Stars Across the Ocean

by Kimberley Freeman

  As she waited, watching the ebb and flow of people around the pillars and arches, she cursed herself for her curiosity in asking Julius how much the journey would cost. Upwards of fifty pounds in first class! She had demanded he book her second class, and he finally agreed when she pointed out she would be happier with a companion in her cabin. Even so, the amounts of money he could part with so casually stupefied her, and left her with the lingering suspicion that a gift of such value would curb her freedom somehow.

  It was two hours before he returned, and the afternoon had begun to cool. He strode down the concourse with a merry smile on his face, waving a short piece of paper.

  ‘Here,’ he said, presenting it to her. ‘One second-class passage to Ceylon, and return, aboard the Royal Mail Ship Udolpho. It departs Saturday afternoon from Victoria Dock.’

  ‘Saturday? But it’s Thursday today.’

  ‘The next one isn’t for three weeks, so I thought you would prefer to get away sooner.’

  ‘Where shall I stay until then?’

  ‘We shall stay in a guesthouse that I know of, about eight miles out of town, but directly north of the docks. I intend to be with you, Agnes, until you board that ship.’

  She clutched the ticket in her hand, her palm moist with perspiration. ‘Thank you,’ she breathed. ‘Thank you with all my heart. I’ve never been so excited.’

  ‘All the more reason to have a quiet evening. Come along. Let’s find the porter and collect our luggage.’

  •

  It was evening by the time they arrived. An old friend of Julius’s owned the guesthouse, a thirteenth-century building with jettied overhangs that sat across the narrow road from the village green. Julius introduced Agnes to his friend, Hugh, in the small entranceway. He had an open face and round eyes, and Agnes would have taken to him immediately if she wasn’t so tired from travel, and made to feel so awkward by his curious stares. He clearly wondered what relationship existed between Julius and Agnes, and his questions were all designed to unlock that mystery.

  Julius interrupted him and said, ‘Agnes is very tired. Can she have supper sent to her room?’

  ‘Of course,’ Hugh said, with a wide grin. ‘Allow me to show you to your room, ma’am. Julius, meet me at the pub.’

  Agnes followed Hugh up narrow, uneven stairs and then out onto a landing whose floor leaned dramatically to the left.

  ‘This is the ladies floor,’ Hugh was saying. ‘The bathroom is at the end of the hallway. Your key will open it. Here is your room.’ He unlocked the door and handed her the key. ‘I’ll have someone bring up your trunks and some food in a little while.’

  ‘Thank you. I’m very grateful.’

  He gave her one last curious look, then left, his feet squeaking on the floorboards.

  Agnes closed the door behind her. The room was small but cosy, with a four-poster bed, a thick rug and lace curtains. She made her way to the window – this floor, too, was old and uneven – and peeled aside the curtain to look out over the green. The ankle injury had trapped her inside again. It seemed half her life was spent gazing out of windows. The view outside was much quieter than Paris, but still not as quiet as the village where she had grown up. Agnes supposed no place was truly quiet this close to London. Two ladies in dark grey riding habits cantered past, and Agnes watched them enviously. One day, perhaps, she would learn to ride a horse. Across the other side of the green, a team of horses driven by a young man in a very high carriage with huge wheels sped by. A mother played with two chubby children – identical twins, by the look – and a rangy dog on the green.

  Agnes sat on the edge of her bed and found herself wondering, just like Hugh, about her relationship with Julius. She admired him so greatly, and sometimes being near him made her imagination flare and her reason dim. She developed, on such occasions, a strong desire to touch him, or to feel him pressed hard against her. She remembered the feel of his fingers on her wrist at the opera, and imagined them elsewhere on her body. On the curve of her hip, her breast. For his part, he had hinted enough times now that he cared for her and had spent a large sum of money on her, but perhaps she misunderstood his intentions. Men like Julius could spend large sums of money and never notice them. Perhaps all that drove him was familial care. That thought deflated her so much that she had to stand up and stride about her tiny room, driving her fingernails into her palm. You mustn’t be such a fool, Agnes.

