The FitzOsbornes in Exile

by Michelle Cooper

  Toby opened his eyes cautiously. “I’m still a bit seasick, I think. And, ugh, Rupert, your cat is staring at me again.”

  “ ‘A cat may look at a king,’ ” quoted Rupert, although she looked more like Grimalkin than the Cheshire cat as she crouched on the chimneypiece, flicking envelopes to the floor with her tail and keeping her eerie green eyes fixed upon Toby. I’d forgotten that Alice in Wonderland had lived at Christ Church. Her father had been the Dean, or something like that.

  “Yes, and Lewis Carroll was a Mathematics don,” Rupert said when I asked. “We’ll take you to see the Alice window in the Hall after luncheon. If your brother ever deigns to get up, that is.”

  “I think I prefer it down here,” said Toby. “It gives one a whole new perspective on life, looking at things upside down. The world’s far less cluttered. Soph, come and try it.”

  “No thanks,” I said. “My life’s all right as it is.”

  “Mine isn’t,” said Toby with an enormous sigh. “It’s full of sorrow and suffering.”

  “Oh God,” muttered Rupert. “I’m going to see about luncheon. Sophie, if you lose all patience with him, my rooms are two doors down.”

  “Dear old Rupert,” said Toby after Rupert had stalked off, the cat making her stiff-legged way after him. “He’s never been properly in love, that’s his problem.”

  “Rupert doesn’t seem to be the one with the problem,” I retorted. “And if you are miserable, I don’t see how getting drunk would make things any better.”

  “Oh, but being drunk is lovely,” he said. “You’ve no idea. Everything turns fuzzy and golden.” He stretched his arms over his head. “It can be awful afterwards, of course,” he conceded. “Although, at least then my wretched physical self matches my wounded … What’s the inside bit called?”

  “Your mind? Your soul?”

  “My wounded soul, yes,” he said, clasping his hands upon his chest in a deliberately melodramatic gesture.

  I huffed at him impatiently. Toby is so used to concealing his feelings under flippant remarks and frivolous pursuits that even now, in what I suspected was genuine pain, he had to make a joke of it. It was especially annoying that Toby’s good looks seemed quite unaffected by his recent bout of debauchery. Even the weight he’d lost merely served to accentuate his cheekbones. I thought of how I looked when I woke up the morning after a ball, purple smudges under my eyes and hair like a gorse bush (when I was never allowed so much as a sip of champagne). It was immensely unfair.

  “Oh, stop wallowing, Toby!” I snapped. “Honestly! When I think of how hard Veronica and Simon are working to get Montmaray back—looking up law books, writing letters, trudging round Whitehall—and here you are, lying about, feeling sorry for yourself!”

  He sat up then, wincing a bit, and frowned at me. “Well, what do you expect me to do?” he said peevishly. “It’s not as though they need me. Anyway, what are you doing, other than being driven round the countryside on outings—”

  “Me!” I exclaimed, jumping up from the armchair. “When I’m not attempting to talk some sense into my idiot brother, I’m stopping Veronica and Simon from killing each other! I’m the one running messages between them, because they can’t even bear to work in the same room! I’m the one helping them write their letters and doing their typing! I’m the one trying to keep Aunt Charlotte off their backs—”

  “Sorry!” said Toby, reaching out a hand and tugging me down beside him. “I know you are. I know they are. I’m sorry, Soph, I really am. I just—” He took a deep breath. “I just feel so useless!” he burst out. “I know I can’t do anything to help with the campaign, I’m too stupid and I’m stuck here, but at least I used to be able to … to entertain them. Make them laugh when things were getting too tense—”

  “Them?”

  “You know what I mean,” Toby said quietly, bringing his knees up under his chin and hugging his shins. “Tell me. How is he?”

  “He’s fine,” I said. I didn’t need to ask whom Toby meant.

  “He tells me not to come to London,” said Toby, not meeting my eyes. “He says that he’s busy working, but I know he goes off somewhere in the evenings. One of the footmen told me.”

  “Oh, Toby,” I said, my voice softening. “It’s not what you think—”

  “So, he confides in you,” said Toby bitterly.

