The Constant Companion

by M C Beaton

  What else had Lady Amelia said in her letter? “I want some respectable lady of good birth to be my chaperone.”

  “Why couldn’t it be me?” thought Constance. “I’m a respectable lady of good birth!”

  It was then that a mad idea, born of insecurity and despair, began to take shape in her mind.

  The letter had been addressed to Miss Lamberton. “I am Miss Lamberton,” thought Constance. “Could I not just go to London and apply for the post? I am, after all, a relative of Lady Amelia. Surely she would not turn me away if I explain the situation.”

  The evening sky was turning black outside and a faint wind had begun to moan through the trees. Constance lit the foul-smelling tallow candles and went to look into the flyblown looking glass over the fireplace.

  Her thin, white face stared back at her, the eyes looking enormous in the flickering gloom. “You haven’t said you’ll do it,” she muttered. “But at least you could wash your hair.”

  With quick nervous steps, she descended to the kitchen and then began to pile wood into the fire. When the flames began to leap up, she hung the great kettle on the idle back, a long sort of hook with an ingenious contrivance by which it could be tipped to pour out boiling water.

  Then taking a sharp knife, she shaved fine pieces from a bar of soap into a cup, and adding a little water, mashed them into a paste. When the kettle began to boil, she first infused a jug of camomile tea and let it stand to cool so that she could use it for a rinse.

  She washed and washed her hair until her arms ached. Then she took down the tin bath from its hook on the wall and waited for more water to heat.

  By the time she had bathed, she decided to indulge in the extravagance of washing her clothes. Clothes at Berry House had only been washed every five weeks, in the same way as the laundry was done in almost every other genteel house in England.

  After two hours of hard work, she stood shivering in her wrapper in her bedroom, staring at the glossy tresses of black hair which fell almost to her waist.

  “I shall keep my hair like this, just for tonight and all of tomorrow morning. Then when I travel to London, I must make myself look as old and staid as possible.”

  Constance nearly dropped the hairbrush as she realized that somehow she was going to London.

  Her mind began to race. There was the house to close up. She would need to leave the keys with the vicar, ready for the arrival of Aunt Maria’s heir who, it was believed, lived somewhere in Hertfordshire.

  Constance suddenly wondered if she were being too precipitate. Might it not be better to remain where she was and rely on the charity of the heir?

  But the lure of London was strong. She had an overwhelming desire to escape from this dark house with its grim memories of harsh religious training. She wished to flee from an overpowering feeling of guilt caused by the fact she could not mourn for the dead Miss Lamberton.

  As she brushed and brushed her long black hair, the great shining toy of the London Season beckoned.

  She put down the brush and knelt at her prayer stool through force of habit. But this time she found herself praying for security, for love and for a home of her own.

  Constance finally arose and climbed into bed with the feeling she had left her childhood with all its miseries behind.

  “Traveling post,” she thought dreamily as she watched the patterns thrown by the rushlight on the ceiling, “is too expensive—eighteen pence a mile. But there is enough left from the year’s sale of eggs to pay for a seat on the mail coach. I wonder if the egg money really belongs to the heir? If it does, I shall just have to pay him back when I am a rich and married lady.”

  And lulled by rosy dreams of security, Constance fell sound asleep.

  Chapter Three

  Lady Amelia’s butler did not look like a butler at all. Friends of her ladyship were wont to murmur behind her back that her butler, Bergen, looked more like a jailbird. Butlers were meant to be quiet, discreet individuals, but there was something about Bergen that was too quiet. Where other butlers moved with a slow and stately tread, Bergen scuttled softly from room to room with an odd, bent, crablike walk. His long, lugubrious face was also tilted to one side, giving him an air of constant enquiry. His bony wrists protruded from the sleeves of his uniform, and his hair was never sufficiently powdered and black patches always seemed to be showing through.

  Mrs. Mary Besant eyed this individual with disfavor as she entered the hall of Lady Amelia’s mansion late one afternoon, a full two weeks after her previous visit. Her sharp eyes fell on the morning’s post, still lying unopened on the marble top of a pretty mahogany side table.

