‘Beg pardon, ma’am.’
‘One moment, sir.’ She detained him from scampering off. ‘What is all this prodigious rush?’
‘The stage is due to arrive from Edinburgh, ma’am.’
A flush of excitement brought immediate colour to her cheeks and sparkle to her eyes.
‘Where?’
‘The Saracen’s Head in the Gallowgate.’
She let him go and began waving her arms about and shouting,
‘Caddie! Caddie! A chair, a chair!’
She would have hitched up her skirts and run all the way up the Saltmarket and along the Gallowgate but it would have taken some considerable time and she did not want to risk missing the great event.
A caddie in a brown coat and flat tam-o’-shanter took up her cry. Down Saltmarket Street he gusted like the wind, waving his arms and roaring.
‘A chair! A chair!’
He disappeared round the Briggait and soon returned with two chairmen trotting at a brisk pace with a sedan bouncing on its poles between them.
In a matter of minutes she was snug inside it and swinging along towards the Gallowgate.
Before she had gone to America the place where the Saracen’s Head Inn now stood had been an ancient and neglected graveyard, called St Mungo’s after Glasgow’s patron saint. It had been overgrown by grass and nettles, nearly hidden amongst which had been a few narrow grey stones much encrusted with fog and deeply set in the earth, marking the graves of the long departed.
Now, miraculously, an inn stood there. Not an ordinary tavern or ale-house with the usual sign above the door saying ‘Good Entertainment for Man and Beast’ but a hotel with thirty-six bedrooms and a large ballroom at the back with a fiddler’s loft. It had a yard at the back too with stables numbering sixty stalls. It was also a great Posting House and here were to be got the only post-chaises and gigs in the city.
The inn had a large signboard outside the main entrance. It displayed a Saracen fierce and bold with staring eyes and half-drawn scimitar, painted in strong brilliant colours.
Annabella rapped on the sedan to signal the chairmen to stop when they reached the inn but it was only with some difficulty that they squeezed a place for it near the main entrance. The stage had just arrived with its bugle still loudly blaring and its six horses steaming and rearing up and pawing the air and snorting and whinnying with excitement at all the cheering crowds jumping and struggling and pressing all around. The chairmen elbowed a space for Annabella when she stepped out of the sedan and she was able to view with delight the fashionably dressed strangers who alighted from the coach. Who were they, she wondered, and what news and titbits of gossip and scandal had they brought from the capital city?
There was an aristocratic woman in a cherry velvet hoop with broad double bands of gold trimming. She wore a large-brimmed hat decorated with enormous feathers and she held a mask on a stick in front of her face. She stood preening and posing and swirling her skirts as she waited for all the others to alight. Suddenly a rough fellow from the crowd pounced on her, knocking aside her mask and shouting:
‘Welcome to Glasgow!’
Then he gave her a noisy kiss. The woman’s male travelling companion was a long narrow-shouldered man with a stiff, sticking-out hem to his silver-spangled coat. He flung up his arms in dismay but that did not stop more ruffians shouting and grabbing and kissing the other women passengers until the whole party, men and women, were forced to fly into the Saracen’s Head Inn screeching with harassment, hats and wigs askew.
Annabella could not help giggling as she bunched up her skirts and squeezed her way back into the sedan chair. It had been an amusing diversion and she could hardly wait to get home to tell Betsy all about it.
But when she arrived back at the house in Saltmarket Street breathless from running up and round and round the tower stairs, she did not get the chance to tell Betsy anything.
The servant’s eyes were enormous and her voice conspiratorial.
‘There’s a gentleman visitor waiting to see you. And you’ll never guess who it is.’ Betsy pressed her hands against her bosom in a dramatic pose. ‘When I saw him I had such a turn, mistress. I thought, dear Jesus, my eyes must be deceiving me …’
Annabella stamped her foot with impatience.
‘Gracious heavens, tell me who it is.’
And then, who should she see standing in the doorway of her bedroom but Carter Cunningham from Virginia.
