The Sea Between

by Thomas, Carol

  George is on rock-solid ground there, Charlotte thought silently. The very last names that Richard and Eliza would drop into the conversation were hers and William’s.

  Charlotte left for the haberdashery as soon as she’d washed the breakfast dishes. The shop bell tinkled cheerily as she pushed open the door, and tinkled again as she closed it. Leaning into the window, she pulled out the sign: Premises, including business, goodwill and stock, for sale—enquire within. Well, she thought, as she dropped the sign on the counter, if the events of this last week or so have worked out well for no one else, they’ve worked in Rose’s favour. Rose would be delighted when she learned that the business wasn’t to be sold after all and that she’d be keeping her position.

  As it was Sunday, and also New Year’s Day, the shop was closed. An opportune time to do an inventory of the stock. Charlotte cast her eye over the shelves and the neatly stacked bolts of material—they would be easy to record. The laces, trims, buttons, fasteners, silk and cotton threads, thimbles, pins and needles, bodkins, hatpins, skeins of wool, handkerchiefs, stockings, whalebone stays…and the contents of the drawer labelled Miscellaneous would take considerably longer to count. There was no need to count them at all, in fact—she and Rose had made a full inventory of the stock only two months before, in anticipation of the business being sold. She was repeating the process purely and simply because it was something to do, and something she could hopefully concentrate her thoughts on. She would rearrange the window display, too, while she was there, she decided.

  Reaching under the counter for the ledger, she made a start on the inventory. Far from focusing her mind, though, she found it constantly wandering, zigzagging between Richard and Eliza, George and Ann, and William. She counted and, after losing count, recounted buttons, sometimes several times, and in the end gave up on the inventory and set about designing a new display in the shop window. She did that several times, too. After the sixth or seventh attempt, she had something that she felt reasonably satisfied with, and went back inside to tidy away all the things she’d rejected. She was crouched down beneath the counter, putting away a box of braids, when the shop bell tinkled.

  Can people not read? she thought. The sign on the shop door clearly said Closed. She popped her head up, all set to say ‘I’m sorry—the shop is shut today’, but only one word came out: ‘Richard.’

  As she stood up, Richard pushed the door shut then walked over to the counter. He looked every inch the sea captain in his brass-buttoned jacket, a very different figure from the one she’d seen at William’s house, a man she’d barely recognized, a man in a violent rage.

  ‘You look somewhat calmer today,’ she remarked in clipped tones. She hadn’t intended to be brusque, but that was how the words had come out.

  Richard sank his hands in his jacket pockets, his eyes fixed on hers. ‘I’m not sure that “calm” is how I’d describe myself at the moment. I’m under a lot of strain.’

  ‘So am I,’ she returned.

  Richard nodded. ‘I know you are. That’s why I came to see you. To see how you are. George told me you were here. I’ve just been to his house to deliver a letter to him and Ann, from Eliza. She isn’t receiving visitors. You’ll appreciate why.’

  ‘How is she?’ Charlotte asked evenly.

  ‘As can be expected.’ His gaze flicked up and down her face. ‘How are you, Charlotte?’

  ‘As can be expected,’ she returned.

  A muscle in Richard’s cheek twitched as he compressed his lips. ‘I know you’re hurting, and so am I. Let’s not make it any worse for each other than it is already.’

  She looked away, closed her eyes for a moment, then turned back and said simply, ‘I’m sorry.’

  She walked from behind the counter into the shop, where there was more space and where she could escape his eyes. There was a time when she’d loved him looking at her as if she was the only thing in the room. Today, she found his gaze merely unsettling. To avoid it, she walked slowly around the shop.

  ‘It isn’t only you and I who are hurting,’ Richard added quietly. ‘My mother will be hurting too. I didn’t find it easy to tell her that I’d be taking away her grandchild, denying her the chance to be a grandmother at last. God knows what she thinks of me for not going to tell her in person, for just sending her a letter.’

  ‘Well, my father isn’t very pleased with me, either,’ Charlotte replied. ‘He was hoping to see me married soon.’

  ‘Your plans to marry Fairfield—’

  ‘Are off,’ she chipped in.

