‘And she’s very fond of you,’ John Yetman replied warmly.
‘For one so young she is very talented.’ Miss Fairchild’s eyes positively blazed with enthusiasm. ‘Why, she can master quite complicated pieces.’
She turned, her blue eyes shrewdly appraising him. ‘And yet I’m glad to find you firm with her, Mr Yetman. She is a spirited child and lack of discipline would turn her into rather a spoilt one, I fear.’
‘You need not fear I will spoil Connie,’ John said firmly. ‘I know quite well to what you’re referring, Miss Fairchild. An indulgent father could spoil a daughter who has lost her mother. I ...’ he stopped and looked searchingly at her. ‘I have seen Christopher... though I suppose you’re not interested...’
Miss Fairchild didn’t answer but gazed sternly in front of her.
‘He’s bearing up to prison well. You can imagine how he repents of his past ... especially towards you.’
Miss Fairchild seemed about to reply just as Connie appeared, draping her shawl casually round her shoulders. Miss Fairchild flicked a tear away from her eyes as she drew on her gloves and straightened her hat. ‘Well I must prepare to depart,’ she said briskly, ‘I have promised Mrs Lamb to help her make strawberry jam. It always helps to be busy, you know,’ she said as if she were, by implication, referring to the part of the conversation that had touched on Christopher. Then, as Connie and John stood watching her, their hands tightly clasped together, she gave a little wave and hurried along the path towards the gate. ‘See you on Thursday, Constance.’
‘She always calls me “Constance”,’ Connie said in a slightly rebellious tone as they watched Miss Fairchild follow the path away from the house towards the Rectory.
‘Don’t you like the name Constance, my darling?’John drew her arm through his and they walked slowly back towards the house.
‘I prefer Connie, Papa. Connie sounds more... fun,’ she burst out at last.
‘Fun!’ He stopped and looked anxiously at her. ‘My poor child, I don’t think you have enough fun, do you, with an old father ...’
‘Oh Papa, don’t say that.’ Connie stamped her foot on the ground and her tight ringlets seemed to fly above her head. ‘To me you are not an old father; you are a wonderful, lovely father and I want to live with you, and only you, until I am a very old lady ...’
And, as she impulsively threw her arms around him, obviously completely unaware of what she was saying, his own arms enfolded her and his tears moistened the top of her silky hair.
After a while he raised his head, hurriedly wiping his eyes on his cuff.
‘Now, my darling,’ he said in a normal tone, once more clasping her hand. ‘We have a lot of preparation to do for Ryder and Eliza’s anniversary. Ten years married, and a big party at the house. That will be fun, won’t it. Eh Connie?’
‘Fun, Papa,’ Connie concurred, bursting into excited laughter and, without even looking at him, she began to skip along the path ahead of him, her arms floating up and down in imitation of the action of a bird.
He thought that, if she could, she would fly – so infectious was her happiness and enthusiasm. At that moment she was the embodiment, the very spirit of her dead mother, and the picture of her so attuned to nature, so happy with the world, was a sight that would remain in his heart until the day he died.
Eliza woke up on the morning of her tenth wedding anniversary and glanced at her spouse slumbering beside her. As luck would have it, it was a Saturday and there had been no need to get up at dawn, the usual hour of rising. She could hear the children playing in the nursery, and there were sounds of life from the garden. Ted might have taken Laurence out on his pony, because her elder son adored riding; and maybe Dora rode behind Ted, because she, like her mother, loved horses.
Hugh might be standing at the window or, under the watchful eye of the nursemaid, be playing on the lawn with Jenny.
Eliza, revelling in a sense of peace and well-being, lay with her arms under her head and thought back to that day ten years, before when she had gone to the church with John Yetman and walked up the aisle towards Ryder, who was standing waiting for her. She would never forget the look in his eyes, though she had seen it many times since: love, devotion, admiration, even a form of worship. He had promised to worship her, and she felt he did.
They had been loyal and devoted friends and lovers ever since. Would God be so good and allow it to continue for ever?
