magical.” Lallie sank onto a comfortable sofa, drawing her husband down beside her.
“How are you faring? I hope you are not too tired.”
She shook her head. “No, not at all, although I find the air in the ballroom very oppressive. I think I might retire after supper, depending on how long the pantomime is. I have to say that I hadn’t thought Clarissa would provide such pleasurable entertainment. I saw you dancing with her; I’ve never seen her waltzing before, but you looked very comfortable together.” She yawned and leaned her head against his shoulder, gratefully resting against his supportive arm.
“She was an excellent partner, but I’d rather have danced with you.” With his free hand, he lifted her fingers to his lips and then retained them, so that they sat hand in hand.
“This is a part of marriage no one tells you about,” she said drowsily, “just being together.”
“One of the quiet joys,” he returned, smiling tenderly down at her. His arm tightened around her and he felt her head grow heavier on his shoulder. A quiet joy, indeed, Hugo thought as he watched over his wife and child.
Lallie jerked awake when a stentorian voice rang through the orangery. “My Lords, Ladies and Gentlemen, your presence is requested in the Hall where Sherwood Frolics await your pleasure.”
She opened her eyes, embarrassed to have fallen asleep so publicly, but was then relieved to notice that the Admiral and Lady Halworth had joined her husband and tactfully placed themselves to that she was screened from the notice of passers-by. They waved away her stammered apologies.
“Perfectly natural, my dear,” the admiral assured her. “I daresay you feel much better for having had forty winks.”
Lallie agreed that she did and took her husband’s arm to join the file of guests heading towards the hall. A platform had been erected at one end where doors led left and right to the staircases to the floor above and these exits served as the wings of the temporary stage. Footmen dressed in Lincoln green offered tankards of cider and ale as well as possets for the ladies. Henrietta, Charles Forbes and Roderick, dressed as travelling musicians, strolled through the crowd playing a lively tune before leaping onto the dais as the curtains parted to reveal Robin surrounded by his merry men who immediately launched into a full-throated rendition of “Under the Greenwood Tree.”
As the tale of Robin Hood unfolded, the partisan audience applauded, booed and cheered the antics of the performers.
“What baron or squire, or knight of the shire
Lives half so well as a holy friar?
* * *
A ho-o-o-o-o-ly fri-ar
A fri-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-ar
Lives half so well as a holy friar?”
On his final flourish, Lord Malvin drank deeply from the tankard of ale with which he had beaten time to his song, the resulting resounding belch earning him a sharp rebuke from Maid Marian, who sat demurely on a log by Robin’s side.
“Why, Sir Friar, if thou canst not mind thy manners, thy penance shall be short commons.”
“I beg my Lady’s pardon!” He fell to his knees in front of her. “But the fault lies with the ale.” He smiled cunningly. “Now, if I were to have the sack wine that is my due, I swear I would coo as meekly as any dove.”
“Thou’rt shameless, sir! She turned to the assembled guests. “Do I forgive him or exact a forfeit?”
“A forfeit! A forfeit!”
Maid Marian raised a hand and spoke balefully. “Before this night is out, thou shalt steal a kiss from the Witch of Nottingham Well. Be gone, Sirrah and dare not return to our revels before thou hast purged thy guilt. Minstrels, play a sweeter air.”
Not long afterwards, the strains of Greensleeves were interrupted by the sound of a smacking kiss followed by a shriek and a resounding slap. The friar dashed onto the stage, one hand held to a violently reddened cheek, the other holding his habit kirtled above his knees as he endeavoured to escape the wrath of the broomstick-wielding witch hot in pursuit. He leapt down into the hall, inspiring the musicians to strike up ‘A-Hunting We Will Go’, a song taken up by actors and audience alike as witch and prey dodged through the hall and out the other side.
“A splendid entertainment, my lord, my lady,” Hugo said later, “although I was shocked to see my sister and brother-in-law lose all sense of decorum.”
Malvin, now attired as Dick Turpin, grinned. “I’m dashed glad to be out of that friar’s habit. I don’t know how you ladies manage in skirts. Practice, I suppose.”
“And the requirement to behave at all times in a ladylike manner,” Lallie said ruefully “I often think it must be wonderful to be able to wear breeches and top-boots. Despite her skirts, Arabella played her part very well, I thought.”
“She’s getting above herself,” Arabella’s father grumbled but could not repress the twinkle in his eye. “That last was unplanned.”
“I am even more impressed by your presence of mind.”
“That was Clarissa,” he said proudly. “By the time I left the stage, she had it all worked out. She even remembered to get word to Forbes to be on the alert with the change of music.” He looked fondly at his wife. “But she couldn’t bring herself to slap my face, even in jest. She beckoned to Matthew to leave the stage and at the right moment, he clapped his hands loudly.”
“Your cheek is still rather red,” Hugo observed.