  There was a brief silence, then Richard said, ‘I’m sorry. Sorry you’ve been hurt the way you have, Charlotte.’ He leaned against the counter, watching her as she paced back and forth. ‘Do you blame me for what’s happened to your wedding plans?’

  She shook her head. ‘No. I blame the father of your wife’s child.’

  ‘Fairfield.’

  ‘So your wife says. William says differently.’

  ‘He’s a liar,’ Richard said definitely.

  She glanced across at him as she paced past the bolts of linen. ‘What about you? What about your marriage, Richard?’

  ‘If you mean will I divorce Eliza—no.’

  ‘Well, a bargain’s a bargain,’ she said, then turned sharply away as she realized too late that she oughtn’t to know anything about the bargain he’d struck with Eliza. To make matters worse, her cheeks were flooding with flustered, telltale heat. Desperate moments sometimes spawned divine inspiration, however, and, thank God, this moment did. ‘You vowed to stay married to her until death,’ she added quickly.

  ‘I did. And Eliza vowed to be faithful to me,’ Richard returned, making no attempt to keep the bitterness from his voice. ‘God knows, she deserves to be divorced, but I can’t bring myself to do it. She committed adultery because she was lonely, and I must take some of the blame for that. And anyway, I said that if she named the child’s father I wouldn’t shame her, and I won’t.’ Pulling his left hand out of his pocket, he picked up the for-sale sign that was lying on the counter, then tossed it down again. ‘You’re planning on selling the shop, I see.’

  ‘Not any more.’

  ‘You mean to stay on in Lyttelton, then?’

  ‘For the time being. Unless the gossip-mongers wear me down.’

  Richard’s mouth twisted in a crooked smile. ‘They won’t. You’ve never been short of courage, have you, Charlotte? If you can face a wild pig, you can face a bit of gossip.’

  ‘Wild pigs are easier to kill than gossip,’ she retorted cynically. ‘When do you sail?’

  ‘Tomorrow, with the tide.’

  ‘It’s a long journey for a pregnant woman.’ There was no censure in her voice. It was merely a statement of fact. Even so, Richard’s reply was defensive.

  ‘Eliza stopped being sick five days ago. I’m not expecting her to die on the voyage or I wouldn’t be taking her. Anyway, I didn’t come here to talk about Eliza’s health.’

  She glanced across at him again. ‘What did you come to talk about?’

  The floorboards creaked beneath her feet as she continued to pace about, accentuating the silence as she waited for him to reply. It was a good half minute before he answered, and when he did his reply was so quiet that she couldn’t make out his words above the noise of the creaking boards.

  She stopped, the better to hear him, then looked at him and said, ‘I didn’t hear what you said, Richard.’

  Pushing himself from the counter, he walked over to her. ‘I said I came because I wanted to see you. One more time.’

  Leaning forward, he kissed her on the lips.

  Charlotte closed her eyes and didn’t move. She knew it was wrong, she knew he shouldn’t be kissing her, she knew she should be stepping back, and Richard knew it was wrong, too. But what Eliza had done was also wrong, and a lot more wrong than a kiss. And that was why Charlotte was still standing there and why Richard would kiss her again in a moment. And, wrong or not, she wanted him to; s
he wanted him to take her in his arms, to hold her as he’d held her on the hills above her father’s farm. She wanted to pretend for a few fleeting moments that the impossible had happened: that they’d gone back in time to before it had all gone so very wrong.

  Wrapping her in his arms, Richard kissed her again, with a tenderness that made her want to weep. She pulled him closer, until the brass buttons of his jacket dug into her chest. Tears were slipping down her face. She could taste their salty wetness mingled with Richard’s kisses. Tears for so many things, for all that might have been between them, if things had been different.

  Slackening his hold on her, Richard drew back his head so that he could see her face. Then in a voice that was barely a whisper, he said, ‘I still love you, Charlotte. I’ve never stopped loving you.’

  Letting her go, he walked over to the door and, without looking back, left.

  Chapter 24

  April 1869

  Lyttelton was astir. Even at nine o’clock in the morning, people were starting to congregate on the foreshore. A special train from Christchurch had brought official dignitaries and anyone else fortunate enough to come by a ticket, and the general public had flocked in from far and wide, including John and Letitia. The occasion—a royal visit by His Majesty, Prince Alfred, Duke of Edinburgh.

