That Inevitable Victorian Thing

by E. K. Johnston

  “Come on then, Helena,” August said. “We’ll show them how it’s done.”

  Helena laughed, and took his hand. She loved this song, and the dance that went with it was equally delightful. The Log Driver’s Waltz was for friends and married folk and family. The Rover was something altogether different. It was much more like the kiss in the kitchen. Helena was not one for flirting or public displays, it was true, but the Rover was a dance for ignoring the rules. They made it to the floor in time for the final bit of the promenade, and settled into their places to dance the formal steps as the male vocalist took his place in front of the band.

  The Rover began like most staid country dances you could imagine, and then devolved almost immediately into a reel that encouraged partners to touch each other in ways they generally weren’t supposed to on a public dance floor. August smirked at Helena from his place in the men’s line, just beyond arm’s reach, and as they circled each other, she knew he felt the same way.

  Though the night be dark as dungeon,

  Not a star to be seen above.

  I will be guided without a stumble,

  Into the arms of me only love.

  When they came together for the reel, Helena knew that the heat between them wasn’t just because the room was crowded and nearly everyone in it was dancing. Every time they had ever danced before had led to this, from when they were children and Helena wore the crêpe, until now, when they were both adults and thinking about the commitments they would make to their futures. They matched so well in every way except for one, friends from so young, and grown into something more. God, she loved him. And she could never have him, not anymore. But she would have this, before everything ended.

  I went up to her bedroom window,

  Kneeling gently upon a stone.

  I rapped on her bedroom window,

  “My darling dear, do you lie alone?”

  She laughed as he lifted her just because he could. The dance could be as raucous and complicated as the pair wished, and August had clearly been practicing. Helena couldn’t take her eyes off August for very long, lest she miss a step, but she knew that they were the focus of attention. Every eye was on them, even those of the other pairs who were dancing on the floor. They must be such a sight.

  I’m a rover, seldom sober

  I’m a rover of high degree

  And when I’m drinking, I’m always thinking

  How to gain my love’s company.

  He laughed along with her, his bright eyes reflecting the light of the flameless candles his mother had set about the room. Helena hoped that he would be able to forgive her for what she had done, and was about to do. They had been friends for so long, after all, and surely he could not hold her genes against her character, even if it would prevent their marriage. It was not as though it would be impossible for him to find someone else, even if it would break Helena’s heart to see it happen before her. She would do right by him, and hope that he could, at the least, respect her for it. She was almost positive he would, but the heart—ah, the heart—was the least logical part of the human body.

  The song ended, and the cheering was even louder than it had been for the waltz. August led her around the floor, her wide green skirt trailing after her, before delivering her back to where Margaret was waiting for them, a tray of lemonade at the ready.

  including newly debuted Helena Marcus. Miss Marcus did not open the ball with the younger Mr. Callaghan, however. That honour went to newcomer Margaret Sandwich, who is a guest at Lake Muskoka for the summer. She did acquit herself nicely during the Log Driver’s Waltz and looked to be enjoying her time at the party.

  Charlotte Callaghan served hors d’oeuvres that fused several different culinary styles from around the Empire. We spoke with her chief cook, Sally McCallister, for details. Recipes can be found on page 7.

  In the meantime, we look forward to seeing what the summer has in store for

  —a clipping from the society page

  of the Port Carling Push

  CHAPTER

  18

  Margaret had not spent so lovely an evening in her entire life. After sitting out the Rover because she didn’t know the steps, she never lacked for dance partners. The food was simple but delicious, and the atmosphere was so happy it was difficult to explain. She had seen happiness before, of course, and there had been a great deal of it in Toronto, but there was a carefree nature to this gathering, and she found she rather adored it.

  Helena was also a delight to watch. Clearly aware of August’s intentions, his family and his employees were all wonderfully gracious to her, without crossing into obsequiousness and without making her uncomfortable. She glowed with delight, and Margaret didn’t think she’d ever seen anyone so beautiful.

  When the music began for what was to be the last set, August had led Helena to the centre of the floor again, to the visible delight of the onlookers. Hiram joined them to complete the numbers for the Dashing White Sergeant. Margaret would have been happy to watch them from the side, except that little Matthew had finally worked up the courage to ask her to dance with him. She couldn’t lift him, so she made sure she was careful not to step on his gown as they stumbled their way through the dance with Evie. Margaret tried to apologize for her gracelessness, but Evie assured her that the Dashing White Sergeant nearly always ended with some sort of disaster, and that was part of the fun. Of every story Margaret would tell her father about this evening, a five-year-old boy dressed as her great-great-etc. grandmother in mourning would probably make him laugh the most.

  When the music ended, Fanny, who had spent a great deal of the evening dancing with Hiram, appeared as though conjured from thin air with their shawls. It was that awkward transition season where it was too warm for a coat and too cold to go without. The wraps were slightly curious, belonging to the cottage itself rather than to any person in particular, but Margaret was happy to have hers as soon as they stepped outside.

