I had never understood this need in her, to maintain her writing so thoroughly, and so unfailingly, over the years, that her thoughts and doings might be preserved. Well, perhaps I had understood, from an observer’s point of view, but I had been unable to take up the practice myself. I had tried! How can the intangible artefacts of life ever faithfully be recorded? Probably I simply lack the skill, but how could I—for example—reproduce perfectly enough the shades of occurrence and meaning of the many occasions in my childhood when John would insist I was upset when I was not, and so I would become upset, and he would be satisfied, and laugh at my red face? How could I put into words those emotions, and the tiny flickers of cold-hearted intent in John? Or the shifting quality in Mamma’s eye—partly sad, partly amused, and partly some other thing—when she would look at me in solidarity as Father made some particularly imperious remark? How Freddie and I would dash through the beech wood for sheer joy, and it would be understood between us that the joy was fleeting, and that we must soon return indoors, and that understanding only made us whoop louder, and run faster? Or how, when Susannah told me her mother had been Welsh, and I’d said, ‘Oh, they love Leeks there, do they not?’ and she had supressed a smile at my silly remark that nevertheless reached her eyes? I can write the words, but they seem hollow and impotent! And the memories themselves are quite hazy. It is like I have told myself the story of the memory, and I am remembering the story—and not the thing itself.
It seemed so impossible that I sometimes felt within myself a deep yearning to be forgotten entirely. I should have liked to be painted out of the portraits, to be struck from Mamma’s diaries while I was still living, and to be set free somewhere wild and strange.
Of course, for the first time in my five-and-twenty years, I was indeed somewhere wild and strange. And yet I found I did not feel the anonymous liberation of my dreams. I knew that, far away at Home, my portrait frowned over the quiet Hall, and Mamma’s memories of me were stained into the pages arrayed there on the library shelf for any idle hand to take up.
The lady duly invited us to dine, and Jack indicated that he would withdraw to dress.
‘Take Mr Fox, surely,’ said Mrs Montserrat. ‘He must be in some discomfort in your things.’
I made all the proper protestations, assuring both, though neither was listening, that I was quite comfortable, and the sausage-skin clothing was most commodious, and that therefore there was no need for anybody to trouble themselves about me.
‘Come, Mr Fox,’ said Jack, calmly cutting through my polite explanations.
Jack did find me a better-fitting suit—rather, he sent a servant to find me one—which he told me was his father’s. Therefore, it was outdated, dusty and morbid.
Although our meal was informal, it was the first occasion I had really dined since Sydney-town. Mrs Montserrat presided over our repast, which was served competently, but without excess ceremony, by a nicely attired young manservant. The wine was good—proper wine—and we ate brown soup, fish in a white sauce, beef with mushrooms done some clever way in cream, and a suet pudding with custard. Proper food!
‘I beg your indulgence for the simplicity of our table, Mr Fox,’ said Mrs Montserrat. ‘You are no doubt accustomed to something rather more refined.’
‘Oh, madam,’ I said. ‘Lately I find I have become accustomed to hardships I had never dreamt of, and thus your table is a fabled Cornucopia to me now.’ She smiled modestly, and I hurriedly added, ‘Of course, Mrs Montserrat, even had I suffered no hardship, I should still be very happy to be here …’
‘You are kind,’ she said. ‘And where are your people?’
‘Norfolk, mostly,’ I said, and I named our native village.
‘Oh, you are those Foxes,’ she said. ‘That is good. I grew up quite near that place. What are your parents called?’
I was charmed by the unpretentiousness of this question, and of the lady herself, I must say. ‘They are Sir Alfred and Lady Fox,’ I said, and from that simple nicety, I found I could not but expound upon the whole sorry tale of my mother, to one so kindly listening as Mrs Montserrat. I told her how Mamma had fallen out of fashion amongst her circle, and had grown sad—or had grown sad and then fallen out of fashion as a result; I did not know—and I found myself even disclosing the private shame of her outburst on Christmas Day, and her subsequent locking-up. What daze had come upon me, that I should say so freely such frank and intimate things!
‘That is a very grave thing,’ said Mrs Montserrat.
‘It is,’ I replied, wishing I had not told her of it. I attempted a discreet change of topic, which I handled with all the subtlety of a frigate in a fishpond. ‘And what brought you to the colonies?’ I asked. ‘Did you accompany your husband?’
