Lovers' Vows

by Smith, Joan

  “Mr. Parsons is ill, and there was no one to take over the school,” she explained briefly.

  “Let the world slide, Kate. Such good advice that Shakespeare stole it from Heywood, who doubtlessly stole it from the Greeks. Don’t take the cares of the whole world on your slim shoulders. Just the play is enough weight for them.”

  “When it comes to a choice between reality and make-believe, Sir Swithin, there is no question in my mind which takes precedence.”

  “Not the least in my own mind either. Make-believe must be given the right-of-way. Our imaginations are what separate us from the wild beasties. Cats and dogs tend their young and teach them what they must know. Only we humans are able to indulge our fancies. I consider it a moral duty to exercise my imaginative faculties. No, do not object. Only open your lips to say ‘Yes.’ I have already spoken to your aunt. Tomorrow you come to the Abbey and rescue us from chaos. It is arranged.”

  "Then it will have to be disarranged. I return to the school tomorrow.”

  “Kate, this very wide streak of stubbornness—I dislike it. I admire it tremendously, but I do not like it. We’ll send the prosing preacher down to knock the students’ heads together. You will return where you belong.”

  “Mr. Johnson might have something to say about that.”

  “He has already said the school must be closed, but I am not at all sure Dew would like that. He approves of education.”

  “Lord Dewar will be back tomorrow evening. For one more day, I shall attend the school. If he wishes to make some other arrangement then, I will be very happy to return to the dye pots,” she told him, and was not budged an inch from her decision, despite three quotations from Shakespeare, one from the Bible, and one from Goethe, in German, that neither of them understood.

  Another day of chaos ensued at the Abbey. At four in the afternoon, Lord Dewar returned from London, leaving Sir Egbert off at Stonecroft to describe the house hired to his wife, while Dewar continued home. His first act was to go along to his refectory hall to see how the dramatic arrangements had progressed in his absence.

  Swithin ran up to him. “Dew—dear boy—catastrophe has struck!”

  Looking at the dye-splattered scene before him, Dewar’s heart sank. “I might have known! I told Kate to watch over things. What has happened?”

  “She has betrayed us. Gone off these two days school-manning, while we sink into total chaos. There was never such a mess since the scene of creation.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “Your schoolmaster is struck down with an ague. Why did I not think to cure him? My wits are gone begging. But there—I am in love. Yes, you may well stare! It struck me equally by surprise. After she left, I found a pleasing image of herself behind that wanders in my soul. Dorimant, was it not, in The Man of Mode who uttered the wonderful phrase? I find a pleasing image of Kate, bringing order to this—disaster!” He pointed a patent toe at a welter of dye pots, poles of wood, and rumpled calico. Tossing his bejewelled fingers into the air, he declared, “C’est impossible. C’est tout a fait impossible! This would not have occurred had my Kate been here.”

  “Your Kate?” Dewar asked, blinking. “This is a new turn.”

  “Yes, I am amazed at myself, for having succumbed to the charms of a perfectly average female—sans looks, sans elegance, sans argent I fear. Sans everything. Who would have thought it of me? There is character in the woman, Dew. One would have thought that would have been enough to discourage me, but it has quite the reverse effect. I am not at all happy about it, to tell the truth. I am frightened to death of her. She is so strong, with the moral stamina of a Puritan. I hope she doesn’t make me go to Parliament and become a worthy. I made sure it would be Juliet—or even Lady Montague. A married lady is such a nice safe object of affection, n’est-ce pas? But I do run on. I shall let you congratulate me now, and express your amazement.”

  “Does Holly know?”

  “Holly who? Good gracious, is that her name? I think Holly is bad luck. I’m sure I heard it somewhere. She is bad luck, a very shrew. Laughed at my stunning new greatcoat with the buttons carved to my own design. She is above the fripperies of fashion herself. I dote on her very dowdiness. She is a splendid heroine, Dew, a Boadicea donning armour to do battle. Boadicea deserves a better literary fate than she got at Fletcher’s hands. Shall we write her her own tragedy?”