  I considered breaking my promise and explaining about Simon’s law classes, but it occurred to me that I had no idea what Simon did with his evenings. Perhaps his course had finished. Perhaps he was out with a girlfriend.

  “Don’t you think you’re being a bit unreasonable?” I asked Toby as gently as I could. “I mean, do you really have any right to tell him what to do, or who to see, or—”

  “Yes. I love him,” said Toby. They were the most heartfelt words I’d ever heard him utter. They silenced me. I put my arm round him, and he rested his head on my shoulder.

  “And that’s all there is to it,” he said after a while, almost succeeding in adding a note of levity to his utterance.

  “But how do you know?” I wondered aloud. I knew I felt something for Simon, even now. At one stage, I’d even thought it might be love, but how could one tell? Perhaps it was easier to understand when one had shared … well, whatever Toby and Simon had shared. I suddenly felt very unworldly and innocent.

  “One just … knows,” said Toby. “It simply happens. Like being hit by a bolt of lightning, except more painful.” He turned to me, suddenly intense. “It was only a bit of fun at first, just … uncomplicated pleasure. And I’d always liked him—well, you know how likable he is. And then, all at once, I loved him. If only I’d been serious about him, right from the start … But now, the more I try to show him that I mean it, the more he hates me!”

  “He doesn’t—”

  “No, no, I know he doesn’t hate me. I’d almost prefer it if he did. No, he’s completely indifferent.”

  “I don’t think that’s true, either, Toby. He’s very fond—”

  “You know what?” said Toby, scrambling to his feet. “One of these days, he’ll fall in love with some woman. Oh, I’m sure he’ll be sensible about it. The one he chooses will be rich and well connected and beautiful, because that’s the only sort of woman he ever notices.”

  My heart contracted, knowing this was true. So I wasn’t yet over whatever it was that I felt for Simon—although I was profoundly grateful I didn’t feel anything near as much as Toby did.

  “And I’ll be watching,” Toby went on, “praying that she breaks his heart, wanting him to be as miserable as I am!” He loomed over me. “Soph, don’t you see what a horrible person I am? Do you really wonder why I drink? When I’m drunk, I don’t think those things. I don’t think—I don’t feel—anything at all. I’m lovely when I’m drunk.”

  “You really are an idiot,” I sighed. “Don’t you know everyone has wicked thoughts, all the time? Do you honestly believe your feelings are any worse than anyone else’s? Why, I can think of at least one time when I wanted to—Well, never mind, but it was awful.”

  He frowned at me, clearly incredulous. It was probably a good thing he didn’t realize it was he himself I’d wanted to hurt—and yes, I’d been in a jealous snit over Simon at the time. It was quite a tribute to Simon’s charm, I suppose, that he had us all in a fluster over him.

  I was also surprised that Toby hadn’t yet discovered that one didn’t always get what one wanted. In my experience, one rarely did. But then again, my brother had been born on the Sabbath day, “blithe and bonny, good and gay,” with fireworks and feasts to celebrate his arrival in the world. I imagined that would set one up with rather high expectations for life.

  “What matters,” I said very firmly, “is not what one feels but how one acts as a result of the feelings.”

  I was going to add that it was also a good idea to consider other people’s feelings before taking action, but my words of wisdom were interrupted by a sharp knock at the door. It swung open
a few inches, and Rupert and the cat poked their heads around it.

  “Well?” said Rupert.

  “I’ve now seen the light,” said Toby. “I renounce the Demon Drink. From this moment on, my life will be a shining beacon of purity and—”

  “At least you’re vertical now,” interrupted Rupert. “Are you ready for luncheon, Sophie? We’re eating in my rooms, if that’s all right.”

  Luncheon was delicious—one of the benefits of saving the cook’s cat from death by terrier, I expect. The cat devoured a piece of salmon, then jumped onto the table, peering at each of us in turn as we worked our way through melon, lobster salad with fresh rolls, and then meringues and coffee and tiny glasses of a liqueur that tasted of marmalade. The warmth of the sun, the cooing of the pigeons, the soft snufflings of the bandaged hedgehog asleep on Rupert’s desk, all combined to lull me into a sense of drowsy well-being (although I suppose the Cointreau may have helped). The problems of the world seemed a long way away. Even Toby looked a bit happier by the end of the afternoon, I was pleased to report to Veronica when I finally arrived home.