  August offered one arm to Helena and the other to Margaret. Fanny had disappeared again, presumably to walk home with Hiram, and so when they reached the kitchen door of the Marcus cottage, there was only the one light on. Margaret thought to give August and Helena some privacy, but apparently whatever they had to say to each other they had already said, because August merely bid them goodnight, and went back up the road. Helena watched him go, but it was too dark for Margaret to see the expression on her face. She was glad, because her own face was probably marked by that odd jealousy of a life she could never have. Then, Helena turned to her.

  “Let’s go down to the dock,” she said. “It won’t be too cold, and the sky is clear tonight.”

  Margaret nodded and slipped out of her shoes, leaving them on the steps beside Helena’s. They carefully picked their way down the path. It was by no means easy in the dark, built as it was of rocks and bent tree roots. And of course, they were wearing gowns.

  The sky was clear indeed, with more stars than Margaret had ever seen. Here, over the water, there was nothing to block the sky and very little to light it. There were a few boats out on the lake, mostly other cottagers on their way home from the Callaghan party, but even their motors seemed politely quiet.

  A moment after Margaret and Helena settled themselves and their gowns on the dock’s edge, there was a haunting, longing call that echoed in the stillness, and Margaret felt her heart swell.

  “What was that?” she whispered. It seemed very necessary to speak in a low voice.

  “A loon. They’re mating.”

  Helena cupped her hands and put them together, lining up her thumbs in a way that bent her fingers oddly. Helena raised her hands to her mouth and blew, and a quieter, breathier version of the loon’s call came out of her hands. Somehow she was even able to make the pitch of it change, warbling as the loon had, but it was too dark for Margaret to see what she was doing.

  �
�You can ask August to show you tomorrow. He’s good. Sometimes the loons answer him back.”

  There was silence then, just the quiet slap of the water against the dock and the hum of the retreating boats, and then, much more closely than last time, the loon call as the bird answered.

  “I hope it doesn’t decide to court you,” Margaret said. “I have a suspicion that your heart is spoken for.”

  Helena dropped her hands into her lap, and Margaret could see her pale fingers twine into the dark fabric of her dress.

  “I suppose,” Helena said.

  “My father says it is one thing to love and another to marry,” Margaret told her. When he said it, he had been referring to his own love of the Empire and his decision to accept the then- Crown Princess’s marriage proposal, but Margaret thought the advice might be more widely applicable.

  “I think he’s right,” Helena said after a moment. “I’ve been such good friends with him for as long as I can remember, and we decided to get married when we were very young. I still want to, of course, but at the same time . . .”

  Her voice trailed away. The loon called again, and Margaret thought that this time it sounded even more melancholy.

  “He understands that, though,” Margaret said. “Which is wonderful.”

  “Yes. Neither of us are in the rush we expected to be in, though there is still the same agreement between us. I am glad of it.”

  There was an odd sadness in her voice that Margaret couldn’t explain. Perhaps it was merely the result of growing up. Heaven only knew that Margaret probably sounded the same sometimes, and would do so even more after she went home.

  Helena was quiet again, tracing a line across the otherwise-still water with her toe. Margaret sensed her comfort in the silence and let it be.

  A few discreet inquiries of her dance partners had revealed that no one knew of a Henry Callaghan in relation to the family here. It was, she had been assured several times, a very common name. Perhaps if she knew more details about Henry they would be able to help, but of course she couldn’t tell them the details, because that would put her secret in jeopardy. Her father had worried that her own appearance would do that, since very few people looked like her, her mother, and her sisters, but aside from several well-meant compliments on her looks and dress, it hadn’t been an issue. August’s family was, of course, all at least part Hong Kong Chinese, and his sisters had married members of the Algonkian First Nation. Such combinations were seen in the faces of almost everyone she had danced with, and so her own face had gone unremarked upon.

  Beside her, Helena seemed somehow to get even more quiet, but when Margaret looked over at her, the other girl was merely lost in the stars above them.

  “It’s beautiful,” Margaret said, her voice still very low. The silence leant an intimacy to their closeness that she, selfishly, very much enjoyed.

  “Yes,” Helena said. “My mother likes the sky up here because it reminds her of the hymn. She can see it in New London, and in her work, but she likes to see it in nature as well, because it reminds her of why she chose her work in the first place.”

  “Which hymn?” Margaret said, as there were several about the stars. Most of the ones she knew were Navy related, as those were the ones her father sang as lullabies.

  “All things bright and beautiful

  All creatures great and small.”

  Helena’s voice was quiet, but it was very good. Margaret knew the hymn at once, of course.

  “I like that one as well,” Margaret said. “Though I’m not as good a singer as you are.” This was much to the consternation of the Archbishop of Canterbury and the amusement of her mother, but Helena didn’t need to know that. Except, need or not, Margaret wanted very much to tell her. To give her the secret she carried. To beg her to come back to England with her and be her companion forever, not just for the summer. All of her friends were so independent and self-certain, she realized, not that she had that many friends to begin with. It was difficult amongst the people who already knew her as Princess and heir to find those who loved her, Victoria-Margaret, first.

