The Second Lady Southvale

by Sandra Heath

  Removing her own cloak, Rosalind tossed it over a chair and then went to the window, looking down into the alley below. Signora Segati was in a nearby room, and her singing was very loud. Two seamen walked along the alley, their boots ringing, and they glanced up in astonishment as they heard the trilling, but then their attention was drawn away by a pretty milkmaid hurrying past in the opposite direction, her empty pails swinging on her yoke. They whistled and called after her, but she kept her nose in the air and ignored them with as much hauteur as a fine lady. Rosalind smiled a little, for it was a scene that could have taken place anywhere in the world, not just here in Falmouth. Men would always ogle a pretty girl, and pretty girls would always show their scorn, and their hidden pleasure, by being haughty and dismissive.

  One of the inn’s maids brought a tray set with a rather hearty breakfast, and Rosalind sat by the fire attempting to do justice to the eggs, bacon, sausages, and tomatoes, the fresh bread rolls, and the pot of good tea. It had been over three weeks since she’d eaten such fine food, but although she knew she should eat properly, she was too worried about Hetty to have a hearty appetite.

  Dr Trenance came shortly afterward and swiftly declared that the maid was suffering from a putrid sea fever that would have to run its course. He prescribed warmth and plenty of rest, constant nursing, as much fluid as the patient could be persuaded to drink, and the judicious application of laudanum. He didn’t think the fever was contagious, but had been brought on by the maid’s own foolishness, and he didn’t think she would be well enough to continue the journey to London for at least two weeks.

  Rosalind was relieved that Hetty would recover, but dismayed at the thought of such a long wait. The doctor administered the first dose of laudanum, and then left, saying that he would return the next day. When he’d gone, Mr Penruthin came to see Rosalind, advising her to sleep if she could and inviting her to dine with his family that evening. The thought of sleep was very tempting, for it hadn’t been possible to do so properly during the voyage, and so Rosalind accepted his invitation and then drew the curtains of her room. Hetty was already asleep, the laudanum had seen to that, and when Signora Segati’s singing ceased at last, Rosalind sank thankfully into a deep, restorative sleep.

  She must have needed the rest more than she’d realized, for it was dark when she was aroused by an inn maid who’d crept in to tend the fires.

  Rosalind got up quickly and went to see how Hetty was. The maid was still asleep, her cheeks flushed, but she woke up sufficiently to take a long drink of water. Lighting the candles in her room, Rosalind then selected a gown from her luggage, a palegreen dimity that she knew traveled well and wouldn’t look too crumpled for dining with the Penruthins.

  She was just endeavoring to pin her hair up again when there was a knock at her door. ‘Yes?’ She turned from the dressing-table mirror, still pinning a curl into place.

  A tall young man entered. He bore a striking resemblance to the landlord, and she guessed immediately that he was Samuel, the Penruthins’ son. He wore a gray coat and leather breeches, and he bowed a little awkwardly.

  ‘Begging your pardon, Miss Carberry, but I’ve been sent to tell you dinner will be served in half an hour’s time.’

  ‘Thank you.’

  ‘A maid will come to conduct you.’

  ‘Thank you.’

  He bowed again, his glance moving fleetingly toward the adjoining door into Hetty’s room, then he withdrew.

  As the door closed behind him, Rosalind heard a heavily accented female voice addressing him. ‘Ah, Signor Penrutti, I vish to speak with you.’

  Samuel had halted. ‘Can I be of assistance, signora?’

  ‘I vish to leave for London the day after tomorrow, and so I vish you to secure me a good post chaise, for a stagecoach vill not do at all.’

  ‘Very well, signora. I’ll attend to your request.’

  ‘Excellent.’

  Then there was silence again, Signora Segati evidently having returned to her room and Samuel to whatever he had to do.

  Rosalind looked in the mirror again, raising her aching arms to finish combing and pinning her hair. Oh, how difficult it was to achieve an adequate coiffure without Hetty’s capable assistance.

  An inn maid came to conduct her to dinner. ‘If you’ll come this way, madam,’ she said, bobbing a curtsy.