9
USUALLY Annabella was quick to recover her poise no matter what surprising or vexatious situation fell upon her. On this occasion, however, she found it difficult. She had been deeply hurt by Cunningham’s desertion of her in Virginia. Although, of course, she had refused to allow the matter to cast her down and she certainly did not betray her feelings to anyone.
Now she was glad of the half-dark lobby to hide the distress and confusion in her face. She fumbled for her fan, then began flicking it with apparent unconcern, as she swept towards the bedroom.
‘This is indeed a surprise, sir,’ she flung at him in passing. ‘It has been such a long time, I barely recognise you. But welcome to Glasgow. Can I offer you a glass of whisky?’
He made a graceful bow.
‘Mistress Blackadder.’
Willing her hands not to tremble, she poured out a whisky and handed it to him.
‘I think I will join you,’ she said, pouring another.
He smiled.
‘To our renewed acquaintance.’
She clinked glasses with him, unable to say anything. But the whisky soon warmed her and steadied her, although her heart pattered at the sight of him. What easy elegance he had in his claret-coloured coat with its large buttons and cuffs and lace frothing at his neck and wrists. What a penetrating grey-green his eyes were. Like marble chips. Yet there was a glimmer of mischief about them that gentled their hardness.
After a moment or two of silence while he stared at her in the most disconcerting fashion, he said:
‘What must you think of me?’
‘Think of you, sir? I do not know what you mean.’
‘Since we last met …’
‘Since we last met I confess I have scarcely thought of you at all.’
‘Ah, how could anyone so beautiful be so cruel.’ He sighed. ‘Yet, it would appear that I deserve it. I did promise to call on you in Williamsburg and I did not keep that promise. Or so it seems.’
With a graceful twist of her wrist, Annabella opened her fan.
‘You talk in riddles, Mr Cunningham.’
‘When I called you were gone.’
‘Indeed. And are you usually a year late in paying your calls, sir? If this is your habit you cannot blame your friends for thinking little of you.’
‘Ah, but surely it goes without saying that I did not stay away from anyone so beautiful and charming as yourself from choice.’
She raised an eyebrow.
‘You were being kept prisoner, Mr Cunningham?’
‘In a way that is true.’
‘In what way is it not true?’
‘I had such a fiendish and recurring fever that for many months I did not know where I was or what was happening to me.’
Annabella was nonplussed.
‘I’m much surprised to hear it, sir. And sorry too. I hope you have made a good recovery.’
‘Indeed yes, Mistress Annabella. Although I am somewhat fatigued after the voyage. I came straight here, of course.’
‘Your ship arrived at Port Glasgow?’
‘Yes, this morning.’
‘And you have braved that prodigiously rough ride in this heat and so soon after such a long voyage?’
He bowed.
‘To see your lovely face again and to hear your voice has made the journey well worth the taking.’
‘Why, Mr Cunningham, how gallant.’ She tossed him coquettish glances and fluttered her fan. ‘I can almost find it in my heart to forgive you.’
‘Dear lady …’
/>
Moving closer, he lifted her hand to his lips.
Without removing it, she said,
‘But it was a devilishly long time to expect me to wait, sir.’
His lips warmed round from the back of her hand and moved deep into her palm, sending a tickle of delight through her. His kiss smoothed up over her wrist and the bare part of her arm. She had almost forgotten what it felt like to be made love to in this delicate and charming fashion. How dull and how chaste her life had been since her marriage and widowhood. Not one lover had she had in years.
Mr Cunningham glanced up and she allowed her eyes to twinkle provocatively, invitingly at him over her fan. He slid his arms around her waist and kissed the hollow of her neck. Averting her face, she wriggled away.
‘Mr Cunningham!’
‘Annabella, my dear …’
‘You flutter me, sir.’
‘I adore you.’
He made to embrace her again but she held him at arm’s length.
‘My father will be arriving home at any minute for his evening meal. You will join us, I trust?’
‘Thank you.’ He bowed. ‘You are most hospitable.’
She rustled over to the table and poured him another whisky.
