by Issy Brooke
“I sent Montgomery to fetch him,” Gregory said. “So what is your role in this?”
“Oh, I simply know everyone who is anyone,” Halifax announced. “It doesn’t matter what the circle is – clever university men or trade fellows or bankers or government folks – I am bound to know someone useful. I am a fixer, if you will pardon the rough term. That’s why I’ve been brought into the business. I organise things.”
“So fossils are not your speciality?”
“No. That’s old Montgomery’s preserve. He’s some kind of fossil expert. I leave him to it. They all look like rocks to me!” Halifax grinned. He had dark clipped hair with not a single streak of grey in spite of being into his fortieth decade, a short, neat beard and a foxy kind of smile. Theodore could not help thinking that if one were to describe a charming swindler, they would describe Bablock Halifax. Yet the man was likeable and affable. He spoke with ease and treated everyone as if he was delighted to be in their company. There was something appealing about the man. Theodore wondered if he were married.
The other man in the room had not spoken. Alfred Pegsworth was a surprising addition to the business venture that was being proposed. Adelia’s brother was not known for either his interest in fossils, or his independent business acumen. In fact, as far as Theodore had been aware, until recently Alfred Pegsworth was working as a relatively high-level clerk in a banking office in London.
But since Alfred’s recent arrival at Thringley House, that particular job had not been mentioned at all.
Even Adelia had been somewhat taken aback by Alfred’s sudden appearance. He had been invited to stay at Thringley House, of course, as a member of the family. The three men that he claimed as his business partners – Samuel Froude, Bablock Halifax and George Montgomery – were all lodged at a local inn. The four of them hoped to open their business to paying guests in the spring of the new year, but they had a lot of work to do before then.
Halifax was continuing to tell Gregory and Theodore all about their business idea. He was waving his cigar around as he spoke in a passionate rush about the current mania for travel. “Excursions!” he was saying. “We’ve all been on them. That Mr Thomas Cook is a genius, I can tell you!”
“Hasn’t he retired now?” Gregory said.
“Oh yes, he went a few years ago. His son is carrying it all on now and he’s full of new ideas,” Halifax said. “But they seem to specialise in trips to Italy with their trains and hotel packages and all of that. It’s all very well for the general throb of humanity who just want to see the sea and feel as if they are getting a little culture but what about, you know, the higher sorts? People like us?” He grinned like a wolf.
Theodore was not inclined to admit Bablock Halifax into the echelons of “people like us” but he let it slide. He admired the man’s enthusiasm. “So your idea is to take groups on fossil hunting trips?”
“Excursions, not trips. I think an excursion is a little more highbrow than a mere trip, don’t you?”
“Er – if you say so.”
“I do say so!” Halifax laughed. The door to the study opened. “Ah, here they are now! You’ve met already, I assume? Froude, pull up a chair and stop looking so menacing. That’s not the expression of a man who wants to charm the public, is it?”
Samuel Froude dragged out the corners of his mouth but it could in no way be called a smile. Indeed, even to Theodore, the temperature in the room seemed to drop as Froude and George Montgomery entered. Gregory leaped to his feet and ushered them in. He played host and poured a few more brandies. Montgomery took a chair near the fire, pulling it a little closer to the flames – and away from everyone else. Froude hesitated. The only other spare chair was alongside Alfred Pegsworth.
Theodore watched him. Froude nodded in greeting at Theodore and sat down, angling himself towards Gregory and Theodore.
“So, you four are all in it together,” Gregory said.
Froude spluttered in indignation. “Four?”
Montgomery shook his head. “It was originally Froude and I. Halifax ... came in later, at my request.”
“I see,” said Gregory. “Yes, Mr Halifax, the fixer.” He laughed. “And Mr Pegsworth?”
Montgomery looked down. Froude said, baldly, “Pegsworth has been assisting on a casual basis. Carrying things, sharpening tools, that sort of thing.”
