The Heiress

by Molly Greeley

  She listened silently as I tried, ineloquently, to explain. “What of your beloved novels?” I said at last. “Cannot a well-played song transport a listener the same way a reader can be transported by a well-penned story?”

  Eliza was a portrait of misery. “I just . . . want something else,” she said.

  I swallowed down my frustration, though it tried to lodge itself in my throat. “And I envy your skills. So very much.”

  She wrote me the following day.

  I did not mean to negate your experience by bemoaning my own, dearest Frank, she said. It is only that, sometimes, I cannot see a way out, and I find it hard to be cheerful.

  Out of what, she did not say; but I supposed she did not need to. I bit the inside of my cheek, glanced up at Mrs. Fitzwilliam, who sat across from me on one of the drawing room’s elegant chairs, sewing and humming a little to herself.

  If only ladies did not require the presence of other ladies to move freely through the world, I wrote back later. My cousin and Mr. Watters leave the house whenever they wish, in each other’s company or entirely alone, at any time of day or evening. Their strides are long and full of purpose. And why should they not be? For men are told from boyhood that they have charge of their lives and of the world. Whereas I cannot walk down St. James’s Street, where John’s club is located, without being assumed to be a lady of low reputation.

  I had a friend once. She called me exceptionally fortunate and urged me to take control of my estate and my inheritance. I am beginning to think I might have the strength to do so; but I hardly know where or how to start.

  Her reply was swift and clipped; I felt, rattling through it, the same choking frustration I’d felt with her.

  You’ve relations who manage their own grand estates; surely they can provide guidance, she said. Start with small things. Ask them.

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Mr. Watters and Mrs. Fitzwilliam were urging me to accompany them to the park for the fashionable hour, and I was resisting.

  “It would be so much more enjoyable with you on my arm, Miss de Bourgh,” Mr. Watters said, and then, when I demurred, he added in a teasing voice, “Surely Miss Amherst would not call at this hour.”

  The mention of her name made me bite my lip, and I turned away, pretending to busy myself with my mostly untouched whitework, to prevent his keen eyes from noticing. But he leaned around and said, “What feminine secrets do you two ladies expose to one another in those notes Preston is always bringing in and taking out, hmm?”

  There was something I did not like in the odd lilt to his voice; in his pale, raised brow. The fine hairs all along my body sprang to attention, and it was I who looked away first.

  I was somewhat afraid to approach John’s book room again, but when I knocked and he bid me enter, I found him alone at his desk, looking over some correspondence.

  “Anne,” he said, looking up. “I thought there was some scheme to go walking. Did you not wish to go?”

  “Not today.” I took a seat across from him. “I see you are not out, either.”

  “Hyde Park at this hour has long since lost its allure for me,” he said, with an almost-smile. Then he set down his quill, running a hand over his head so that his hair stood to military attention, and sighed. “And I’ve rather a mess to contend with on the estate. It seems a windstorm knocked over a number of trees—my steward says the damage to some of the cottages was devastating. No lives lost, thank heaven, but a few injuries, and the rebuilding will take some time. In the meantime, there is the problem of housing those who have lost their homes. I really must leave for Surrey directly.”

  He pinched his brow, just above the bridge of his nose, then grinned at me. “The perils of estate management, eh? It would be much easier, I sometimes think, if I could be like so many other gentlemen, and leave everything to my steward. But—”

  “But your tenants are under your protection, and thus are your responsibility,” I said, and he gave me a startled look.

  “Yes, exactly,” he said.

  Harriet Watters brought with her a substantial dowry; when she and John married, they were able to buy a modest estate of some four thousand acres in the same neighborhood where John had grown up. I, of course, had never been there, though I’d heard much of it from Mamma, who visited not long after the couple returned from their wedding trip; she saw great potential in the size of the house, though the kitchens, she said, must be improved if Colonel and Mrs. Fitzwilliam were ever to host ample dinner parties.

  I realized I was picking with one hand at the skin at the base of the opposite thumbnail, and forced myself to stop. “I have been . . . thinking about that, as well,” I said. “My—responsibilities, that is.” I looked at the papers scattered on the desk before him and said, “I am sorry; you have more than enough to worry about just now.”