‘Do sit by the fire and make yourself at home. I must go and tell my servant to set an extra place at the table.’
She favoured him with a warm smile before skimming from the room. Betsy was flying across the lobby when Annabella opened the door.
‘You lazy good-for-nothing trollop,’ Annabella railed at her as soon as she reached the kitchen. ‘You were spying on me.’
‘No, mistress, oh, no, no,’ Betsy wailed. ‘Oh, for the sake of dear sweet Jesus, don’t beat me, mistress.’
Annabella stamped her foot and shook both fists in exasperation.
‘I’d like to beat you black and blue.’
‘Oh … oh …’ Betsy’s wail loudened and tears spurted from her eyes. ‘Oh, dear Lord, save me.’
‘If I find you with your ear to my door again, nothing will save you. And I will tell you another thing. If you do not smarten up your appearance as well as your ways, I will not take you with me to Papa’s grand new house in Westergate. I cannot have someone like you in such a place. Look at you! Your hair is a disgrace. I do not believe you ever comb it, far less wash it. It must be moving with lice. And you are getting monstrously fat and filthy all over. Papa’s new house is sweet and clean and smells of flowers and that is the way I wish it to stay.’
Betsy clasped her hands as if in prayer.
‘Oh, please, mistress, don’t make me wash, please don’t. As sure as God the father of us all is my witness, I’ll get my death of cold.’
‘Pox on you! Get washed, I say. And if you do not wash yourself I will come through here and do the job for you. I am warning you, Betsy. But first set an extra place at the table.’ She rolled her eyes. ‘Hell and damnation, it would have to be a simple meal of boiled fowls today. But thank goodness I made a syllabub. Be careful when you bring it through. That with the sheep’s head broth and fruit and cheese and some of my plum cake and almond biscuits should make the meal at least a tolerable one.’
If only she had known beforehand that he was coming she could have prepared such a splendid meal. How much more impressive it would have looked too in the dining-room of Mungo House. She imagined the sunny peach-coloured room furnished with a long dining-table and high-backed chairs. On the table was a grand pyramid of shellfish. A dish of roast venison and a boiled ham richly ornamented also graced the table. There were fillets of beef marinate too, and dishes of partridges and ducks’ tongues. She sighed as she returned to the bedroom and saw its dirty windows and low ceiling and dingy plastered walls. Everything seemed so cramped and dismal now, she wondered how she had managed to survive in such a place. Already in spirit she was away and living free and light as air in the Westergate.
Cunningham rose when she entered.
‘My dear lady, why do you sigh? I trust I have not saddened you in any way?’
She brightened immediately.
‘Forgive me, sir, for my lapse into melancholy. It had nothing whatsoever to do with you. I am truly delighted to renew our acquaintance. Your visit gives me prodigious pleasure, I do assure you.’
Just then the door-pin tirled heralding her father’s arrival.
‘Papa, Papa,’ she called, running to open the door to him. ‘Papa, we have an unexpected visitor from Virginia.’
‘Oh, aye?’ her father said without any noticeable enthusiasm, but he followed her through to the bedroom to be introduced. He greeted the younger man civilly enough but without any elegant gestures. Her father was a heavily built, slow-moving, dour-featured man in comparison with Cunningham’s tall, lithe figure and laughing-eyed face.
‘Cunningham, you say?’ Ramsay chewed over the name as they settled down by the fire and he lit a pipe. ‘Have you a place on the James River?’
‘I have indeed, sir, Chesapeake Plantation.’
‘I kent your faither.’
‘You knew my father?’
‘That’s what I said.’
‘Poor Papa has been dead these past nine years.’
‘He was a good man to do business with. Hard and astute but fair. A just and intelligent man.’
‘Yes, that is a very proper description of my father, sir, and I thank you for it.’
Ramsay stared from beneath bushy brows. His long wig rested on his shoulders and was topped with his three-cornered hat which he never took off in the house.
After a few puffs of his pipe, he said:
‘You don’t look like him.’
‘Alas!’ Cunningham shrugged and spread his hands palms upwards. ‘That is my misfortune.’