  Helena slapped the side of her own neck, and the noise snapped Margaret out of her melancholy.

  “I’m sorry, Margaret,” she said. “I have to go inside. There’s no wind and I’m being eaten alive.”

  “I don’t have a single bite, I don’t think,” said Margaret. She hadn’t even heard the mosquitoes buzzing around them.

  “I have at least six already. And probably more because we came home through the woods with August.”

  “That just means you’re sweeter than I am,” Margaret said.

  Helena laughed and stood up. The dock creaked under her feet, and she pulled Margaret up beside her.

  “That really doesn’t make me feel much better.”

  “I’m sure Fanny has anti-itch lotion of some kind,” Margaret said. She looked up at the cottage. The lights were all on. “Come on, then, we can tease her about Hiram.”

  “Oh, no. I can’t. She knows too much about me and August.”

  “Well, I can, then,” Margaret declared. “And you can make the tea.”

  “That I can do,” Helena said, and led the way back up the stairs.

  Fanny already had the kettle on and was dancing by herself in the kitchen when they arrived, clearly remembering the evening. She didn’t stop when they came in, though she did put the teapot down and grab Helena’s hands to spin her around the kitchen floor.

  “Oh, I am going to sleep until noon,” Fanny said, as Helena pushed her towards the table and finished making the tea herself.

  “I think that sounds like a marvellous idea,” Margaret agreed.

  Helena would probably be awake at the crack of dawn, Margaret knew, but she was very good at sneaking out without waking Margaret. The only time Margaret had ever tried it, she had stepped on every creaky floorboard.

  Margaret had not allowed herself to dwell on it when they’d arrived, but the fact had remained at the edge of consciousness for the first few days all the same: the Marcus cottage was by far the smallest and most rustic place she’d ever slept. The idea of sharing a bathroom, much less a bed, with another girl was entirely alien to Margaret. Still the manners associated with living so close to others weren’t difficult for Margaret to recognize; in fact, she found she quite enjoyed it. Her room at home was guarded from the outside, as were the rooms of her sisters. Gone were the days when her Ladies would have shared her bed for security and for the preservation of her virtue, but Margaret knew the custom from her education. She did not miss the politics of the situation, which had been intricate and frustrating for several of her foremothers, but she did miss the intimacy.

  Helena poured the tea, and they all nursed their cups without speaking for a while. Fanny was clearly lost in delightful memories, and Helena was lost in something. Margaret was determined not to end the evening on a melancholic note, so she fixed only the best of her memories in her mind: a little boy in a black crêpe dress, the wonderful food, and laughter, Helena’s warm presence beside her on the dock, and August Callaghan’s steady hand on her waist during the Log Driver’s Waltz.

  She shook her head at the last one, wondering where in the world it had come from. Clearly it was time to go to bed. She finished her tea in a long drink, though it was still a little hot for it, and excused herself from the table. Helena was close behind, having poured the dregs of her cup down the sink, and Fanny rinsed the teapot as they left.

  Margaret got ready for bed as quickly as she could, waving off Helena’s offer to help her undress and hoping the other girl didn’t notice how her skin flushed at the suggestion. She tried very hard not to imagine unlacing the back of Helena’s gown and specifically did not watch while Helena wrestled herself out of it on her own. They got under the covers, and Helena turned out the lamp. Her breathing evened out almost immediately, but it
was a very long time before Margaret could fall asleep.

  It would be easy to assume that Lake Muskoka was part of the Trent-Severn Waterway. In fact, during the heyday of Canadian canal building, there were tentative plans to connect Lake Muskoka to Lake Couchiching (and thus Lake Simcoe). However, in the end, the focus on the southern part of the lake remained on the rail lines, and the canal builders went west towards Lake Huron instead. Bala was connected to Potter’s Landing (both the Bala Falls and the Haunted Narrows were preserved during construction), and the New Cut was made to allow for the passage of lumber ships. These ships would travel as far as the port of Goderich, where lumber would be transferred onto the much larger tankers that comprise the bulk of the Saint Lawrence Seaway traffic.

  Local business magnate Murray Callaghan owns the title to the Trent-Severn (having avoided a government buyout when his marriage essentially tripled his capital), as well as substantial land and logging rights on Lake Muskoka itself. His two youngest children, both already active in the business, stand to inherit everything, though it remains to be seen if they will separate the two businesses to form their own empires.

  CHAPTER

  19

  It poured the week after the Callaghan party, and August sent a –gram with his regrets, saying that he would have to work all day until the weekend came again. It might have been a gloomy start, except that Helena was determined never to allow herself an idle moment and to salvage as much of the carefree early summer mood as she could. There was also a small part of her that was grateful she would not have August’s presence as a reminder of what remained to be said between them. As for Margaret’s presence, so completely had she settled in that Helena was hardly ever reminded this summer was any different from all those that came before. And so she did not think of the words she would say to August when the time finally came. Nor did she read more about what the Computer had revealed of her genome. Instead, she turned her attention to the cottage and its comforting routines.