“Rouge,” Clarissa, who had doffed her witch’s weeds and was now a stately Eleanor of Aquitaine, said briskly. “Malvin’s aunt still uses the old-fashioned face paint of the last century and I sent a message to her maid to bring some quickly.”
“You have a heavy hand with it,” her husband complained. “I thought I’d removed it all.” He took out his handkerchief, rubbed his cheek and regarded the result with dismay.
“You need cold cream to remove it properly,” she said. “Hugo, take Lallie into supper while I look after Anthony.”
Much later, as they lay, drowsy and content, in each other’s arms, Hugo murmured, “Thank you for encouraging me to come. I have got to know my sisters in a completely new fashion.”
He felt rather than saw Lallie’s smile. “I’m glad.”
© Catherine Kullmann January 2021. All rights reserved.
Background Notes
“Clarissa has offered to come and stay at Tamm when you are confined,” Hugo told his wife as they strolled through the orangery.
She laughed. “So have Henrietta and Amabel. It’s very kind of them. What would you think about suggesting that they all come if they wish? I would prefer not have to pick and choose between them. I don’t want any of them to feel slighted.”
“We could offer it, I suppose. Let them decide—God knows there’s room enough,” Hugo said, slightly disgruntled at the prospect of having all three of his sisters under his roof at the same time, but he supposed he must bow to the feminine mysteries. “If I thought they would support you, I should even welcome the patronesses of Almack’s, thought I doubt that they would be of much use.”
Lallie chuckled at the vision of Ladies Esterhazy and Jersey, supported by Mrs Drummond-Burrell in the role of assistant midwives. “I think their presence would throw me into raving hysterics. Your sisters will be much more useful.”
In the ballroom above them heavy crimson curtains shot with gold shimmered in the candlelight but the orangery windows were left uncovered and the long room was flooded by moonlight. Soft lamps burned at intervals, conjuring an enthralling nightscape of dim light and shadow where pale blossoms gleamed against dark leaves and scented the air with a subtle blend of sweet and spicy scents. Sofas and small groups of chairs seductively suggested the possibility of a tête-à-tête, but the offer of privacy was deceptive, the participants being seen if not heard by fellow-guests seeking a respite from the over-heated ballroom.
“This is magical.” Lallie sank onto a comfortable sofa, drawing her husband down beside her.
“How are you faring? I hope you are not too tired.”
She shook her head. “No, not at all, although I find the air in the ballroom very oppressive. I think I might retire after supper, depending on how long the pantomime is. I have to say that I hadn’t thought Clarissa would provide such pleasurable entertainment. I saw you dancing with her; I’ve never seen her waltzing before, but you looked very comfortable together.” She yawned and leaned her head against his shoulder, gratefully resting against his supportive arm.
“She was an excellent partner, but I’d rather have danced with you.” With his free hand, he lifted her fingers to his lips and then retained them, so that they sat hand in hand.
“This is a part of marriage no one tells you about,” she said drowsily, “just being together.”
“One of the quiet joys,” he returned, smiling tenderly down at her. His arm tightened around her and he felt her head grow heavier on his shoulder. A quiet joy, indeed, Hugo thought as he watched over his wife and child.
Lallie jerked awake when a stentorian voice rang through the orangery. “My Lords, Ladies and Gentlemen, your presence is requested in the Hall where Sherwood Frolics await your pleasure.”
She opened her eyes, embarrassed to have fallen asleep so publicly, but was then relieved to notice that the Admiral and Lady Halworth had joined her husband and tactfully placed themselves to that she was screened from the notice of passers-by. They waved away her stammered apologies.
“Perfectly natural, my dear,” the admiral assured her. “I daresay you feel much better for having had forty winks.”
Lallie agreed that she did and took her husband’s arm to join the file of guests heading towards the hall. A platform had been erected at one end where doors led left and right to the staircases to the floor above and these exits served as the wings of the temporary stage. Footmen dressed in Lincoln green offered tankards of cider and ale as well as possets for the ladies. Henrietta, Charles Forbes and Roderick, dressed as travelling musicians, strolled through the crowd playing a lively tune before leaping onto the dais as the curtains parted to reveal Robin surrounded by his merry men who immediately launched into a full-throated rendition of “Under the Greenwood Tree.”
As the tale of Robin Hood unfolded, the partisan audience applauded, booed and cheered the antics of the performers.
“What baron or squire, or knight of the shire
Lives half so well as a holy friar?
* * *
A ho-o-o-o-o-ly fri-ar
A fri-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-ar
Lives half so well as a holy friar?”
On his final flourish, Lord Malvin drank deeply from the tankard of ale with which he had beaten time to his song, the resulting resounding belch earning him a sharp rebuke from Maid Marian, who sat demurely on a log by Robin’s side.
