Not that Mrs Colclough could really hold Cara to blame for Marie Moon’s appearance nor seriously expect her to turn so free-spending a lady away from her door. But should Mrs Colclough, who still considered Cara’s charges – indeed any charges at all – to be too high, be looking for an excuse to cancel, then here, undoubtedly, she had it. Particularly if Miss Baker, as seemed highly likely, had offered her a bargain price. A ridiculous price, where the sole profit lay in taking Cara’s customer away. And since Cara could not allow that to happen, she went on smiling, the very soul of patience and good humour and lightness of heart, not a cloud in her sky. Good Heavens, what cause could she possibly have to worry? ‘No – no, Mrs Colclough, absolutely no rush. We have all morning. All day if necessary. Please take your time.’ And although she had little faith in Odette’s ability to restrain Marie, should restraint be needed, she nevertheless waited, with an appearance of complete calm, until Mrs Colclough became engrossed in counting the pearl beads on her daughter’s gown in case she should be paying for one less than the several hundred contracted for, before seizing her opportunity to slip away.
‘I shall only be a moment.’
It would have to be now.
Mrs Colclough had reached a count of only two hundred and one and could be safely left – thought Cara – to make the count again. Rachel, the bride, appeared to be praying. Three bridesmaids were in the fitting room in charge of Madge Percy and her minion. Four more were whispering and giggling around the counter, dipping greedy fingers into the ribbon boxes. Mrs Gage seemed lost in pleasant contemplation. Miss Linnet Gage seemed fully occupied in despising Mrs Colclough, the woman she was hoping to make her mother-in-law. Anna Rattrie, moving like a shadow but a surprisingly effective one, was pouring tea where it seemed appropriate, modelling, at the same time, about her thin but – there again – surprisingly effective shoulders, a silk fringed shawl of the type Cara hoped to be selling in quantity throughout the autumn season.
The scene had a settled look, she calculated, likely to last an hour or more no matter how speedy they managed to be with their needles and pins. And since the mere idea of ‘rushing’her customers offended her deeply in any case, her best hope lay in tidying Marie up and, at the most convenient moment – when Mrs Colclough should not be looking – whisking her into the street. Providing, of course, one could find her carriage and get it to the door. And her front door at that – damn the woman – her back door opening into a foul little yard which was blocked, at present, with builder’s rubble.
And when all was said and done Marie Moon was a customer too, drunk or sober, who should not be asked to go scrambling over bricks and mortar to the back gate by the privy door.
Unthinkable. Especially since she would be more than likely to lose her way and end up in the shop again, with brick dust all over her.
The carriage, then, to begin with. Cara smiled, most encouragingly, at Mrs Maria Colclough and then, beckoning to Anna Rattrie, sent her out to look for a landau with blue upholstery and a pair of chestnut horses. Could there be many such in Frizingley?
‘You may have to go as far as the Fleece,’ she warned her, making it sound like nothing to make a fuss about.
‘Oh, Miss Adeane …’ Anna’s eyes, eternally apprehensive, had grown terrified, imagining she had been asked to manage a team of horses.
‘Oh Miss Adeane nothing, Anna.’ Cara had no time, just then, for anybody’s terror but her own. ‘Just do it. There’ll be a coachman, you ninny. All you have to do is tell him to come here. And if not …’ because it was just possible that Marie might be driving herself, ‘then – well – ask your brother Oliver to help you.’
Marie Moon was sitting with her elbows on Cara’s table, her arms and shoulders bare since she was still in evening dress, her hair coming down, her cloudy, short-sighted blue eyes somewhat out of focus but gazing, with the intensity of a woman baring her soul, at Odette who, speaking softly and swiftly and in French, was clearly offering her comfort.
Damn the woman. How could she – how could any woman – let herself down in this way, wandering around a town like Frizingley in the early morning dressed in the beautiful ball-gown Cara had once made her, an enchantment of white silk now shamefully soiled at the hem, dragged through the mud and the gutter as she seemed intent on dragging herself. And why? She was rich and extremely beautiful. She had the best proportioned figure Cara had ever measured. Poise and grace and her own carriage. And, in that case, why should it matter to her that petty-minded provincial bores like Maria Colclough and Lizzie Braithwaite would not invite her to their daughters’weddings? She had been an actress, hadn’t she? Or perhaps just an artiste of the music-hall, the café-concert – accounts varied. But nevertheless it was a profession, an identity, a life of her own. Why didn’t she just snap her fingers at Frizingley and go back to it? Damn the woman.