  The port had never looked so colourful and gay. Long lines of flags and bunting were festooning the streets in readiness for his arrival, and a magnificent arch, lavishly decorated with native greenery, had been erected. On the seaward face of the arch the words Welcome, Victoria’s Son had been worked with leaves on a white background, and on the other side were the words God Bless Prince Alfred. A large dais, draped in royal blue and crimson, sporting the royal coat of arms, had also been erected the day before, and beyond it were several rows of seats, reserved for the dignitaries and their wives.

  It was now a little after ten o’clock and a sizeable crowd had gathered. Those with tasks to perform were starting to assume their positions. A detachment of police had assembled at the foot of the stairs down which Prince Alfred would disembark from the HMS Galatea, and the artillery had split their ranks to form a double line of honour from the arch to the dais. The schoolchildren had turned out in force, as one would expect for such an occasion, the girls all sporting clean white aprons, the boys with their best caps on. Even the hard-labour gang had been allowed to assemble at the breakwater from where they could watch the prince’s vessel pass.

  ‘Well, it couldn’t have been a better day for the prince to visit the port,’ John remarked as he cast his eye over the cloudless blue sky.

  ‘No, indeed,’ Letitia agreed. ‘The harbour’s like a mill pond. There’s hardly a ripple on it. And don’t the ships look fine with all their colourful bunting.’

  John nodded as he lowered his eyes. ‘I should think the prince will be mightily pleased with his reception.’

  ‘I’ll be mightily pleased, too, if even a tenth of all these visitors call into my shop and buy something while they’re here,’ Charlotte said.

  John turned to her and smiled. He had got over the Christmas upset. John had a quick temper and could flare like a torch, but normally the blaze didn’t last very long. It was a bonfire while it did last, though. ‘Is the shop doing any better?’ he asked.

  ‘Considerably better,’ she returned with a grin. ‘Thanks to Rose. She likes to be busy and she’s a very capable seamstress, so she suggested that I should offer a mending and hemming service. She said it would keep her occupied when the shop wasn’t doing any business. So I did as she suggested and she gets a percentage of everything she sews. It works very well for both of us. The takings have increased quite noticeably, and so has Rose’s pay.’

  ‘Oh, look at the all the watermen’s boats, John. Don’t they look a picture, flying all those flags!’ Letitia remarked, interrupting them. She placed her hand lightly on John’s sleeve.

  Charlotte watched as her father affectionately covered Letitia’s hand with his own. ‘They look very fine, Letitia,’ he agreed.

  Ann, who was standing on the other side of Charlotte, leaned over and whispered in her ear, ‘It’s good to see John and Letitia looking so happy.’

  Charlotte smiled at her and nodded. It was good to see Ann looking happy, too. Her back had been much better of late. George was looking much happier, too, now that Charlotte had stopped sticking pins in him.

  As for herself, she simply went from one day to the next and didn’t think or plan much beyond that. And Richard and Eliza, they would probably be in England by now. Not many days passed when she didn’t think of Richard—it was hard not to with the sea there as a constant reminder. As for William, he was now in Wellington and she thought of him hardly at all. In early March, he and George had been approached by a Christchurch insurance company which had subsequently made them a good offer for the business, so they’d decided to sell. William had moved to Wellington and George had accepted a position with the new owners, doing much the same as he’d been doing before, but without all the worry of owning a share of the business.

  ‘Aha!’ George said, interrupting her thoughts. ‘Did you hear that?’

  ‘That’ was a distant, resonating boom: the HMS Galatea had fired one of her guns, announcing her approach. The general air of expectancy among the crowd lifted like a kite caught in a sudden gust, the schoolchildren excitedly broke ranks, only to be hastily shooed back into line again, while the detachment of police and the artillery straightened their spines and assumed more official poses. A quarter of an hour later, however, the air of expectancy had been replaced by restless fidgeting. The Gazelle, which had steamed out to meet the Galatea and take aboard the prince’s luggage, was steaming back into the harbour, but there was still no sign of the royal vessel.

  ‘Now there’s a curious thing,’ George said, dipping his head in the direction of the Gazelle. ‘Do you see how all the watermen’s boats are following her? Do you know what I think? I think the Prince has boarded the Gazelle.’

