by Lisa Berne
“Christopher, please,” said Gwendolyn, and with a scowl he lowered the axe and looked down at her.
“Well?” he said curtly.
But she was silent, only gripping her fingers together till the knuckles showed white, and then, just when he was about to lift his axe again, she said, in a quick urgent rush of words:
“Oh, Christopher, we’re in trouble. We’ve so little money, and Mama’s so worried, though she never says anything. But I can tell. And Hugo’s finally back in England, but he was injured and we don’t know how is he is. Or even where he is. It’s all so awful, and so frightening!” She took a tentative step closer to him, as one might, he thought bitterly, approach a fire-breathing dragon. “Diana says your mother left you a great fortune. And I thought—if you didn’t mind it too much—that we could get married—and you could give Mama some of your money—”
“Get married?” he said, stupefied.
Gwendolyn nodded eagerly. “I know I’m only fourteen, and you’re only seventeen, and a girl isn’t supposed to ask a boy, but . . . but I’d do anything for my family. So will you?” She was looking up at him and suddenly it struck Christopher that her eyes were like great deep sapphire pools, sparkling with summer light. At this uncharacteristically sentimental thought he felt a rush of confused—confusing—emotions. Sensations. Gwendolyn lived next door and was his younger sister Diana’s dearest friend; he saw her frequently. She’d been just a girl, as uninteresting and irritating as Diana.
But here she was, asking him to marry her. All at once Christopher realized, as if he’d been grabbed by the shoulders and violently rattled about, that Gwendolyn was beautiful. Tall, willowy, with delicate features and bright golden hair and a mouth the color of a ripe peach. Girls did get married at fourteen. His gaze dropped to her breasts, to their slight but unmistakably feminine curves, both revealed and tantalizingly concealed by the simple white bodice of her gown.
Lust, hot and piercing, rolled through his veins like fire and he was sharply aware that she might see it manifested. He could feel his face flaming red and, willing himself not to look down at his trouser front, awkwardly he shifted behind the rough pile of wood he had made and said to her:
“You mean it?”
Gwendolyn nodded again. “Oh yes, I do.”
I do. The words of a marriage vow. Did she realize the implications of what she’d said? His mind was racing. How would they manage it? They were both underage. Of course: a bolt to Scotland—to Gretna Green—only fifty miles away. Ha! How furious Father would be. He was always prosing on about university, getting good marks, the need to be prudent and cautious, business deals, contracts, and how he was looking forward to Christopher joining him in his offices (a damned horrid stuffy place filled with people who sat around all day long shuffling papers back and forth), and on and on till Christopher all too frequently felt as if he would explode with anger and impatience.
Now, picturing Father’s reaction upon discovering that his son had embarked on a runaway marriage—a decidedly imprudent, uncautious act—Christopher felt defiant glee overtake him. No more useless arguments with Father, ever again. He tossed his axe aside.
“Let’s do it,” he said.
Gwendolyn laughed and gave a little bounce on her toes. “Oh, Christopher, that’s wonderful! It’ll solve everything.”
He barely heard her; he was already planning. They’d have to leave at night. And he’d need to pay for their coach fares, and lodgings and food also. After they were married, they could travel further north, up into the wilds of Scotland. How much money did he have on hand? He thought about it. Probably fifty pounds or so. They’d need to live rough for a while, but he’d find work. They’d be fine. And then he remembered something. A small, minute, critically important detail. Oh, bloody hell, but he was fortune’s fool. He told her:
“I won’t come into my money till I’m twenty-one.”
Even as he said it, he saw the happiness fade from Gwendolyn’s exquisitely pretty face.
“But that’s four years from now. That won’t do at all.” Her voice wobbled with distress. “Oh, Christopher, I need the money now.”
Well, that was that, then. His world closed in upon him again—his many failures, Father’s disappointment, Diana fluttering round him like a small maddening moth in a house far too big for just the three of them—and Christopher could feel his scowl returning, his brows drawing together, the quick downturn of his mouth. He shrugged, turned away, picked up his axe. “Sorry,” he said, and didn’t wait for her to leave before he brought the axe down into the yew log and sundered it in two.
