It seemed a miracle that she was able to survive the strain of the next few days and still retain a calm and polite mask for her guests. Some degree of strain or unhappiness must have shown, however, or Mrs Jeffries was a more perceptive person than the others. On one occasion she inquired in a confidential and kindly tone if there was anything amiss and if so was there anything she could do to help. Mrs Jeffries was a timid woman overshadowed by her rather pompous and self-opinionated husband and the sympathy and pity in her expression made Regina die a thousand deaths. Were they all pitying her, she wondered, were they all thinking that Harding preferred Annabella to her and that Annabella would make a more suitable wife? With icy dignity she assured Mrs Jeffries that everything was perfectly all right.
At last the guests bid their farewells, or at least the Washingtons, the Abercrombies and the Jeffries did. Annabella and Nancy stayed a day longer and until, or perhaps especially during, the last meal before they left, Regina was in a state of tension.
Harding said,
‘Next time you visit you must bring your son, Annabella. It seems strange that I have not met him yet. Does he take after you or your late husband?’
‘He has my husband’s colouring, Mr Harding, but I fear he takes after me in other things,’ she said. ‘He is prodigiously high-tempered and wilful at times.’
‘If he is like you, he cannot be lacking in charm, mistress,’ Harding said.
Annabella widened her eyes.
‘Why, sir, I believe you nearly paid me a compliment. If you are not truly solicitous to check such pretty speeches, you will have us all in a flutter for we won’t know what to make of you.’
‘I only tell the truth,’ Harding grinned, ‘and I will tell you what I think of your son when I meet him.’
‘Sometimes I think he misses a father’s stern hand. My Papa spoils him, indeed he is amused when the boy copies his somewhat harsh manner. He was telling Papa not long ago of an incident in which he’d seen fit to give some unfortunate fellow a kicking. Apparently the man is a consumptive and a butt of much ridicule and harsh treatment at the settlement. I was not amused, I can tell you, and I boxed Mungo’s ears. Of course he is a good boy really, and even in this matter had been concerned for the way the man was fouling the path on which ladies had to walk.’
‘He sounds a devilishly fine youngster to me.’
Annabella eyed him mischievously.
‘Yes, I believe the two of you would get on wondrously well.’
Regina was sitting with eyes lowered, hardly daring to breathe. Annabella was surely tormenting her, purposely dangling her on an ever-tightening noose of suspense. She sat willing the laughing voice to wither into silence, the light to extinguish in the vivacious face. But to the very last moment before she left, Annabella remained as energetic and every bit as frustrating as ever.
She even managed to catch Regina unawares and shock her just before she left. Before Regina could freeze her off, Annabella pounced on her and kissed her goodbye.
‘You went to such a lot of trouble for us, Regina. I thank you for your kind hospitality.’
Then into her carriage with much bunching up of skirts and hat ribbons fluttering in the breeze, then waving from the carriage window, then a last cheery sing song of:
‘Goodbye! Goodbye!’
And she was gone.
Regina’s tension and strain relaxed thankfully away with the rollicking carriage as it disappeared into the forest. A silence descended like a blanket. Suddenly the place was isolated again. If you stood very still, as she was doing now, you could hear the grass sighing. Squirrels darted half way down a nearby tree, clung and stared, and darted up again.
Harding turned and without a word strode back into the house. After a few minutes she followed him, the skirt of her green gown making regular swishing sounds. Passing Melie Anne in the hall, she ordered all the flowers to be removed, tea to be served in the drawing-room and Lottie to be brought down. Not that she particularly enjoyed having the child take up so much time and attention at tea time, but she was anxious for everything to return to normal as soon as possible. Harding had been happy and contented before with the routine they had established. Surely he would be again. Not that she had forgiven him for his behaviour during the visit. She felt harrowed and wounded. All she wanted was to recover, to feel safe and secure once more.
Harding was sprawled back in his chair with a glass of whisky in his hand when she entered the drawing-room.
‘Well,’ he said, his dark eyes full of bitterness. ‘Are you satisfied now?’
‘What do you mean?’
‘She’s gone.’
‘I believe the visit was a social success,’ she said, going around plumping up cushions and ignoring his last remark. ‘Everyone enjoyed themselves. Or so they said.’
‘Of course they enjoyed themselves. Of course it was a social success. But they needn’t thank you for anything.’
Green eyes glittered across at him like cut glass.
‘I worked hard to have everything run smoothly and to have their every need satisfied.’