Theodore was shocked. He thought that his wife’s brother was far above being a mere servant. He looked at Pegsworth, who had gone pink in the face. He coughed, and rose suddenly.
“Stay, stay,” Gregory cried. “This is my study and my house, sir...”
But it was no use. Pegsworth fled from the room, and it was as if Montgomery and Froude breathed out in relief once he had gone. That was, until Halifax began speaking again, holding court in a bombastic manner.
“Obviously we will handle everything for our clients – the accommodation, the food, the travel, but most importantly we will be able to offer specialist knowledge!” he said, pointing at Montgomery, who smiled politely from his position by the fire. Halifax ran on, speaking at length about the sorts of people he expected to pay for the trips. To listen to him speak, Theodore thought that there wouldn’t be a person of standing in the land who would not leap at the chance to spend a day hacking at rocks with a hammer and chisel. While Halifax spoke, it all seemed so very plausible.
It was only in the silences that one questioned the viability of such a venture.
It was lucky, then, that Halifax did not allow many silences to form. He raved on, and Theodore drank more brandy, and occasionally Montgomery interrupted to correct some of his points regarding fossils and their discovery.
Samuel Froude, who was supposed to be the main inspiration behind the whole thing, did not speak again.
Two
“I say, this is rather fun,” Adelia said two days later. She had called in at Ivery Manor to see Edith and had found her in the gardens practising archery. At first Adelia had been sceptical of the idea but Edith persuaded her mother to just have a go. Adelia braced herself and struggled to draw the bow, but the thrilling feeling of letting go and seeing the arrow thrum through the air was addictive.
She was also motivated by the thought of perhaps getting good enough to even hit the target.
Edith was pacing around with a shawl wrapped across her shoulders, occasionally offering advice to her mother. “Isn’t it? I like how it’s a combination of skill and power. I thought you’d like it, too. Straighten your arm, if you can.”
“My shoulder is hurting already.” Adelia flexed it and something went click. But it was nice to feel the stretch of one’s body. One could get so stuck, day after day, keeping one’s limbs all close to one’s self, striving to be ladylike and reserved.
The idea that what she was doing was dangerous was also something of a thrill.
“Take a break if you need to,” Edith said.
“Just one more go,” Adelia said, fixing her eye on the butts. “I am not too old for this, you know.” Her fingers had a spasm before she was ready and the arrow spun away at a haphazard angle. “Oh, drat!” A cat shot out of the bushes behind the targets and ran away, hissing.
“You nearly hit Mrs Ginger,” Edith said, laughing. “A moving target, in fact. Well done. Well done for missing her, I mean.”
“I could not forgive myself if I hit the cat.”
“No, and I shouldn’t forgive you either, to be honest. But she’s fine and she’s learned not to hide there. Have a seat. I want another go.”
Adelia passed the bow over, but she didn’t sit down. She shivered. “How long have you been outside? Your hands look frozen.”
“I don’t know. Ever since Gregory’s maiden aunt once removed on his mother’s side arrived, I think.”
“Who?”
“I just said who.”
“What’s her name?”
“I haven’t the faintest idea. I left him playing the dutiful host and escaped out to here as soon as I cou
ld. She has very fixed views about India, and I simply cannot bear it. He is awfully patient with them all – far more than I can manage to be.”
“You are going to have to learn to manage. Did you apologise to Angelina and Claire Edgbaston?”
Edith didn’t bother to reply. She loosed the arrow and it struck home almost in the very centre of the target. She nodded but it wasn’t in reply to her mother. It seemed to be more of an acknowledgement of her own skill. Then, in a sudden rush, she flung the bow to the ground and threw herself into a wicker chair with a dramatic sigh. “Oh, mama! Is this it? Is this how my life will be until I die?”
“Archery every day? That’s not so bad while the weather holds.”
“You know very well what I mean. God, mama, I am so bored.”
“There’s the charity dinner coming up in a matter of weeks.”
