The Daughters of Mrs Peacock

by Gerald Bullet

  ‘I’m glad you did. I think I should have died if you hadn’t.’ She smiled up at him. Tears stood in her eyes. ‘Am I being very silly, Robert?’

  ‘Not silly,’ he answered. ‘Heavenly. But ill-advised. I’m warning you against me, Kitty.’

  ‘Too late for that,’ said Catherine happily. ‘The damage is done.’ They stopped again, to look at each other. The trouble in his eyes troubled her. He bent over her, forgetting caution. Their lips met in a brief, butterfly kiss.

  ‘We shall have to be very patient, my dear, and secret. Your parents will be against me, and quite rightly, because I don’t deserve you.’

  ‘When shall we tell them? Today?’

  ‘No.’ He shook his head sadly. ‘We must go very carefully. I’m not out of the wood yet.’ He hesitated before adding: ‘There’s someone ready to make trouble. I needn’t say who. It’s possible I may become a public disgrace. If that happens, my dearest, I shall go away and you must try to forget me.’

  She smiled, tenderly scornful. ‘If you go away I shall go with you, Robert. Don’t imagine you can get rid of me, because you can’t. Not unless you stop loving me.’

  ‘I shall never do that.’

  ‘Very well then. That’s settled,’ said Catherine comfortably. In her present mood of exultation she was ready to defy all the world. Answering the thought she discerned in his mind, ‘I’m not,’ she assured him, ‘so very young, after all. I shall be twenty-one, you know, in December.’

  Catherine was no longer the ingenuous girl she had been three months ago: the situation in which she then found herself had discovered in her an unexpected talent for self-concealment. When she and Robert caught up with the others and returned with them to the house, when all the family and their guest were assembled at the tea-table, and when half an hour later she watched her lover mount and ride away, she behaved with exemplary calm and propriety. A close observer during the meal might have noticed that she had moments of starry-eyed abstraction and that her glance, if it strayed towards Robert, did not linger there but was quickly averted; but by contributing to the conversation just enough and no more, as became the youngest member of the party, she succeeded in being inconspicuous. No one knew, not even Sarah, that she was hugging a precious secret to her bosom. No one guessed, when the farewells were being said, what it cost her—nor with what sombre romantic pride she paid the price of discretion—to stand a little aloof, to refrain from darting forward to help Robert saddle his horse, to refrain from possessively touching him, to let him go without one eloquent look or intimate word. Since Robert for reasons she could only painfully surmise had ordained secrecy, it pleased her to please him by playing her part well. Moreover, the need for concealment granted, she could enjoy it for its own sake. It appealed to her sense of drama. It made her what she had so long dreamed of being, the heroine of a wonderful, hazardous, perhaps even tragic, love-story. Not that she doubted, in her heart of hearts, that the story must have a happy ending: the alternative possibility was no more than a fiery condiment in the dish of her delight. And even if the future were uncertain, to know that Robert loved her was for the moment all-sufficient, a world-transforming ecstasy. They were in love with each other; no one knew but themselves; and no one, except Sarah, was to be told, until the way should be made clear. Dear, faithful Sarah! The bliss could hardly have been borne but for the near prospect of confiding in Sarah.

  The evening that followed was much like other Sunday evenings: a second visit to church, then the ritual forgathering in the drawing-room where the girls must sit, hands in lap, mindful of what day it was, dedicating their enforced idleness to heaven. All looked confidently to Papa, who presently, having sufficiently teased their impatience with a number of evasive pleasantries, announced that he would read aloud to them for half an hour from a suitable, non-Sabbath-breaking, book.

  ‘That will be a great treat,’ said Mrs Peacock, as though it were a delightful surprise, not an almost weekly event.

  ‘And then,’ said her husband, blandly humouring the pretence, ‘we’ll have a little music, eh?’

  His choice this evening was the gentle Cowper, whose poetry in his happier moods, remarked Mr Peacock, might be aptly described in a famous misquotation as ‘the cup that cheers but not inebriates’. But if any of the girls should feel inebriation coming on, he warned them, they must stop him at once, seeing it was Sunday. He glanced slyly at his wife, cleared his throat, nestled deeper into his chair, leaning slightly towards the small glowing lamp at his elbow, and began reading an invocation to evening. Behind him, through the unshrouded window, the fast-waning day was still visible, a ghostly presence.