Suddenly she was filled with an inexplicable feeling of apprehension, but then she decided it was because when one considered how fortunate one was, it was a little like tempting fate. Besides, her Ryder was a healthy, strong, robust man, not yet forty. She gently prodded him and his eyes flickered, then opened wide.
‘Happy anniversary,’ she said, leaning over him.
When they came down to breakfast there was already an air of festivity in the house. The staff greeted them with bobs and bows at the bottom of the stairs, and the children had presents for them which they presented at table. Beth brought Elizabeth with a posy and a special hug for Eliza, and John Yetman and Connie came with more flowers and stayed for lunch.
There was to be a big marquee on the lawn, tables and chairs scattered about, and a troupe of entertainers from the circus, which had recently encamped outside Blandford, arrived after lunch and began practising their acts.
There was a sword-swallower, a man who could eject flames from his mouth twenty feet high, a juggler, a clown, a negro who could break out of an iron cage into which he was padlocked, and three Russian dancing bears who arrived chained together.
The lawn resembled nothing so much as the annual Wenham Fair, when all these turns, and more, would be seen again. The Yetman children were joined for lunch by the Woodville children, and they all spent the afternoon enthralled by the many different spectacles as the various acts began their rehearsal for the evening’s entertainment.
At five a troupe of gaudily dressed Morris dancers arrived complete with tambourines and streamers and, casting rather hostile jealous glances at the Russian bears, who were going through their paces with their trainer, they started dancing between sticks, arms held high in the air, to the accompaniment of three fiddlers who had also been engaged for the general dancing which would follow.
A fire had been lit by the river, well away from the revellers, over which an ox was being slowly roasted on a spit, watched over by Ted to ensure nothing went wrong.
Among the first to arrive were Guy Woodville with his wife, and Julius Heering, who was staying with them for the weekend. Then all the notabilities of the town and surrounding countryside began to trickle in, the ladies in their finery and the men wearing their best suits.
Dr and Mrs Hardy were here; the dentist, Mr Few, with his wife and grown-up daughter. The chairman of the Parish Council had come, and all the local shopkeepers with their wives. Even Mr Newman the saddler was there, because Albert had long since been released from the county gaol, but had emigrated to Australia. There would be no successor for his father at the saddler’s shop. Among Ryder’s employees there were stonemasons, bricklayers, carpenters, roofers and thatchers with their wives.
His head man, Perce Adams, who was a bachelor, always on the lookout for a wife, was roaming the field, keeping an eye out for pretty unattached girls. The Reverend Austin and Mrs Lamb came with Sophie, their daughter, docile, well-behaved and very clever. The Mounts, although invited, did not come, because the business with Agnes had cast a shadow over relations between the families, and they also wished to avoid Guy.
The bank manager, Mr Troup, was there with his wife and three daughters. Miss Bishop accompanied Miss Fairchild, who still felt nervous about visiting the Yetman house because of the memories it awakened of Christopher, now serving seven years in prison for bigamy.
Miss Fairchild had recently sold the haberdashery store to a young, newly married couple called Goodison. Mrs Goodison was a fine hand with a needle and thus very suitable to take Miss Fairchild’s pla
ce. Both she and her husband were there, making a nervous entry to Wenham society.
When the Morris dancers had finished their performance to great applause, the general dancing began, while Ryder ceremoniously began to carve the ox still turning slowly on its spit.
In the marquee, as well as a variety of meat, fish and game dishes, salads, sweetmeats, fruits, pies and pastries galore, there was a plentiful supply of wine, beer and spirits, and several people began to show the effects quite quickly.
At about seven another carriage drove up the drive, and Eliza, who was talking to Miss Fairchild and Miss Bishop, suddenly excused herself and ran quickly up the lawn as Prosper Martyn descended and then reached up to hand his lady from the carriage. A gasp of admiration went up from the crowd who were standing nearest as Lally alighted, dressed with an elegance that was better suited to a Mayfair drawing room than a field in Dorset. She wore a closely fitting dress of fine organdie with a matching hat, in the middle of which lodged a stuffed bird which looked for all the world as though it were alive and had recently laid an egg. Her silver shoes, extremely unsuitable for the terrain, were fastened with fine little pearls, and as she reached the ground she rested one hand on her parasol, the other on the arm of her fiancé.
