A Far Horizon

by Brenda Rickman Vantrease

  ‘Do you feel well enough to continue?’ he asked. ‘I think they will not bother us again.’

  She nodded and led the way back to the coach, climbed back in with his assistance. When they left Bath, he had given her a bell and told her to hold it out the window and ring it if she needed him. He listened closely, but the only sound that punctuated the night silence was the clip-clopping of the horses and the occasional hooting of an owl.

  Just before daybreak they reached Glastonbury.

  The second Sunday in June, Caroline waited outside the Church of St Lawrence. Arthur had said he would meet her there and they would have a nice Sunday afternoon stroll and a chance to visit if the day was fine. The day was indeed fine: a rare blue sky, with little clouds like white lace handkerchiefs – mares’ tails, her dear auntie used to call them. A soft breeze teased at her hair and the sun shed a delicious warmth on her face.

  She had only seen Arthur once – she must remember to think of him as Ben now – since their meeting at the print shop. He had come by the guildhall last week to check on her, apologizing that he had been busy with a new project, telling her that she should feel free to come and see him there if she got lonely. ‘Milord said to tell you that you are welcome anytime.’

  James Whittier was the reason Caroline had not tried to visit Arthur again. Despite his former kindness to her, or maybe because of it, she couldn’t quite decide, the printer made her ill at ease. She couldn’t tell Arthur that, so she merely said she did not want to be a pest, and it was enough just to know he was near. He assured her that they were almost finished with the big project and he would be able to see her more often, adding that since he and Patience Trapford had been attending church together, he might bring her with him the next time. He was anxious for them to get to know each other.

  ‘I have already met her.’

  ‘Where? How?’

  ‘I went to see John Milton to reassure him that his wife had not abandoned him. I did not want him to have recourse for claiming desertion.’

  ‘How did he take that?’

  ‘Skeptical and tight-lipped, very noncommittal, but at least he knows Mary has a witness. Patience met me at the door. She was very nice to me … after I told her I was your stepmother.’

  He laughed. ‘She can be a little brusque for a servant girl, until you get to know her. She is loyal. Clever too. And very kind. I hope you will like each other.’ He said this with a sincerity that spoke more than words about his feelings for the girl.

  ‘I am sure I will like her,’ she said.

  ‘Next Sunday?’

  ‘I shall look forward to it. I will go right home after church. The soldiers will be gone so we can talk in the parlor.’

  Now, in anticipation of that visit, along with the few congregants of St Lawrence Church, Caroline filed out past the heavy wooden doors, one or two generous souls even giving her a nod of recognition. She noticed a lone carriage making its way down the street and paused to let it pass before crossing. But it did not pass. It pulled to a stop in front of her, and the driver dismounted with easy grace.

  Was that? It was.

  ‘Lord Whittier. If you have come for Sunday services, I am afraid you have arrived too late.’

  ‘I have not come for service. I have come for you, Lady Pendleton.’

  ‘For me? I am sorry, my lord, but I have an appointment with—’

  He smiled and gave what might pass for a courtly bow. ‘Ben told me you would be here. I … we …’ He pointed to the carriage from which Ben waved sheepishly and called out, ‘It promises to be such a fine day, Patience and I thought you might enjoy a picnic in St James’s Park.’

  ‘St James’s Park! That’s a goodly distance.’

  ‘That is why I suggested the coach.’

  ‘But that must have been a terrible expense. I hope you hired it for another, worthier, purpose.’

  ‘What could be worthier than a Sunday afternoon in the park with a lovely lady? But lest you think me profligate, the stable gives me a discount. I mention them in my broadsheets from time to time.’ He gave a little shrug as if to say it was nothing. ‘Ben and his friend want a Sunday picnic. And propriety requires a chaperone.’

  Did a wink accompany that remark, or was it just a tic? Definitely. A wink.