Why? The answer came to Cara very suddenly as she saw Marie’s face, upturned to Odette, in a shaft of sunlight and understood this lovely woman to be far closer in age to her mother than to herself. And Odette had just turned forty-five. Not easy, one felt bound to admit, to return to the exhaustions and rivalries of the music-hall at that age unless one had been an outstanding success. A name not yet forgotten. And even then it might be unwise. Tiring, at any rate, to compete all over again – at that vulnerable time of life – for men and money in the market-place. Particularly if one tended to wilt easily. And to bruise easily. For Cara had now seen the swelling around one cloudy blue eye, the dark smear along the papery cheek, the red weals turning yellow at their edges and starting to blacken along Marie’s shoulders. Old wounds that were still smouldering with new, raw wounds on top of them.
‘My husband beats me, madame – from time to time,’ said Marie Moon simply, ‘because he is impotent. Beating me is all he can do, you understand. It is the alcohol.’
Odette understood. So too, with a tug of pity she did not really wish to feel, did Cara.
‘How long, madame?’ murmured Odette with some tenderness.
‘Since we were married. He believes it to have been caused by the scandal. Therefore it is I – he says – who have castrated him. After all, who was it who inflamed him to the point of carrying me away from my lawful husband? Who tarnished his reputation so that his own sister named him unfit for the care of his children? I did. And in those flames, which I created, perished his manhood. So he tells me. Therefore, when his frustrations overcome him and incline him to violence, who am I to complain …?’
‘I suppose he tells you that too.’ There was no tenderness in Cara.
‘He does.’
‘Why do you put up with it?’
‘My dear.’ Marie spread her arms in a comedienne’s wide gesture of regret, assuming, for a moment, the mask of a sad, terribly endearing clown. ‘One does the best one can, as you – my little one – should know. And after these dozen years without debts and all that weary business of finding work and keeping it, this – I fear – seems little enough to pay. Have you any idea how much a dancer’s legs can ache – and her back – at this “certain age” we have reached, your mother and I? Do you know how many exceedingly tired dancers there are, offering themselves from the passageways of Montmartre. Or Mayfair? Or anywhere? And one grows tired, mademoiselle. Your mother understands.’
Yes. Cara was in no doubt of it. Just as she knew that Mrs Colclough, whose narrow virtue inclined far more to punishment than pity, would not choose to understand at all.
‘I am sorry, Mrs Moon,’ she said stiffly.
‘Sorry? Are you really, Miss Adeane? Or do you feel that I should simply pack my jewels and anything else I can carry and run? At your age perhaps I would. Oh yes. Even at mine. Last night – or perhaps it was this morning – that is what I tried to do. Or so I seem to remember. We had been – oh – somewhere – no matter – Adolphus and I. Drinking. His children are with us just now which makes him agitated. And then sentimental. It gives him a tendency to weep for his lost
wife and his lost virtue. So vivid, you see, is his imagination. Last night I wept too, I think, and was chastised as being unworthy to shed tears for such a noble lady. I seem to remember that as being the reason. Although I confess that I am easily muddled these days. It is the champagne. What else? A blow to the head? Ah well – one grows accustomed. Then I found myself in Frizingley in full daylight, with no jewels, of course, in my carriage, no money in my pockets, nothing but these very unsuitable clothes I am wearing. I went to the tavern we both frequent occasionally, Miss Adeane, but the landlord was not sympathetic. I took a stroll to clear my mind. Your door was open. Have I greatly inconvenienced you?’
‘Oh no,’ murmured Odette.
‘Yes,’ rapped out Cara.
Marie smiled, very sweetly.
‘Then I must leave at once.’
‘Where will you go?’
‘Why – home to my husband, of course, my dear – where else? As I always have. As a penitent, to beg his pardon. He so enjoys that, and since his remaining pleasures are few … Do you have a back way?’
