The Daughters of Mrs Peacock

by Gerald Bullet

  But the presence of Edward, already it seemed one of the family, did not persuade them to forget Julia, who for the past few days had been living and sleeping at the vicarage with only a village girl for companion. The Budges, their boxes duly searched, had departed that same morning, leaving behind them an odour of unsanctity which it was Julia’s chosen task to dispel. Her sisters, escorted by Edward, went to see her every day.

  Her dark eyes were larger nowadays. Her tea-rose complexion had lost its warm bloom.

  ‘Dear Julia,’ said Sarah, ‘you need a rest from it. Go back with Kitty and let me stay.’

  ‘Oh no. Thank you, darling, but no.’

  ‘Mama says I may,’ said Sarah. Much as she would hate to leave home while Edward was there, she felt obliged, and the more so because of that reluctance, to persist. ‘It really would be best. We shall have you getting ill next.’

  ‘No,’ said Julia again. ‘He’s used to me. He needs me. It won’t be for long now.’

  ‘Well, then,’ put in Catherine, ‘wouldn’t you like one of us to stay with you? Me, for instance. I should like to. Not Sally. They need her at home to cope with Edward. Don’t they, Edward?’

  Edward blushed, glancing shyly at Sarah. ‘Oh no. You mustn’t consider me, please! If Miss Julia would like to be relieved——’

  ‘But she wouldn’t,’ said Julia firmly. ‘I won’t hear of it, girls. I’m quite determined.’

  ‘Do you know, Julia,’ said Catherine, ‘you get more like Mama every day.’

  ‘I wish I could believe that, Kitty dear. And now you must excuse me, all of you. Good-bye, Mr Linton.’ She gave him her hand. ‘I do hope they’re looking after you properly, these sisters of mine.’

  ‘No complaints so far,’ Catherine assured her.

  Rather timidly Sarah said: ‘How is he this morning? I’ve been afraid to ask.’

  ‘No better, dear. He’ll never be any better, the doctor says. But he’s not frightened any more, thank God. Now I must go to him. Good-bye.’

  The first part of the walk home was accomplished in thoughtful silence. Breaking it at last Sarah said:

  ‘I ought to have stayed. Poor Julia! She looks worn out.’

  ‘How could you?’ said Catherine. ‘You did your best. There’s no moving Julia once she’s made up her mind. And I know how she feels.’

  ‘She’s very beautiful, your sister, isn’t she?’ said Edward.

  ‘But of course!’ said Catherine.

  ‘So different from both of you.’

  ‘Really, Edward! Is that quite polite, do you think?’

  He laughed. ‘Oh, you’re beautiful too, my dear Kitty, in your sweet, childish way.’

  ‘Thank you for nothing, Mr Linton. And what about Sarah?’

  ‘That,’ said Edward, ‘is a subject for more private discussion.’

  Two days later Julia’s ordeal came to an end. The death of the old man on whom she had lavished a mother’s care left her feeling lost, exhausted, but in some deep sense fulfilled. She had charmed him from his fears. She had reconciled him to what must come. He died at peace, soothed by the touch of her hand.

  ‘Well, emily, my love,’ said Mr Peacock, having lured his wife into the study, ‘it seems that we are to lose a daughter.’

  ‘What do you mean, Edmund?’ she demanded in a joyous flutter. ‘Are you trying to frighten me?’

  ‘Not at all. There is no occasion for alarm, I think. Unless you dislike the young gentleman.’

  ‘Which young gentleman? Come to the point, do!’

  ‘Can you not guess? You surprise me. It’s Edward Linton. He has asked my permission to pay his addresses.’

  ‘Ah! So that’s how it is! I thought so. And you’ve given him your permission?’

  ‘My dear Emily, you flatter me. As if I should dare, without first consulting you!’

  ‘Nonsense, Edmund! Don’t pretend to be henpecked. And don’t pretend you didn’t say yes, because I’m quite sure you did.’

  ‘Am I to understand, then, that you approve?’

  ‘You know I do. I’ve made no secret of liking him. It will be a most suitable match in every way.’

  ‘If the young lady consents, yes, I agree with you.’

  ‘She’ll consent fast enough. You need have no doubts on that score. I’ve seen it in her eyes a hundred times. So would you have done, Edmund, had you been her mother.’

  ‘That privilege, alas, has been denied me. Paternity was all I could rise to.’