  “Good,” she said, nodding.

  “And how were the Pembertons?” I asked her.

  “Bad,” she said. Sir Julius had shown not the slightest interest in discussing Montmaray. “He’s one of those very correct civil servants who’d no more question a departmental ruling than run naked through Whitehall. And I could see he was horrified that Geoffrey liked me. Not even Aunt Charlotte’s money could compensate for me being a bluestocking and a Red.”

  “That would make you a deep shade of purple. What about Lady Pemberton?”

  “Dead, years ago—probably from boredom. You’ve no idea how tedious the conversation was. Even Aunt Charlotte thought so. She put on her Queen Mary act—you know, looking down her nose at everything.”

  “That can’t have helped our cause.”

  “No, but it never really had any chance of succeeding,” said Veronica. She sighed. “Still, at least it’s got Geoffrey off my back. He hasn’t the imagination or the strength of mind to go against his father’s orders, thank heavens. I almost wish …” She stopped.

  “Go on.”

  “No, it would sound insufferably vain.”

  I laughed. “How could anyone accuse you of vanity? I’ve never met a girl less interested in clothes and hairstyles and makeup!”

  She pulled a face. “Well, no, I’m not interested in any of that, although I quite understand why so many girls are. Their only hope for a secure future is to marry well, and men do seem to care what a woman looks like. It must have been even worse in centuries past. It’s pure luck, though, whether one’s looks happen to fit contemporary conventions of beauty. I’m not sure mine do now—”

  “They do,” I said emphatically.

  “—but if they do, if how I look attracts even a few men, I’ve realized it feels very uncomfortable to use my appearance to … to further my own aims. So I was going to say, I almost wish I didn’t have that option. Not that it worked particularly well with Geoffrey Pemberton.”

  “But you don’t have any scruples about using your brain to convince others of your point of view,” I noted.

  “Well, I feel as though I’ve developed my brain, through reading and listening and thinking. It feels less of a gift, and more of a hard-won prize, than how I look.”

  “I think it’s just as much a gift, being born with a brain that’s capable of developing,” I said. “I mean, look at Kick’s sister.” (Rosemary Kennedy is a little slow, poor thing, although she’s a very sweet girl. And it’s possible she only seems slow in comparison to her brothers and sisters, who are unrelentingly quick, sharp, and loud.) “Anyway, whatever you’ve been given, Veronica—looks or brains—I think it would be a dreadful waste for you to ignore them. I just wish you could transfer anything you don’t want to me.”

  “Don’t talk like that!” she scolded. “You’re very pretty, Sophie, and there’s certainly nothing wrong with your brain. And you’ve been blessed with a lovely temperament, so calm and gentle. Or is temperament a gift? Perhaps it’s developed through hard work, too.”

  This is the sort of thing I could talk about for hours. I was going to say that temperament was surely related to looks and brains—that a beautiful girl was bound to be more confident than an ugly one, for example, and that only someone with brains could be effectively devious. But the gong rang to dress for dinner, and Phoebe arrived to help me do up the back of my gown. Then came dinner and sitting around in the drawing room afterwards—and it is only now, long after midnight, that I’ve found the time and privacy to take out my journal and write this down. However, I’m so tired from my long day that any further musings on the human condition will have to wait.

  21st July 1938

  Dinner at the American Embassy last night. Kick’s elder brothers have arrived from the United States, and Veronica made quite an impression on Jack, the younger of the two, during cocktail hour. She must have spent at least twenty minutes deep in conversation with him, until she suddenly broke off and stalked across the room towards Toby and me.

  “Do you know what that young man just said?” Veronica exclaimed indignantly, once she was within exclaiming distance.

  “His sister’s standing right behind you, you realize,” warned Toby.

  “Well, I don’t hold girls responsible for the behavior of their brothers,” retorted Veronica, unable to refrain from shooting a contemptuous look in Simon’s direction as he clinked glasses with the most glamorous of the Embassy secretaries. Kick poked her head out from the cluster of young men surrounding her and grinned at us.

