The change in Regina in that three-month period was frightening. She was all beauty and youth and love at the wedding, her eyes sparkling when she danced with her groom. When Alyce arrived at their home, Regina was pale, thinner, with dark circles under her eyes. Her smile never reached those lovely eyes anymore. When Regina hugged her sister-in-law in welcome, she clung to her like a drowning person to a buoy. If she had thought Alyce’s presence would save her, however, she was wrong. Alyce knew that William hit her, either from the bruises on her once-unmarred skin or the sounds of her sister-in-law falling to the floor. Alyce’s shame grew because she could not help but feel relief that it was not she who was the object of her brother’s wrath.
When it was announced that Regina was pregnant, however, her brother turned his abuse to her once again. He was too afraid of hurting his heir that he was sure grew in Regina’s belly. For seven months, Regina only had to put up with slaps, bruised wrists, and verbal abuse. Alyce took the brunt of William’s bad humor, and often felt she deserved it for feeling her earlier relief that she was spared by his kind-hearted wife.
After Edward was born, there was a brief period when William seemed blissfully happy. He had the son he desired, and he seemed very pleased with his wife for delivering a boy. Regina even seemed to regain some hope for happiness because of William’s change of mood. The tenuous reprieve was short-lived. As Alyce understood it later, most of the money from the sale of their parents’ estate was lost in a bad investment William made. Without these funds, he was in danger of losing his own estate. The day he learned of the lost investment, his fury was unstoppable. He started in on Regina outside their bedroom. Alyce had come into the hallway when she heard the shouting start. For the first and perhaps last time in her life, she found courage and went to defend her sister-in-law against this tyrant. This infuriated her brother all the more. Alyce didn’t remember much of that night. According to the doctor who attended her, both she and Regina fell down the massive staircase. Despite being in and out of consciousness for more than a week, she survived the fall; Regina did not.
Alyce also knew from what the doctor told her, that her brother had lied to him about the circumstances of the two women starting at the top of the stairs and ending at the bottom. Her physical pain was nothing to the mental anguish she felt at learning of Regina’s death. Whatever fight she may have had in her diminished like the flame of a candle burning away the last of the wick.
Filled with shame and guilt and fear, Alyce cried herself to sleep, again.
Downstairs, William fueled his anger and shame with whiskey. He had lost a fortune once on a bad investment and that had forced him to sell his property to buy a smaller one here, in Cirencester. It had gone well for years, but the money he had accumulated from those very profitable years had inflated his estimation of his business acumen. He had put most of those earnings into merchandise being imported from India. Three days ago, that ship had been lost at sea during a storm, and all of its precious cargo descended into the depths with it.
William finished his glass in one, long swallow. He threw the glass into the fireplace where it shattered and the remnants of the alcohol made the fire flare. His financial situation was getting desperate. Tomorrow he would go to London to speak with his solicitor and see what relief he could get from the banks in the form of loans.
He had to find a way back to wealth.
Chapter 24
Dahlia had spent what seemed like an eternity thinking on what Josephine had said to her about James. She spoke to Lady Sweet about what she had heard at the café and what Josephine had told her. Despite all she had been taught about pre-marital relations being a sin, Lady Sweet also seemed to be reconciled to the fact that they occurred very frequently and it was just as well that young men gained some experience so one half of a newly-wed couple would know what to do on the wedding night. When Dahlia asked her why that half shouldn’t be the woman, Lady Sweet was just as adamant that that was not proper and Dahlia shouldn’t even think about getting any experience prior to her wedding night.
“A woman’s virtue, in the truest sense, is something she can give but once in a lifetime. That is why it is so highly valued and why it should be given to her husband. It is a gift she brings to the marriage.”
“Another gift. Aren’t we already paying them with our dowry? Sounds like a lot we bring to a marriage. What do we get in return?”
“Security, a home, a family. Someone to protect us. A place in society. In the best cases, a friend and companion for life, and love.”
“Well,” Dahlia countered, “how are young men supposed to get experience when young women are not supposed to?”
“There are always women who make the wrong choices. Women who think they should give their virtue to the first man with whom she falls in love rather than waiting until she is married. Men find all sorts of ways to bed women, and will often say anything, do anything, to get what they want. But in the end, they often lose interest once they have what they want. And once we give them what we want, there is nothing to keep them bound to us.”
“You mean like Anne Boleyn who became Queen by refusing to sleep with Henry the Eighth until he married her. In the end, though, didn’t work out so well for her, did it?” asked Dahlia.
“No, but she proved what a powerful motivation abstinence is,” Sharon laughed. “Anyway, she got what she wanted – for a time. Most women don’t hold out for a man who has the power to lop their heads off!”
“Thank goodness for that!” Dahlia laughed. Then she got serious again. “Don’t you believe love can bind two people?”