‘May I introduce Mrs Bowyer?’ Prosper beamed with pleasure and obvious pride as Lally and Eliza shook hands.
‘You are very welcome,’ Eliza said. ‘I am so glad you could come.’
She thought that Mrs Bowyer looked at her with unusual interest, as though she already knew her, as she smiled and said: ‘I’m delighted to be here. I’ve heard a lot about you.’
‘Have you?’ Eliza looked bemused.
‘All good, I assure you.’ Despite her appearance of tremendous calm, almost hauteur, Lally was anxious and uneasy. She had not wanted to come, but Prosper insisted. He regarded the Yetmans as part of his family, and as he and Lally were soon to be married they would be part of hers too. But Lally was surreptitiously looking around for Guy and wondering what his reaction to her appearance would be. She imagined that Guy would want to forget the past as much as she did; that the risk of seeing him was worth taking, for to have refused point-blank to come would have looked most suspicious. Nevertheless it was with a feeling of acute apprehension that she had journeyed down and now that she was here she was more frightened than ever.
‘May I introduce my husband, Ryder?’ Eliza said, bringing him forward. Ryder was sweating and still wiping his hands on a rag.
‘Forgive my appearance,’ he said, making Lally a deep bow. ‘I’ve been carving – our guests are hungry already.’ His eyes seemed suddenly transfixed by her dainty flimsy shoes. ‘Do please sit down,’ he said. ‘I’m afraid you’ll have trouble walking on that lawn. It has been raining for days.’
‘Oh, I shan’t venture on the grass,’ Lally said in horror. ‘I didn’t realise the party was to be outdoors or I should have worn boots! Oh!’ She suddenly gave a scream and clasped a dainty hand to her mouth as the Russian bears were led past her by a man carrying a pole with which he scattered the crowd to clear a way through to the centre of the lawn.
‘They are quite tame,’ Ryder assured her as she backed towards him. ‘They’re circus bears.’
Lally watched in fascination as, at a command from their trainer, the bears began mournfully to dance in a circle to the music of the fiddlers, aided by the encouraging handclaps of the enthusiastic crowd.
In a way it was a melancholy sight – these poor old bears, their coats lacklustre, their eyes dull and bewildered, dancing in a circle like marionettes. Every now and then when one faltered he received a sharp prod from the pole.
Eliza found it a distasteful spectacle and turned away when the crowd roared approval and the trainer, wiping his sweaty forehead, gave fresh commands for the dirge-like routine to begin all over again.
The footmen, some of them borrowed from Pelham’s Oak, dressed in shirts and breeches, scarves knotted round their throats, began to circulate with trays. Ryder summoned one of them and offered Lally and Prosper champagne.
‘To you.’ Prosper raised his glass. ‘Ten happy years.’
‘Thank you, and to you,’ Ryder replied, and all four of them toasted one another. ‘When is the wedding to be?’
‘As soon as we can,’ Prosper said. ‘It will be conducted very quietly in London, as Lally is a widow. We are not having any guests, but we shall have a party on our return. Incidentally, Ryder, I would like to take this opportunity of talking to you again about joining our firm ...’
‘Oh, not now, dearest.’ Lally gave her sweetest, most persuasive smile. ‘Not business on a happy day like today.’
‘You are quite right, my love.’ Prosper inclined his head as if to acknowledge the wisdom of her remarks, and was astonished to see a look of acute apprehension, even terror, on her face.
Happily at that moment there came a roar from the crowd on the lawn as the man who swallowed fire belched a great arc of flame which seemed to flash across the river like a huge, translucent, orange rainbow. For a moment there was silence as everyone stared at the exhibition, with the possible exception of Guy and Lally, who were gazing at each other.
‘May I present my fiancée Mrs Bowyer?’ Prosper said smoothly as Guy stooped, wooden-faced, over Lally’s hand.
‘Lally, Sir Guy Woodville.’
‘How do you do, Mrs Bowyer?’
‘How do you do, Sir Guy?’
‘Lady Woodville.’