  “No, no.” John leaned forward, hands clasped together atop one page of his steward’s correspondence. “Please, go on—is it your estate that brings you here today?”

  “Yes. I . . . have been avoiding questions that I should not have . . . for far too long. And I think you might be able to help me.” I licked my lips. “How—how does Rosings Park do, in your estimation? Is Mr. Colt a good manager?”

  “Ah.” John frowned. “Yes, I think Colt does well enough by the estate. And I believe my aunt likes to keep her hand in things as well.”

  “Which is part of the problem. Rosings Park is profitable, but I do not know any of the details. And I do not know . . . I do not know my tenants at all. I’ve no idea of their lives, or their needs, or . . . And I do not know whether they have those needs met, at present. Or even what meeting them would mean.” What I did not say—that my tenants were, for the most part, not people at all to me but shadows, anonymous bowing figures in the fields and village as I passed them—was too contemptible to admit aloud.

  John’s smile unfurled like a leaf in spring. “Anne,” he said, “are you preparing to take your proper place?”

  I flushed. “I am . . . not sure. Perhaps.”

  “Then I would suggest beginning with a letter to Mr. Colt. He could answer these questions better than I. I can only say from once-yearly observations that Rosings does appear to be well managed; but I cannot speak to your tenants’ thoughts.”

  I released a shaky breath, and he laughed softly.

  “Cousin—this is truly admirable.”

  “Mamma will not approve.”

  “No,” he said, and rested his chin upon one fist, the picture of thoughtful ease. “But when does she ever?”

  Outside the carriage window, I watched the passing scenery. This part of London was less chaotic than more commercial quarters, but still the streets teemed with horses and vehicles; passing ladies and gentlemen strolling arm in arm; servant girls carrying baskets from the market; a small boy scuttling along the pavement, a message clutched in one fist. The afternoon was bright and pleasantly cool, and the whole of the city seemed golden to me, a cup filled to the brim with beautiful life. I thought at last that I was in the place I was meant to be at the time I was meant to be there, and my lips spread irrepressibly wide of their own volition.

  Mrs. Fitzwilliam seemed less pleased with her current circumstances. “You were upstairs a long while,” she said, as if making a simple observation; but I heard the criticism in her tone.

  But even her sourness could not induce me to feel less than perfectly content. “I apologize,” I said. “I did not intend to be gone so long.”

  “Mrs. Amherst was rather put out,” she said, and I shook my head. She would never dare speak so to my mother. But I held my peace, for in truth, I knew she was right that I behaved badly, leaving her and Mrs. Amherst alone in the drawing room while Eliza took me upstairs with the flimsy excuse of showing me a new book. I touched my fingers to my lips to stop the smile that longed to grow there. My body hummed.

  “As I said, I am sorry.”

  She looked out the window as well, but I doubted,
from her expression, that she enjoyed the view as much as I did.

  We had scarcely handed off our gloves, hats, and spencers to the servants when Mr. Watters poked his head out of the drawing room. He affected surprise upon seeing us, and hesitated a moment before coming forward down the hall.

  “Harriet,” he said, nodding to his sister, and then to me, “Miss de Bourgh. I hope you had a pleasant visit with your friend.”

  “Yes, very pleasant, thank you.”

  “I wonder,” he said, looking down at his fingernails, as if they held some great fascination for him, “would you care to take a turn in the garden with me? There is something I would speak to you about.”

  “I . . .” I looked at Mrs. Fitzwilliam, who, to my eternal frustration, was smiling now. She nodded at me, all encouragement. “Very well.”

  The garden was not particularly conducive to exercise, and I felt a little ridiculous as we began a slow circuit around the center topiaries. Mr. Watters kept his hands clasped behind his back and his eyes on the toes of his boots as he took one measured step after another. I watched him from the periphery of my vision.