“Why, Sir Friar, if thou canst not mind thy manners, thy penance shall be short commons.”
“I beg my Lady’s pardon!” He fell to his knees in front of her. “But the fault lies with the ale.” He smiled cunningly. “Now, if I were to have the sack wine that is my due, I swear I would coo as meekly as any dove.”
“Thou’rt shameless, sir! She turned to the assembled guests. “Do I forgive him or exact a forfeit?”
“A forfeit! A forfeit!”
Maid Marian raised a hand and spoke balefully. “Before this night is out, thou shalt steal a kiss from the Witch of Nottingham Well. Be gone, Sirrah and dare not return to our revels before thou hast purged thy guilt. Minstrels, play a sweeter air.”
Not long afterwards, the strains of Greensleeves were interrupted by the sound of a smacking kiss followed by a shriek and a resounding slap. The friar dashed onto the stage, one hand held to a violently reddened cheek, the other holding his habit kirtled above his knees as he endeavoured to escape the wrath of the broomstick-wielding witch hot in pursuit. He leapt down into the hall, inspiring the musicians to strike up ‘A-Hunting We Will Go’, a song taken up by actors and audience alike as witch and prey dodged through the hall and out the other side.
“A splendid entertainment, my lord, my lady,” Hugo said later, “although I was shocked to see my sister and brother-in-law lose all sense of decorum.”
Malvin, now attired as Dick Turpin, grinned. “I’m dashed glad to be out of that friar’s habit. I don’t know how you ladies manage in skirts. Practice, I suppose.”
“And the requirement to behave at all times in a ladylike manner,” Lallie said ruefully “I often think it must be wonderful to be able to wear breeches and top-boots. Despite her skirts, Arabella played her part very well, I thought.”
“She’s getting above herself,” Arabella’s father grumbled but could not repress the twinkle in his eye. “That last was unplanned.”
“I am even more impressed by your presence of mind.”
“That was Clarissa,” he said proudly. “By the time I left the stage, she had it all worked out. She even remembered to get word to Forbes to be on the alert with the change of music.” He looked fondly at his wife. “But she couldn’t bring herself to slap my face, even in jest. She beckoned to Matthew to leave the stage and at the right moment, he clapped his hands loudly.”
“Your cheek is still rather red,” Hugo observed.
“Rouge,” Clarissa, who had doffed her witch’s weeds and was now a stately Eleanor of Aquitaine, said briskly. “Malvin’s aunt still uses the old-fashioned face paint of the last century and I sent a message to her maid to bring some quickly.”
“You have a heavy hand with it,” her husband complained. “I thought I’d removed it all.” He took out his handkerchief, rubbed his cheek and regarded the result with dismay.
“You need cold cream to remove it properly,” she said. “Hugo, take Lallie into supper while I look after Anthony.”
Much later, as they lay, drowsy and content, in each other’s arms, Hugo murmured, “Thank you for encouraging me to come. I have got to know my sisters in a completely new fashion.”
He felt rather than saw Lallie’s smile. “I’m glad.”
© Catherine Kullmann January 2021. All rights reserved.
Background Notes
- The 6th of January, the Feast of the Three Kings or the Epiphany, is the twelfth and final day of Christmas and still widely celebrated. For centuries in England it was an occasion of general frivolity, including masked and fancy dress balls.
This is the statue of Athena Promachos, found at the Villa of the Papyrii in Herculaneum, that inspired Lallie's tunic. Of course she wore neither the aegis (cape-like garment on the statue's outstretched arm) nor the helmet.
The statue is now in the Archaeological Museum of Naples. Photo: Kurt Kullmann
The statue is now in the Archaeological Museum of Naples. Photo: Kurt Kullmann
Short Story His Cousin's Bride
Dublin, 1820
“Ten to nine. Twenty, twenty-five minutes to get the business done, a bite of breakfast and you’ll be back at your premises by eleven.” Bartholomew Hines snapped his watch shut. “You’re doing well, they tell me.” He broke off when the minister emerged from the vestry. “I’ll just have a word with Mr Hare.”
Left alone in the pew, Joel MacAllister awaited the arrival of his cousin’s bride. His second cousin, he reminded himself. Apparently the Alderman considered the relationship close enough to request him to act as groomsman at his second wedding. It would have been churlish to refuse, especially as Bartholomew was intent on a private ceremony. Just a year since, he had lost both his first wife and their only child.
Joel idly studied the lists of benefactions inscribed in gold on two dark brown boards and quirked an eyebrow at the gallery’s vice-regal pew where the Lord Lieutenant might shelter between the forceful display of the royal arms and the imposing organ. Strange to think that the rebel Lord Edward Fitzgerald lay in the vaults below. The then rector had waived his right to be buried there in favour of the Duke of Leinster’s son. It showed that even in the worst of times there were men who behaved decently.