  Rosalind followed her from the room and down the staircase. The inn was no less noisy, now that it was dark. There were still stagecoaches coming and going in the yard, and the dining-room sounded as if it was filled to capacity. As she and the maid reached the foot of the stairs, a waiter emerged from the room, pausing to wedge the door open. She looked past him and saw a great assortment of people seated around the large circular tables. There were ladies and gentlemen, clergymen, naval officers, well-to-do farmers and their families, and a large group of red-uniformed army officers.

  Then the maid led her through another door and along a narrow passage into the kitchens, which were, if possible, even more a hive of industry and noise than the dining-room. The stone-flagged floor was spotlessly clean, and there was an immense fireplace, blackened with the smoke of ages, where a number of huge copper kettles were kept constantly at the boil. There were metal trivets standing before the heat, and on them were pans of varying size, some sizzling, some steaming, and some boiling with thick sauces. A huge joint of beef was being turned on a spit by a small boy whose face was red from the heat and exertion, a cook was drawing a fresh batch of bread from a wall oven, and a small army of maids and kitchen boys was chopping and peeling vegetables at several well-scrubbed tables. A fat man was preparing meat on a marble slab at the far end of the room, and a woman was pumping water at a stone sink by a window. Cold viands, strings of onions and drying mushrooms, and apples were suspended from the beamed ceiling, and a maid was climbing up a ladder to lift down a large bunch of dried herbs from another hook close to the fireplace.

  Rosalind was conscious of interested glances upon her as she followed the maid through toward the Penruthins’ private rooms at the rear, and she knew that everyone at the inn was now aware that she was the future Lady Southvale.

  Mr and Mrs Penruthin, but not their son, were waiting in a cozy parlor where the chairs were covered with green-and-white chintz. The floor was stone-flagged, like the kitchens, and the walls had been recently whitewashed. A splendid collection of brass candlesticks stood on the high mantelpiece, and a white-clothed table had been laid with the very best crockery and cutlery the inn could offer.

  The landlord’s wife was a round, cheerful countrywoman, and looked very neat and precise in a gray-and-white-checkered gown, starched white apron, and large, frilled mobcap. Her brown hair was plaited and coiled at the back of her head, and she had long-lashed brown eyes that reminded Rosalind of a King Charles spaniel.

  The Penruthins were determined both to make her feel welcome and to serve her with a delicious meal, and they succeeded. The dinner commenced with a light and tasty clear onion soup, followed by a brace of roast partridge, stuffed with mushrooms; the partridges were accompanied by vegetables so fresh that they must have been pulled from the earth only minutes before being cooked. As a dessert there were raspberries preserved in honey, served with the clotted cream for which Cornwall was so famous. After the somewhat dismal meals on board the Corinth, Rosalind found it almost too appetizing for words.

  Conversation was wide-ranging, covering topics as varied as the state of the war in Spain, Bonaparte’s qualities as a general, the Prince Regent’s lavish hospitality at Carlton House, and whether mad King George would ever recover. Everyone tactfully steered clear of whether there would be war between Britain and America, but clearly it was at the back of all their minds – Rosalind’s for obvious reasons, and the Penruthins’ because Falmouth had such strong connections with the former colony across the Atlantic.

  Philip was also mentioned, and Rosalind was conscious of her hosts’ great liking and respect for him. He was sp
oken of as a shining example of all that was admirable in the aristrocracy, and they made it plain that they were glad he was to marry again. From time to time Rosalind felt Mrs Penruthin’s gaze upon her in an oddly speculative way, and never more so than when she, Rosalind, mentioned in passing that she hoped she could adequately replace the first Lady Southvale.

  They’d almost finished when Samuel came to tell his father that a gentleman in the dining-room was refusing to pay his bill. Mr Penruthin quickly excused himself from the table and hurried away with his son.

  In the ensuing silence, Mrs Penruthin studied Rosalind for a long moment before speaking, and when she did, she chose her words very carefully. ‘I know I have no right to ask, Miss Carberry, but are you truly apprehensive about following in the first Lady Southvale’s footsteps?’