Cara shook her head.
‘I see. And your shop is full of pious wolves? Then throw me to them, dearest. Don’t hesitate. They will be so happy naming me slut and slattern and asking each other if they noticed the terrible state of my hair and my gown that no blame will attach to you at all. Nor to my husband. Poor man – they will say – tied to a woman like me. And so they will all fall over themselves in the rush to invite him to dinner. I am speaking seriously, Cara. He needs pity. So join with them and save yourself.’
Shakily, she got to her feet, perfectly willing to trail her disgraceful gown, her dishevelled head, her black eye and bruised shoulders at once past the scandalized wedding-party who most certainly would not keep silent about it, their outraged twitterings unlikely to escape the notice of Marie’s husband. Thus giving him another reason to punish her.
Sacrifice me, Marie was saying. Everybody else does.
‘No,’ said Cara. ‘Mother – go and take Mrs Colclough into the fitting room. Turn the bridesmaids out if you have to. Tell her you are not satisfied with the bodice of the dress we have made her for the wedding. Keep her there until I come. Set her to counting the buttons. And you, Marie Moon – take off that dress.’
Swiftly she pulled and tugged Marie’s entirely passive figure into a dress of her own that seemed quite suitable for a morning carriage drive, did up her hair as if she had been a doll, powdered her face and then, when the black eye would not succumb to cosmetic artifice, covered it by a hat with a high brim, tilted rakishly to one side – the strategic side – and a spotted veil, pulled well down.
‘There. No one notices a woman’s eyes,’ she said with professional satisfaction, ‘when she wears a hat like this.’
‘I will pay you for it, my dear.’
‘I sincerely hope you will. I can hardly take it back for resale, can I, when all those Colclough cousins and Miss Linnet Gage have seen it on your head.’
‘Linnet Gage.’ Marie wrinkled a fastidious nose. ‘That one offends me.’
Cara shrugged. ‘Are you ready?’
‘I am. And will you worry about me, Cara, once I am off your premises and out of your sight – causing my embarrassment and my alarm elsewhere?’
‘Probably not.’
She smiled. ‘Quite right. Nor would I give a thought to you. And yet – how strange it is … We give all our emotions to men, do we not? And our bodies. They are all in all to us – these gentlemen. Oh yes – everything. And yet one can turn for comfort only to another woman. Or are you too young, as yet, Miss Adeane, to be philosophical?’
They walked together through the shop, the knot of bridesmaids tying and untying themselves in girlish confusion at the approach of Frizingley’s acknowledged adulteress, their round, over-innocent eyes fastening avidly on her stylish blue gown, her dashing veiled hat, so that every detail could be recounted later to one’s younger sisters who would listen with relish and to one’s mamma who would pretend not to listen at all.
Gemma Gage took absolutely no notice. Linnet Gage, being on exceedingly sympathetic terms with Mr Adolphus Moon, looked through his wife as if she did not exist. Miss Rachel Colclough, uncertain as to whether sinners ought to be prayed for or burned at the stake, glanced around apprehensively for her mother, who would be sure to know. Anna Rattrie, slipping noiselessly forward, opened the door. A landau and a pair of chestnut horses stood in the street.
‘Friday then, Miss Adeane, for the black velvet?’ called out Marie Moon, negotiating the carriage-step with the help of Cara’s strong arm and then collapsing into helpless giggles on her blue-upholstered silk cushions.
‘Black velvet – to go with my new diamonds. Large ones, Miss Adeane – so the neck will need to be very low.’
‘Certainly, madam.’ And Cara stood, with her habitual courtesy, on the pavement, while Marie – still giggling beneath her spotted veil – was driven off.
‘Miss Adeane – this will not do, you know,’ announced Mrs Colclough stridently as she returned to the shop. ‘I must say a word to you …’
‘Yes, madam?’
‘This bodice, Miss Adeane – We settled, I believe – for three rows of braid. How is it that you have given me four?’
‘I judged it to be smarter, madam. I will gladly remove the extra row, of course, if you wish, but since the price remains the same …?’