The second witness, the clerk’s wife, sat opposite. She was the only other person present.
Bartholomew was marrying the orphaned daughter of a Bristol sea-captain; brought to Dublin three years ago by her uncle, Samuel Gore. She was wealthy, perhaps, but that was not what Joel looked for in a wife. His thoughts drifted to Sarah Lewis, remembered how her warm smile lit up her eyes and softened her lips. A devoted daughter, they said, who had nursed her mother to the end while ensuring that Mrs Lewis Milliners continued to thrive.
She had purchased a pair of scissors the morning he had opened his new shop. ‘This is my first sale,’ he had told her proudly.
She had smiled, counted out the exact sum due and added a silver sixpence. ‘A handsel, Mr MacAllister. May it bring you good fortune.’
And so it had. Between Dublin Castle and the regiments garrisoned in Ireland, a good sword-cutler was always in demand and other cutlery—razors, scissors and the like—was also going well. His fortune would be sealed if he could win Sarah as his wife!
Joel looked towards the door. Still no sign of today’s bride.
Across the city, the young woman in question turned from the window as the carriage disappeared from view. Too late, now, to change her mind. She paced up and down, pausing to peer into the looking-glass. “Are you sure you’re doing the right thing? Have you truly considered the consequences?” Her curved lips firmed. She nodded resolutely to her reflection and lowered the embroidered veil, obscuring the pale oval of her face.
The door opened. “You’re ready,” Mr Gore said. “Come, then!”
He neither offered his arm nor waited for her to precede him, but purposefully descended the stairs, confident she wouldn’t balk at this last moment. She climbed docilely into the waiting carriage. Soon they had clattered across Carlisle Bridge and were turning into Dame Street. By rights the wedding should have taken place in the bride’s parish, but the Alderman had insisted on St Werburgh’s. It didn’t matter. She resolutely looked away from her companion, her unseeing gaze fixed on the passing scene.
The air was cool despite the morning sun, and she shivered as they waited. A heavy oak door gave onto a tunnel-like entrance which in turn led to a gloomy vestibule within the thick tower walls. It opened into an ante-chamber. Beyond it, a high arched window flooded the church with light that shimmered down the aisle and spilled through the doors in a glittering stream.
“Wait here,” the clerk instructed. He vanished, to appear moments later at the top of the aisle, hovering behind a minister who stood expectantly at the altar steps beside two gentlemen.
The minister moved forward and the bridegroom beckoned imperiously. Joel touched the ring in his pocket before taking his position on his cousin’s right.
The bride approached slowly over the black and white squares, her head bent and her fingers barely resting on her uncle’s arm. She was expensively dressed in a pelisse of dark green velvet trimmed with fur, her face concealed by the heavy veil which fell from the deep brim of her bonnet.
Was she disfigured? By the smallpox, perhaps? Joel shrugged. It was no concern of his.
The minister commenced the awful prologue to the marriage service.
‘Mutual society, help and comfort,’ Joel reflected dreamily. Perhaps he should simply ask Sarah if he might escort her to church next Sunday. That would make his intentions clear. But to do that, he must contrive to have a private word with her.
"……For ever hold his peace.” The minister paused perfunctorily before addressing the bridal couple, “I require and charge you both……that if either of you know any impediment, why ye may not be lawfully joined together in Matrimony, ye do now confess it.”
“I do so confess. The bride does not consent.”
It was the bride who spoke. A salvo of startled gasps and bitten-off exclamations escaped the few onlookers. Incredulous glances crossed uneasily before focussing on the still, veiled figure. Mr Gore and the bridegroom closed in on her from either side.
The minister cleared his throat. “I beg your pardon, miss?”
She took a folded paper from her reticule. “Miss Matthews has not agreed to the marriage.”
Gore grabbed for the letter but the minister was before him. Furious, Gore lunged and viciously jerked her by the wrist. “I warned you not to make trouble, my girl. It’s all lies!”
“It’s true, I swear it!”
She put up her veil with her free hand and, chin raised, looked defiantly from one man to the other. Her eyes were huge in her chalk-white face.
“Sarah!”
As Joel started forward, his cousin rounded on Gore. “What the devil are you about, man? I’ve never seen this woman before in my life.”
Joel pushed past Bartholomew to clasp Sarah within a steadying arm then stretched across to clamp Gore’s wrist in a steely grip. “Release her!”
“Who the devil are you to interfere?” Gore tried to tug his captive towards him. “Fetch the constable! Most likely she kidnapped my niece and stole her clothes.”
“Release her, I said!” Joel’s fingers tightened in a brutal vise that made the other hasten to obey.
“You’ll pay for this, you brazen hussy!
Joel urged the trembling Sarah into a pew and slid in beside her to block her from further assault. “Sit. You are safe now.”
She leaned against him, cradling her wrist. After a moment she looked up, blushing faintly. “What must you think of me!”