  It was an unexpectedly direct question, but Rosalind chose to answer it all the same. ‘Yes, Mrs Penruthin, I believe I am,’ she admitted, remembering how glowingly Philip had described his first wife.

  ‘Then don’t be, for she was undoubtedly the most spiteful, selfish, disagreeable cat in all the world, and I, for one, wasn’t at all sad when she was lost in that shipwreck. Good riddance to her, that’s what I said at the time, and it’s still what I say now. She was a bad lot, and I believe her husband was one of the few people never to have realized the fact.’

  9

  Rosalind stared at her, thoroughly amazed by such frankness.

  Mrs Penruthin smiled a little. ‘Have I shocked you, my dear?’

  ‘Just a little.’

  ‘Forgive me, but I felt you should know what she was really like. It’s my guess that when you think of her, you imagine a beautiful, delightful creature whose tragic death broke her adoring husband’s heart and whose loss was mourned by all who knew her. Am I right?’

  Rosalind hesitated, not really wanting to indulge in such a conversation, but curious to know more. She nodded slowly. ‘Yes, I suppose that’s more or less how I think of her.’

  ‘I thought so. Well, she was beautiful, that much is true, and she was all sweetness and light when Lord Southvale was near, but when she was on her own, it was a different matter. She stayed here often when she was going to visit her family in Ireland, and we saw both sides of her.’ Mrs Penruthin paused. ‘Nothing pleased her when she stayed here on her own, and she thought little of demanding someone’s dismissal if things didn’t go as she wished. The last time she was here on her own, Mr Penruthin wouldn’t bow to her wishes when she wanted a stableboy punished for not having her horse saddled in readiness for her morning ride on the moor. It had been raining heavily the night before, and she’d said she wouldn’t need the horse, but when she woke up the next day, the sun was out, and it was her contention that the stableboy should have known she’d need the horse, after all. It was unreasonable, and Mr Penruthin stood up to her, so much so that he said he’d appeal direct to Lord Southvale if she persisted. She showed her deep displeasure by removing immediately to the Crown and Anchor, and she stayed there as well on her return from the trip to Ireland. We expected her to blacken us with Lord Southvale, but all she apparently said to him was that she preferred to stay at the Crown and Anchor because it was right by the harbor, and therefore more convenient. She obviously didn’t want to risk his lordship believing our version of events.’

  Rosalind didn’t know what to say, for it was hardly a flattering picture of Philip’s first wife.

  Mrs Penruthin sighed. ‘Oh, she was a clever liar, and a fine actress, and Lord Southvale never knew her for what she really was. All she cared about was getting her own way no matter what, and she didn’t worry who she hurt in the process. But she had to be careful where her husband was concerned, for although he doted on her and gave her everything she wanted, all that would have come to an end if he’d realized the truth about her. She didn’t love him, I’m sure, but she liked having all such a man could give her, and so to him she was always an angel, while to the rest of us she was the devil incarnate.’

  ‘I can’t believe she was really so bad,’ said Rosalind, quite bemused by what she’d been told.

  ‘To my mind she was less than perfect in other ways too, but I couldn’t prove it.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  The Cornishwoman hesitated to say anything else, but then went on. ‘That last time she stayed in Falmouth, at the Crown and Anchor, there was a foreign gentleman staying here with us. They were seen riding together on the moor.’

  Rosalind stared at her. ‘Are you suggesting…?’

  ‘As I said, I couldn’t prove anything, but I saw how they were when they were together.’

  ‘Who was he?’

  ‘A Portuguese nobleman by the name of Dom Rodrigo de Freire. He’d been in England for some three months, visiting London after serving with the Duke of Wellington in Spain. He was very handsome and dashing, and very wealthy, for he had fine estates outside Lisbon. His ship set sail for Portugal on the same tide that hers left for Ireland.’

