by Carla Kelly
Her aunt smiled. “I know it. We can safely say that your father only got a half-share of the eccentricity too! But seriously, my dear, you must get out of this place.”
“How?” Ellen asked and helped herself to another biscuit. She studied the tray in front of her, remembered the reason for her visit, and cleared her throat.
When she said nothing, Aunt Shreve snorted in impatience. “What errand has your ridiculous father sent you on, child?” She chuckled and rubbed her hands together. “One would suspect you had come to me on some nefarious expedition, sent by my brother!”
Ellen was silent as the embarrassment spread up her shoulders and onto her face like a contagious disease.
“You have hit upon it, aunt,” she murmured. “Papa made an extravagant promise at the last Assembly Ball that he would toast the happy couple with Fortaleza sherry, and now Sir Reginald won't rest unless it actually happens. You know what a connoisseur of wines he thinks himself.” Ellen looked away, suddenly ashamed of her relatives. “You would think that the fate of nations hung upon this single issue.”
Aunt Shreve was silent for a long moment that stretched into minutes. She poured herself another cup of tea and took it to the mantelpiece, where she sipped it and regarded her niece thoughtfully.
“My dear,” she said finally, “what would irritate your father the most? I mean, what would really get his goat?”
Ellen smiled in spite of her own discomfort. “Probably to be forced to dance to your tune, Aunt. You know how he hates that.” She laughed out loud, her embarrassment overcome. “He must have been a dreadful little brother.”
“The worst,” Aunt Shreve agreed absently, her mind intent upon the question she had posed.
“Papa even told me that he would give me anything I wanted, if I could talk you out of one dusty bottle of sherry,” Ellen said, joining her aunt by the fireplace.
Aunt Shreve mused a moment more and then looked her niece in the eye. “My dear, what is it you want more than anything?”
“Well, I would like to be one of Horry's bridesmaids, but even wishing won't help me grow six inches.” She blushed at her aunt's shocked stare. “I … I upset the symmetry, Aunt.”
“Upset the …” Aunt Shreve paced the length of the room and back.
“I don't mind, truly I don't,” Ellen said quickly, her heart pounding at the look in Aunt Shreve's eyes. “I was thinking about teasing Papa for some hair ornaments.” She fingered her cropped hair. “I don't need anything else, really. Oh, Aunt, don't look like that!”
Aunt Shreve was silent. When she spoke, her voice was even, serious. “We can do better than that, much better. Did I not see you this morning, trailing in the wake of our vicar, one of organized religion's greatest jokes upon the Church of England? Are you in trouble again for correcting him in Ralph's lessons?”
Ellen nodded. “He insisted that Boston was the capital of the United States of America.” She shook her head. “Papa assured him that New York City was the capital, and that is how the matter stands.”
Aunt Shreve rolled her eyes and returned the teacup to the table with an audible click. She took her niece's hands in both of her own.
“Do I recall a conversation last week over tea where you told me your greatest wish was to go to Oxford like your brother Gordon?”
Ellen stared at her aunt, remembering her words. “Yes, but that was only in jest! It's impossible. Just wishful thinking. Besides that, Papa told me only an hour ago that I had all the education I needed and that my duty now was to find a husband. He would never permit it.” Ellen laughed. “Not to mention the entire English educational establishment! Really, Aunt Shreve.”
Aunt Shreve went to the bell pull and gave it a tug.
“Do you think he would change his mind for two bottles of Fortaleza? What about four bottles?”
Ellen stared at her aunt. “That would be the half case that Grandfather left you. Even the Prince Regent doesn't have four bottles of Fortaleza, I vow.”
“I never could tolerate the stuff,” Aunt Shreve confided, “although I would never tell your father that.” She clapped her hands together. “I would love to see the look on your father's face when you present him with my half case and tell him that his sister will take it all back unless he allows you to go to Oxford!”
Ellen sat down. “What do you mean?”