‘You look very well as you are, Mr Cunningham,’ Annabella said. ‘Come over to the table now and have a sup of sheep’s head broth.’
Her father knocked out his pipe and joined them to intone a long, mournful grace before they could lift a spoon to the soup.
‘I apologise for the simplicity of the meal,’ Annabella said once they had come to the boiled fowls. ‘If I had known beforehand of your visit …’
‘Dear lady,’ Cunningham interrupted, ‘this is delicious. You have no need for apologies.’
‘Or for falderals,’ Ramsay grunted. ‘Good plain food and lucky to have it. That’s what you should be thinking, mistress.’
At least she felt fortunate in being able to offer her guest her truly delicious syllabub. The plum cake and almond biscuits were rich and tasty too and they were just enjoying these sweetmeats when the door-pin tirled through the warm, peaceful dustiness of the house.
Then suddenly a distraught Phemy burst into the room.
‘Oh, Annabella, Annabella,’ she sobbed, ‘something terrible has happened!’
Douglas had meant to go to the counting-house after he left his wife and sister and sister-in-law to have their tête-à-tête. He felt more like going to bed, of course. Indeed he longed to crawl beneath the bedcovers and close his eyes and pray for relief. He felt physically as well as spiritually distressed. His legs had lost so much strength they could hardly support him and, like his hands, they feebly trembled. He trembled all over like an old man with a fever. He was absent-minded too. He tried to sound bright and normal but his inward attention kept wandering. Often he felt completely lost and bewildered.
He left the house meaning to go to work, hoping that in doing so he would please Griselle. But somehow, instead of turning down towards the Briggait and his Papa’s counting house, he found that he had wandered in the other direction. He had drifted up Saltmarket Street without seeing any of its lofty buildings or long rows of arcades that afforded shelter from sun or rain. He had passed the shops and booths and little markets nestling in the background, their open windows or half-doors revealing rolls of cloth ribbed or chequered in blue or white or homely hodden grey. He had reached the Cross without even noticing the magnificent Tolbooth. Its
musical chimes played Lass o’ Patie’s Mill without him hearing it.
He passed the pillared tenements of the High Street, then the more rickety semi-wooden erections. He was nearly at the college before he halted, startled, realising for the first time where he was. One of a row of stone seats caught him just in time before his legs crumpled. He sat looking helplessly around. There was the thatched-roof grammar school where he had spent so many tormented, unhappy hours. There was the college where he had gone when he was twelve. It had been better there but the discipline had been strict. No-one dared to speak a word of their native tongue. Latin was spoken at all times by lecturers and students. ‘Early to bed and early to rise’ had been the motto and heaven help any student who was caught dozing in bed after five am or not in bed by nine-fifteen pm. The culprit was lashed by the Principal in the Common Hall in front of the assembled masters and students. But the severest penalties were kept for the awful crimes of robbing the college orchard or any invasion of the kitchen by hungry scholars.
There were privileges, of course. The boys were allowed to indulge in the sports of golf and archery but all carding, dicing, billiards, and the indecent exercise of bathing were strictly prohibited.
Then, of course, the civil power could not touch anyone in the university. The college held the right of final jurisdiction over its own members in all matters, civil or criminal. There had been one case in which a student accused of murder was tried before the Rector and acquitted.
Many memories of the place flooded back to Douglas. He had been relatively happy there. It was a place with a good record. Many great men had passed through its portals. He had hoped that one day George would go there and learn a profession and become not only a great man but a happy one. He had wanted George to have a good life. Often, hand in hand, they’d walked to the college and he’d said to George,
‘One day you’ll be a student there, my cockie.’
And he’d taken the child in to see the splendid college courts and gardens. George had been impressed.
‘I’m sure I’ll like it much better here than at the grammar school, Papa,’ he’d said. ‘I don’t like it much at the grammar school; did you when you were a little boy? Oh, I am looking forward to coming here. When will it be, Papa?’
The Tobacco Lords Trilogy Page 72