  “Shall we put on this damned play first?” Dewar asked angrily.

  “I suppose we must but, to tell the truth, my heart is not in it. I want a play where Kate is heroine. Meanwhile, you must find a tutor for your school and bring her back here. A Prendergast person, someone mentioned, is the heir apparent to the seat of your school. Get him, at once! Tout de suite.”

  Dew regarded him a long moment, then spoke. “Dear boy, if you really wish me to spike your gun.... The day I appoint Prendergast, he is in a position to wed Kate.”

  “Marry him, a schoolmaster? A driller of children? A near-peasant who works for his daily bread? Good God—she would love it. So very worthy. What is to be done?”

  “We haven’t much choice in the matter.”

  “None. She will make us hire him.”

  “When it must be done, ‘tis best done with grace.”

  “Is that Shakespeare, Dew?”

  “No, it is Despair, Swithin.”

  “You feel for me in my dilemma. I appreciate it. We have always been close friends, true epicures. I shall go with you to see the Prendergast. I expect he is very large, and doubtlessly ugly. I may triumph over him yet. I have some—charm, have I not, Dew? Some evanescent quality that attracts women? Ladies do seem to like me.”

  “You are different. Therein lies your charm. One never knows quite what to expect from you.”

  “Yes, falling in love with Kate, par exemple. That surprised even me. She has coerced my passions. Colley Gibber—so underrated today—invented the phrase. Kate has gone him one better. She has mauled my heart, ravaged my brain, and I am not at all sure she won’t end up cutting my hair as well. But I shall adore being changed by her, I think. Once a fellow becomes predictable, he is a dull old dog, good for nothing but work. Prendergast will be predictable. He will wear low collars and short hair and admire Samuel Johnson. I hate him already.”

  “He probably drives a gig and wears muddy boots,” Dewar added.

  “Are you joking me, Dew? Too cruel.”

  “I am feeling rather cruel. By all means, let us go and see Mr. Prendergast.”

  The meeting was brief. Not fifteen minutes after entering his rooms, the two gentlemen exited, wearing defeated faces. “He is not so ugly as I had hoped,” Swithin said, disconsolate. “His jacket too—quite unexceptionable. Not Weston, nor even Stultz, but a creditable imitation.”

  “Hung on a very creditable pair of shoulders,” Dewar added.

  “His face—quite like the Apollo Belvedere. You must have noticed the resemblance, the lapidary quality of that profile. Yet the lips sensuous, as if they were alive. Well, they are alive, aren’t they? He would have made an admirable Mercutio, by the by.”

  “Oh no, he is Romeo. He seems a rational creature as well.”

  “Downright intelligent. And, if we say one more word in his praise, I shall expire of jealousy. I hate Mr. Prendergast! The way his eyes lit up when you told him the salary. I swear I could sense him dividing it into parcels of household money, twenty-five pounds for the hire of a cottage, twenty-five for food. Kate will feed him mutton and potatoes and mend his jackets. Ah well,” he added, beginning to rise from his fit of the dismals, “she will likewise get the transparency dyed and hung,”

  “We had better stop at Stonecroft and tell her about Prendergast.”

  “You know my chemise—the one I wear to play the musico ambulante, Dew. I had it dyed a pretty saffron shade, but am beginning to think I shall revert to the violet shades of half-mourning I wore when my dog died. If Kate spurns me, that is. I shall have it dyed a windy indigo colour. I do wi
sh I had violet-coloured eyes to match. My violet period was probably my favourite—sartorially speaking, that is, for of course my heart was broken.”

  “Would you mind awfully to shut up, Swithin? You do get very silly at times.”

  “Am I being a frightful bore! How dreadful. Don’t hesitate to tell me. I hate to be a bore.”

  * * *

  Chapter 17

  The remainder of Mr. Prendergast’s afternoon on that day was a busy one. His first item of business was to inform Mr. Raymond he wished to leave as soon as was convenient. Hard on the heels of this was the matter of getting his own younger brother installed in his place as Raymond’s clerk. As well as permitting his own immediate transfer to the school, this would provide his family some additional income.