“I know that Oxford University itself is out of the question, and more's the pity. I ask you, what possible polluting effect would females have upon the quadrangles of Oriel or Balliol? But setting that aside, as we must, have you not heard of Miss Dignam's Select Female Academy? Miss Dignam is an old and dear friend of mine, for all that we have not seen each other in years. And I believe the academy is even located on the High Street. You could admire any number of spires and crockets and see that clever round library from your window.”
“Do you mean the Radcliffe Camera?” Ellen asked, her eyes wide. “Papa would never …”
“I believe he would, my dear, for four bottles of Fortaleza, and relief from Horatia's endless tears.” Aunt Shreve went to her escritoire and took out paper and pen. “‘Dear Charles,’ ” she began, and then crumpled the paper. “He has never been ‘Dear Charles.’ ‘Charles’ will suffice.” She thought another moment, smiled, and wrote a note, sealing it with wax and handing it to her niece.
“Take that to your ridiculous father and start packing, my dear!”
AM A PERFECT BEAST, ELLEN THOUGHT AS SHE leaned back against the cushions in the post chaise and rested her eyes on the late October scenery. I should be missing them all so much, and I am not.
She thought a moment and then smiled to herself. I will miss Ralph. He had hugged her for a few moments longer than the others. “I shall think of you often, El,” he had whispered when the others had already turned back to the house, and Mama and Horry had resumed their argument over hothouse flowers or potted plants for the wedding.
“I will miss you too,” she replied. “I will write you and tell you all about the colleges.”
“About Oriel, if you please,” he urged, letting go of his sister and straightening his new waistcoat, sewn by the squire's own tailor.
“Do you wish to be an Oriel man someday?” she teased, keeping her tone light to discourage the tears that threatened to fall.
“I do, above all things,” he replied fervently. “And then I will hope for an appointment to All Souls, where I will read literature and eventually become a scholar of renown.”
Ellen kissed him on both cheeks. “And I will be your secretary?” she teased.
Ralph shook his head. “No, El; you will be my teacher.” He looked across the fields stripped bare by winter. “At least, that is how it should be.”
“But it is not, my dear,” she said.
He stood on the front steps, waving good-bye until he was only a small figure. “I will write you often,” she whispered to the glass.
Horatia had been properly appreciative of the Fortaleza, although she did not change her mind about her bridesmaids. “You are a perfect dear to do this, Ellen, and I am fully aware of what I owe you,” she declared, tears glistening on the ends of her lashes as she clutched the dusty bottles of sherry to her breast. “After the wedding, I will tell you just where to stand so that you may catch my bouquet. Mama will be so thrilled.”
Papa had turned shades of scarlet, crimson, and a deep magenta that worried them all when Ellen brought the Fortaleza to him and declared that she would spend the winter at Miss Dignam's Select Female Academy in Oxford as her reward. Horatia sat him down and Mama loosened his waistcoat, while Ellen propped his feet on the hassock and Ralph stood close by with a pillow for his neck.
When he had control of his faculties, the squire fired off a fierce note to his sister in the village, demanding an explanation of Ellen's strange request, and declaring that it was absurd and out of the question. Aunt Shreve sent her reply in the form of her footman, who demanded the return of the Fortaleza. He stoo
d there, his hands outstretched, while Horatia sobbed and Mama scolded. Papa had no choice but to relent and then collapse in his armchair, overcome by the rigors of maintaining domestic tranquility.
“You are the most unnatural Grimsley!” he declared for the next two weeks, each time he encountered her in a hallway or at meals. He even began to eye his wife askance, as if to accuse that virtuous and boring woman of some misdeed that had landed someone else's child in the Grimsley bassinet some eighteen years previous. The result of his mutterings had been a lively argument between the parents that kept everyone tiptoeing about the manor until a truce was declared and the squire readmitted to his bedroom.
Ellen bore it all calmly, ignoring Papa's pointed stares and Mama's torrent of advice, larded with admonition and foreboding. “You know, Ellen, that Dr. Spender Chumley over in Larch lectured on the subject of females damaging their brains with overmuch study,” Mama warned. “He claims that the brain enlarges and creates a curiously shaped head that is not attractive in any way.”