  “I see her ladyship has not yet perused her mail,” she said to Bergen. “I shall take it up to her.”

  “My lady said she had no time to read her mail at present,” said Bergen, with his head tilted to one side like a raven at the Tower.

  “Nonetheless, I shall take it up to her,” said Mrs. Besant, gathering up the little pile of letters and cards. She stood and stared coldly at the butler. “That will be all, Bergen.”

  “I shall announce you, madam,” said the infuriating Bergen, staring at the correspondence in Mrs. Besant’s pink-gloved hands.

  Mrs. Besant had no intention of letting Bergen announce her. In the first place, she delighted in surprising her friends at their toilette. Had she not, just the other day, discovered that Lady Jessington wore a wig by just such a ruse? In the second, she planned to extract one or two of the invitations and hide them in her reticule so that dear Amelia would smart with humiliation, thinking she had been slighted.

  “I shall announce myself,” she said waspishly. “Bustle about, man. I am sure you have other duties.”

  Bergen gave her a low bow and retreated.

  Mrs. Besant walked up the wide shallow stairs and gleefully flicked through the letters. Ah, she recognized that seal. Lord Philip Cautry’s sister, Lady Eleanor Rider, was giving a musicale, that much she knew, having received an invitation herself. How furious Amelia would be if she thought she had been excluded from the guest list! Quick as lightning, Mrs. Besant slipped the invitation in her reticule, and feeling very pleased with herself, walked into Lady Amelia’s private sitting room.

  To her disappointment, Amelia was fully dressed and looking more beautiful than ever.

  “I brought your post, my dear,” said Mrs. Besant with a great display of strong, yellow teeth. “Don’t you want to see if you have received any billets-doux?”

  “I probably have,” said Amelia, stretching out her hand for the letters. “That wretched Comte Duval is always writing some sort of rubbish to me!”

  “Many ladies would be delighted to receive such letters from the comte!” exclaimed Mrs. Besant. The Comte Duval was a rare bird among the French emigrés who haunted London. Unlike most of his compatriots, he was extremely rich.

  Amelia paid her no attention. She scrabbled through the letters and invitations, a small frown beginning to crease her beautiful brow. “I had thought the Riders’ invitation would have arrived by now,” she said.

  Mrs. Besant gave a little titter. “Oh, poor Amelia. I have had my own invitation for ages. Never say the Cautry family has turned against you!”

  She watched in delight as the storm clouds began to gather in Amelia’s blue eyes, and then jumped nervously as a hollow cough sounded directly behind her. She swung round and found herself looking into the pale gooseberry eyes of Bergen, the butler.

  “My lady,” he began, “there is a young person waiting below to see you. A Miss Lamberton. I have put her in the library.”

  “A young person? You must be mistaken, Bergen. Miss Lamberton is old.”

  “No, my lady. Definitely young,” said Bergen.

  Amelia stared at him for a few minutes and then shrugged. “Well, whoever this Miss Lamberton is, I had better see her. Oh, and Bergen, could you check carefully in the hall and make sure that all my post has been delivered to me? I am missing a most important invitation
.”

  “Perhaps it is the one that madam put into her reticule—for safekeeping I am sure,” said Bergen, his head on one side, looking carefully at the floor.

  “What is this?” cried Amelia.

  “I-I don’t know what he is talking about,” said Mrs. Besant turning an unlovely shade of puce. “My good man, are you accusing me of stealing my lady’s correspondence? Why, I…”

  But that was as far as she got. Amelia wrenched the reticule from Mrs. Besant’s shaking fingers and tore it open. She pulled out the Rider invitation and waved it to and fro slowly in front of Mrs. Besant’s patrician nose.

  “Think of some excuse, dear Mary,” she said softly, “I shall be back as soon as I have seen this Lamberton woman.”

  Amelia left the room in high good humor. The idea of making Mary Besant sweat a little was exhilarating. Old cat!

  She tripped lightly into the library and stared in amazement at the young female who was rising to her feet to meet her.