  “Jack just can’t help himself with beautiful women,” she said. “Go on, tell us.”

  Veronica crossed her arms and scowled. “Well, we were having a perfectly sensible discussion about European rearmament—although I do think he overestimates the influence of British trade unions in this economic climate—”

  “Get on with it,” said Toby.

  “Well, and then he said something about ‘you English’ and he’d never even heard of Montmaray! And, as if that wasn’t bad enough, he asked if I was a Catholic!”

  “Are you?” said Kick. “I didn’t know that!”

  “I most certainly am not!” said Veronica. “I’m an atheist!”

  “Gosh,” said Kick. “Which one’s that again? I always get it confused with ‘agnostic.’ ”

  “Oh Lord, please don’t ask questions like that, Kick,” groaned Toby. “Not unless you want a three-hour lecture on why the very notion of God is fundamentally irrational—”

  “I’ll pray for you, Veronica,” said Kick, patting Veronica’s arm, then disappearing back into her scrum of admirers.

  I don’t think Kick was joking, either. Last week, I went to her house to collect her on the way to Harrods, and just as she was putting on her hat, she realized she’d forgotten to say her rosary that morning. With a quick “Oh, Soph, you’ll excuse me, won’t you?” she dropped to her knees, right in front of me in her bedroom, and prayed away in silence for a good ten minutes. Watching her, I almost envied her unwavering faith in such rituals. Perhaps believing in God is part of why she’s so confident. Although I suspect that’s simply due to growing up in her family. Having Mr. Kennedy as a father would either frighten a child to death or make her tough enough to withstand anything. He certainly terrifies me. I had luncheon with the family when we came back from our shopping trip, and had to keep reminding myself that I’d faced far more unnerving situations and survived them. Hans Brandt dead with all his insides coming out, surely that was scarier than the Ambassador’s ice-blue glare and razor-sharp tongue, I kept reminding myself. But (unsurprisingly) this didn’t help my state of mind much. Mrs. Kennedy is extremely odd, too, so brittle that one expects her to crack apart any moment … Oh, but who am I to talk about odd families! Even the nicest ones, such as the Stanley-Rosses, have a black sheep or two. And Kick is a lovely girl, despite what Aunt Charlotte say
s.

  Aunt Charlotte was just getting back from a dinner of her own as we arrived home last night, and she wanted to hear all the details of our evening. One good thing about our second Season is that Aunt Charlotte is a little more relaxed regarding letting us go places without her as a chaperone. I’m not sure if it’s because Veronica and I have been on our very best ladylike behavior lately or because Toby’s now around to escort us. (Of course, it’s possible that our aunt was exhausted from the strain of supervising us and simply needed a rest.)

  “Elizabeth Elchester says she hears Billy Hartington is making an absolute fool of himself over that Kennedy girl,” Aunt Charlotte announced after herding us into the drawing room. She perched on a sofa, spine straight as a poker, and fanned herself briskly. “Not that it will come to anything. Imagine, the heir to the Duke of Devonshire marrying a commoner! And, of course, with the Duke’s poor grandfather having been murdered in cold blood by Irish Republicans—”

  “It wasn’t his grandfather. It was his great-uncle,” said Veronica.

  “—it’s completely out of the question that an Irish Catholic girl could ever become the next Duchess of Devonshire,” Aunt Charlotte went on, frowning at Veronica. “Particularly that girl. A gum-chewing American whose father splashes money around in that vulgar fashion.” Our aunt turned to me. “I suppose she’s gloating about having snared the most eligible bachelor in England.”

  “No, she’s not,” I said stoutly. “Kick has dozens of boys after her, she might not even have noticed Billy Hartington. Besides, her family would hate for her to marry a Protestant.”

  “Of course they would,” said Aunt Charlotte. “They’d expect him to convert. It’s all part of their Popish plot, you see, marrying English peers and bringing up the heirs as Catholics. Those Roman Catholics have never given up hope of reclaiming the British throne. It’s Guy Fawkes all over again—”

  Veronica opened her mouth, no doubt to explain the political context of the Gunpowder Plot, but Aunt Charlotte held up an imperious finger, decorated with diamonds and emeralds and a sapphire the size of a quail’s egg.