This information sent Horatia rushing to the mirror to examine the shape of her own head.
Ellen laughed out loud. “Horry, you haven't a fear in the world,” she said. “I don't think two consecutive thoughts have ever encountered each other in that space between your ears.”
“Thank goodness for that,” Horatia declared. “I would not wish to risk deformity.” She looked at her mother, her eyes filled with anxiety. “Mama, surely dancing lessons do not come under the category of study that Dr. Chumley speaks of?”
“They wouldn't dare,” Ellen replied.
Ellen was packed by the end of the week, but the November rains came early that year. She was forced to fidget and pace about the house another week until the roads were passable again.
She endured one final visit from Thomas Cornwell, who dropped by after a day at the Grain Exchange in Morely, full of news about the price of corn and the effect of war on his bankbook.
No use in telling Mama to send down the news that she had a headache.
“Ellen, you never have a headache,” Mama said. “Now go downstairs and do your duty!”
“But Mama!” she protested.
Mama only stared at her as her lower lip began to quiver. “If I have to play the hostess and sit for hours in the parlor while he talks on and on about rye and barley, I will go distracted.”
Ellen dug her heels in. “Mama, this is the man you paint in such rosy colors for me! Now I find that you can scarcely tolerate his conversation!”
“My dear Ellen,” said Mama as she held the door open for her daughter. “Once you are married to Thomas Cornwell, you needn't listen to him!”
And so she had listened until the rains began again and darkness settled in, and she had no choice but to invite him to dinner. By the time he left after a game of whist in the sitting room, she knew everything about this year's rye and barley crop (the most promising in the last ten years) and the total number of pigs transported to market.
And now my head does truly ache, Ellen thought as she walked Cornwell to the door, careful to keep her distance, dreading the moment when he would clear his throat and look at her expectantly.
So far she had managed to avoid his kisses. For a small stipend from her quarterly allowance, Ralph usually presented himself in the front hall in time to dampen the Romeo in Thomas Cornwell.
But this time Ralph had been dragged to the sewing room to try on the new waistcoat Horry had commissioned just for the wedding. Cornwell cleared his throat on cue.
“I will miss you dreadfully, Ellen,” he said and gazed at her, his eyes hopeful.
This is my cue, Ellen thought. Instead, she held out her hand and smiled up at the big farmer. “Mr. Cornwell, I am sure that your rye and barley will keep you feverishly busy this winter.”
He dropped to his knees in front of her as she grabbed his elbow and tried to tug him to his feet. “Marry me, Ellen, and make me the happiest man in Oxfordshire!”
“Get up,” she hissed. “This will never do.”
“Only say yes and I will get up,” he pleaded, following her on his knees across the hallway.
Mama, her arms full of deep green fabric, hurried into the hall. She stopped, her eyes enormous, and stared at Thomas Cornwell. Ellen looked at her in desperation.
Mama sighed. “Mr. Cornwell, this will never do! I cannot possibly contemplate another wedding right now! Do get off your knees and save this for the spring.”
His face red from his exertions, Cornwell scrambled to his feet. “Yes, Mrs. Grimsley,” he said as he accepted the hat and coat that the wooden-faced butler was holding out. “Ellen, I will write,” he declared, hand to his heart, as she opened the door and ushered him into the rain. He stuck his head back in the door, his face redder still. “Provided that is not too forward.”
Ellen shook her head. “I think it is, Mr. Cornwell,” she said, her voice low, even though Mama had already retreated from the front hall. “I will see you at Christmas.” She closed the door on his protestations of love.
Ellen endured another week of Mama's tears and good advice. “You will be sharing rooms with Fanny Bland, our own dear Edwin's sister. That is the only thing about this havey-cavey business that sets my mind at ease. Fanny is all that is proper and she will keep an eye on you.”
“Yes, Mama.”
“And you will not go out of doors unaccompanied, or have anything to do with the students in the colleges.”
“No, Mama.”
“You will do nothing to call attention to yourself.”
“Never, Mama.”