  ‘Mmm, you could be right,’ John agreed. ‘I see the organizing committee is watching the Gazelle fairly closely. One or two of them are looking a bit concerned. It must have upset their plans.’

  John’s comment proved absolutely right. The disembarking stairs had been carefully constructed to be correct for the Galatea’s deck, but they were evidently all wrong for the Gazelle. After some hasty modifications and a somewhat embarrassing delay, Prince Alfred eventually disembarked, impeccably attired in morning costume, to the accompaniment of exuberant cheers from the crowd. As the official party walked to the dais, a loud boom sounded from the big gun that the artillery had mounted on the reclaimed land some fifty yards away. The line of volunteers presented arms and the brass band launched into the national anthem.

  Once at the dais, the Superintendent, William Rolleston, officially welcomed the prince. Leaning discreetly over to Charlotte, Ann whispered in her ear, ‘Men do like to orate, don’t they?’ Charlotte grinned at her, then quickly straightened her face as her father threw her a disapproving glance.

  The Superintendent’s speech was both well delivered and short, as was Prince Alfred’s response. The speeches that followed were rather more tedious. Not that it mattered. Most people hadn’t come to hear the speeches, they’d come to see the prince; so the longer the speeches, the longer people were able to see him.

  The only disappointment of the morning was the news that Prince Alfred had declined the invitation to go to the Colonists’ Hall for refreshments. In fact, his visit was fairly brief. After the speeches had finished, he inspected the reclaimed land, spoke with one or two of the schoolchildren, then boarded the waiting train.

  As the engine chuffed into the tunnel, Charlotte tapped her father’s arm to get his attention. ‘I’m going to the shop now, Father—hopefully to a full shop,’ she said with a grin.

  John nodded. ‘All right, Charlotte. We’ll see you later in the afternoon.’

  As John and Letitia s
tarted walking slowly from the railway platform, along with the rest of the large throng that had gathered there to see the prince off, John watched the distinctive purple feather in his daughter’s hat weave in and out of the crowd as she hurried back to her haberdashery. He was damned if he knew why she’d bought a shop. She needed a husband, not a shop.

  Voicing his thoughts, he said in confidential tones, ‘I wish Charlotte would find herself a good man and settle down, Letitia. I was so pleased that she was going to marry William Fairfield, then…’ John shook his head.

  ‘Water under the bridge, John,’ Letitia said soothingly. ‘Water under the bridge.’

  John gave a reluctant nod. ‘I know it is but…well, I wonder sometimes if she’ll ever marry. She’s got too much of Isobel in her, and I blame myself for that. I was the one who asked Isobel to come and live with us after I was widowed.’ John shook his head again. ‘Isobel was a huge influence on Charlotte. I could see her changing before my eyes. In the space of two years, she went from a quiet, keen-to-please girl to a strong-willed, self-reliant young woman. Had it not been for Isobel influencing and shaping her, I’m damned sure that Charlotte would have accepted Richard’s offer of marriage. Damned sure!’

  ‘And I’m equally sure,’ Letitia returned, ‘that had Isobel not shaped Charlotte into the woman she is, Richard wouldn’t have asked her to marry him. It was Charlotte’s strength of character, her self-reliance, that drew Richard to her. If she’d been weaker, more compliant, he wouldn’t have loved her as he did.’ She paused, then added quietly, ‘As he still does.’

  John looked at her, a deep frown puckering his brows. ‘D’you think he does still love her, Letitia?’

  ‘I know he does. Just as you know that Charlotte still has strong feelings for Richard.’

  John looked away.

  ‘I think that’s one reason why Richard agreed to take Eliza back to England,’ Letitia continued. ‘Oh, I’m sure the story about her being homesick and wanting her mother close at hand when she gives birth is all quite true, but I also think that Richard has decided that he needs to put some space between him and Charlotte. Unless I’m much mistaken, Richard’s ship won’t be visiting Lyttelton very often from now on. He knows there’s no possibility of his ever marrying Charlotte and…well, you know the saying, out of sight, out of mind. It’s my conjecture that he’s putting the sea between them, in the hopes that he’ll forget her and she him. I must say, I think she’s more likely to forget Richard and marry if he doesn’t keep sailing back into her life every few months.’