Margaret of the North

by EJourney

  John, replied without taking his eyes off of his wife. "She is indeed alluring. I suppose I always thought I was the only one privileged to see her dressed so………casually."

  Frederick chuckled, "You are on the Andalusian coast! We put on a public persona when we leave the house but in here, what you do is between only you and your conscience. You make your own rules. Most of the year, we cannot dress as you do in Britain. This climate encourages an informality that I find good for the spirit."

  "But does not the Spanish temperament figure into it?"

  "It must. It is spontaneous, less inhibited, well-suited to this particular area of Spain where nature is all around us and trade brings in such a diverse group of people. To live here, one cannot always insist on proper decorum and be resistant to change. Take me, for instance, I was bred to be a proper English gentleman and I believe I am now closer in disposition to a Spaniard. Their outlook on life has influenced mine entirely. It did take years, though."

  "Meeting Dolores probably helped, too." John said, smiling.

  "Yes, indeed." Frederick grinned with pleasure as they both looked in the direction where their wives stood in lively conversation.

  John nodded with a smile, gazing at Margaret as she listened intently to Dolores explain something about some figurines on the mantelpiece. He observed with a mix of pride and concern, "Margaret might have adapted to this society with ease, particularly with you here."

  Frederick shot him a curious glance and replied, "I did write her to come live with us after my father died but she was not ready for such a momentous change. I told her she could come any time but eventually, I think you two found each other. I cannot thank you enough for coming to visit. I despaired over not seeing my sister again and I have spent many sleepless nights wondering how she was and what would happen to her."

  "I am glad she did not come here," John replied, hesitated a moment, and went on. "If she had done so, I would have invented some excuse to come for her after I found out who you actually were."

  Frederick studied his countenance briefly and smiled. "I do believe you would have! You have been good for her. She has a radiance I have never seen before."

  **************

  Luncheon, frequently a heavier repast than dinner, usually took two hours and was followed by siesta which occupied another two hours. During siesta hours, the sun was at its zenith in the summer and the local people tended to stay within the comfort of indoor spaces. Were Frederick not on vacation, he would have returned to his office after the siesta and worked from 4 p.m. to 8 p.m. in the evening. Margaret vaguely remembered siesta mentioned in one of her brother's letters and was not surprised at the practice but John, used to a schedule of continuous work during the day, found it perplexing. Frederick and Dolores were faithful to the custom, treated those hours of repose as a necessary indulgence that they spent in their bedroom, and left John and Margaret to entertain themselves.

  John and Margaret found themselves, on their first two days in Cadiz, too languid from the luncheon and too uncomfortable in the heat to do anything but seek the coolest part of the house and laze around—talking or reading, with glasses of cold water and a fan. After a restless quarter of an hour in their bedroom, they settled on the verandah where ocean breezes blew enough of the heat away to make it quite tolerable. By their fifth day, Margaret started to dose off from reading her book. The verandah bed became too tempting to resist and she yielded to it.

  As she was drifting off to sleep, she opened her eyes momentarily at the stirring next to her and saw that John had come to join her. The following days, John submitted willingly to the exigencies of the weather and adapted to the local custom right after lunch. Towards the end of their stay, he loosened up enough to banish his cravats and vests into their luggage, roll his shirtsleeves up to his elbows, and entice Margaret to the big verandah bed for an afternoon siesta.

  On a particularly lazy afternoon, as they lay together, he said, "I could get used to this."

  She sat up, suppressing a smile, and exclaimed, eyes wide with feigned disbelief, "What? And how could you survive a dull life of careless days of ease?"

  He pulled her back so she lay on top of him. "How could you remember something I said so long ago? What if I would rather not be reminded of it?"

  "Would you really not want to be reminded of that remark? Should it not flatter you instead that what you had to say made such an impression on me that I could remember it?"

  "But it offended you at that time so I would rather that you had forgotten it."

  "Well, you might think that but, in fact, what you told us shortly thereafter about what you had to do and endure after your father died rather impressed me. I was mortified and began to think I had been too harsh on you."

  "A fine way you had of showing you were impressed by refusing to shake my hand!" He feigned offense by scowling at her and shaking his head.

  "I really was ignorant of the practice at the time. Anyway, I could not admit then nor let anyone see that you had begun to interest me," she replied archly and kissed his mouth. Then, she lay back next to him, her head on his shoulder.

  "That is not all, either. Do you recall when Mr. Bell asked you what you worked so hard for and when you intended to enjoy the fruits of your labor?"

  John obviously remembered and did so with some pain. He groaned. "I was an ass because I was consumed by jealousy and still stung by your rejection. I told myself I should hate you or at least ignore you pointedly; instead, I could not get you out of my mind. And yet, you sat there looking serene and unconcerned. Mr. Bell must have thought me irrational and irritable."

  "Well, yes, he did," she replied. "But I told him you were not your usual self that night, that something was troubling you."

  He stared at her, his eyes wide and incredulous. "You knew that. You defended me!"