“Oh yes,” Edith said, with a laugh. “Mrs Ingram cornered me and was positively spitting venom about you and papa’s little pet Prendergast. She kept reminding me that her cousin is a baronet and Prendergast has no background to speak of.”
“Inspector Prendergast is not our pet. He is a highly skilled and well-trained policeman who deserves his promotion on his own merits, and it’s nothing to do with background and who one’s cousin might be. He has earned the chance to speak at the dinner. Mrs Ingram has taken against me for it, but there is nothing I can do about that. She’s always been against me for one thing or another. Was she very rude to you?”
Edith shrugged. “Don’t be angry, mama, but I was rude back to her and then she went away. I was defending you, so that’s probably all right.” She tipped her head back and made another strangled sigh of frustration. “Parties! Dinners! Ugh! Marriage!”
“You have only been married five months. Is he not treating you well?”
Edith rolled her eyes. “Oh, he’s perfect. Gregory is not the problem and you know it. You would never had allowed me to marry the wrong sort of man. I think it’s just that I’m the wrong sort of woman.”
“Edith, my dear girl, why did you get married at all?”
She shrugged and turned her face away, lifting her chin as if she were trying to absorb the weak warmth of the winter sun. With her head tilted back, she looked even younger than she really was, fine-boned and fragile, not a line on her perfect skin. Only the set of her jaw hinted at the steely nature underneath.
Eventually she muttered, “I knew that I had to wed at some point so I thought that I might as well get it over with. You know the list of things a woman has to do. Learn accomplishments, coming out in London, first season, get married ... all that. But I didn’t expect everything to change like this.”
“Oh, Edith. You didn’t have to rush into it. I warned your father...”
Edith snapped back to attention. “You warned papa what? Did you say to him that I shouldn’t marry Gregory?”
“I counselled that you ought to wait, yes.” Even as Adelia said it, she knew it would rile Edith, and it did.
Edith snarled, “Well, it was none of your business. I made my own choice without your interference.”
“Do not speak to me like that.” Yes, Adelia thought. Too young by half.
Edith was immediately contrite, aware that she had crossed the line. She blinked rapidly and Adelia realised that her youngest daughter, the strongest one of the lot in some ways but not others, was trying not to cry. Edith never cried. “Mama,” she said, in a small voice, “I really have got things wrong. But it’s too late to change anything now.”
“No; it’s actually too early to really say that it’s wrong. And things can always change. Look at the differences in your sisters’ lives – consider where Mary was this time last year!”
“Oh, I am sure everything’s turned out splendidly for her, but I can’t imagine starting up a business like she has done.”
“The other day you were very interested in this fossil business of Mr Froude and his associates.”
“Yes – fossils are interesting in their own way but business is not. Money; it’s so tiresome. I’ll leave that to Mercenary Mary. Oh, but there is a thing I meant to ask you, mama,” Edith said, suddenly perking up. “Why is Uncle Alf involved? I thought he worked in a bank or something. I was awfully surprised when he turned up. You and he don’t really ... well, you are not terribly close. Unlike Gregory’s lot,” she added.
Adelia tried to keep her face impassive. Alfred hadn’t worked in a bank for years. He had obtained such a position as a clerk, it was true, and he had lost it again within a matter of weeks. Since then, he had been rolling from one disaster to another. He had long since separated from his wife, leaving her struggling with a son to educate, and Adelia had been sending money to both the son’s school to pay his fees, and even to Alf himself. If she didn’t send money, he threatened to turn up and baldly ask for it.
And she couldn’t have that happen because she had never quite come clean to Theodore about how much Alf was leeching from her.
So when her brother had turned up in the area, apparently now involved in some new business venture, she had been astonished and alarmed. She wasn’t entirely sure in what capacity he was working with them. Regardless, Theodore had immediately invited him to stay at Thringley House because to do otherwise would have looked strange. After all, Theodore had said, Alfred was family. Since then, she had been sitting on pins, waiting for someone to say something that would expose all of her ...