  Her heart skipped a little, as she was trying to decide whether she should be pleased or dismayed. There was a familiarity in that wink that was almost insulting. But then she remembered, embarrassed, how tightly she had wrapped her arms around him and how solid and reassuring his body had felt as they fled a city under siege. Familiarity there too. He had shown nothing but kindness to her; still, there was something in him – his impulse to take charge of whatever situation he was in; the easy way he manipulated those around him – that meant just being in his presence incited a feeling of heightened excitement in her that she had never felt before.

  He did not wait for her to give consent but, bowing from the waist, opened the door of the carriage to reveal the prim young Mistress Trapford, clutching her picnic basket in her lap with a white-knuckled grip. The girl was dressed in the plain clothes of the godly, but her simple bonnet and collar were gleaming white and braided in the plain bun beneath that proper bonnet was a string of yellow ribbon. Something about that bit of ribbon was endearing, that and the trusting way she looked at Arthur. At Caroline, she only nodded and smiled, then lowered her thick lashes to cover the bold eyes Caroline remembered.

  Arthur reached out for Caroline’s hand to help her inside the carriage. ‘I hope that you don’t think me presumptuous. I thought you deserved an afternoon lark. We all deserve it. And the day is so fine …’

  ‘It is a very generous gesture. From all of you.’ Caroline forced a smile, trying to include the girl.

  ‘Good day to you, Mistress Caroline. I am glad to see you again,’ Patience said, a very becoming blush blooming on her cheeks.

  ‘It is good to see you too,’ Caroline said, thinking that she wasn’t the only one nervous here.

  ‘How about letting the printer’s devil drive?’ Arthur said.

  ‘Only if you take an extra pair of hands with you,’ Whittier said, with a sideways nod at Patience.

  ‘Always,’ the boy laughed. Jumping from the coach, he reached up with his strong arm to assist the girl, who looked as though she needed no assistance whatsoever, so eager was she to escape.

  Suddenly alone with him and wondering if she was being manipulated by Arthur or by James Whittier, or both, her backbone so straight against the seatback that she might be giving more support to it than it to her, she resolved to be on her guard.

  ‘Tell me about Arthur’s father,’ Whittier said as the carriage began to move. ‘William Pendleton must have been a remarkable man.’

  With that one casual remark from him her resolve loosened – a little.

  ‘He was, my lord, but how would you know that?’

  ‘Because of the remarkable courage that his son – and his wife – have shown in adversity.’

  ‘Remarkable courage?’ That was hardly the first attribute that came to mind when she thought of William. Good, compassionate, wise, careful, but courageous? She pondered this for a minute, remembering how his hands shook when he opened the King’s summons, but remembering too that he answered it anyway.

  ‘He did have remarkable courage,’ she said. Disarmed by the question, she blinked hard and looked down at her hands clasped primly in her lap. ‘Not fearless as are some, loving the fight for the sake of the fight, rushing out in eagerness to meet the enemy. But if by courage you mean right action taken in the face of trepidation, then, yes, he was very courageous. I miss his quiet strength most of all.’

  ‘That is exactly what I mean. Ben has that kind of courage. The way he refuses to allow the loss of his arm to stop him; the way he doesn’t wallow in pity, or become bitter. And since you are not his natural mother, I can only assume he inherited that courage from his father.’

  Diverte
d from her surge of grief by his comment about Ben, she looked up. Whittier was watching her with a calculating eye, almost like a hunter stalking a deer. An inappropriate comparison, she thought, when he had been nothing but kind to them, yet there was something about him that incited a kind of restless longing that she could not quite define. It was a disconcerting feeling. She turned her gaze to the open window, but not really seeing, not noticing that they had left behind the winding lanes of the crowded city for the wider green expanses of greater London.

  ‘I am very grateful to you, Lord Whittier, for your kindness to Ben. And for your kindness to me. You very well may have saved my life and most certainly much distress.’

  ‘Please. Call me James. I am lord of nothing except my own decisions. I expect we are kindred spirits in that regard. I shall call you Caroline and you will call me James. As for gratitude, you don’t know me very well. I don’t usually go out of my way to play hero. Self-interest is more in my nature. From the beginning I saw something in Ben that I knew would serve both of us. He is turning out to be a remarkable printer.’