  Amelia was a very thin, young girl with a pinched white face dressed in a brown wool gown, much patched and mended, and wearing, as she afterwards said, “The worst quiz of a bonnet I ever did see.”

  “You are not the Miss Lamberton I wrote to. Who are you?” demanded Amelia.

  “An it please your ladyship,” said the girl in a low voice, “I am Miss Lamberton. Miss Constance Lamberton. My aunt passed away, you see, but I thought… I hoped… th-that you would perhaps employ me as your companion instead,” she ended in a breathless rush.

  “Good heavens, no,” said Amelia crossly. “You are much too young to play chaperone. Of course I wouldn’t dream of hiring you. Be off with you!”

  “But—but I have nowhere to go tonight,” wailed Constance in despair. “Could I at least wait until morning?”

  “No, of course not. Go away!” said Amelia petulantly.

  “Is there anything I can do to help?” came the sugary voice of Mrs. Besant from the doorway.”

  “No!” snapped Amelia. “This chit is nothing but an imposter. Old Maria’s dead, and this person claims to be her niece.”

  Constance raised her magnificent eyes hopefully to Mrs. Besant’s face and then dropped them hurriedly. She saw no signs of a champion there.

  But in that she was wrong.

  Amelia had been yawning fretfully and staring at the wall, but Mary Besant had caught the full impact of those beautiful eyes. If Constance Lamberton were well-fed and well-clothed, why, she might be quite a beauty, thought Mrs. Besant, and wouldn’t Amelia just hate that!

  “Amelia, my love, a word with you in private. ’Tis most important!”

  “Oh, very well,” said Amelia with a gleam of interest in her eye. She was longing to know how Mary Besant meant to worm her way out of her crime of stealing. “You may go,” she said to Constance.

  But as Constance was trailing dejectedly from the room, Mary Besant whispered urgently. “No, keep her for the moment until you hear what I have to say. You, Miss Lamberton,” she said in a louder voice, “are you Sir Edward Lamberton’s gel?”

  “Yes, ma’am,” said Constance in a pathetic voice which broke on a sob.

  “As I thought,” smiled Mrs. Besant. “Wait in the hall a moment.”

  Constance stared wildly at Lady Amelia with sudden hope. But then her face fell. Lady Amelia was examining her own beautiful face in the looking glass as if Miss Lamberton had never existed.

  Mrs. Besant waited until the double doors had closed behind the shabby figure of Constance and then turned eagerly to her friend.

  “Now, before I begin, Amelia,” she said eagerly, “you know that diamond pendant you so admired the other day?”

  “Yes,” said Amelia slowly, a pale light of avarice beginning to dawn in her eyes.

  “Well, it is yours, my dear—to make up for my stupid lapse of memory in taking your invitation by mistake.”

  Amelia looked at Mary Besant thoughtfully and tapped her small foot. “There is a very fine pair of earrings that go with it,” she said softly.

  Mary Besant’s eyes widened. Bloodsucker! Amelia had all the grasping greed of a Haymarket Cyprian. But if she, Mary, did not pay up then, by tomorrow morning all the world and his wife would know that she had purloined that letter!

  “But of course, how remiss of me,” she said with a painful smile. “Of course, the earrings as well.”

  “Very well,” said Amelia with an expression on her face like that of a well-fed cat. “Now, tell me, what is all this about that depressing Lamberton female? La! What a quiz.”

  “That,” said Mrs. Besant dramatically pointing in the direction of the hall. “That is the way to Philip Cautry’s heart.”

  “Fustian!” said Amelia roundly. “That drab!”

  “But listen, my dear. Only listen. Sir Edward Lamberton was a wastrel and a rake-hell, but very well beloved by Society and very, very good ton. And he taught Lord Philip Cautry to hunt! For you know Lord Philip’s papa was a scholar and did not care for sports. ’Tis said Lord Philip was devoted to Sir Edward when he, Philip, was a boy. In fact, he once was heard to wonder what had become of the little Lamberton girl. Now, if you were to give such a respectable—such a dull little girl a home. Think on ’t! Philip would smile on you, would he not? Society would consider you had done more than your duty in rescuing one of their kind from poverty. Also,” added Mrs. Besant cleverly, “’twould be a marvelous foil for you! The girl is so plain and quiet. How she would set off your beauty!”

