Vintage Love

by Clarissa Ross

  “Maybe not,” James said. “More’s the pity.”

  “You don’t like my husband,” she challenged him.

  “Few do.”

  She stared at him. “How dare you say that? I could easily tell him of your opinion.”

  “I don’t think you will.”

  “He is my husband, remember.”

  “But you are clever enough to see through him,” James taunted her. “He gives everyone the impression of his strength. But he is not a strong man; he’s a cowardly one. That is why he tends to be cruel and corrupt! Worse than that, he corrupts everyone with whom he comes in contact!”

  “Please!” she said sternly.

  “I beg your forgiveness,” James said. “But it is true. To an extent he has corrupted my father, making him engage in labor practices which are unfair to the loyal men who have worked for us over the years. He has drawn this Bart Woods to him because he knows of his corrupt background and hopes he will be of use to him. Even you must have corrupted your moral values to become the wife of a Mark Gregg!”

  “If you were not the son of my husband’s partner, I would ask you to leave the carriage,” she warned him. “I do not like your conversation.”

  “You are right,” he said. “I should not so loudly express what are merely my opinions. I’m probably jealous of Mark for taking the place I might otherwise hold in the firm. If you will overlook all that I’ve said I will pursue another tack in my conversation.”

  “You must, or leave my company,” she warned him. But while she could not agree with him, she knew much of what he’d said was true. This cut deeply. Especially his comments about her. She had compromised in marrying Mark, and perhaps now she was getting her proper pay for it in an unhappy married life. For she was truly not happy with the stern, middle-aged tyrant.

  The carriage halted and James helped her out. The restaurant was a popular one in a fashionable street. But it was small and rather intimate. She was relieved at this and pleased when they were quickly seated at a small table somewhat hidden by a false waterfall in the middle of the dining room. They ordered and then faced each other over drinks.

  She said, “No prudent wife would be doing this.”

  “Your reputation is safe with me.”

  “Mark is jealous of you, I must tell you that And of me.”

  “Don’t worry,” the good-looking James said. “Soon after the New Year I’m leaving England for America.”

  Becky was surprised. “You’ve made your mind up?”

  “Yes. My father is still well enough to look after his share of the business. And Bart Woods joining the firm means there will be no active place for me. I don’t agree with Mark’s policy in any case.”

  “What will you do?” she asked.

  “In America?”

  “Yes.”

  “I have a few things in mind,” James said airly. “If I wish I can live on the family money.”

  She said, “You must have more ambition than that.”

  “There is much shipbuilding going on in America and in Canada,” James told her. “I intend to look into the firms and perhaps make some agreement with one of them. Unlike Mark, they are all much interested in iron ships.”

  “I see,” she said.

  “Samuel Cunard has established a regular mail service across the Atlantic,” James said. “Passenger traffic is increasing every year. Steamships are beginning to come into their own. But they will be ships with hulls of iron!”

  “You should try to convince my husband of that.”

  “He won’t listen,” James Kerr complained. “But perhaps Bart Woods will be able to make him see sense.”

  Their food came and they had an enjoyable lunch. Then she and James parted, and she went back home in the carriage. It had been an interesting and not unpleasant afternoon. She found James extremely intelligent and felt it a pity that his lack of ambition made him so indifferent about what he did with his life.

  When Mark returned that evening, he brought up the subject of her visit to the yards. He asked her, “Why did you not come up to the office to see me?”

  “I met Bart Woods on his way to you. I thought it might be an important discussion and I’d find myself in the way. So I simply continued on.” She omitted any mention of meeting James or having lunch with him, trusting that Mark would not hear of her mild adventure.

  Her husband’s stern face was lined with weariness. “The strike will end tomorrow, but on Bart Woods’ terms.”

  “Isn’t that what you wished?” she asked.

  He stood before their log fireplace with his back to it and his hands clasped behind him. “Yes and no.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  Mark frowned. “I’m worried about him. I need his firm hand to keep the laborers in line, but I think he is overly-ambitious. And worst of all, he agrees with Matthew Kerr; he thinks we are wrong in not turning to the construction of iron ships.”

  “Perhaps you should consider it?” she ventured.

  “Never,” he snapped. “The company will be operated my way—and that is that!”

  She made no further mention of business to him. But she noted from that evening on that he began to drink more. He sometimes came home from the office with whiskey on his breath and in a surly mood. And he would continue his drinking through the evening, being no company for her. Then he would drop sodden into bed to sleep drunkenly through the night before beginning another day in the same way.

  The way his drinking was aging him alarmed her. But when she made a small protest to him about it, he accused her of being a meddling wife and not knowing her her place.

  • • •

  The holiday season was at hand. A time for Christmas festivities and saying an end to 1862. Becky had first read Dickens’ A Christmas Carol while her father was still alive, and it had changed customs in England a great deal. More than ever, Christmas had become a great family tradition with a tree, a feast of turkey, and many parties. Mark Gregg informed her that he and Elizabeth had always held a dinner party for the Kerrs on Christmas night, and that they, in turn, entertained on Boxing Day, the day following Christmas.