“That you are very brave—and very foolish,” he answered honestly and was rewarded by a startled smile.
The minister refolded the letter. “Miss Matthews says she was confined so closely that only through such a substitution could she escape. I shall have to report this. I must remind you gentlemen that it is a grave offence to coerce a woman into marriage.”
Bartholomew bristled. “I did no such thing. Her uncle there assured me the girl was happy with the match.”
“If you had taken the trouble to court your intended directly, sir, you would have learned otherwise.”
The Alderman reddened at Sarah’s quiet reproach and pointed sourly at Gore. “He wouldn’t leave us alone together, said she was willing, but shy. Well, I thought, there’s plenty of time to woo her after we’re wed, especially when he insists the marriage take place quickly. There was some seaman from Bristol annoying her, he said and,” he looked embarrassed, “I was lonely after Maria died. She, Miss Matthews, I mean, is a taking little thing.”
While he was speaking, Joel had gently bared Sarah’s wrist. “He bruised you,” he growled, with a dark glance at the offender.
“That’s nothing compared to Miss Matthews’s black eye.”
“What!” Gore snapped. “I never raised a hand to her and if she said so, she’s a liar!”
“No,” Sarah’s voice dripped contempt. “You put her on bread and water and kept her on her knees repenting her sin in opposing you until she fainted and bruised her face. That’s why he had me bring her such a bonnet and veil,” she explained to her appalled listeners, “so that no one would see.”
“The rotten scoundrel!” the clerk’s wife cried.
“I refuse to stand here and be insulted.”
“Just a minute, my fine buck!” The Alderman hurried after Gore as he headed down the aisle.
“I apologise for the disruption, sir” Sarah said to the minister as a dull thud signalled the closing of the outer door, “but we could think of no other way to manage it.”
“It truly was a unique experience,” he replied with a boyish grin. “I admire your courage, Miss Lewis. Miss Matthews writes that she is safe and well.”
“She is, and out of harm’s way by now.” She sighed. “I suppose it will cause a great stir.”
“Maybe not,” Joel said. “I doubt Gore will wish it bruited about and I’ll have a word with my cousin.”
“Poor man, I was sorry for him,” Sarah looked at the minister. “Do you require anything more of me, sir?”
“No. Thank you, Miss Lewis.
“Come,” Joel said to Sarah, “I’ll take you home.”
To his relief, she didn’t challenge this brusque assumption of authority but simply replied, “Thank you, Mr MacAllister” and followed him out of the pew.
Once in the vestibule, she turned her back to him and, with a murmured, “pray excuse me,” removed her bonnet revealing a heavy coronet of rich auburn hair. It must come to her hips, he thought, shifting uneasily at a vision of it flowing over creamy shoulders and a white shift. When she looked down to unpin the veil, his fingers itched to touch the little tendrils curling at her delicate nape. Better think of something else, he ordered his unruly mind, you’re still in a church and wearing clinging trousers at that. His working garb of leather breeches and jerkin would be more concealing.
Sarah opened the top button of her pelisse and spread the collar wide, then ran her finger around the inside so that a delectable little lace frill sprang into view. She donned the bonnet again, tilting it to what was evidently just the right angle before tying the ribbons in a coquettish bow. Seemingly oblivious to his presence, she removed a small folding mirror from her reticule and examined her appearance, then touched a finger to her lips and smoothed it over each eyebrow. Apparently satisfied, she tucked the mirror, pins and veil away before turning towards the door.
“You look charming,” he said, entranced by this glimpse of the private Sarah.
She jumped when his deep voice broke the silence and blushed scarlet. “Oh! Mr MacAllister! I had quite forgotten— pray excuse me.”
He shook his head, smiling. “That bonnet is much more becoming now than when it was set four-square on your head and pulled down over your forehead like a coal-scuttle.”
She laughed. “Tricks of the trade, sir. I can’t afford to appear as a dowdy any more that you would willingly sport a dull or clumsy blade.”
“Very true,” he agreed.
“I suppose I should be grateful to Gore,” he began as they strolled down Castle Street. “I’ve been at my wit’s end wondering how to arrange a private conversation with you.”
She raised her eyebrows. “For what reason?”
“I’m told you permit your girls to have followers provided they present themselves for your approval first.”
She hesitated briefly but then walked on. “That is correct. They are orphans, you see, and live with me. I won’t tolerate their being pestered by men who consider any shop girl fair game, especially if she has no family to protect her.” Her hand went to her mouth. “Not that I mean to imply, Mr MacAllister—that is, of course an upright man like yourself must always be acceptable.”
“Thank you,” he said gravely. “Tell me, Miss Lewis, to whom does a man apply if he wishes to court you?”
Her jaw dropped. “Please don’t mock me, Mr MacAllister,” she said with quiet dignity and looked away.