As it turned out, Gwendolyn’s brother Hugo arrived in Whitehaven a week after that, healthy and well, and within a matter of days was betrothed to a rich heiress who lived just outside town, thereby neatly solving at a stroke all the family’s money problems. Which was just as well, Christopher thought, because Diana had come trailing after him with the news of Hugo’s engagement, and added in a low voice trembling with excitement:
“And Gwennie told me that her mama said that Papa asked her to marry her!”
He paused just outside the stable, stupefied all over again. “What the devil are you talking about, you nitwit? Father wants to marry Gwendolyn?”
“No, no, Papa asked Gwennie’s mama to marry him! But she said no. Oh, Christopher, I do wish she’d said yes, she’s the nicest, kindest, loveliest mama in all the world! And then Gwennie and I would be sisters! We’d all live together in the same house, and maybe, someday, I could marry Francis—or Percy—they’re so very handsome—though I can never tell which is which. Aren’t identical twins simply fascinating?”
“O God,” said Christopher, nauseated to his very soul, then took one long step inside the stable and slammed the door in Diana’s freckled face. He brushed aside the groom’s offer to saddle his horse and did it himself, doing his best to keep his hands gentle despite the anger firing up inside him again, and within five minutes was on the wide, sandy beach, bent low over his horse’s neck, riding hard and away, half-wishing he could plunge straight into the turbulent blue-green waves and disappear forever.
Four years after that . . .
Whitehaven, England
Winter 1815
“Oh, Gwennie,” exclaimed Diana, “you’d look like a fairy princess in that gown!”
The two girls were sitting close together on a sofa in the large, comfortable drawing-room of Gwendolyn’s house, poring over the current issue of La Belle Assemblée, all around them the cheerful sounds of a convivial holiday gathering.
Gwendolyn studied the illustration of an improbably elongated lady wearing an elaborate dress of striped silver gauze, its glossy silver-edged hem drawn up to the knee (boldly displaying the white satin slip beneath) and ornamented with a large cluster of artificial pink flowers. It was difficult to envision herself in such a dramatic gown, and also wearing the pearl headdress, low-set wreath of brilliants, and the silver ribbons dangling negligently from the bodice—all of which were praised in the caption as the height of modish elegance. Doubtfully she said:
“Do you really think so, Diana?”
“Oh yes, do ask your mama to have it made for you! And you must wear it to Almack’s! Every gentleman in the room will fall in love with you!”
Gwendolyn laughed. “One will be enough.”
“Well, he’ll be the best one, then,” said Diana stoutly. “And he’ll love you so much he’ll want to be married right away. Maybe he’ll spirit you away to Gretna Green, and you’ll be a bride at eighteen! Wouldn’t that be romantic?” She slipped her arm through Gwendolyn’s and squeezed it. “Oh, Gwennie, I’m so excited about your Season! I know you’re going to be declared a Diamond of the First Water! Everyone says so. Why, the other day I heard the butcher’s wife tell everyone in the shop that you’re as pretty as a Greek goddess!”
This was not the first time Gwendolyn had heard herself described in these terms, and although of course it was very flattering
it was also rather embarrassing. One admired paintings and sculptures of the gods and goddesses of ancient Greece and Rome, but it wasn’t real, really. They weren’t real—they were works of art. Just abstract things. And it mattered to be real, because—
A burst of laughter over by the mantelpiece interrupted Gwendolyn’s train of thought and she glanced over to see Hugo laughing at something his business partner, Mr. Studdart, had said. She let her gaze sweep around the room. How lovely it was to have her three other brothers home from Eton—and how tall they’d become, too, though they hadn’t quite reached Hugo’s great height yet. Percy stood next to Hugo, Francis was talking to Grandpapa, and Bertram sat next to Hugo’s wife Katherine on a sofa, his hand on her rounded belly and on his face a look of deep interest.
“Did you feel that, Bertram?” said Katherine, and he nodded.
“It feels like an elbow, or a knee, kicking at me. How curious to think there’s a person inside you, Katherine. Do you want a boy or a girl?”
She smiled at him. “I’ll be happy with either.”