  ‘It shows how right I was,’ declared Mrs Peacock, ‘to take the stand I did. I knew she would come to her senses, given time.’

  ‘There, I’m afraid, I do not quite follow you, Emily.’

  ‘Oh yes, you do. I know you were half-hearted about it, but you know very well we did the right thing when we sent your precious Robert about his business. And this proves it, if proof were needed.’

  Mr Peacock, perceiving her drift, settled down to enjoy himself.

  ‘It would have been a mistake, you think, to let him marry our Catherine?’ he inquired courteously.

  ‘A mistake? No. An outrage. A disaster.’

  ‘Possibly. Possibly not. But forgive me. It’s not quite clear to me what bearing that affair can have in this present situation.’

  ‘What bearing! Every bearing! If she’d been allowed to engage herself to your Mr Crabbe she could never have had Edward, that’s obvious.’

  ‘Nor can she now, my love.’ Mr Peacock smiled beatifically. ‘Unless she and Sarah should decide to share him. An improbable contingency, you will agree.’

  ‘Sarah! What’s Sarah to do with it? You don’t mean … you can’t mean …’

  But he did. His nod, his delighted smile, proclaimed it.

  ‘But it’s absurd!’ cried Mrs Peacock. ‘It’s impossible. I don’t believe it. You’re teasing me, Edmund. It’s Catherine he’s in love with. You’ve only to look at them to know that.’

  ‘In that case, my dear, we must lose no time in acquainting him with the state of his affections. He himself, at the moment, is firmly under the impression that he wants to marry Sarah. What a singular mistake! I really must speak to him about it.’

  Before Mrs Peacock could collect herself for speech, the door behind her softly opened.

  ‘May we come in, Mama?’

  On the threshold stood Edward and Sarah, hand in hand.

  Chapter Eight

  Twenty-first Birthday

  ‘Thank you, Mama, it’s very kind,’ said Catherine. ‘But honestly, I don’t want a dance.’

  ‘How odd of you, Catherine, to talk like that. I can’t believe you quite sincere. Not want a dance on your twenty-first birthday! I never heard of such a thing. In my young days I should have been only too delighted. Let me see now, who can we have? The Claybrooks, that’s two. Your Cousin Barnabas, that’s three. Edward, of course, and perhaps he could bring a friend: we can trust his judgment. Then how about Captain Beckoning? He’s back at the Manor again, I hear. It would be a nice neighbourly gesture to invite him; and he looks so splendid, doesn’t he, in his regimentals? And your Uncle Richard, and your Uncle Thomas, if they can spare the time. How many does that come to? Eight, I think.’

  ‘Two and a half men for each of our girls,’ said Mr Peacock. ‘They can fight for the other half. I shall look forward to a most amusing evening.’

  ‘Nonsense, Edmund. Our brothers will hardly want to dance.’

  ‘Will they not, poor old gentlemen? But I shall, my dear. May I have the first dance, Kitty?’

  ‘Not Captain Beckoning, Mama, I do hope,’ said Julia. ‘He’s a tiresome person.’

  ‘How can you say that, Julia dear?’ exclaimed Mrs Peacock, with an Et tu Brute look. ‘Such a respectable family! His father the Colonel is one of the very nicest men. It’s quite time he found himself a wife.’

  ‘I was under the impression,’ remarked Mr Peacock, ‘that he already had a wife. Is it your idea that he should start a harem?’

 
; ‘I’m speaking of young Arthur Beckoning,’ said Mrs Peacock severely, ‘as well you know, Edmund.’

  ‘If he does come,’ said Sarah, ‘he can dance with Cousin Barnabas. They can talk crops together.’

  ‘God forbid that I should discourage your enthusiasm, my dear Emily, but have you thought how all these people are to be accommodated? We have only, I think, two suitably furnished spare bedrooms.’

  ‘Julia can share with her sisters for once. I’m sure she won’t mind.’

  ‘Of course not, Mama.’

  ‘And my brother and brother-in-law,’ said Mr Peacock, ‘will no doubt be happy to make themselves comfortable with Jenny and Alice. We will give them their choice. That leaves Edward and his hypothetical friend in one spare room, and our military gentleman in the other, unless he takes a fancy to Cook. It will be a famous arrangement.’