She spoke so quickly that Mama looked at her and frowned, but made no further comment beyond a martyr's sigh and a sad shake of her head.
Ellen found herself walking to the road during that interminable week of impassable roads, testing the gravel, willing the sodden skies to brighten.
The postman met her one morning with a letter of welcome from Miss Dignam and a list of her classes. I will take French and embroidery? she asked herself, letter in hand, as she walked slowly back to the house. She turned the letter over, hopeful of further enlightenment. Surely there was some mistake. She wanted to take geography and geometry too, if it was offered.
She folded the letter. Surely I can discuss this with the headmistress when I arrive, she thought.
Mama could spare none of the maids to accompany her to Oxford. Papa was forced to prevail upon his sister to act as escort. Aunt Shreve accepted with alacrity, declaring it a pleasure and presenting the squire with two more forgotten bottles of Fortaleza, to his great amazement and grudging approval.
“There now,” she declared. “Charles, you have enough Fortaleza to toast Horatia, and her first child, and Ralph's entrance into Oxford—if you have the unexpected good sense to send him there instead of to a beastly counting house in the City. You can also celebrate Gordon's leaving of Oxford eventually, if that should ever happen before we are too gnarled to pop a cork.”
Brother and sister had declared a wary truce and were sitting knee to knee over the tea table in Aunt Shreve's house. Ellen cast anxious glances at her papa throughout the interview.
He surprised his daughter by managing a ponderous joke. “What, no bottle for Ellen?” he asked. “She may marry someday, if we can force her nose out of books, or if she is not off exploring the world in a birchbark canoe.”
Aunt Shrive smiled at her favorite niece. “I wasn't going to tell you this, Charles, but years ago Father gave me a bottle of Palais Royal brandy.”
The squire choked on his tea. “My word, sister,” he exclaimed when he could breathe again. “I doubt there is another bottle in England!”
“Quite likely,” his sister agreed as she poured more tea. “I am depending upon Ellen to make a fabulous alliance.” She set down the cup and fixed her brother with the stare that had probably made him writhe when they were growing up. “When she is good and ready, Charles. Then I will open the Palais Royal.”
Thinking back on that artless disclosure, Ellen laughed softly to herself. Mama declares that since I scared off the vicar, the best I can hope for is Thomas Cornwell. Horatia claims that she can find me someone among her darling Edwin's circle of rattlebrained acquaintances. She shook her head. None of these paragons would be worth Palais Royal. I suppose I must make the exertion on my own.
Aunt Shreve joined her in the village and they continued east across rolling fields shorn of sheep that dotted the landscape in other seasons. The trees had all molted their leaves in great piles, leaving skeletal branches that bore no promise of spring in the near future. “Bare ruined choirs, where late the sweet birds sang,” she thought, her mind upon Ralph and his everlasting Shakespeare.
“Perhaps I should study Shakespeare, in honor of Ralph,” she said out loud. She dug in her reticule for the letter from Miss Dignam and held it out to her aunt. “See here, Aunt, they have me down for nothing more strenuous than French and embroidery; I believe that I will request geography and Shakespeare, at least. I am not afraid of scholarship.”
Aunt Shreve put on her spectacles and read the letter. She leaned back, the look on her face telling Ellen that she was choosing her words with care.
“My dear, I hope you will not be too disappointed if Miss Dignam's falls short of your expectations,” she began. “I have never been there, but I do not know that study for women is serious anywhere.”
Ellen waved her hand and reclaimed the letter. “Oh, that is all right, Aunt. If they only teach the tragedies of Shakespeare and not the more ribald comedies, I can be forgiving!”
The sun broke through the weight of autumn clouds by late afternoon and their entrance into Oxford. The post chaise had slowed to the movement of farm carts that trundled toward the ford of the Thames called, in true scholar's eccentricity, the Isis, while it wound around the university town.
“It is only when I travel this road behind loads of potatoes, onions, and pigs that I wonder why anyone saw fit to establish a university in this place,” Aunt Shreve grumbled. “If this is the center of the universe, then I am Marie Antoinette, head and all!”