  ‘And the two newsboys you shelter?’

  He shrugged, ‘They hustle my ink. It is a trade that serves us all.’

  ‘And rescuing a lonely, frightened woman on a fruitless search, how was that in your best interest, my lo … James?’

  ‘I don’t know. The impulse of a man following a beautiful woman into the night?’ He grinned. ‘That is not so hard to understand. And then when I heard your story at the garrison, I became intrigued because I knew then, or thought I knew …’ he paused, glancing away briefly, as if considering some inward impulse before continuing, ‘… that the man you were seeking was probably already dead.’

  Had she heard right?

  ‘You knew William was already dead? How is that possible unless …’ But she couldn’t say it.

  ‘Unless I killed him? No. I have many sins blotting my account, but murder is not one. I never saw his body or knew who killed him or even for sure that he had been killed. But the same night I encountered you inside the city wall at the Reading Garrison guardhouse, I had been playing at cards with a man who carried the same pistol that was in your possession – or one just like it. You told Lord Aston it was one of a pair. When I had admired its mate earlier in the evening, the man said he took it off a dead man.’

  ‘Why did you not tell me then?’ She looked straight into his eyes, her gaze demanding an answer.

  ‘Would you have believed me? A stranger? And I had no way of knowing for sure. But I did know that you were in danger and in no condition to continue the search, and that if you had a home and some place where people loved you, you needed to be with them when you learned that you were a widow. If I was wrong in that assumption, I apologize.’

  She could not speak for the great lump in her throat, remembering that night, the fear, the futile hope. When the horses pulled to a stop, she was facing the window, looking out over the wide green meadow that led down to a lake in the distance, but not really seeing it.

  ‘It appears that we have arrived at our destination,’ he said, breaking the silence. ‘I’ll just help secure the horses.’

  His self-assurance seemed a little threadbare, she thought as he stepped out. Ben, wreathed in smiles, was at the door offering to help her down. Of course, Ben did not know what she had just learned, how fate had conspired to bring the three of them together … the four of them, she corrected herself, as she looked up to see John Milton’s housekeeper standing behind him. The wind had pulled tendrils from beneath the girl’s bonnet, framing her face, and even her eyes were smiling as she reached in and, with strong arms, pulled the picnic basket out.

  It just seemed to happen that they walked in pairs down to the lake.

  ‘Sorry,’ James said, spreading a blanket. ‘It has a bit of ink on it. You don’t have to worry. It won’t wipe off. It won’t even wash out with lye and hot water. I’ve tried.’

  ‘I am not afraid of a little ink,’ Caroline said, just for something to say as she helped him spread the corners.

  He laughed, ‘I think that is a very good thing, since everything in my life seems to have ink stains.’

  She ignored the subtle invitation there. Or was that just her suspicious nature? Maybe it wasn’t meant to be flirtatious at all.

  ‘This looks quite a feast,’ Caroline said, as Patience and Ben unpacked the basket: cheese and pickles and fresh bread and slices of roast fowl. ‘Wherever did you find the greens?’ Caroline asked, thinking of the scarcity of all produce in the markets.

  ‘They are fresh-picked this morning,’ Patience said. ‘I keep a little patch behind Mr Milton’s back door.’

  Ah. Mr Milton. The uninvited fifth guest, Caroline thought, remembering Mary and the hateful divorce papers. The publication that their host facilitated. And her stepson too, if she was honest. How could Arthur stomach Patience’s association with the man? But, she thought bitterly, what real choice did either of them have?

  ‘And my contribution – French red,’ James said, producing a large bottle and four glasses. ‘Now don’t worry about the expense, Caroline. I mention the vintner—’

  ‘From time to time in my broadsheets,’ Caroline chimed in, laughing despite herself.

  She took a sip eagerly, savoring it. ‘I haven’t had French wine since … well, in a very long time.’