  “Miss de Bourgh,” he said at last when we had achieved a full circle and were standing before the table and chairs near the door. And then, reaching for my hand, “Anne.” I was too startled by the contact, my hand trapped between his, to protest the intimacy. “You cannot have failed to notice my attentions these past weeks. I think—I know—others have marked my preference for you, as well.”

  My mouth opened, closed, opened again.

  “And so I think the time is right to offer you my . . . hand”—with a faint smile down at our own layered hands—“in marriage.” He raised his eyes to finally meet mine, adding, with an almost boyish earnestness, “I very much hope you will accept.”

  There were calluses on his palms, I noted from some distance, probably from riding. I tugged gently and he released me, surprise darting across his face before he returned his expression to one of patient expectation.

  “I would like to sit down,” I said, and half-fell into one of the chairs. He perched on the edge of the other, but I did not look at him. My eyes sought rather wildly for the spider in her corner, but she was gone, and all that remained of her web were a few tattered strands of weaving. For some reason I felt like crying.

  “Are you well?” Mr. Watters said.

  I managed a small smile. “Yes. I am well. And you are right, this is not . . . entirely unexpected. But I did not . . .” I glanced at him and then away. “May I speak plainly, sir?”

  “Of course.”

  “I rather hoped I was misjudging your intentions. I intend no offense whatsoever, but I . . .” I paused, for there was no possible way for him to take my meaning without taking offense.

  “You speak not a word of affection,” I said at last. “I imagined you would . . . pretend to it, at least.”

  When I chanced a look at him, Mr. Watters was very still, his face quite impossible to read. “Do you require affection from your husband?” he said in a strange low tone, and then added, “Do not misunderstand me, Miss de Bourgh, I hold you in high regard. You have . . . quite subverted my earlier understanding of your character, and I find I like you very well. But affection of the . . . romantic sort . . . I cannot offer.”

  He tapped his steepled fingers together in a way that spoke of some internal disquiet. I looked at him for a long moment, not speaking, then said, cautiously, “I think, sir, that I do not entirely understand you.”

  He rose abruptly, paced a few steps in one direction, then wheeled about to face me. “I think, madam, that you are in possession of all the affection that you require.”

  I pressed back against the chair. “I do not—”

  “I saw you,” he said, lowering his voice until I had to strain to make out the words. “Here, in this very garden. I came into the breakfast room for a moment, and there you were. You and Miss Amherst.”

  “No,” I said; and my voice was even weaker than his.

  My fear seemed to calm him; he regained his seat and his earnest expression. “I would not curtail such . . . activities as your husband,” he said quietly. “For you see, Miss de Bourgh, I am . . . sympathetic . . . to your plight. I would require little from you in the way of wifely duties after we’d an heir in the nursery.”

  “I . . . oh.” The garden seemed to be tilting rather alarmingly around me; or was it I, myself, who was tipping over? Apparently it was the latter, for quite suddenly Mr. Watters wrapped his hand around my arm, steadying me. I pulled away from him, wishing, for the very first time, for Mrs. Jenkinson; she would probably have smelling salts somewhere about her.

  “You needn’t answer now,” he said. “But can you not see how agreeable such an arrangement could be for both of us? My fortune can help enrich your already prosperous estate—”

  I waved him silent, as irritably as ever Mamma waved off unwanted conversation. I did not need to hear the rest, for I understood him perfectly. Our union would provide him instantly with an estate of his own; for once wed, my property would no longer belong to me. Mr. Watters, by contrast, would be elevated instantly by our marriage into the class of the landed gentry.

  “Please take as long as you’d like to consider,” he said after a time.

  I did not look up as he returned to the house.

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Eliza had a subscription at Minerva Press, one of London’s many circulating libraries. She liked this one, she told me with a playful smile, because it lent out its own printed works—“The very lowest of the low novels, my father thinks; but he lets me read what I please.”

  Today she was in search of something “deliciously sensational,” and I followed her into the building. The sudden hush when the door closed behind us, dampening the noise from Leadenhall Street, disoriented me, as if someone stuffed my ears with rags, leaving me with nothing to listen to but the clerks’ and customers’ humming conversations and my own thoughts, turning like a hoop and leaving me dizzy. Eliza made her selection while I waited, and took my arm as we stepped back out onto the street, her hand squeezing my sleeve lightly.