  "I knew by then that I loved you just when I was convinced you no longer cared for me. How could I possibly reveal how I felt?"

  "Did you think me uncaring because of my callous remark to you?"

  She shrugged her shoulders and did not answer.

  He clasped her close. "Oh, Margaret, my love! All I was waiting for was a look from you so I could show you how contrite I was."

  She snuggled closer to him, still silent, thinking that all that mattered then was he had his warm, reassuring arms around her now.

  After a long silence, John returned to the question of leisure, "Well, it is true. Leisure normally discomfited me. I had always been more at ease being busy, usually with work at and for the mill. I rarely did anything that was in service only of my mind or my knowledge until I started studying with your father. But this is a different place and, with you, certainly a different time. You have opened up my world and I can no longer imagine it without moments like this with you." He kissed her forehead and closed his eyes. On that verandah bed that afternoon, as he settled snugly next to Margaret, he smiled wryly at himself and thought, "Well, Mr. Bell, you won that argument."

  In pleasing Margaret, John had to open himself up to experiences that were new and, sometimes, even strange to him. He initially saw some places and people through her eyes before he discovered something in them that he uniquely found intriguing or at least interesting. It had been so in Paris—at the museums and art galleries where his reactions were, at first, colored by hers; at the cafés and theater where she translated what she heard. Though this was her first Paris visit, she recognized many things from Monsieur Fleury's descriptions and the books he had sent her. Her delight and wonder soaking in the city, pointing to monuments and places she read or heard about was infectious, inevitably drawing him into her enthusiasm.

  This trip that took them to new places and exposed them to people with different customs, idiosyncratic ways of thinking and of viewing the world had, indeed, been a journey. It had changed them both although it seemed to have affected him more than Margaret. Paris, in their brief sojourn, gave him a glimpse into a culture imme
rsed in arts and pleasure and the pursuit of both. Yet, it was also deeply engaged in progress and ideas—was it not, after all, the land of Diderot and Voltaire—and was apparently on a well-planned path of modernization to better meet the needs of its inhabitants. It was a culture and a people equally at home with concerns of a nature he would consider serious and important as well as those he once relegated to mere "appearances" or even frivolities, nonessential to survival or comfort. He had to reconsider, to acknowledge that "appearances" and "careless ease" were created for a purpose, to nourish, perhaps, some higher human need.

  Cadiz was a different experience. It had a careworn aspect about it, not surprising in possibly the oldest city in Europe. It did not have the frantic rush to modernity that pervaded Paris. Instead, underneath the constant buzz of commerce, it had the languid ambiance of an aging city, with its medieval churches and tree-covered plazas. The warm balmy climate encouraged living alfresco much of the day and public spaces—the open plazas, gardens, and beaches where breezes flowed freely and continuously—teemed with people, drawn out of the houses they inhabited on narrow winding streets.

  It was, for John and Margaret, a carefree interlude—a time of playfulness, of kissing and caressing, of strolling on beaches under clear skies to the sonorous vocalizations of gulls and the soothing coolness of sea breezes. It was a time they would both often hark back to during cold wintry days in Milton, a sweet respite from events that came before and those that were still to come. They expected the coming years to be trying: John, as he once again faced the uncertainties of establishing a business and Margaret, as she assumed new responsibilities and adjusted to a society suspicious of, probably even hostile to, her southern sensibilities.

  **************

  Margaret and John had originally planned to stay in Cadiz for only a week, after which Frederick and Dolores would take them to other towns and cities in the region. But before the week was over, everyone agreed that they should postpone the visit to other places since they were all having a pleasant time being together and getting better acquainted in Cadiz. Thus, the week stretched to two and John and Margaret only had time to see the cities Andalusia was well-known for.

  The two couples went to Granada and Seville where they stayed a few days. When merely seen on the surface; Seville looked like a much larger inland incarnation of Cadiz, with plazas and numerous churches, the most famous of which was its grand cathedral, the largest Gothic cathedral in existence. It had been built in the former site of a mosque whose tower, the Giralda, still stood. They also tried to see the Alcazar, the royal palace, but the royal family was there and it was closed to the public. In Granada, they visited the Alhambra, an enchanting Moorish palace, exotic in its intricate designs, its colorful tiles, and its fountains and pools. Its location on a hill up above the city was, no doubt, strategic for its defense against invaders. Margaret vaguely recollected hearing the Alhambra mentioned by someone and, going around its rooms a second time, she realized it was Fanny. She had to agree that the Alhambra was indeed a very special place to visit.

  The month with Frederick and Dolores passed too quickly for Margaret and Frederick whose parting was nearly as tearful as their reunion. They all vowed to meet again, anywhere else but England, of course. By the time, John and Margaret boarded the boat back to Marseilles, they agreed to meet Frederick and Dolores in Paris in two to three years.