  ‘Come, Evening, once again, season of peace;

  Return, sweet Evening, and continue long.

  Methinks I see thee in the streaky west,

  With matron step slow moving, while the Night

  Treads on thy sweeping train; one hand employ’d

  In letting fall the curtain of repose

  On bird and beast, the other charged for man

  With sweet oblivion of the cares of day:

  Not sumptuously adorn’d, nor needing aid,

  Like homely-featured Night, of clustering gems;

  A star or two, just twinkling on thy brow,

  Suffices thee; save that the Moon is thine

  No less than hers, not worn, indeed, on high

  With ostentatious pageantry, but set

  With modest grandeur in thy purple zone,

  Resplendent less, but of an ampler round.

  Come then, and thou shalt find thy votary calm,

  Or make me so. Composure is thy gift.’

  He broke off, to direct a searching glance at Catherine and to say gently:

  ‘Mark that, my dear child. Composure is her gift.’

  ‘Yes, Papa,’ said Catherine. How much did he suspect? Had her studious self-control been wasted labour?

  He resumed the reading, and though she tried to listen, and was soothed despite herself by the gentle rhythms, its meaning went past her unheeded. When it came to an end Mrs Peacock, by general request, went to the piano and sang in her deep surprising contralto, I know that my Redeemer liveth; Julia and Sarah played a duet; Catherine, for all must have a turn, obediently followed with a favourite piece by Sterndale Bennett; and finally Mr Peacock, without much persuasion, was prevailed upon to give them a sea song to which they were all much addicted. This was in the main a rollicking affair, with much noisy bass-work in the accompaniment to illustrate the anger of the waves; but it was redeemed from unsabbatarian impropriety by a middle section in which, the music changing to slow tempo and a minor key, a young mother drifting with her child on a raft invokes the mercy of heaven. The prayer over, the rescue achieved, all was triplets and jollity again, just Mr Peacock’s style; for he too, like his wife, was an astonishingly different person when singing. By force of long habit he put tremendous gusto into the song’s joyous conclusion: in earlier years it had always been a moot point whether he could reach it before one or another of his little girls was reduced to tears. Sarah on one occasion had been found hiding under the table, stifling her sobs, uncomforted by the knowledge that help for the poor castaways was close at hand, the prayer promptly answered. Now, recalling that ancient grief, she smiled maternally at her former self.

  ‘That was glorious, Papa. What shall you sing for us next?’

  Yes, it was a Sunday evening like many another. The same familiar pattern, the same comfortable cosy feeling. But for Catherine, newly translated into heaven, how different!

  Next morning, when she woke, that same heaven was waiting to receive her. Sunlight was a miracle and the solid world a wonder. Everything her hands touched or her eyes looked on had a new, virgin quality. The water in which she washed herself was more lithe and smooth and sparkling than water had ever been before, the cake of soap more deliciously hard, more exquisitely scented, the touch of the towel luxurious, and Sarah, in the first flush of waking, visi
bly an angel. It was hardly credible that only twenty-four hours had passed since yesterday morning when here in this very bedroom, with Sarah, as now, drowsily regarding her from the bed, she had stood, towel in hand, trembling at the dizzy prospect of Robert’s coming. Reverting to a childlike fashion, being unable to contain her happiness, she darted across the room to Sarah and kissed her exuberantly.

  ‘Thank you kindly, I’m sure,’ said Sarah. ‘But hadn’t you better save them?’

  ‘Oh, Sally! Isn’t everything lovely!’