Her what? Her lies? No, she told herself. She had never actually lied. She had simply not corrected anyone’s assumptions; she had used misdirection and obfuscation to hide the truth, that was all.
Her discomfort told her that such things were not so very far from lying, and she did not like herself one bit.
“Mama? What’s wrong?”
Adelia realised she had sunk into contemplation. She shook herself and sat up straight. “I’m so sorry, my dear. I think the cold is getting to me. Shall we go inside?”
“I suppose we must. Oh, I say, would you like to come to my study? I will send for some nice hot tea and we can avoid all the tiresome chatter in the parlour. Gregory has set me up with my very own space, just like a man, where I can sit and read and no one is allowed to disturb me.”
“You are very lucky,” Adelia said as she followed Edith inside. She could not help but bent to pick up the discarded bow, and lay it on the table as she went. Edith seemed oblivious to the act. “I don’t think you realise how good life is for you.”
But that was not what Edith wanted to hear. She strode off, and within minutes, Adelia was in the study and being shown all the latest scientific journals from London, Oxford, Cambridge and Edinburgh, and her head was quite spinning with ideas of electromagnetism and water pumps, telegraphs and locomotives.
EDITH CAME BACK TO Thringley with Adelia about an hour later. There seemed to be no particular reason for it except boredom, and perhaps a need to avoid the visitors in her own house. They rode in a covered carriage, bundled up in furs and blankets, and Edith stared out of the window at the grey fields and bare trees. “I should imagine it would be fun to travel across Siberia. If we must have cold weather, why cannot we have snow? Do you think Felicia and Percy will go north?”
“I really am not sure which way they are intending on going. My last letter from them was from Cairo, of all places. I miss her. Does she not write to you?”
“Who, Felicia?” Edith snorted. Felicia was four years older than Edith and the pair of them had fought mercilessly their whole lives. Felicia’s dreaminess, her wild imagination and her general nervousness made her the very opposite of Edith. “Goodness, no. Lottie writes, from time to time, but she’s awfully busy.”
“Charlotte writes to you?” Adelia said in surprise. “She barely writes to me. Is she well?”
“She is as well as she always is, enjoying her social whirl in London. Don’t take it to heart, mama. She only writes to me when she wants to boast of her – well, anyway, she’s very happy, I’m su
re.”
Adelia wondered what Edith had stopped herself from saying. Boast of her conquests? Achievements? It didn’t bode well. Charlotte was only one year older than Edith, and though their relationship had blown hot and cold over the years, when all the others had left home and got married, the two youngest sisters had been thrown together more closely than ever. At least until Charlotte had left for married life in London, and Edith had been suddenly completely alone.
Except for her old childhood friend Gregory – who was now a grown man. Had Edith married him not only to get it over with, but out of desperate loneliness?
Adelia reminded herself that he was a good man and a good match. There had been worse reasons for people to get married.
Adelia resented the fact that Charlotte was writing to Edith. She ought to be writing to her own mother. But if Charlotte was happy, that had to be the main thing; it was some small comfort, at least. She kept the unworthy thoughts to herself as they arrived at Thringley House.
There was another carriage in the yard, a small black gig with markings on the door which showed it had come from the inn in town. She was not surprised, then to find Bablock Halifax peering over a stable door and admiring the horses. He spun around as she alighted from the coach, and bowed low. When he saw Edith emerge behind Adelia, he bowed even more deeply, and let his gaze linger for an unseemly amount of time. Adelia bristled a little. The last thing a bored young wife needed was the presence of a handsome lothario like this.
“Good afternoon, ladies,” he oozed, and when he turned his dark gaze on Adelia she found herself forgiving him just because there was a twinkle in his eye that made her feel as if she were pretty too. She stood up straight and tried to appear aloof but pleasant, appalled at her own shallowness. But then, if it were all done in light-hearted innocence, where was the harm?
“Good afternoon. How can we help you?” she asked somewhat more stiffly than she intended to as she was trying to maintain her illusion of decorum.