“I do think it’s a possibility, but marriage doesn’t guarantee its probability. Don’t underestimate the power of societal norms. Women who don’t abide by them are shunned from good society. Even the suspicion she has wavered from what is expected of her can be enough to ruin her reputation. Unfortunately, there are many women who fall for a man’s promises. These are often the women with whom young men get their experience.”
“But the actress didn’t seem ashamed to be speaking of her…” Dahlia couldn’t bring herself to say the word lover when referring to James. “…her relations with Mr. Kent.”
“She isn’t of the same social class as we are, Dahlia. And as Miss McElroy told you, Mr. Kent is not going to marry her.”
“What if she gets pregnant?” Dahlia hadn’t thought of that possibility until now. “Then he’d have to marry her!”
“Who would make him? She is not considered a woman of family. Because she has slept with one man, it would be used against her as evidence she has probably slept with many. Don’t you see, Dahlia? Her loss of virtue, regardless of the circumstances, equates to a loss of reputation and the ability to defend herself. She is quite on her own. It is not an advantageous situation, and one from which she will never escape.”
Dahlia also had a conversation with Matilda. Because Matilda was closer to her age, Dahlia wondered if she would have any different views on the topic. If anything, she was even more adamant than Lady Sweet about the importance of keeping one’s virtue. She did, however, have something further to share that neither Josephine nor Lady Sweet had commented on – why it wasn’t easy to keep one’s virtue.
“When you are a bit older,” she told Dahlia, “and you fall completely in love, you will find the temptation is so great that everything you are taught just flies out of your head.”
“Did it happen to you?”
“It happens to everyone at some point, whether or not you want it to.” Matty got very solemn then. “When I was seventeen, I fell in love with a boy from the next county who came to stay with his aunt, at whose estate I was working. He was the most gorgeous boy I had ever seen, and could charm the patina off a Grecian statue. We fell in love, despite the fact that he was part of her Ladyship’s family and I was just a servant. When he looked at me in a way that he never looked at anyone else, I would go weak in the knees,” she said, smiling at the memory.
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“So what they say in books is the way it really feels?” asked Dahlia. She always thought the romance novels were silly and made women appear very weak.
“I’m afraid so. I wouldn’t have believed it either, until it happened to me,” sighed Matilda. “And when he kissed me…good Lord, I understood temptation!”
“You let him kiss you?” Dahlia asked, surprised.
“Kissing isn’t a sin,” Matilda said quickly, defending herself. “But, it certainly puts you in dangerous territory.”
“Why?”
“Because it wipes your mind blank of everything and fills your body with such strange and wonderful feelings that all you can do is want more.” Her eyes took on a distant look as if she were no longer with Dahlia, but back with her rich, gorgeous beau.
“So what happened?”
Matilda’s face lost its bliss and she looked away. “What had to happen,” she said quietly. “He told his aunt he wanted to marry me and she threw me out of the household.”
“But why, if you loved each other.”
“Because I was poor, a servant. Her Ladyship accused me of seducing her nephew to get his money.”
“Didn’t he tell her he loved you?”
“I imagine he did, but it didn’t matter. His family was not going to allow it. What could he do?”
“Then he didn’t love you enough,” said Dahlia firmly in support of her friend.
“In matters of marriage, love is never enough. In fact, when it comes to love between two people of different classes, it is irrelevant,” said Matty sadly.
The more Dahlia learned about what was important and expected in society – and of her, the more questions she had. All of it didn’t make sense to her. She understood now why the Gaggle was so fixated on getting married. These girls had been taught since they were very little what society expected and what was expected of them. They had been reminded of it daily by their mothers. Things like this were rarely discussed in Dahlia’s household of men. The inconsistencies of what society demanded were perplexing. Men could sleep with women who let them, but women were never expected to sleep with men until they were married. Women were supposed to keep their virtue, but if they never got married, they became old maids who, despite their virtue, were ridiculed for not getting married. The most valued thing a woman brought to her marriage was something she was destined to lose the very night she was wed. Love, which the books exalted, was a very low priority on the list of prerequisites for marriage. Worse, from what Matilda had experienced firsthand, women could fall prey to the same ‘urges’ that young men did, only women were not expected to indulge them. The whole mess was a quagmire of quandary.
Given all her discussions and analysis of love and marriage and actresses and their fallen ways, Dahlia was never so glad to let herself be overcome by her music. She accompanied Josephine to the practices with the orchestra every day, and spent hours playing the gleaming piano in her conservatory. The music comforted her, the rhythm and flow of the notes gave order to her thoughts. She escaped all the expectations of young ladies of society in a world where she was master, where she set the tone, the melody, and the accompaniment.
Josephine noted the change in Dahlia since the day at the café. Gone were the questions, replaced with a dedicated concentration to music that surprised Josephine. She had spent her life singing, playing, and performing, but never did she become the music the way Dahlia did. Never did she understand the music the way Dahlia did, otherwise she, too, would be able to vary the melodies without losing the tune, would be able to weave new notes that improved the song without diminishing the original score. Dahlia created music from her feelings, from her surroundings, apparently from people she met, and seemingly out of thin air. Josephine recognized genius, though she had never met it personified. She knew the genius of Mozart, Beethoven, and Vivaldi in the music she revered. She knew the genius of Rembrandt, Velazquez, and Goya in the paintings she admired. And she knew there was genius in the young woman she saw before her.