“Sarah! You wrong me! I meant it most sincerely,” he protested urgently. They had reached Essex Bridge. He stopped and gently turned her so they stood looking down the Liffey, their backs to passers-by.
“What is a man to do? You don’t appear to have any relatives and you might as well live in a papist nunnery, surrounded as you are by all your girls—they even swarm around you at church. How the deuce am I to get to know you better?”
“Do—do you really want to? Pray consider—I’ll be thirty next birthday.”
“So old?” he teased her. “So will I.”
“It’s different for men,” she said flatly.
“Who says so? They? Sarah, a woman who in the cause of what she considers right is willing to appear disguised as a bride and reject another woman’s bridegroom at the altar should be able to rise above what they say!”
“Most men want a biddable girl. I’m not that.”
He grinned. “You made that very clear this morning. Just listen to me, Sarah. Please?”
After a moment, she nodded.
What should he say? This was worse than awaiting the trial of his proof piece by the Guild. He could only speak from his heart. He laid his hand over hers where it rested on the parapet.
“You’re beautiful, kind, generous, a good mistress, a good neighbour and a highly respected tradeswoman. What man would not want such a helpmeet, provided she could find in her heart a fondness for him to match his for her?”
When she didn’t respond, he was sure he had spoiled his chances. Then she brushed her eyes with a gloved finger.
“Mr MacAllister.”
Her voice, softer, more hesitant than usual, gave him hope and, his heart in his mouth, he corrected her. “Joel.”
“Joel,” she repeated quietly. “I own I feel the lack of a loving companion in my life.”
He tilted her chin lightly so he could see her eyes. “Sarah, could you bring yourself to walk up the aisle again, properly this time?”
Her smile arched through her tears like a rainbow across a stormy sky.
“I think so, Joel, just not at St. Werburgh’s.”
© Catherine Kullmann 2020
Dublin, 1820
“Ten to nine. Twenty, twenty-five minutes to get the business done, a bite of breakfast and you’ll be back at your premises by eleven.” Bartholomew Hines snapped his watch shut. “You’re doing well, they tell me.” He broke off when the minister emerged from the vestry. “I’ll just have a word with Mr Hare.”
Left alone in the pew, Joel MacAllister awaited the arrival of his cousin’s bride. His second cousin, he reminded himself. Apparently the Alderman considered the relationship close enough to request him to act as groomsman at his second wedding. It would have been churlish to refuse, especially as Bartholomew was intent on a private ceremony. Just a year since, he had lost both his first wife and their only child.
Joel idly studied the lists of benefactions inscribed in gold on two dark brown boards and quirked an eyebrow at the gallery’s vice-regal pew where the Lord Lieutenant might shelter between the forceful display of the royal arms and the imposing organ. Strange to think that the rebel Lord Edward Fitzgerald lay in the vaults below. The then rector had waived his right to be buried there in favour of the Duke of Leinster’s son. It showed that even in the worst of times there were men who behaved decently.
The second witness, the clerk’s wife, sat opposite. She was the only other person present.
Bartholomew was marrying the orphaned daughter of a Bristol sea-captain; brought to Dublin three years ago by her uncle, Samuel Gore. She was wealthy, perhaps, but that was not what Joel looked for in a wife. His thoughts drifted to Sarah Lewis, remembered how her warm smile lit up her eyes and softened her lips. A devoted daughter, they said, who had nursed her mother to the end while ensuring that Mrs Lewis Milliners continued to thrive.
She had purchased a pair of scissors the morning he had opened his new shop. ‘This is my first sale,’ he had told her proudly.
She had smiled, counted out the exact sum due and added a silver sixpence. ‘A handsel, Mr MacAllister. May it bring you good fortune.’
And so it had. Between Dublin Castle and the regiments garrisoned in Ireland, a good sword-cutler was always in demand and other cutlery—razors, scissors and the like—was also going well. His fortune would be sealed if he could win Sarah as his wife!
Joel looked towards the door. Still no sign of today’s bride.
Across the city, the young woman in question turned from the window as the carriage disappeared from view. Too late, now, to change her mind. She paced up and down, pausing to peer into the looking-glass. “Are you sure you’re doing the right thing? Have you truly considered the consequences?” Her curved lips firmed. She nodded resolutely to her reflection and lowered the embroidered veil, obscuring the pale oval of her face.
The door opened. “You’re ready,” Mr Gore said. “Come, then!”
He neither offered his arm nor waited for her to precede him, but purposefully descended the stairs, confident she wouldn’t balk at this last moment. She climbed docilely into the waiting carriage. Soon they had clattered across Carlisle Bridge and were turning into Dame Street. By rights the wedding should have taken place in the bride’s parish, but the Alderman had insisted on St Werburgh’s. It didn’t matter. She resolutely looked away from her companion, her unseeing gaze fixed on the passing scene.