  When she had calmed down she returned to her window. In just two days she would be on a ship, on the ocean. She was equally frightened and excited as she watched the world and imagined her reunion with Genevieve, and let all other unsettling thoughts float away.

  •

  The following morning Julius insisted she rest her ankle and gather her energy for her journey, and so she was cooped up in the little room most of the day while he went out riding in the woods with Hugh. Agnes read, but could barely focus on the lines in front of her. Time crawled, and she grew irritated with Julius for leaving her without his company for so long.

  Late in the morning, she moved her chair next to the tiny window and pushed it open to let in some fresh air. She saw Julius, then, with Hugh, returning from the stables, still in riding breeches but their horses nowhere in sight. They were joking about something inaudible and Agnes could see that Julius’s cheeks were flushed from exercise and merriment, and she had the feeling of a soft clunk in her heart, as though something important had finally made sense to her. She wondered if perhaps she loved him. To see him happy and carefree, after the difficulties he had experienced working with the children’s hospital, made her feel happy and carefree. Agnes may not have known much about love, but if his happiness was hers, that was a clear sign, was it not? She watched him approach but he didn’t see her; it was a powerful thing to study somebody who didn’t know they were being studied. They disappeared under the first storey of the house, and Agnes returned to her chair and realised she was smiling.

  •

  Agnes was invited downstairs to Hugh’s cosy lodgings for a lunch of roasted chicken with potatoes and the most divine gravy she had ever tasted. He apologised that his wife was visiting her cousin in Woodbridge, that it was ‘dashed inconvenient’, but ‘he had to let her off the leash every now and again’. Agnes didn’t reward his joke with even the smallest laugh.

  The afternoon was spent in Hugh’s lodgings, and Agnes taught them to play an old Yorkshire card game called Four’n’Switch, beating them both soundly many times. Hugh laughed about it, but Agnes could tell he was annoyed at losing repeatedly. He began to gulp his brandy faster and his jokes became crueller. After supper, Agnes had had enough of being cooped up inside.

  ‘Julius, I want to go for a walk around the green.’

  ‘Your ankle,’ he said, as though it explained everything.

  ‘My ankle is fine. I will have plenty time to rest it on the ship. I feel like a trapped bird.’

  Hugh raised an eyebrow at Julius, and a glance passed between them.

  ‘Go on, old man,’ Hugh said. ‘Take the lady for a walk. You told me yourself this one is a malcontent in the parlour.’

  Agnes didn’t know whether to be proud or irritated with this pronouncement, but Julius soon smoothed it over. ‘What I actually said was that Agnes’s spirit is too adventurous for the ordinary pursuits of women,’ he said to Hugh, although his eyes were on Agnes. ‘And that I admire that about her.’

  Hugh waved dismissively. ‘Either way. Take the lady for a walk.’

  ‘Sir,’ Agnes said before Julius could reply. ‘I am not a dog in want of exercise. I am quite capable of taking myself for a walk.’

  Hugh found her retort amusing, but Julius rose quickly and said, ‘I’d be delighted if you’d let me accompany you, though.’

  ‘I’ll fetch my coat.’

  They met at the bottom of the stairs. The evening had grown unseasonably cool. The sky was pale watercolour blue streaked with gold. Together, Agnes and Julius crossed the road and began
to slowly circle the green. On the far side, a tall stone monument stood and they made their way around to it. Here, Julius insisted she sit and rest, which she did. It was enough to be in fresh air. They sat together on the plinth of the monument, a statue of some local figure in the clothes of an old dandy: ruffled cravat and tricorn hat.

  Agnes leaned back and looked at the sky. The silhouettes of birds arrowed overhead. All grew quiet; the air was cool on her cheeks. She sighed softly and closed her eyes.

  ‘Agnes, there is something I must say to you.’

  Agnes opened her eyes. Julius sounded so serious and now she grew worried. Was this about the money he had spent? Or had he guessed her feelings and needed to let her down? ‘What is it?’ she asked, heart ticking a little faster.