‘No, for I met him here,’ she said. ‘How long has your mother been put away?’
I told her that it had been since Boxing Day.
She inclined her head in a very subdued manner. ‘You are unmarried, I think,’ she said.
So I described Susannah, and gave a few details of what had gone between us. As I was speaking, however, and when I begged leave to pass over the miniature for her to admire, I thought of the matter of Susannah’s grey eyes, and how she had refused me, and not spoken to me ever again, except for an excessively courteous farewell. I found myself saying that perhaps she was not the girl for me.
‘That is a sensible conclusion,’ Mrs Montserrat said, and gave me back the painting.
‘Thank you,’ I said.
‘But Susannah has a Relative,’ said Jack.
‘Most girls do,’ said his mother.
‘This one was a Lady at great advantage, in pecuniary terms, and those of Years.’
‘A rich old lady,’ said his mother, smiling now.
‘Yes—Mrs Prendergast,’ I said. ‘There is a woman, somewhere, here, in Van Diemen’s Land, unless she had died or otherwise departed, called Maryanne Maginn. Mrs Prendergast gave me a letter to put into Maryanne Maginn’s hands, and a letter of credit, which gave me access to a great deal of money, with which to live, and support myself, and bring us both Home, after I had found her. Both of these things are now gone—the Letter, and the Money. And I find myself somewhat at a loss.’
‘Why at a loss?’ asked Mrs Montserrat.
‘Well, because I fear I do not know quite what to do next. That is, I have determined that I must find some kind of work, and raise some money, and continue my search for Maryanne Maginn, as I have promised. But I do not yet know how I shall go about this.’
‘Well—yes: that is one path of many you might choose. Do consider, however, that you need not decide hastily, nor think you are not Free to choose differently.’
‘You are right, Madam, of course,’ I said. ‘I might also consider that I write to Mrs Prendergast, and have her send another letter of credit, and continue my search thus equipped, and thus forgo the need to secure paid employment. For that, of course, I should have to admit that I had been careless with the letters she had entrusted to me.’
‘Yes; alternatively, you might free yourself of Mrs Prendergast, and go on with your own life, and leave Maryanne Maginn to hers.’
‘Ah—with regards to that, Madam, I do not know that I am free to so do. I have given my solemnest vow to Mrs Prendergast that I should certainly find Miss Maginn.’
‘Perhaps your Miss Maginn has a life of her own, and does not need to be found,’ said Mrs Montserrat.
‘I suppose that could be true.’
‘She might have changed her name.’
‘Yes, she might have married.’
‘And your Mrs Prendergast felt sure she would wish to go Home?’
‘Yes—she did not doubt it.’
‘Do you know what was in the letter she wrote?’
‘No! Madam, I certainly did not read it.’
‘You do not know if it was apology, or the opposite—forgiveness?’
‘Is forgiveness the opposite of apology? Is it not blame?’
‘It does not matter, Mr Fox.’
‘An academic point merely.’
‘Perhaps.’ She paused. ‘You ought to go Home,’ she said. ‘You must see to your own family.’
‘I do not think Susannah will accept me,’ I said. ‘I think … I have thought a great deal of this matter, lately. And I have concluded that, if she has refused me, as she has, then that must be the last word on the matter. Unless she decides to give me some reason to hope. But I am better served if I do not wait for that signal of hope. I truly feel that I have let her go in my heart—well, not my feeling for her, perhaps, but my feeling that I have a claim on her—just in the course of a few days!’
Mrs Montserrat responded to this, which was a frankly outrageous outburst before near strangers, very simply. ‘That is not the family to which I refer,’ she said. And a picture of my mother arose again between us.
I looked down at my place and collected my thoughts. ‘I wish that I had completed my task,’ I said, after a pause. ‘I only feel ashamed that I did not take better care of the letter Mrs Prendergast wrote. It was a precious thing, and it did not belong to me, and I did not pay it a moment’s thought when I went out upon the water with it in my pocket.’
‘I think you can be forgiven that, at least,’ said Mrs Montserrat. ‘You could not have known you would go into the water. And, if I am quite frank with you, even if you had preserved the letter, and had given it to me, I should not have bothered to read it.’
A Treacherous Country Page 19