The air was cool despite the morning sun, and she shivered as they waited. A heavy oak door gave onto a tunnel-like entrance which in turn led to a gloomy vestibule within the thick tower walls. It opened into an ante-chamber. Beyond it, a high arched window flooded the church with light that shimmered down the aisle and spilled through the doors in a glittering stream.
“Wait here,” the clerk instructed. He vanished, to appear moments later at the top of the aisle, hovering behind a minister who stood expectantly at the altar steps beside two gentlemen.
The minister moved forward and the bridegroom beckoned imperiously. Joel touched the ring in his pocket before taking his position on his cousin’s right.
The bride approached slowly over the black and white squares, her head bent and her fingers barely resting on her uncle’s arm. She was expensively dressed in a pelisse of dark green velvet trimmed with fur, her face concealed by the heavy veil which fell from the deep brim of her bonnet.
Was she disfigured? By the smallpox, perhaps? Joel shrugged. It was no concern of his.
The minister commenced the awful prologue to the marriage service.
‘Mutual society, help and comfort,’ Joel reflected dreamily. Perhaps he should simply ask Sarah if he might escort her to church next Sunday. That would make his intentions clear. But to do that, he must contrive to have a private word with her.
"……For ever hold his peace.” The minister paused perfunctorily before addressing the bridal couple, “I require and charge you both……that if either of you know any impediment, why ye may not be lawfully joined together in Matrimony, ye do now confess it.”
“I do so confess. The bride does not consent.”
It was the bride who spoke. A salvo of startled gasps and bitten-off exclamations escaped the few onlookers. Incredulous glances crossed uneasily before focussing on the still, veiled figure. Mr Gore and the bridegroom closed in on her from either side.
The minister cleared his throat. “I beg your pardon, miss?”
She took a folded paper from her reticule. “Miss Matthews has not agreed to the marriage.”
Gore grabbed for the letter but the minister was before him. Furious, Gore lunged and viciously jerked her by the wrist. “I warned you not to make trouble, my girl. It’s all lies!”
“It’s true, I swear it!”
She put up her veil with her free hand and, chin raised, looked defiantly from one man to the other. Her eyes were huge in her chalk-white face.
“Sarah!”
As Joel started forward, his cousin rounded on Gore. “What the devil are you about, man? I’ve never seen this woman before in my life.”
Joel pushed past Bartholomew to clasp Sarah within a steadying arm then stretched across to clamp Gore’s wrist in a steely grip. “Release her!”
“Who the devil are you to interfere?” Gore tried to tug his captive towards him. “Fetch the constable! Most likely she kidnapped my niece and stole her clothes.”
“Release her, I said!” Joel’s fingers tightened in a brutal vise that made the other hasten to obey.
“You’ll pay for this, you brazen hussy!
Joel urged the trembling Sarah into a pew and slid in beside her to block her from further assault. “Sit. You are safe now.”
She leaned against him, cradling her wrist. After a moment she looked up, blushing faintly. “What must you think of me!”
“That you are very brave—and very foolish,” he answered honestly and was rewarded by a startled smile.
The minister refolded the letter. “Miss Matthews says she was confined so closely that only through such a substitution could she escape. I shall have to report this. I must remind you gentlemen that it is a grave offence to coerce a woman into marriage.”
Bartholomew bristled. “I did no such thing. Her uncle there assured me the girl was happy with the match.”
“If you had taken the trouble to court your intended directly, sir, you would have learned otherwise.”
The Alderman reddened at Sarah’s quiet reproach and pointed sourly at Gore. “He wouldn’t leave us alone together, said she was willing, but shy. Well, I thought, there’s plenty of time to woo her after we’re wed, especially when he insists the marriage take place quickly. There was some seaman from Bristol annoying her, he said and,” he looked embarrassed, “I was lonely after Maria died. She, Miss Matthews, I mean, is a taking little thing.”
While he was speaking, Joel had gently bared Sarah’s wrist. “He bruised you,” he growled, with a dark glance at the offender.
“That’s nothing compared to Miss Matthews’s black eye.”
“What!” Gore snapped. “I never raised a hand to her and if she said so, she’s a liar!”
“No,” Sarah’s voice dripped contempt. “You put her on bread and water and kept her on her knees repenting her sin in opposing you until she fainted and bruised her face. That’s why he had me bring her such a bonnet and veil,” she explained to her appalled listeners, “so that no one would see.”
“The rotten scoundrel!” the clerk’s wife cried.
“I refuse to stand here and be insulted.”
“Just a minute, my fine buck!” The Alderman hurried after Gore as he headed down the aisle.
“I apologise for the disruption, sir” Sarah said to the minister as a dull thud signalled the closing of the outer door, “but we could think of no other way to manage it.”