  ‘Really, Edmund!’ Mrs Peacock was not amused. ‘In front of the girls too!’

  ‘They’ll come to no harm, my love. They’re growing up, we must remember. And they make allowances for their poor frivolous father. Don’t you, girls?’

  ‘Of course, if you’re bent on making difficulties——

  ‘We’re not, Mama,’ said Sarah, cutting in. ‘But won’t eight gentlemen be rather more than we can manage? Indeed it will be nine with Papa, and not nearly enough females to go round. There are only four of us.’

  ‘I’m aware of that, Sarah. Your father and the uncles do not count. Dancing is for young people.’

  ‘That still leaves us outnumbered, Mama.’

  ‘So it does. Thank you, my dear, for being so helpful. We must find another young lady. Your friend Ellen Skimmer, Catherine. That will be very nice and suitable.’

  ‘And with whom is she to sleep?’ inquired Mr Peacock.

  ‘If necessary, we can engage rooms at the Waggon and Horses. As for Captain Beckoning, he’ll go back to the Manor, of course. There’s no problem there.’

  ‘Let’s hope the weather keeps fine for him. Not much fun turning out on a cold December night. But a soldier should be accustomed to rough living, so I daresay he’ll make nothing of it.’

  ‘We must do everything we can,’ said Mrs Peacock, ‘to make the day a great success, for dear Catherine’s sake. Our one thought—isn’t it, Edmund?—is to give her a happy birthday. You know that, don’t you, Catherine?’

  All eyes turned to Catherine.

  ‘In that case, Mama, may I speak? I’d really sooner we didn’t give a dance. What I’d like best is a little dinner party. Quite small. Just family and a few friends.’

  Mrs Peacock made a gesture of despair. Her patience was being sorely tried.

  ‘Very well, Catherine. If that’s your wish. So I’ve had all my trouble and thought for nothing.’

  ‘Not for nothing, my love,’ said Mr Peacock, ‘if by trouble you mean this conversation. For my part I’ve greatly enjoyed it.’

  ‘I must say it seems unnatural in a young girl. But never mind. There shall be no dancing. I must think again, it seems.’

  ‘Come, Emily, let us swallow our disappointment, you and I. Let us even concede, since it is Kitty’s choice, that a dinner party would be rather more manageable.’

  ‘Very well, Edmund, Let us take that view.’

  Catherine looked at Sarah, as if to gather courage from her. Then with an effect of reciting a prepared speech she said:

  ‘And, as it will be my birthday party, Mama, I would like, if you please, to invite Mr Crabbe.’

  Silence and consternation. Catherine had gone deathly pale. Julia and Sarah held their breath. Mr Peacock, with a covert look at his wife, cleared his throat noisily.

  ‘That, my dear,’ said Mrs Peacock with exaggerated gentleness, ‘is quite out of the question. What is more, I don’t wish to hear that name again. How can you be so foolish, so wilful, Catherine?’ she continued after a pregnant pause. ‘We quite thought, your father and I, that you’d got over that nonsense.’

  Catherine looked to her father, but he would not meet the look.

  ‘It isn’t nonsense, Mama. And I shall never get over it.’ She rose and moved to the door. ‘Thank you for planning a happy birthday for me. It was very kind.’ Her voice trembled, on the verge of breakdown. ‘But you needn’t have troubled. I don’t want a birthday. I don’t want any presents either. I don’t want anything if I can’t have Robert.’

  She was gone. The door slammed behind her.

  ‘A good exit-line,’ said Mr Peacock. ‘She has quite a sense of theatre, our Catherine.’

  ‘She gets it from you, Papa,’ said Sarah, returning the ball.

  She was not misled by his airy manner into supposing him undisturbed by Catherine’s outburst, and was willing to help him evade its discussion. Nevertheless, and not for the first time in this context, she was disappointed in him. Was it possible that he agreed with Mama? Remembering Olive Stapleton she had to admit that it was more than possible. Or was he merely, as usual, pursuing his lazy man’s policy, anything for a quiet life?

  She herself had her own private reasons for preserving an appearance of neutrality. Mrs Peacock, to everyone’s surprise, maintained a severe silence. When at last she opened her tight-shut mouth it was to speak of other things.

  ‘Very well, Mama,’ answered Julia. ‘I’ll see about it at once.’

  Sarah, making her escape, went in search of Catherine.