  “I want you to see that this is the best year of all,” he told her in one of his more sober moments, and he gave her a wad of pound notes to cover the expenses.

  She was excited at the prospect. But one thing concerned her more. She was still haunted by the knowledge that Peg had not been found. With the money she had put aside each week and some pound notes from the Christmas money, she made a journey to the business section of the city one afternoon. There, in a small office up three rickety flights of stairs, she met a most peculiar man.

  Mr. Phineas Pennifeather was thin with round shoulders, and he had a mass of long, gray hair which was always wildly askew and thick-lensed glasses shielding small blue eyes. He had a pinched face and in his shabby, dark clothes, he could have been anything from fifty to seventy. He was the sort of old man whom no one looked at twice. And that was the secret of his success, for Mr. Pennifeather was a private detective.

  He sat at his rolltop desk and listened to her story. Then in a gravelly voice, he said, “It is an old story, Mrs. Gregg, and a sad one. I have often been engaged to find missing girls.”

  Becky leaned forward, the face under her cranberry shade bonnet pale as she said, “Have you had much success?”

  “Sometimes,” the old man said, drumming bony fingers on the desktop.

  “Sometimes these girls vanish in the underworld without a trace.”

  “I assume this Alfie Bard and Peg are still in France,” she said.

  “I doubt that,” he told her.

  “You do?” She was surprised.

  He nodded. “It is a familiar trick to throw the family of the girl off the track. No doubt he has made use of her in Paris to his advantage. And then when he has felt it safe, he has returned to England with her.”

  She said, “So you think she might actually be in London?�
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  “More than likely, she is,” Phineas Pennifeather said. “But it will take a good deal of seeking out.”

  “I’m prepared to pay.”

  “You must not be impatient,” the private detective warned her. “This could take weeks, months, or perhaps as long as a year. I could even fail altogether.”

  “I have confidence in you.”

  “Thank you, ma’am,” the old gentleman said. “I have a good name in the city. I’m known as honest, which is a rarity in my profession. I will undertake the search and will contact you when I have any news. In the meantime you can generally find me here when you wish to talk with me or look after additional fees.”

  “I shall press this until we find her,” she promised. “I will find the money to pay you.”

  “My fees are modest for a prosperous lady like yourself,” the old man said with a sniff. “There is just one thing I must warn you of.”

  “Yes?”

  “This could turn out unpleasantly.”

  She frowned. “You mean?”

  Phineas Pennifeather’s ancient face was gloomy. “You could wind up discovering your sister dead.”

  “I can face that better than not knowing where she is or thinking of her living a life of shame and misery.”

  “Ah!” he said, tapping the side of his nose. “That is another aspect of it. The sister who left you was in the full bloom of youth and health. The girl we may find will surely not be in that state.”

  Becky hadn’t thought of this. She figured Peg would look exactly as she did when she had run off with Alfie Bard. She said, “You are saying she may have become a different person? It is not all that long a time!”

  “Life lived as a drab ages one fast,” the private detective said. “Degradation erodes beauty and character. Disease sickens and changes a personality.”

  “You frighten me!”

  “I cannot be less than truthful with you,” he said. “You may locate your sister and find her with lost beauty and ravaged with some social disease. She might also be a drunkard or an opium addict. Favorite escapes for prostitutes. And under that man’s tutelage she has surely become a prostitute.”

  Becky said desperately, “I will not accept that she cannot be saved.”

  Phineas Pennifeather sighed. “Yet she has made no attempt to reach you.”

  “She might find it difficult. He may be threatening her. Or she may be too ashamed!”

  The old man nodded. “I can see that you must find this Peg. You will have no peace until you do.”

  “Thank you for understanding,” she said gratefully.

  The old man rose to see her on her way. “I hope it will turn out well. But I have to warn you of the other possibilities. I do not wish to bring sorrow to you without at least a warning.”

  She stood up. “I want you to begin the search. And I will see you every fortnight to take care of your fee and find out what progress you’ve made.”

  “Do not come back until after the holidays,” he advised her. “Neither I nor my agents get much accomplished during that period.”

  “So it is likely I shall have to spend still another Christmas without Peg,” she said sadly.

  “I would expect so,” the private detective said. “But perhaps next year.”

  Becky gave the thin, stooped man a wan smile. “That thought will sustain me.”

  And it did. She now went about preparations for Christmas and the New Year blithely. Elizabeth Gregg was away a great deal of the time, as she was planning to hold extra dinners at her mission for the poor in the holiday season. And the prim woman who kept a good deal to herself refused to assist Becky in her preparations for the Christmas party.

  The Yuletide spirit did not seem to have any beneficial effect on Becky’s husband. Mark arrived home most nights as irascible as usual. He forever complained about her running of the household and when they made love it was a quick, cold act on Mark’s part. He did not seem to care that she had not so far become pregnant. Or if he did, he made no mention of it.

  Occasionally Bart Woods came to call on Mark after hours. At such times she inevitably had to act as hostess. And she was aware of the dark, handsome man’s strong interest in her. His eyes followed her in an almost embarrassing fashion, and though he spoke little with her, he was always polite and quiet.