  ‘I do not know how to …’ He took a deep breath, set his jaw. ‘When you return, I would …’

  Agnes gazed at him, puzzled and apprehensive.

  He tried again. ‘While you are away, I intend to travel north to see Lord Breckby in Yorkshire. While there, I will ask him if he has any objections to our marriage.’ Then, having finally got it out, Julius nodded once, decisively. ‘There.’

  Agnes’s brain whirled. Words from his declaration flashed up before her. Marriage. Julius wanted to marry her. The thought amazed and excited her. But then there was that other word, a shadow. Objections.

  ‘Objections?’ she said. ‘And what if he has them?’

  ‘Agnes, I’m sure he will not. When he finds out who you are—’

  ‘A lass from the local foundling hospital? Give over! You know he will object! And why do you speak of marriage in this way, as if it is decided between you and Lord Breckby? Were either of you, at any stage, going to ask me if I have feelings on the matter?’

  A look of horror and embarrassment came over Julius’s face, and if Agnes had been thinking clearly she might have felt sorry for him. But her pride had been so bruised that her head overheated.

  ‘My apologies, Agnes. I misspoke. I am so nervous in speaking to you of this matter—’

  ‘This matter? Is that how men speak of love? Do you love me, Julius? Is that what you are trying to say? Or are you trying to say that now you have spent so much money on my improvement—’ Here she flapped the skirt of her dress violently. ‘—I am a chattel that can be installed somewhere as long as your grandfather doesn’t think it looks too cheap among his things?’

  ‘Agnes, no. I never meant for you to infer such insults from my words.’

  ‘Because you and your family have money and I do not, did you assume my assent? Do you think all poor girls moon about after rich men, and so the only person whose permission must be sought is his Lordship, so he can decide whether I am worth the social embarrassment?’

  ‘Please understand. I was tongue-tied by the moment. Of course I love you. I fell in love with you watching you with Marianna. I love your will and your fire but also your kindness, I love your voice and your eyes and … I love everything about you, and I want to make you my wife.’

  But now Agnes was not so sure. Love confused her. Perhaps growing up without family as she did meant that she could only love crookedly or distantly. She doubted herself, and she didn’t like the way he spoke. Make you my wife sounded like he would own her. She wasn’t sure if she loved him, and Hugh’s words about letting his wife ‘off the leash’ echoed in her head.

  ‘Ask me when I return,’ she said; she immediately regretted it but didn’t take it back. Instead she stated it more boldly. ‘Ask me on the day I come back, when I have had a chance to meet Genevieve and know better who I am in this world. I promise you that if you ask me then, I will give you a swift and decisive answer either way. But for now, I am not certain enough to say yes.’

  Julius’s entire posture softened. He smiled weakly. ‘I am such a fool.’

  Agnes wanted to comfort him, to say Don’t be sad or take his hand in hers and squeeze it gently; but now she felt awkward and exposed and it was easier to think of other things. A journey by sea to the middle of the world. Yes, that’s what she would think about.

  Julius stood and straightened his waistcoat, then pulled his coat tighter. ‘It’s quite cold out. Perhaps we should return to our lodgings.’

  ‘It is cold,’ she agreed, glad to be on firmer ground in their conversation.

  ‘Colder than I expected,’ he said pointedly. ‘I thought it was the middle of summer.’

  Agnes didn’t answer, and they returned to the guesthouse in silence.

  •

  Victoria Dock on the Plaistow Marshes was a wonder of modern construction, and Julius happily explained to Agnes the swing bridges and hydraulic machinery on the way down in the train. Agnes barely heard any of what he said. Everything was muffled through the sound of her thumping pulse. As the train slowed through the sprawling docklands, Agnes saw huge, black objects made of metal jutting into the grey sky like monstrous trees; she saw wide wooden decks and jetties teeming with men of all colours, who loaded and unloaded freight in and out of iron warehouses, and tall silos, and belching steamships; she saw a sea of train carriages in sidings, filled with coal. It all made her feel very small and soft.