  He dashed the note off home with a happy heart, wishing to settle all details before going to his fiancée with the wonderful news. After a jubilant dinner with her family, he left early, for he wished to see Miss McCormack and thank her in person for her efforts on his behalf. He learned during the interview with Dewar that she had suggested him for the post. He was in Lady Proctor’s saloon when the group from the Abbey arrived.

  Dewar was vexed to see Holly was already informed of the news. Swithin was considerably annoyed to see her sitting with the competition, both of them smiling in triumph. He must conquer her by his consummate charm. Let her see how infinitely superior he was to Prendergast, in all but appearance. He would be urbane, witty, original. He would counter Prendergast’s dull common sense with magnificent flights of fancy and poetry. He would be utterly scintillating and irresistible.

  Having come courting, he was outfitted carefully with this end in mind, in garments vaguely rose in hue, with deep brown accents in waistcoat. Holly, he noticed, wore a drab shawl over a drab gown and, having been surprised by Prendergast’s early visit, had not had time to repair, her coiffure. A tail of hair hung forlornly behind her left ear.

  “I have just been telling Miss McCormack of my appointment,” Prendergast said, after the gentlemen were in. He had arisen at Dewar’s entry, and towered half a head above Swithin, who advanced mincingly toward him.

  “Naturellement,” Swithin drawled, drawing out a handkerchief to fall in graceful folds from his dazzling fingers. “It is no surprise to her, I think.”

  “A very pleasant surprise,” she answered, smiling to Dewar, who nodded briefly and took up a seat between Jane and her mother. Swithin perched daintily on the edge of a petit point chair and crossed his legs.

  “Tell me, Prendergast,” he began, “how soon can it be arranged for you to take up your duties at the school? We require our Kate back at the play. Things fall apart without her.”

  “She keeps us all running smoothly,” Prendergast answered, with a warm smile in her direction. “I expect to be free by the first of next week. As you find Miss McCormack indispensable, I daresay the students could be suborned to take a holiday on Friday. Perhaps on the week-end I could attend a rehearsal myself. I am eager to see the stage. I hear a great deal about it from the ladies.”

  “Ah yes, we must hear you recite your bit at the beginning,” Swithin said.

  “And my Prologue to Act II,” Prendergast reminded him. “That sonnet is one of my favourites—an eloquent plea for young love.”

  Swithin sneered at him, but with such an inconsequential face the expression was difficult to read. Prendergast thought he was going to sneeze as he brandished his handkerchief still. “It is a subject dear to my heart at the present time,” he added, smiling to Holly, who had just heard of his approaching nuptials.

  Dewar glanced toward them. “Tell me, milord,” Prendergast went on, “have you informed Parsons yet that he is retired? I planned to visit him tonight, and would not wish to mention it if he is unaware of the fact.”

  “No, I haven’t told him yet.”

  “Oh dear, it is well you asked the question!” Holly exclaimed. “What a dreadful way for him to discover he is unemployed. What are your plans for him, Lord Dewar?”

  “I have no alternative employment in mind for a septuagenarian,” he answered. He saw at once that Miss McCormack was again displeased with him.

  “The days will be very long for him, cooped up in two rooms. He is used to being busy,” she pointed out.

  “He is too old to work.”

  “Yes, real work is beyond him, but some sinecure must be found,” she answered.

  “In any case, I shall say nothing till you have spoken to him,” Prendergast said, arising to hasten his steps back to his beloved, and happy to be able to delay the visit to Parsons. He took a polite leave, with once more special thanks to Miss McCormack and Dewar.

  Eager to win favour with Holly, Swithin began to mention a series of unlikely occupations for Parsons. “He might be my penman for the new drame I am creating,” he said, looking to see how she was impressed by this plan. She felt the tail of hair tickle her ear, and reached to put it up, totally ignoring his remark. “A tragedy based on Boadicea,” he went on. “You may imagine what led me to that subject.” His little yellow eyes were sparkling with passion.