Mrs Colclough’s eyes brightened, the sharp-edged brain behind them busy enough now with her favourite pastime of getting something for nothing to overlook a dozen Marie Moons.
‘I merely wondered,’ she said, quick as a flash, ‘– since the price remains the same – whether four would be enough? Madame Odette, come here a moment and give me your opinion. Shall it be four? Or five?’
The fitting ended, the wedding-party dispersing in several busy directions, the Dallam carriage remaining in Frizingley to collect various parcels for Amabel while Linnet rode back to Almsmead with Gemma who had little to say beyond ‘Yes.’ ‘Indeed.’ ‘Really?’ as Linnet aired her opinion that Mr Adolphus Moon was a man who had a truly heavy cross to bear.
‘Poor little Mr Moon.’ He had been figuring rather a great deal in Linnet’s conversation lately. ‘So amiable and obliging and so easily put upon. Although I was somewhat surprised at seeing Madame Marie in town so early, it being her practice – one hears – to lie in bed all day with slices of cucumber on her eyes. Recovering, one supposes, from whatever a woman of that sort may have to recover from. I am sure I cannot imagine.’
‘No, Linnet. Of course not.’
Only to Daniel could she have said ‘The poor woman drinks. I wonder why?’
‘One feels particularly for the children,’ said Linnet, her light voice chirping on like a pretty little bird of bright plumage, the hoarse croak of a bird of another variety hidden well beneath it. Listening now, with Daniel’s ears, Gemma had never heard it so clearly.
‘Children?’ she said quickly, shocked and then suddenly very amused at her own conviction that if they resembled their father they would have been better drowned at birth.
That too she could have said, easily and happily, to Daniel.
‘Why yes, dear – Mr Moon’s children by his first marriage. His real marriage, as I once heard him call it in an unguarded moment – with tears in his eyes, poor soul. He has an absolute love of a girl about fourteen and a boy a little older. Very timid and shy, although the girl will talk to me, I find, if I am very patient with her and take an extra special lot of care. And the boy has started to follow me about rather – hovering around me looking moonstruck as boys do at that age – you know. Poor things. They have that same lost little air as their father. One shudders to think what they may learn from her example …’
‘His wife, you mean? Their stepmother?’ She knew Daniel Carey would have said that, just as acidly.
‘Oh my dear …’ Linnet sounded very much the older sister. Infinitely patient if slightly am
used. ‘It is common knowledge that she enticed him – quite blatantly – for he is very, very rich, you know – into an entanglement which she has since given him every cause to regret. They say, in fact …’
‘I suppose you mean he says?’
There was a moment of chilling silence although Gemma, in fact, was not chilled by it.
‘Yes,’ said Linnet crisply. ‘I see no reason to deny that Mr Moon confides in me. One is simply happy to be of service to one’s friends. One is even proud to be accorded their trust.’
What game was this? No game at all, of course, since Linnet did nothing with less than serious intent. And how ruthless she was in the pursuit of that ‘position in society’she craved. Her own establishment, rather than a dainty toe-hold in some other woman’s home. Her own horses to drive, her own servants, instead of Amabel’s, at her beck and call. Her own invitations to be sent out for impeccable dinners at which she – as the wife of any man who could pay for it – would shine. How very clever she was in her various campaigns to hunt him down – whoever he happened to be. How admirably she would fulfil her chosen role, should she ever gain it. How versatile she was. And, at the same time, how unsuccessful.
Sophisticated confidante to Mr Moon who was not free to bestow upon her his sugar fortunes in Martinique and Antigua even if he so desired. Woman of slow-burning fires to Mr Ben Braithwaite who, even now that he had married the textile fortune of Magda Tannenbaum, still cast ardent glances upon her. Would she fare any better with Uriah Colclough who might well be content just to gaze at her beauty until it withered, scourging his body and thus purifying his soul by denying his lust for her until there should be nothing left to arouse it?
And after Uriah Colclough, who was left in Frizingley with means enough to give Linnet the life she desired? The life, indeed, which in her own view she richly deserved. Would she settle for less? Fervently Gemma hoped so. For, in marrying Tristan, she had made no allowance for having Linnet on her hands – and under her skin – for the rest of her life.
A Song Twice Over Page 34