  The train left them at Custom House Station and, as they alighted, Agnes was struck by the sour, ancient smell of the river, and the steam and smoke that lingered in the air. The ships were now in full view, and Julius pointed out one to her: it seemed impossibly large, with two masts and a black funnel in the middle. ‘There she is,’ he said. ‘The RMS Udolpho.’

  Agnes fought the feeling that she was simply one more commodity, being loaded onto a ship and exported out into the vast, sun-soaked empire. She drew a little closer to Julius. ‘Where do I go now?’

  He stopped, turned her to face him. ‘All the way across the world, my dear Agnes.’

  •

  Other passengers were taking their friends on board to show them their cabins, but Agnes said goodbye to Julius at the bottom of the gangplank. His failed proposal lingered between them awkwardly, and as people pushed past and around them, he took her hand and kissed it through her glove. He reminded her of her promise to return to him the moment she arrived in London, and handed to her an envelope. ‘You will need this. Don’t open it until the ship has left port.’

  Agnes nodded, her heart in her throat. ‘Goodbye, Julius,’ she said, tucking the envelope into her purse.

  ‘Farewell, Agnes,’ he said, and he was gazing curiously at her.

  ‘What is it?’

  ‘I expected tears.’

  ‘Not me. I hardly ever cry.’

  He smiled. ‘Of course you don’t.’ He gave her a gentle push towards the gangplank, to show that he was letting her go.

  She found her way into the queue and ascended onto the ship. As her foot struck the wooden deck, she realised what an enormous step it was and excitement fired up inside her once again, burning away her fear. All around the edges of the deck, protected by metal rails, were wooden bench seats. She kneeled on one and looked back towards the dock, trying to find Julius. There he was, his tall top hat disappearing into the crowd towards the station. Her heart twinged, and she pressed her lips together hard so she wouldn’t let out a little moan of regret.

  She withdrew the envelope and picked away the seal to peek inside. Money. She’d known it would be. Julius wouldn’t send her out into the empire without means. She kissed the envelope and tucked it away again. The deck was busy, noisy, but she had a sense of stillness and quiet inside her, thinking about Julius. At length, a steward found her and asked if he could take her to her cabin, but she refused.

  ‘If I may, I will sit here and take my last few breaths of English air.’

  ‘The ship won’t move for another hour,’ he said.

  ‘All the same,’ she replied.

  The steward nodded and smiled. ‘As you wish, madam.’

  Agnes settled in her seat and cast her eyes back towards the dock. Julius had left long ago, but her gaze sought out the directi
on he had disappeared. Then, finally, she turned her gaze away and over the gleaming river, out towards the east.

  CHAPTER 14

  Once the ship was clear of the Thames and out into the open waters, Agnes decided to see her cabin. The ship would make her way through the English Channel then out into the Bay of Biscay sometime in the evening. The trip to Colombo was said to take three weeks: she would have plenty of time to look at the sea, and she was curious about what a second-class cabin on a Royal Mail Ship looked like.

  She found a steward, a very tall man with round spectacles, who read over her ticket and smiled down at her. ‘I will take you directly there, Miss Resolute. I am bound by the rules of the company to remind you about your return journey.’ He pointed at small writing at the bottom of the ticket. ‘You’ll see the date here.’

  ‘The date?’ She peered at it. ‘You mean my return passage is already booked?’

  ‘Yes, ma’am.’

  The date was two weeks after her arrival. Two weeks? Even if that were enough time to find Genevieve, it wasn’t enough time to get to know her. ‘Is that able to be changed?’

  ‘I’m afraid not, ma’am. It is one of your conditions of passage. We do like to know how many guests we will be carrying on any journey.’ He smiled. ‘But they would have told you all this when you booked it.’

  ‘It was booked for me,’ she said, taking the ticket and folding it away.

  ‘Ah, of course.’

  ‘Are you telling me that the person who paid for this ticket chose the return date?’