  For the moment, yes. But as day after day went by, with no word of reassurance that should seal the compact and consolidate her joy, doubts and misgivings began stealing in. She had nothing but a memory to live on, a few spoken words, a single feather-soft kiss. It was precious indeed, but not enough: infinitely precious, but not enough to sustain her faith unimpaired. Aeons of time, time that changes all things, had passed since that Sunday afternoon. He had said he loved her, but did he love her still, after five, six, seven whole days? Another Sunday came and went. Another Monday dawned. The weeks stretched before her, a monotonously repeating pattern of empty days. She applauded, and detested, the wise caution that prevented—as she supposed—his writing to her. He was wonderful. He was perfect. But she wished he were not quite so sensible. She herself wrote letter after letter, but refrained, heroically, from posting them. He, not she, must break the silence, if he would. And if he would not, it could only mean that his love had been a moment’s idle fancy, already repented of and soon to be forgotten in the arms of that Other Woman.

  Every day she watched and listened for the postman, and at every delivery either she or Sarah was first at the door to answer his knock. One morning there arrived a letter addressed in a strange handwriting to Mrs Peacock. The two girls, swallowing their disappointment, examined it inquisitively, asking each other whom it could be from, an unidentifiable letter being a rare event in their household. The postmark was Newtonbury, the calligraphy bold and sprawling. They carried it into the breakfast-room and placed it beside Mrs Peacock’s plate.

  This morning she was the last to come downstairs. Her husband, having a train to catch, had started his breakfast. The three girls waited for their mother. Jenny hovered at the sideboard, watching over the teapot, ready when her mistress should arrive to carry it, in tribute, to the table.

  ‘Good morning, my dears,’ said Mrs Peacock. Her greeting never varied. ‘I’m a little late this morning. I hope you’ve been looking after your father?’

  ‘Yes, Mama,’ said Julia. ‘Have you had a bad night?’

  ‘Not as good as I could wish, but that’s no excuse for unpunctuality.’ She sat down and unfolded her napkin. ‘How is the porridge this morning, Edmund?’

  ‘In its customary state of rude health, my dear.’

  ‘Not lumpy again, I hope?’ She began pouring out the tea. ‘I really must speak to Cook.’

  ‘That,’ said Mr Peacock, ‘is a course I do not advise. Speaking to Cook is a danger best avoided. Besides, the porridge is excellent. She is to be congratulated on her mastery, belated though it is, of a difficult art.’

  The cups circulated. The girls, Catherine in particular, waited for a sign before beginning the meal.

  ‘Shall I ask a blessing, Mama?’

  ‘Dear me, yes, child. Of course. How forgetful I am!’

  ‘For what we are about to receive …’ said Catherine.

  ‘And for what Papa has already received,’ murmured Sarah, not quite audibly.

  Both she and Catherine had for the moment forgotten the letter, to which now, however, Mrs Peacock turned her attention.

  ‘Now who can this be from? I don’t know the handwriting.’

  ‘Nor do we, Mama,’ said Catherine.

  ‘Newtonbury,’ said Mrs Peacock. ‘Now who can be writing to me from Newtonbury?’

  ‘Forgive a bold suggestion, my dear,’ said her husband. ‘But there is, you know, a way of finding out. You could, for example, open it.’

  She was already doing so. She extracted the letter from its envelope, and read. Her eyes widened. Her lips pouted ominously. Her dark brows rose. She looked up to find three pairs of eyes frankly staring at her. Only Mr Peacock seemed uninterested.

  Without a word she folded the letter and replaced it in its envelope. Her silence was palpable, pointed. It continued unbroken throughout the meal. When Mr Peacock with a glance at his watch rose to go, she got up, the letter clutched in her hand, and followed him from the room, shutting the door firmly behind her.

  So abrupt a departure, without explanation or apology, was without precedent. Mrs Peacock had the most precise ideas about good manners and of the need to set her children an example.

  ‘Can it be bad news?’ said Julia. ‘I do hope not.’

  All three waited anxiously for the sound of the front door shutting that should tell them Papa had left the house. Five minutes passed. No one dared leave the room. A premonition of disaster dawned gradually in Catherine’s mind.

  ‘Papa will miss his train,’ said Julia. ‘He’ll be so vexed.’

  Neither Sarah nor Catherine thought it worth while to answer her. She looked at them in pained surprise, wondering at their muteness.

  At last the expected sound reached them, Catherine, going to the window, saw her father hurrying down the street. Mrs Peacock reappeared and with a face of frozen calm gave them, as usual, their instructions for the morning. No clue to her thoughts, except their sombre colour, was forthcoming.