Chapter 25
The day of the Valentine’s Day Ball dawned clear and bright, but bitterly cold. Josephine would not let Dahlia go out until they left for the ball for fear she would do damage to her throat breathing in the extremely cold air. Dahlia was just as happy to stay in the warm and cheerful house with her friends. The women had established a routine and she enjoyed the companionship. Matilda would join them and regale them with stories from Ireland. She was very good at telling stories – whether legends of magical creatures or contemporary tales – as well as jokes and riddles. When the ladies pressured her to tell a tale, she came alive and seemed to forget her position as lady’s maid, of her station in life. Dahlia treated her like a friend, and Lady Sweet and Josephine always invited her to join them, but Matilda would often refuse. She was her own reminder of her station since no one else in this house cared to make much of a distinction. She noted that Miss McElroy’s servants were not treated as friends, so she was a bit confused by her own treatment. She relished the opportunities she was given. She had never been to restaurants so fine, or shops with such cloths and laces and hats! The fact that Miss McElroy insisted she be made a dress and attend the ball, supposedly with the aim of gaining ideas for Dahlia’s hair was something she never would have dreamed of doing. She knew her place in life. She had been born to it, and trained for it. She had lost her only love because of it. But when she told her stories, as she had done since she was little, she forgot about her station in life. She forgot about the world as it was and immersed herself in the make believe. It was a small escape that also seemed to delight her listeners, so she was always glad to do it.
Today, the ladies’ regular routine was hampered not just by the weather, but their excitement about the ball. Josephine and Sharon masked it well enough, but Dahlia was distracted and couldn’t stick with any activity for two minutes together. Matilda kept checking Dahlia’s dress, gloves, shoes, and jewelry as well as her own new ensemble, laid out and waiting. Both Dahlia and Matilda kept practicing their curtsies and asking questions regarding protocol at the Royal Palace. Dahlia had performed there when she was six years old, but only had vague memories of it.
For a day that seemed to drag on, time seemed to speed up uncontrollably as the four women started to dress. Servants were scurrying to and fro between the rooms of Miss McElroy and Lady Sweet, and Matilda was dressing herself and Dahlia. Somehow, everyone was ready on time and just coming down the stairs when the doorbell rang.
“Oh,” said Josephine reaching the polished foyer landing and looking back up the stairs at the others. “Did I mention I arranged for some escorts for us tonight?”
Despite Dahlia’s consternation over hearing of James from the actress, his was the first name that popped into her mind and she felt flushed with excitement. She barely made it down the stairs when the maid opened the door.
Sir Sweet and Dahlia’s brothers Mark and Leland stood at the opening, all smiling broadly. “Surprise!” they said together.
Dahlia was so pleased to see her brothers, whom she thought she should not see for many months at least, that she forgot to be disappointed they were not James and ran to hug them both.
“How is it you both are here?” she exclaimed.
Leland answered her. “It appears that Miss McElroy is on quite friendly terms with both the dean of the theological college, Bishop Wexford, and General Cunningham. So we were sprung for an evening to escort you lovely ladies to the ball!” He hooked his arm with that of his sister.
Mark looked at each of the women in turn then said, “And where is my lady? Where is Matty?”
Matilda blushed and stepped forward, “It’s good to see you, Master Mark.”
Mark feigned surprise to see the maid in a ball gown with her hair done up with ribbons. “Miss Matilda,” he said very formally. “It will be my extreme pleasure to be your escort for the evening.” He offered her his arm, which she was about to take when Leland dropped his sister�
��s arm and rushed forward.
“But only if you allow me to fill half of your dance card!”
“Now back off, man,” said Mark. “I saw her first!” He pointed to his sister. “You claimed the young, scrawny one first!”
“Hey! I’m not scrawny!” countered Dahlia, and everyone laughed.
It was Sir Randal who came to her defense. “No, my dear, you look quite lovely and very grown up,” he said. He did not admit out loud that, for the first time, he noted she was starting to fill out.
The ladies put on their winter wraps, assisted by the gentlemen. The Sweets and Josephine went in one carriage, and the younger couples followed in another to make the trek to Buckingham Palace.
Matilda was very glad she would have Mark beside her. She did not want to admit to the other ladies how nervous she was to be a maid attending her first ball at the palace. She was quite convinced they would turn her away at the door, knowing her to be a servant trying to put on airs to get into the event.
Mark noted her nervousness. It wasn’t hard not to detect as they were sitting together on one side of the carriage and Matty’s knee was bobbing up and down rapidly.
“This really is a treat,” he said. “Only Dahlia has ever been to the palace. I must admit I’m a little nervous, though. The General will be there, as well as some of my other superior officers.”
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