“That’s how I felt, Katherine dear,” said Mama, who sat nearby with Mr. Studdart’s new wife, Céleste, who had once been his housekeeper. Mrs. Studdart looked at Katherine, smiling a little, and Gwendolyn saw how her gaze went thoughtfully to Percy and Francis, and then to Aunt Verena and Aunt Claudia. Two sets of twins. Gwendolyn stared at Katherine wonderingly, then jumped when a mocking voice said from behind her:
“A fairy princess, eh?”
“Christopher, you frightened us!” said Diana reproachfully, twisting about to look up at him.
He ignored her and went on, drawling, “A bride at eighteen, Gwennie, how romantic.”
Gwendolyn felt a hot blush coming over her as she too looked up at Christopher, into his dark saturnine face. She wished Diana hadn’t mentioned marriage and Gretna Green within his earshot. That time she’d actually gone to him and proposed—what had she been thinking? After all these years it still felt a little awkward being around Christopher; there seemed always to be a sardonic, measuring gleam in his dark eyes when they rested upon her.
“Don’t be a beast,” said Diana. “Why are you here, anyway? You told us earlier you weren’t coming.”
His lip twisted in a sneer. “Father insisted.” Casually he bent down, resting his elbows on the sofa-back, and so brought himself close to Gwendolyn, too close for comfort, but stubbornly she refused to budge, though with an abrupt prickle of awareness she realized that Christopher wasn’t a boy any longer. At twenty-one, his shoulders were still wiry, but filled out with muscle now, and she could see a trace of stubble on his lean cheeks. Not a boy, but a man. He said, his dark gaze upon her:
“Looking forward to your Season, are you, Gwennie dear? Ready to sell yourself to the highest bidder?”
“I’m not selling myself,” she retorted, nettled.
“No? Isn’t that why women go to London, as commodities on the so-called Marriage Mart?”
“I’m going to enjoy myself, that’s all.”
“Really.” In that one word was a wealth of skepticism. Scorn.
Oh, he was a beast. Why had he bothered coming home from university, anyway? For the pleasure of taunting her? In a low angry voice Gwendolyn said, “You don’t know anything about it! I’m not just going for the balls and parties, I’ll be going to museums, and lectures, and concerts, and all sorts of interesting things. You’re just jealous! You wouldn’t even know how to comport yourself in Society, or how to talk to people like a human being. You’re—you’re a lout, Christopher Beck, and a brute, and I despise you!” And she jumped up from the sofa and went over to where Aunt Claudia stood next to the perch of the family parrot, Señor Rodrigo, talking to him in her vague, amiable way.
“Do try, Rodrigo. Say ‘I love you.’” Aunt Claudia held out half of a sweet rolled wafer and Señor Rodrigo only cocked his sleek green head and looked at it with visible contempt in his bright beady eyes.
“I love you,” cooed Aunt Claudia.
Señor Rodrigo gave a loud, shrill, extended laugh, then said, “Blimey.”
“I love you.”
“Blimey.”
“I love you.”
“Blimey.”
Finally Aunt Claudia gave him the wafer, which he accepted in an outstretched claw. Leisurely he ate it, scattering crumbs below him with total nonchalance, then looked up at her. “I love you.”
Aunt Claudia laughed, and Gwendolyn, trying to shake off her bad mood, reached out her hand to allow Señor Rodrigo to climb onto her forefinger. “Naughty Rodrigo,” she murmured affectionately.
“Blimey,” he said, then made his way up her arm to her shoulder where he tried to nibble on her garnet ear-bob and then demanded, “Kiss me, you saucy wench,” and she did, lightly touching her lips to his sharp black beak. And he laughed again.
From across the room Christopher straightened up, watching Gwendolyn, inside him a familiar roiling stir of anger. At her; her jibe. Anger at himself. Maybe he was a lout. A beast. Of no use to anyone. He cursed himself for having come to the party tonight against his own wishes, and again, later, when, home again, Father took the opportunity to mention just how well the Penhallow boys were doing at Eton, how bright were their futures, and if only Christopher could bestir himself to emulate them he’d likely be doing considerably better at university than he was.