  Preparations for the birthday continued, and with Catherine’s co-operation, as if nothing untoward had happened. Within an hour of the storm’s breaking the skies had cleared and sweet reason resumed its sway. A talk with Sarah persuaded the sinful girl to change her tactics, make a formal apology to dear Mama, and be reinstated yet again in the maternal bosom. Convinced that her defiance had been premature, she became once again the contrite, dutiful daughter, whose mother knew best.

  Even had she persisted in her naughtiness it would have availed nothing. With or without her consent the birthday would have been celebrated: the alternative was too preposterous to be considered. Family decency required that the child should be made to enjoy herself, whether she would or no. And now, mercifully, she gave every sign of accepting her destiny with a good grace: in return for which Mrs Peacock generously agreed that there should be only a simple dinner party instead of the threatened dance. On that point Catherine was immovable. After a series of conferences a list was at last drawn up and the invitations dispatched.

  Uncle Tom was the first to arrive, and characteristically, having made a muddle about the date, he arrived ten days too soon, wearing a deerstalker cap and an Inverness cape. Everyone rejoiced in the mistake, both because it was so like him and because he was a general favourite. Tom Peacock, fifteen months younger than his brother Edmund, looked several years older by reason of his baldness and spareness and his untidy grey moustache which was apparently his chief source of nourishment since he was for ever chewing it. He and Edmund had been Cambridge undergraduates together for two of their three academic years; but Tom, unlike his easygoing brother, had taken ferociously to scholarship, won high honours, secured a Fellowship, and ever since had been the delight and despair of the young gentlemen who sat at his feet—slippered feet as often as not, though sometimes, on high ceremonial occasions or in wet weather, he would wear a pair of ancient down-at-heel boots, laced with the nearest piece of string or whatever came handiest. He was preternaturally tall, lean, angular, with a long stringy neck, jutting ears, small blunt nose, innocent blue eyes, a high narrow dome of forehead not unlike a human knee, and a small prominent chin with which he pointed his more emphatic remarks. He lived most of his time in the Middle Ages, could tell you with confident particularity how many people succumbed to the Black Death in the parish of Little Puddlington, yet had surprising flashes of modernity. The bicycle upon which during two laborious days he had transported himself and his bulging haversack from Cambridge was the very latest model, as he never wearied of declaring. He had violent political opinions and combi
ned with his habitual absentmindedness a passionate belief in the strenuous life. Every morning, summer and winter alike, he took a cold bath and rejoiced in his suffering, convinced that it did him a world of good: the daily ritual cost Jenny and Alice much labour, pumping and carrying water and mopping up the residual flood from his bedroom floor. In fine he was stubborn, learned, goodnatured, and affectionate, and so far as could be discerned utterly without humour. In a somewhat puzzled fashion he enjoyed being laughed at, especially by Edmund, but whether he ever saw the joke was a point much debated in the family.

  Being unmarried and celibate (that he should be anything else was unimaginable), he was free to devote himself to a series of inanimate loves, the latest being his new bicycle—‘my machine’ as he proudly called it. This super-glorious object, a marvel of applied science, was accommodated in a convenient outhouse; and there he could often be found, by one or another of his nieces, perched in the saddle, fondling the handle-bars, happily dreaming of rides accomplished and others still to come. He did indeed take it out for a ‘spin’ every day, as though it had been a favourite dog, until an untimely fall of snow made the going too hazardous even for him.

  ‘My machine, Sarah,’ he would say reverently. ‘Isn’t she a beauty?’

  ‘I’m Catherine, Uncle Tom. But never mind.’

  ‘Ah! Catherine is it? Of course. So it is.’

  ‘What are you doing, Uncle, out here in the cold by yourself?’

  ‘Just sitting, my dear. Just sitting. She’s a Phantom, that’s what they call her. A Reynolds and Mays model. She made her first appearance last year, at the Crystal Palace. Rubber tyres, you see. Not like your old boneshakers. And suspension wheels, with wire spokes in tension.’

  ‘I’m afraid I don’t know what that means, Uncle. But I’m sure it’s something very nice.’

  Three days after his arrival he burst into the breakfast-room clad in cap and cape and carrying his bundle which he dumped in a corner before taking his seat.

  Mrs Peacock stared in wonder. Her daughters smiled happily.

  ‘Feeling cold, Tom?’ said Edmund.