  ‘Mrs Penruthin, you surely can’t be saying that simply because they were occasionally seen riding together on the moor …’

  ‘Every day, Miss Carberry, they rode together every day. She’d ride up past us, and he’d leave about ten minutes later. She’d wait for him up by the crossroads and then they’d ride off together. They didn’t come back until several hours later. I simply can’t believe that it was all innocent, but maybe I’m too cynical after all the goings-on I’ve seen in this inn over the years. A landlord’s wife develops a sixth sense about such things, you know, but whether or not she and Dom Rodrigo were more to each other than they should have been, nothing alters the fact that she wasn’t the sweet creature Lord Southvale thought she was, and therefore not the sort of woman you have any need to go in awe of.’

  Rosalind rose slowly to her feet and went to a window. She held a curtain aside to look out and found herself gazing at the courtyard. A sea mist had risen, and although the yard was still bustling, everything was indistinct, as if seen through a veil. The glow of lamps and lanterns was diffused and sounds seemed to be muffled. ‘Why did you tell me all this, Mrs Penruthin?’ she asked without glancing back into the parlor.

  ‘Because I’m a second wife, too, my dear. There was another Mrs Penruthin before me, and I had to battle against her memory. She seemed to have been a paragon of all the virtues, and I was constantly striving to live up to her example. Then, one wonderful day, I found out by chance that she’d had a fault, after all – two faults, to be precise: twin daughters born out of wedlock before she’d even met Mr Penruthin. She hadn’t said a word about them and behaved as if she was untarnished, giving herself airs and graces, and actually having the neck to look down on others who’d fallen by the same wayside as she herself. Feet of clay she had, Miss Carberry, just like Lady Southvale. I didn’t tell Mr Penruthin the truth about her, for I didn’t want to hurt him, but I felt so much better once I’d discovered her flaws. I could be myself after that, and I know I’ve made him much happier than she ever did. You’ll make Lord Southvale happier as well, my dear, for you really do have all the qualities he thought she had. You’re the best thing that could have happened to him, I knew that when I saw how changed he was on his return from Washington. He’s yours now, Miss Carberry, so just you get on with your life and don’t give that wicked first wife of his any thought at all.’ The landlord’s wife got up from her seat and came to stand by Rosalind, putting a reassuring hand briefly on her arm. ‘I wish you every good fortune in your marriage, my dear, for in Lord Southvale you have a man second to none, and I sincerely hope that one day you and he will visit the Black Horse, so that we can show you both how much we welcome you.’

  Rosalind smiled at her. ‘Thank you, Mrs Penruthin.’

  ‘As to what I so indiscreetly said about her ladyship and Dom Rodrigo …’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘I’d be grateful if you forgot I ever said it, for I had no right. I don’t know the truth about them, and I
could be wrong. I’m not wrong about what a spiteful, unpleasant creature she was, though, and I don’t take back another word.’

  Later that same night, when Rosalind had retired to her bed in Falmouth, Philip sat alone in the library at Greys, his fine country house some five miles north of London, overlooking Hampstead Heath. It was a magnificent mansion, built in the classical style by Robert Adam, with two symmetrical single-storey storey wings projecting on either side. Porticoed, with a decorative pediment supported on four fluted Corinthian columns, Greys was visible for many miles over the heath. It stood on a lofty grassy terrace, facing south over a small valley containing an ornamental lake, and it was set in a splendid park that had been laid out some twenty years before by Humphrey Repton.

  Hampstead Heath stretched away on all sides, but nowhere was it higher than the house, which consequently enjoyed an enviable view over London, visibility on a clear day reaching as far as the dome of St Paul’s cathedral. But it was dark now, and the moon was obscured by clouds, so nothing could be seen outside the only library window that was unshuttered.

  The library at Greys was housed in one of the single-storey wings, the other contained a conservatory of rare and exotic plants. Dust sheets covered the furniture, and all the windows were shuttered and curtained, for the house was closed. The only people who knew Lord Southvale was there were the permanent staff, especially the housekeeper, Mrs Simmons.

  He sat wearily at the ornate writing desk his father had acquired in Rome during his grand tour. A lighted, four-branched candlestick was before him, the soft glow falling over a silver-gilt inkstand, and the untouched sheet of vellum that lay in readiness for the letter he wished with all his heart he didn’t have to compose.