Christopher listened, said nothing, ground his teeth, waited till Father had done, and then flung himself up to his room, paced around—back and forth, back and forth—until it was very late and his mind settled into something hard and sure, and from his armoire he pulled out a small valise and began to pack.
“Gone?” repeated Gwendolyn. “Gone where?”
“We don’t know,” answered Diana, breathless with excitement. “He left a note saying goodbye, but he didn’t say where he was going. He must have left in the dead of night! Papa’s so upset, and says he’ll hire the Bow Street Runners to go after Christopher and bring him back! Which of course I don’t think he will. It’s not as if Christopher committed a crime, you know.”
After Diana had returned home, Gwendolyn went with slow steps up to her bedchamber, where she stood at the window overlooking the Becks’ house. Almost level with her own room was Christopher’s, though it was far enough away that she could only see the white curtains, left half-open, admitting the cool gray light of a winter’s day into its new emptiness. Surely, surely, Christopher’s leaving had nothing to do with their argument last night.
A fairy princess, eh?
A bride at eighteen, Gwennie, how romantic.
Looking forward to your Season, are you, Gwennie dear? Ready to sell yourself to the highest bidder?
Isn’t that why women go to London, as commodities on the so-called Marriage Mart?
You’re a lout, Christopher Beck, and a brute, and I despise you!
Suddenly all her joy, her anticipation in the coming spring, dimmed. As the days passed without word from Christopher, Gwendolyn found herself increasingly reluctant to make plans, consider her wardrobe, practice her dance steps.
And so when Katherine got a letter from their relation Henrietta Penhallow, the elderly, indomitable family matriarch in Somerset, who let fall the interesting tidbit of news that her former companion, Evangeline Markham, and her husband Arthur were planning an extended tour of Europe now that the war was finally over, intent on taking in the art and culture of France, Spain, Portugal, Italy, the German states, and—because Arthur was a Shakespeare aficionado and wanted to take his Evangeline to Kronborg, to show her the famous castle thought to be the model for the one in Hamlet—Denmark also, impulsively Gwendolyn said:
“Oh, Mama, do you think I might go too? May I write to Mrs. Markham, and ask?”
Katherine lowered the letter which she had been reading out loud to the family, and looked curiously at Gwendolyn. “But Gwennie, what about London?”
“I’ve always wanted to see the Louvre—the Rhine—Saint Pete
r’s Basilica. And I’d love to see Hamlet’s castle, too. This may be my only chance!” Gwendolyn knew she sounded a little too bright, a little too cheerful. A kind of desperation had overtaken her, and it felt as if she was lying somehow, even though she did long to see these famous places.
“You could go another time,” Bertram pointed out. “After your Season.”
“But—but war could come again, couldn’t it? Please, Mama, may I write?”
There was more discussion, and in the end, her mother agreed, and Mrs. Markham graciously said yes, how delightful it would be to have a lively young person accompanying them, and in the spring, instead of going to London, Gwendolyn was on her way to Europe. If there was, deep within her, an ache of guilt, an anxiety, for Christopher, she did her very, very best to not to show it.
He could have gone to London, to their family bankers, to take some—or all—of the money his mother had left him. But he didn’t. A few years ago, Hugo Penhallow had let him work in his shipbuilding firm in the Whitehaven harbor, and so he went to the house of an acquaintance he’d made, an older, somewhat disreputable man who ran a collier-boat back and forth to Liverpool (and, possibly, also smuggled French spirits). A good-hearted fellow, Barnabas asked no questions despite being woken from his sleep, and cheerfully agreed to take Christopher along on his next run, which, as luck would have it, was to happen the very next day.
Once on board, Christopher waited until the shoreline disappeared from view, then he went topside and took his place among the other sailors, who, as uncurious as Barnabas, accepted his presence without comment. In Liverpool he found a ship bound for Greece and hired himself on, wending his way toward the exquisite blue waters of the Mediterranean and the hot yellow sun. In Athens he boarded yet another ship, this one sailing to Crete, where he quickly found work in the olive groves despite his limited command of Greek. If he was homesick, if there was, in his thoughts, any longing for the people and places he’d left behind, he did his very, very best not to show it.