  X. Concerns

  The passage back to England proved demanding for Margaret. She suffered bouts of dizziness and nausea from the constant swaying and occasional turbulence of the ship they took from Cadiz to Marseilles and, later, from the even more tempestuous passage on the ferry between Le Havre and Dover. By the time they reached England, she seemed in a stupor, her eyes glazed and her face drained of color and brightness. She leaned heavily on John as she walked down the ramp and once on the pier, she felt faint and enervated, her spirit sucked out of her. John was alarmed and insisted on spending the night at a hotel in Dover. There, he asked for a local doctor to see his wife. The doctor found nothing to be seriously concerned about and declared it a bad case of seasickness that should go away in a couple of days. In the meantime, he gave her a potion to control nausea and put her to sleep and prescribed very light bland meals for a day or two. Margaret slept peacefully through the night, woke up late the next day, and felt well enough to insist, despite John's hesitation, on resuming their journey back to Milton.

  Before returning home, they stopped in London where Dixon waited at the Lennoxes with the remainder of Margaret's belongings not transported on Dixon's previous trip to Milton. They stayed one night during which Margaret rested further and was fussed over by Edith and Mrs. Shaw who, remarking on her looking ill, were informed of her troubles at sea. Even Edith's little boy was drawn into the effort, offering his aunt a small posy of flowers picked out of the vases all around the house and coming to see her several times during the day to embrace her and kiss her face all over.

  John noted all the busy, affectionate gestures of concern over his wife with some amusement. His mother never fussed over him when he had been ill as a child and although she was more solicitous with Fanny, it was still in an efficient sort of way. John knew that what Margaret needed was rest and sleep and, indeed, that was what she preferred but she received the attention with gratitude, sensible of the fondness and caring behind all the pampering her aunt and cousin gave her. It did do her some good and by evening, she felt well enough to join them for dinner. John's anxieties were allayed for the time being and he turned his attention to becoming better acquainted with Mrs. Shaw, Edith, and Captain Lennox. Edith implored them to stay longer but despite her appeals, John and Margaret were impatient to be home and were back in Milton, with Dixon, on Sunday evening.

  **************

  The morning after their return, John walked across the yard to the mill. There, he expected to find Williams who he intended to send on some errands in preparation for reopening the mill. After more than two months respite from the work that had been his life, he was eager to return to it. He knew that, this time, he was going to have to do many things differently to forestall or at least reduce the bitter effects of strikes, the last one of which brought about his recent failure. Since that bleak period when it became clear that he had to close the mill, he had spent endless hours mulling over what changes he would make if he could somehow restore its operation. He laid out alternative plans on paper that listed different possibilities for financing its restoration, among which was working for some other manufacturer until he could amass enough capital to resume the management of his own mill. None of those financing alternatives considered coming into wealth by marriage and, at that time, he had already resigned himself to approaching middle age alone as he struggled once more to build his business.

  By law, the wealth that Margaret brought into the marriage was now also his to use as he pleased or saw fit and she made it very clear that she would not interfere in business matters. Still, he felt reluctant assuming control of that wealth and investing it freely in the mill. Perhaps, it was merely that he could not get accustomed to how easily his financial problems resolved themselves and that, despite his misgivings about starting all over again at so late an age, he had rather looked forward to the new challenges that were certain to come with a late restart. In marrying Margaret, he no longer needed to find employment with another mill until he could reopen his own. He could also immediately start practices that he had only recently put together, borne out of new perspectives he had gained through closer alliance with his workers. He doubted that any of his colleagues would have allowed him the free reign he needed to try those practices out at their mills. Now, of course, he did not have to contend with those matters.

  How much Margaret changed his life! He leaned back on his chair thinking about her. He would see her again for afternoon tea as he had promised her that morning although she told him that she understood if he did not come, that she knew how much work he
needed to do to bring the mill back into operation. But John was still immersed in the pleasures of being with his new wife, still sometimes in awe that Margaret had come back and that he could bask in her warmth, listen to her loving voice, touch her, caress her. The past two months, their first ones together, had been blissful, full of wondrous moments that he wanted to recapture as often as he could and for as long as possible. He was certain that no matter what the future held, those moments they shared the past months were his to treasure forever.

  They had never been apart for more than a few minutes at a time since their wedding and, alone in his office during a lull in his work, she took hold of his thoughts just as she had in what seemed like such a distant past when he believed he would never see her again. But the images of her he now conjured up had changed. They were no longer of Margaret, beautiful, bewitching, distant, unattainable. Now, they were mostly of her yielding deliciously, ardently to his lovemaking, of gazing at him tenderly, her full soft lips in a half-smile, before she swayed against him and settled contentedly in his arms.

  It seemed that they grew closer every day but what was most wonderful to him, had also been unexpected: something she taught him about women or at least, the particular type of woman that Margaret was. He had assumed, as many men did, that a woman's more delicate nature also made them more placid, more diffident, not so intense as men in their feelings and Margaret was, indeed, tender and sometimes, even shy. But he was amazed to discover that she could also be passionate, returning his ardor with almost equal intensity, and it thrilled him infinitely to be the object of such feelings.