  ‘Will Papa miss his train, Mama?’ Julia ventured to ask.

  ‘Possibly. Possibly not. If so, he will no doubt catch the next.’

  The next was an hour later. The long wait, spent pacing up and down the brief platform like a trapped animal, gave him plenty of time to think: far more than he needed. There was only one thing to be done, and because it was unpleasant he wished it done quickly and chafed at this intolerable delay. The carefully cultivated ironic detachment that was his defence against life’s troubles failed him now. Decisive action, of a kind for which he had a profound distaste, was forced upon him.

  Arrived at the office he went straight to Robert’s room.

  ‘Good morning,’ said Robert.

  He returned the greeting perfunctorily, then turned back to shut the door. Something in his aspect as he turned again and approached the dividing table provoked a sharp glance from Robert.

  ‘Anything wrong?’

  ‘I rather fancy there is, Robert.’

  ‘All well at home, I hope?’ said Robert quickly.

  ‘My wife received a letter this morning. As it concerns you, it’s best that you should read it.’

  As if to brace himself for a crisis, Robert stood up. The two men faced each other across the table. The letter changed hands. Its anonymous author, self-styled a sincere well-wisher, begged leave to inform Mrs Peacock that her youngest daughter was believed to be innocently encouraging the attentions of a gentleman who, being already committed elsewhere, was not in a position to carry out any honourable proposal he might be rash enough to make. In spite of great reluctance to interfere, and profound sympathy with the ill-used young lady, the writer felt it only proper to warn Mrs Peacock that the gentleman’s being her husband’s professional partner did not preclude the possibility of legal action being taken against him, should the need arise.

  ‘I see,’said Robert. ‘Thank you. It’s a pretty document.’

  ‘Is that all you have to say?’

  With great deliberation Robert put the letter down and placed a paperweight on it. A contemptuous smile sat in the corners of his mouth.

  ‘Extraordinary woman! She doesn’t even trouble to disguise her handwriting.’

  ‘You will correct me if I’m wrong,’ said Mr Peacock, ‘but it occurs to me that you owe me an explanation. Let me remind you that I am Catherine’s father.’

  ‘I owe you more than an explanation, Peacock. I owe you an apology. This lying letter puts me in the wrong. I
t is precisely the kind of thing I feared might happen. That is why I kept silent about something you had a right to know. Until the way was clear it seemed to me useless, and worse than useless, to speak. Believe me, my chief anxiety was that if there was to be trouble, you and your family should not be involved in it.’

  ‘Well?’ said Mr Peacock. He waited for more.

  ‘It’s true that I love Catherine. I want nothing so much as to marry her. It’s not true that I am committed elsewhere. It may have been true, in some sense, once. But not now. All that is past and done with.’

  ‘On that point,’ Mr Peacock suggested, ‘the lady in question seems not to agree with you. She hints, you will observe, at legal action.’

  ‘That,’ said Robert, ‘is merely malicious. A blackmailing point.’

  ‘Nevertheless I feel bound to inquire, speaking as a lawyer: has she an arguable case?’

  ‘There has been no promise. There are no incriminating letters. There was no intention, on either side, of marriage. And never will be, for the best of reasons.’

  ‘And that is?’

  ‘It’s a queer story,’ said Robert. He seemed reluctant to continue.

  ‘I hope I’m not unduly inquisitive, my dear Robert. You’ll do me the justice to admit that I’ve never pried into this affair of yours, obvious though it was. Better, perhaps, if I’d been a thought less scrupulous. But now it’s become my business as well as yours. You’d better tell me everything while we’re at it.’

  ‘Very well. But don’t you think we might sit down?’

  ‘I agree that the sedentary posture is less melodramatic,’ said Mr Peacock, sinking into the armchair reserved for clients.

  ‘A fellow came to see me the other day,’ said Robert, ‘here in the office. An elderly, loudly-dressed blackguard, with a racecourse accent. You saw him, if you remember, when he was on his way out.’

  ‘I remember. The fellow who tried to touch you for money.’

  ‘That’s what I told you. And it was true. But not the whole truth. He came, he informed me, as the accredited representative of Mrs Stapleton.’