  “Shall we walk a little?” she said. “It is so fine today.”

  I nodded, and we walked for a short while as she told me about Julia’s wedding preparations. “The entire household is running quite mad,” she said. “I would invite you in today, but I fear there would be little privacy; Julia is wont to burst into my room without knocking these days, frantic over the silliest details. I cannot wait for it to be over.”

  “Will you miss her?”

  “Of course. But not this iteration of her. She is usually fairly sensible.”

  “Will you still see her often, do you think? After she marries?”

  “Oh, yes, I expect so. Mr. King’s house in Town is not far from Cavendish Square. And she has promised me that I will be invited to their house in the country as soon as may be, though in truth the prospect holds little enough joy for me. All those insects and cows. Give me a street full of carriages.” She sent me a sly glance. “I know you are quite at home among the beetles and spiders, though, darling Frank.”

  I tried to smile. “I hope you will visit me at Rosings as well,” I said. “I promise, our cows are quite tame.”

  “For you,” she said, lacing our arms more closely together, “I will brave the fiercest cows in Kent.” A pause. “Are you—thinking of returning soon, then?”

  “I . . . am not sure.” I looked up at her, but the angle of the sun was such that it was directly behind her, and I blinked, dazzled. My steps dragged. She looked sideways at me again, her brow furrowed as a farmer’s field, but did not question me further.

  Mr. Watters proposed. The words were there, dancing a quadrille on my tongue, but I swallowed them down. If I told her and she believed our continued . . . friendship . . . too great a risk to her reputation—well, the thought made me think of my bittersweet drops with a ferocious hunger.

 
Back at John’s house, I lay flat upon my bed. The scent of lavender lingered among the linens, and the now-familiar reek of London rolled in through the open window.

  As offers of marriage went, Mr. Watters’s was not a bad one. Like the arrangement I assumed my own parents enjoyed, he would make no demands upon my person once Rosings Park had an heir. And he would pretend not to notice if Eliza and I crept away together for a few hours; just as, I supposed, I would ask no questions about him and any of his more intimate friends. It was truly the best possible offer I could ever hope for, and everyone, everyone in the family would be pleased that poor sickly Anne had caught a rich husband. He might not have a fine estate like Darcy, but he had wealth and an abundance of charm. He was a great friend of John’s, which spoke well of his character, however little I felt I truly understood it myself. This was more than any of my family probably dared hope for me, at this late point. Mamma might even forgive my running off to London, if this were the result of my folly.

  My fingers flexed against the coverlet. A marriage like my mother’s. I thought of her and Papa in the breakfast room, him with his paper and her with her letters, and neither with very much to say to the other. Papa off to London every chance he got. And marital relations—I could not help thinking, from Mamma’s apparent unwillingness to continue them after my birth, that they must be very different to what I enjoyed with Eliza. I already recoiled from Mr. Watters’s touch; how much harder would far more intimate relations be to endure? To give up my body to him, when I had only recently gotten it back for myself—

  And all the rest. I had completely bared myself to Eliza—she had seen all of me. Not only my body but all the strange and secret corners of my mind and heart. I had no such desire to be so naked before Mr. Watters.

  I sat up on the bed, a hand pressed against my rib cage. A seed seemed to have been planted somewhere between my heart and stomach. It had grown over the last few days into a cold, stonelike ball that I could not seem to shift. It was all very well for him, I thought, speaking so casually about producing an heir, as if it were a small thing to demand of a wife. I recalled, with dreadful vividness, Nurse’s gossiping words with one of the maids after Aunt Darcy’s death. So many infants lost between my two cousins, and then—a bloody business—Aunt Darcy lost as well. Women’s bodies were such strange and mysterious things, swelling and shrinking and swelling, again and again, until we were at last too old to swell any longer; or until the swelling killed us. Perhaps it should shame me, but I felt nothing strong enough, holding little George in my arms, to induce me to take such a risk for myself. I had, after all, only just begun to live.