  It was different when he was in duscussion with her husband. She had often heard Mark and the young man quarreling in the library. It was apparent that Bart Woods was gradually taking over more decisions at the shipyard, and Mark was often not in agreement with them.

  The night of the party arrived. On Christmas Day Becky presented Mark with a copy of Dickens’ new novel Great Expectations. Copies had been at a premium and hard to find, but she had a favorite bookseller who had found one for her. With it she presented him with a fine new gold chain for his watch.

  Mark received the gifts with grudging appreciation, murmuring, “I wish my expectations could be called great!” And he presented her with a new shawl imported from India and a fine emerald locket, which opened to show small round cutouts of tintype likenesses of them.

  Becky was delighted with her gifts and kissed Mark warmly. They both had gifts for his sister, Elizabeth. She received them casually and then dampened their day by going off to spend the entire day and evening at her mission. Buttoning the heavy coat she wore against the December weather, she informed them, “I find that the mission is my chief interest these days. So I will be happiest there!”

  There was a light snowstorm in the afternoon, which made everything very picturesque and clean-looking. Lads came by offering to shovel the steps and sidewalks, and she gave them all coins. The household staff looked after such duties, but she did not wish to turn any of the urchins away. Mark sat in his study reading his book and drinking some fine brandy while she bustled about making the preparations for dinner.

  The entire Kerr family appeared at five, with Bart Woods in tow. She could tell by Mark’s cool greeting of the young man that he had not invited nor expected him. Woods looked as handsome as ever in a new dark suit of neat cut. Old Matthew Kerr still puffed as if out of breath all the time, and leaned on his cane until he found the first available chair.

  James Kerr saucily kissed her under the mistle-toe in the hall. And Vera and her equally washed-out mother looked more alive than she have ever seen them. Alice Kerr had actually smiled at her when she wished her a Merry Christmas! And Vera was moving about as if she were a desired young beauty rather than a most woebegone, pale miss.

  There was an exchange of presents while all sat to admire the Christmas tree with its many lighted candles, which gave a gala air to the parlor.

  Mrs. Kerr asked, “But where is Elizabeth?”

  “She is spending the day and evening at her mission. They plan to give food to a hundred or more,” Becky said. “She was sorry not to be here.”

  “I should think so,” Alice Kerr said with a mean look on her pale face. “This is the first time she’s ever missed.”

  Mark looked angry as he said, “Well, this year we appear to have some missing and others present for the first time.” He gave Bart Woods an unfriendly glance.

  Anxious to cover up, Becky said quickly, “Yes. This is my first year as mistress of the house.”

  Mark glanced at her. “Time to serve the wine,” he ordered.

  The servants scurried in and out serving all the various delicacies, then they all sat down to a table groaning with its load of fine foods. Oysters were the first course, followed by turtle soup, and then the great Goose, which had been ordered specially. The feast ended with fruit cake, coffee, and brandy.

  The men gathered at the table with cigars while the ladies retired to freshen up. Becky took a moment to congratulate the cook and the other servants below stairs and to give them further instructions. She felt the evening had been a reasonable success, though she worried a little about what would happen before their guests left.

  Becky was
due for a surprise. When everyone gathered in the parlor again in the soft glow of candles from the Christmas tree, old Matthew Kerr struggled to his feet and, clearing his throat, beamed at the assembled company.

  “I have an important announcement to make,” the old man said proudly. “I take great pleasure in announcing the engagement of my daughter, Vera, to a young man of great promise, Bart Woods.”

  It was a bombshell for Mark and Becky. There were not at all prepared for the news, though the others seemed to be. Vera demurely went over and allowed a smiling Mark to take her hand in his.

  Mark finally said, “This is unexpected and pleasant news.”

  “Their marriage will follow shortly,” old Matthew Kerr said happily. “I shall hope to have some grandchildren before I leave this world!”

  “Don’t count on me, father!” James said with meaning. And there was some laughter.

  “I don’t,” his father told him. “Though I’ve no doubt I have a lot of nameless heirs about the town bestowed on by you on willing ladies.”

  Becky said, “We must have a toast to the happy couple!”

  Wine was brought and the toast dutifully given. Then Bart and Vera exchanged happy glances and he addressed the room, saying, “As you may guess I’m more than happy to be offered a membership in the Kerr family. It will make my association with the firm all that much stronger.”

  “Hear! Hear!” said old Matthew Kerr, who had sat down again. “As my son-in-law, you will have control of Vera’s share of my stock in the firm.”

  “Thank you, sir,” Bart Woods said smiling and ignoring Mark’s angry expression. “The firm has been having rough days of late. But I know that is going to change. And as a sign of what is in the wind, I’m happy to announce that the firm headed by Samuel Cunard has invited us to bid on their new iron ship, which will be constructed early in 1863.”

  “Good news!” James Kerr said with a roguish look on his young face as he turned to see Mark’s reaction.

  Mark’s reaction was immediate and unpleasant. He took a step forward. With his square-face dark with anger, he demanded of Bart, “Have you made a bid on the construction of this iron ship?”