Margaret cordially shook hands with the younger woman, who had risen from her seat to greet her.
‘I am delighted for you, Prosper, to have secured such a charming and attractive bride,’ Margaret said with a gracious smile. Then, once again, the crowd’s attention was diverted by another orange arc, this time even higher and longer than before.
‘I hope he doesn’t burn the wood,’ Prosper remarked to Guy.
‘It is all an illusion,’ Ryder assured him. ‘Or so I’m told. So I hope.’
Eliza was drawn into the conversation with Margaret and the bewitching Mrs Bowyer, and Guy, putting a hand on Prosper’s arm, murmured in his ear: ‘A word with you, if I may.’
‘Certainly,’ Prosper said, knowing quite well what was to come.
The two men strolled towards the river, amiably enough, chatting about nothing in particular until they were well out of earshot of anyone who might have had the remotest interest in hearing what they had to say. They stopped just on the far side of the fire-eater, near to the marquee where such a hub-bub of noise arose that their words would be drowned anyway.
‘Yes, Guy, what is it?’ Prosper turned to him, a lighted cigar in his hand.
‘What I have to say might distress you, Prosper, but I thought it better to tell you now, before you are under any further misapprehension as to the nature of the lady you say you intend to marry.’
‘Oh, indeed?’ Prosper casually blew a spiral of smoke into the air which, though not competing with the skill of the fire-eater, was probably equally expressive of his feelings, of the contempt beneath that pleasant and equable façade.
‘I know Mrs Bowyer.’
‘Really? How interesting.’
‘Or rather,’ Guy hastily corrected himself, ‘I knew her many years ago. I am sorry to tell you that she is not a wealthy widow as you suppose, but a common little dancer. A woman of ill repute ...’
‘Really?’ Prosper, his eyes narrowing, said again. ‘Is that so? And how do you come by this knowledge, Guy?’
‘To tell you the truth, I had a liaison with Mrs Bowyer – or Lally as we know her – myself. I’m afraid she must be got rid of as quickly as you can, Prosper. You must despatch her back to London forthwith.’
Prosper continued to smoke his cigar quietly for a moment or two, looking towards the river in which were reflected the myriad lights of the gas lamps, the burning sconces which were being lit now that it was getting dark.
He then threw his cigar into the river with a gesture of
unexpected violence and, turning suddenly towards Guy, caught him by the lapels of his coat and shook him so hard that Guy imagined his teeth were rattling. Then, as quickly as he had seized him, Prosper let him go again in case his violent gesture was observed. Instead he put his face to within an inch of Guy’s.
‘Now listen here, young man, and listen well. I am quite aware of Mrs Bowyer’s past, and your part in it. The intelligence, I may say, never came from her. Not once has she mentioned your name to me. She has no idea that I know, either, but thinks we met by chance. But I did know her. Do you remember I once suggested that you might pay more attention to your work than to the ladies, as you were a married man? I already knew what you were up to. It happened that one night I was passing through Leicester Square with a lady of my acquaintance of whose charms I was tiring. In the glow of the street lamp I happened to see you escorting from the stage door of the Alhambra the most beautiful woman I had ever seen. She had her head turned towards the light, and the way she held her head, her gossamer veil scarcely hiding her eyes, entranced me. Her presence so filled my heart that I felt like a man suddenly and unexpectedly transformed.
‘But I knew it could not be. You were my nephew and I could not expect, or hope, to take your place. Not yet.’
Prosper took a deep breath like a man in the grip of strong emotion. His eyes shone with a fanatical gleam.
‘Some time after you left her I sought her out, meeting her as you had that night outside the stage door. The magic returned. It seemed like a dream; everything was the same, and if she had aged a little it was scarcely perceptible. Maybe I was like a boy playing games, but I knew that it was a game I could win because I had everything necessary to satisfy Lally in material terms. In addition I could bring her real, lasting love, which you could not.
‘The fascination never left, but she has become in fact the love of my life; the woman I was always looking for and have found. I have delighted in teaching her and discovering that she has natural discernment and taste.’
The People of This Parish (Part One of The People of this Parish Saga) Page 35