  “Who is Boadicea?” she asked.

  He smiled fondly. “The historical figure I refer to, but I use her, of course, as a vehicle for a living female whom I much admire, as William subtly hinted at a parallel to Elizabeth in his Julius Caesar. It is not an original idea to use history as a parable for the present.”

  “What living character do you refer to?” she asked, mildly curious, no more.

  “Naughty girl!” he chided, batting his handkerchief. A delicate odour of lavender assaulted her nostrils.

  Sir Swithin’s conversation was not always as proper as it might have been and, as she feared she had wandered into impropriety with the question, she let it drop. “What would Mr. Parsons’s duties be in all this?” she asked.

  “He could act as my scribe. My calligraphy is beautiful—quite a work of art but, unfortunately, it is illegible. I use a style adapted from the illuminated manuscripts of the medieval age. Lady Halton was so impressed with a note I sent her last year that she mistook it for an objet d’art and framed it. It was writ on parchment during my medieval period. It was not at all important—only an apology, in verse, for not being able to attend a levée she had called me to.”

  “It is thoughtful of you to suggest it, Swithin, but that would be only a very temporary employment, for the while you remain here,” she said.

  “Dear lady, I am so enchanté here that I may stay on indefinitely.”

  “You may think so,” Dewar announced from across the room, from which location he had been listening to the conversation with an ironic smile on his face.

  “He jests,” Swithin told Holly. “Dewar adores my company. Our souls march in harmony—well, dally along in harmony, let us say. But your point is well made, Kate. We must find Parsons a permanent coin in which to await eternity. The scriptorium at the Abbey suggests itself as the ideal spot. A schoolmaster must feel at home surrounded by the marks of his profession—books, pens, ink pots. You could use him to make a fair copy of that pandect on the drame you have been compiling these ten years, Dew. How does it progress, by the by?”

  “Slowly. I am revising the Elizabethan period at the present.”

  “Don’t overwrite it, dear boy, and let all those lovely visions be lost in revisions.”

  “That sounds like a good post for Parsons,” Holly said.

  Dewar nodded his head in acquiescence. “Shall I speak to him then?” he asked.

  “It is hardly for me to say!” she said, feeling she was being roasted for taking so lively an interest in his doings.

  “Very true, but somehow you always do say, and it would make things easier if I knew what you want done at the beginning,” Dewar said, with an innocent stare.

  There was an interruption as Homberly and Foxworth were shown in, not entirely sober. Falling onto a chair in the middle of the room, Rex said to Jane, “Dewar tell you?”
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br />   “He has been telling us about Mr. Parsons’s retirement,” Jane answered.

  “Eh? Ain’t talking about a dashed parson. Me and Foxey have decided to wear our horse’s outfit for the romps after the play, after all. Ain’t going to be a bear. Somebody else can be a bear. The pelt would fit you, Swithin.”

  “It would fit, but it would not suit, silly boy.”

  “True. Got a point there,” Foxey mumbled. “Idle can’t growl. Can hardly talk.”

  “Hardly talk?” Rex shouted. “Never shuts up. Worst clapperjaw I ever met.”

  “Don’t talk right. He chirps, but he couldn’t growl worth a tinker’s curse.”

  “Methinks Mr. Prendergast would feel quite at home in the bearskin,” Swithin suggested.

  “I’m sure he would enjoy to do it!” Jane said at once.

  “Oh yes, he has a great sense of fun,” Holly agreed.

  Before Swithin could enter on any more insults, Rex lurched to his feet to secure a chair closer to Jane, and engaged her in some conversation. Dewar quietly arose and joined Swithin and Holly on the other side of the fireplace. She was curious to hear the details of the trip from him. “How is Billie?” she asked. “Does he show any improvement yet?”

  “A little. It will be a gradual process. Dr. John has his instructions for the treatment. The boy’s spirits are considerably improved.”

  “I am so glad. My uncle is very happy with the house he hired. And I am very happy with Mr. Prendergast’s appointment,” she told him, with an approving smile.