  It was indeed a fine picnic, especially in these hard times. The food was fresh and good, the fowl roasted to perfection. Ben and Patience joked and teased each other like children. It was all so carefree, an interlude out of time in grim London, she thought, her mood warmed by the day, the company, the wine. The only reminder of the war was how few people were enjoying the park: no children playing pallemaille on the green, no lovers strolling together – if one didn’t count Ben and Patience, who were walking down to the lake with the leftover crumbs to feed the few skinny ducks.

  ‘Well,’ James laughed. ‘It seems our companions have abandoned us,’ he said. ‘What shall we talk about?’

  Emboldened by the wine, or the sunshine, or just her realization that she needed to take control of the conversation before he did, she answered quickly, ‘Let us talk about you, James. Tell me how you came to be a printer, and I am especially interested in how you decide what is worthy to print.’

  ‘Ah,’ he said with a smile. ‘The Doctrine and Discipline of Divorce. I wondered when we’d visit that subject again.’ He lifted the bottle, but when she declined, he emptied it into his own cup. ‘First things first. You are entitled to know a little of my history.’

  Why would she be ‘entitled to know’?

  ‘When I woke up one morning to find myself suddenly a penniless lord, my older brother having squandered what remained of our father’s fortune before his own untimely death, I realized that I needed a livelihood. Being truly not suited for the Anglican Church, for which I was Cambridge trained, or the military, for which I had absolutely no inclination, I was faced with a conundrum. One day, not long after I had been glancing at a broadsheet and thinking there was so very little in it that was, as you say, “worthy” of print, I remembered hearing that my great-great – one of the greats – grandmother on my mother’s side once owned a print shop in Paternoster Row. I spent a few days considering whether ink might run in my blood too. I decided that would be as worthwhile and lucrative a venture as any.’

  ‘But if you were penniless, how did you get the funds for the press and the ink and the paper?’

  ‘Well, I …’ he paused, appearing distracted by a bird pecking at discarded crumb he tossed its way, ‘… that’s a story for another time. We shall just say that I had a string of good luck.’

  He didn’t have to say. She thought she knew. As upset as she had been that first day she had encountered him in the coaching inn, she remembered there had been a table of card players. It was all a blur, more dream than memory. She couldn’t remember seeing him there but, in her imagination, she could see him there.<
br />
  ‘Cards or dice?’

  ‘Both, but I prefer cards. More skill, less luck,’ he answered, looking a little taken aback.

  ‘Do you always have good luck?’

  ‘Not lately,’ he said, frowning. ‘But I am expecting that to change. You play the law of averages and limit your losses. But, most importantly, you must be able to read people. I am pretty good at that. But it is not the way I want to make my living.’

  ‘And what of the second part of my question?’

  ‘Second part?’ He sipped his wine and paused, as if considering his answer. ‘Yes, Mr Milton and his worthiness. I have lately come to the opinion – no, it is more than an opinion … I have come to the belief that if a man is denied his voice, then he is denied his freedom, and if he is denied his freedom, he is denied his God-given right to his own soul. And that is a true sacrilege.’

  What a mind-bending notion, that even fools and insidious ideas should be allowed an audience. And he delivered it with such sincerity, not pausing long enough for her to offer this observation.

  ‘Who am I to decide whether Mr Milton’s diatribe was worthy? He came to me because his voice was being suppressed. His argument was cogent, even sound, and his rhetorical worthiness well established. His contention slandered no person. Forgive me if I did not then have the personal perspective on it that I have since gained. But I did not endorse his argument. I merely allowed him a channel in which to offer his views in the marketplace of ideas by printing it when others would not.’

  Marketplace of ideas. A strange expression. As if ideas could be traded, bought and sold like goods. If he was so intent on voices, she would let him hear hers. ‘So, you think then a man’s voice should be heard even when it slanders?’

  ‘Slander? That has no basis outside your private knowledge of Mistress Milton and exists only in that personal scheme. As we have already discussed, John Milton did not call his wife’s name or even say that his argument was predicated on personal experience. He merely made a broad argument for opportunity of divorcement on grounds of incompatibility by showing rather pointedly, I thought, the suffering that can ensue from a bad match.’