“It truly was a unique experience,” he replied with a boyish grin. “I admire your courage, Miss Lewis. Miss Matthews writes that she is safe and well.”
“She is, and out of harm’s way by now.” She sighed. “I suppose it will cause a great stir.”
“Maybe not,” Joel said. “I doubt Gore will wish it bruited about and I’ll have a word with my cousin.”
“Poor man, I was sorry for him,” Sarah looked at the minister. “Do you require anything more of me, sir?”
“No. Thank you, Miss Lewis.
“Come,” Joel said to Sarah, “I’ll take you home.”
To his relief, she didn’t challenge this brusque assumption of authority but simply replied, “Thank you, Mr MacAllister” and followed him out of the pew.
Once in the vestibule, she turned her back to him and, with a murmured, “pray excuse me,” removed her bonnet revealing a heavy coronet of rich auburn hair. It must come to her hips, he thought, shifting uneasily at a vision of it flowing over creamy shoulders and a white shift. When she looked down to unpin the veil, his fingers itched to touch the little tendrils curling at her delicate nape. Better think of something else, he ordered his unruly mind, you’re still in a church and wearing clinging trousers at that. His working garb of leather breeches and jerkin would be more concealing.
Sarah opened the top button of her pelisse and spread the collar wide, then ran her finger around the inside so that a delectable little lace frill sprang into view. She donned the bonnet again, tilting it to what was evidently just the right angle before tying the ribbons in a coquettish bow. Seemingly oblivious to his presence, she removed a small folding mirror from her reticule and examined her appearance, then touched a finger to her lips and smoothed it over each eyebrow. Apparently satisfied, she tucked the mirror, pins and veil away before turning towards the door.
“You look charming,” he said, entranced by this glimpse of the private Sarah.
She jumped when his deep voice broke the silence and blushed scarlet. “Oh! Mr MacAllister! I had quite forgotten— pray excuse me.”
He shook his head, smiling. “That bonnet is much more becoming now than when it was set four-square on your head and pulled down over your forehead like a coal-scuttle.”
She laughed. “Tricks of the trade, sir. I can’t afford to appear as a dowdy any more that you would willingly sport a dull or clumsy blade.”
“Very true,” he agreed.
“I suppose I should be grateful to Gore,” he began as they strolled down Castle Street. “I’ve been at my wit’s end wondering how to arrange a private conversation with you.”
She raised her eyebrows. “For what reason?”
“I’m told you permit your girls to have followers provided they present themselves for your approval first.”
She hesitated briefly but then walked on. “That is correct. They are orphans, you see, and live with me. I won’t tolerate their being pestered by men who consider any shop girl fair game, especially if she has no family to protect her.” Her hand went to her mouth. “Not that I mean to imply, Mr MacAllister—that is, of course an upright man like yourself must always be acceptable.”
“Thank you,” he said gravely. “Tell me, Miss Lewis, to whom does a man apply if he wishes to court you?”
Her jaw dropped. “Please don’t mock me, Mr MacAllister,” she said with quiet dignity and looked away.
“Sarah! You wrong me! I meant it most sincerely,” he protested urgently. They had reached Essex Bridge. He stopped and gently turned her so they stood looking down the Liffey, their backs to passers-by.
“What is a man to do? You don’t appear to have any relatives and you might as well live in a papist nunnery, surrounded as you are by all your girls—they even swarm around you at church. How the deuce am I to get to know you better?”
“Do—do you really want to? Pray consider—I’ll be thirty next birthday.”
“So old?” he teased her. “So will I.”
“It’s different for men,” she said flatly.
“Who says so? They? Sarah, a woman who in the cause of what she considers right is willing to appear disguised as a bride and reject another woman’s bridegroom at the altar should be able to rise above what they say!”
“Most men want a biddable girl. I’m not that.”
He grinned. “You made that very clear this morning. Just listen to me, Sarah. Please?”
After a moment, she nodded.
What should he say? This was worse than awaiting the trial of his proof piece by the Guild. He could only speak from his heart. He laid his hand over hers where it rested on the parapet.
“You’re beautiful, kind, generous, a good mistress, a good neighbour and a highly respected tradeswoman. What man would not want such a helpmeet, provided she could find in her heart a fondness for him to match his for her?”
When she didn’t respond, he was sure he had spoiled his chances. Then she brushed her eyes with a gloved finger.
“Mr MacAllister.”
Her voice, softer, more hesitant than usual, gave him hope and, his heart in his mouth, he corrected her. “Joel.”
“Joel,” she repeated quietly. “I own I feel the lack of a loving companion in my life.”
He tilted her chin lightly so he could see her eyes. “Sarah, could you bring yourself to walk up the aisle again, properly this time?”
Her smile arched through her tears like a rainbow across a stormy sky.
“I think so, Joel, just not at St. Werburgh’s.”
© Catherine Kullmann 2020