  “Have her in again!” said Amelia abruptly.

  Mrs. Besant threw open the doors triumphantly and called Constance.

  Both women walked around the drab figure of Miss Lamberton, Mrs. Besant praying that the girl would keep those eyes down.

  “Yes,” said Amelia slowly. “Very clever, Mary. Very clever indeed. I am beholden to you. Well, Constance, I have decided to give you the post.” Those magnificent eyes flashed up, but Lady Amelia was too preoccupied with her scheme to notice. “You will receive your bed and board, but no more. You will go about with me in Society and you will tell anyone who asks that it is thanks to my condescension that you have a home. Do you understand?”

  “Oh, yes,” breathed Constance.

  “You will need to be suitably dressed as befits my companion,” went on Lady Amelia thoughtfully. “Something plain and neat. Gray silk, I think…?

  But Mary Besant had another brainwave. “My dear Amelia,” she cried. “Only think of the needless expense! And you have so many gowns you will never wear again.”

  “That’s very true,” said Amelia, the idea appealing immensely to her cheese-paring nature. “Eliot, my maid, shall find you something suitable.”

  Mrs. Besant sighed with satisfaction. Better that Miss Lamberton should be attired in Amelia’s gorgeous castoffs than in the drab colors that Amelia would undoubtedly have chosen for her.

  Amelia touched the bell. “Ah, Bergen,” she said when the butler scuttled in. “Miss Lamberton is staying. She is my new companion. Take her things up and show her to some room or other.”

  Constance was hardly able to believe her good fortune as she followed the butler up the stairs. She could not understand why such a hard-faced woman as Mrs. Besant had interceded on her behalf, but she was too grateful to have a roof over her head.

  Bergen led the way on up and up until he reached a region of low ceilings and uncarpeted corridors. He pushed open a low door and dumped Constance’s bandbox on the bare floor of a small attic room which was unfurnished except for a narrow iron bedstead and one hard chair.

  “This is yours,” he said with a pale glint of malice in his eyes. But then it was his turn to jump as Mary Besant’s voice grated in his ear. “No, no, Bergen. You must have taken leave of your senses. This will not do. Not at all. Miss Lamberton is not a servant, like you. Find something suitable for a lady of quality. I am sure we shall be friends,” she said to Constance but with her eyes on the butler. “I never forget my friends—or my enemies for
that matter, heh, Bergen?”

  Bergen gave her a surly look but led the way down the stairs again to a more luxurious region. He pushed open a door. Mrs. Besant took a quick look round. “This will do very nicely, Bergen. That will be all. You may go—as far away as possible.”

  Bergen slouched off and Constance looked about her in amazement. A charming sitting room with walls panelled in delicate green silk led to a spacious bedroom with a large four-poster bed. The furniture was light and delicate and the curtains and carpets glowed with color. A small fire crackled briskly on the hearth.

  “This cannot be for me!” she exclaimed.

  “But it is. Of course it is,” said Mrs. Besant, putting an arm around the girl and pressing a bony hip uncomfortably into her side. “Just remember always that you have Mary Besant to thank for it.”

  “How can I ever repay you?” cried Constance.

  “Don’t worry,” murmured Mary Besant, baring her teeth and giving the girl another hard squeeze. “You’ll think of something.”

  She gave a terrible horselaugh and Constance laughed with her, although she could not see what there was that was so funny.

  When Mary Besant had left after a final bony squeeze, Constance was further surprised by the arrival of a small maid bearing a tray with a cold supper laid out on it. The maid bobbed a curtsy and said, “My lady says you are to rest tonight, miss, and to start your duties tomorrow.”

  “Thank you,” murmured Constance gratefully. Lady Amelia was kind after all!

  “I am very, very lucky,” thought Constance when she was left alone with her supper. “I must do my best to repay all this by being the best companion ever. And I shall start by praying for the Lady Amelia… and Mrs. Besant.”