‘You worked hard!’ He sneered sarcastically. ‘You did nothing to make this past week a success.’
‘I did nothing?’ She was so incredulous that for a moment she could not talk.
‘All you were capable of was hovering in the background, like a block of ice, freezing everyone who came near you.’
‘How dare you talk to me like that? You know perfectly well the amount of work and care and thought I put into the preparations for the visit.’
‘The fact remains, mistress, that if it had not been for Annabella, the whole thing would have been a disaster.’
‘I do not see why.’
‘I know you do not see why. Christ, in your own ghastly way you’re as hopeless and as useless as Kitty ever was.’
Regina paled.
‘You are besotted with Annabella. Everyone saw what a fool you made of yourself in her company. They pitied me. How could I feel relaxed in such circumstances? I will never forget these past few days as long as I live.’
‘Papa! Papa!’ Suddenly the door burst open and Lottie toddled in, her plump legs nearly running away with her in her eagerness to reach Harding’s chair.
He swooped her up in his arms and kissed and hugged her before settling her comfortably on his knee.
‘Tea, Papa, tea, Papa!’ she chanted excitedly.
‘Yes, here it comes.’ He pointed to Melie Anne who had arrived with a tray. ‘Let’s see what there is. Ah! Sugar biscuits. Your favourites!’
He gave her one and she promptly held it up to his mouth so that he could share it. He took a bite and dutifully thanked her. Then Lottie held the biscuit up in Regina’s direction.
‘Mama?’
Regina came over and knelt down in front of the child. She took a careful bite at the biscuit. Then she kissed her daughter and said,
‘Mama’s good girl!’
18
ANNABELLA, Griselle, Phemy and Letitia crushed together at the open window of Letitia’s flat in Trongate Street. They kept giving cries of protest and horror at the scene they were witnessing in the street below. A cheering crowd had gathered into a ring in the middle of which two pugilists dressed in nothing but breeches were engaged in a bare-fisted contest. After thirty-odd rounds of pounding at one another, they had reduced their bodies to sides of raw beef and their faces to bloody masks. They were now staggering blindly about and slipping in their own blood.
Annabella stamped her foot and shouted:
‘I cannot stand any more of this. I am going down to put a stop to it.’
‘Annabella!’ the other women cried out in alarm. ‘You will be in danger. It is no place for a lady.’
‘Then, damn it all, I am no lady for I am going down there.’
Just then their attention was caught by a single gig with a speeding horse coming at full gallop from the direction of the Gallowgate. It rushed into the ring sending ea
rth and stones spurting up and spectators scurrying away on either side. Down from the gig jumped a man in a powdered tie-wig and lime-green coat. He took up a stance between the fighters and shouted:
‘The fight is finished.’
There were immediate infuriated cries from the spectators. In answer to this, the man promptly drew a sword.
‘Whoever disagrees with me, step forward,’ he challenged. ‘I will take great pleasure in running him through.’
No one moved.
‘Then away about your business, the lot of you.’
Annabella clapped loudly and enthusiastically and called down,
‘Good for you, sir! I’m glad to find there are still civilised gentlemen in Glasgow.’ Then to the crowd, ‘Well? What are you waiting for? Do you want me to send for the military and have you flung in the Tolbooth?’
Grumbling and muttering the crowd began to disperse and the man gave Annabella a polite bow. Then he called up:
‘One of these men is my brother. He was fighting to pay off a gambling debt.’
Annabella raised her hands and eyes in sympathy and the man in the lime-green coat led his brother over to the pump and splashed him with water. But blood was still pouring from his wounds when he was helped, half conscious, into the gig and driven off.
By this time a weeping woman was tending to the other pugilist as best she could and Annabella turned away from the window followed by the other ladies.
‘Aye, that’s the sort of thing I’ll miss when we have our mansion,’ Letitia observed.
‘Mother!’ her daughters cried out in unison.
‘Tuts, I’m only telling the truth and you enjoy the street diversions the same as me. You’ll be wanting a cup of tea, I suppose, Annabella?’
‘Indeed it will be most welcome after all that excitement. I feel quite fluttered.’
‘Aye!’ Letitia was determined to press her point home. ‘There can’t be much to see from your window in the Westergate.’
She blamed Annabella for putting the idea into her son Andrew’s and her daughter Griselle’s head that they should have a mansion built outside the town. Letitia would have stuck to her guns and insisted on ending her days in Trongate Street but Andrew had said:
‘Well, Mother, I’m afraid you’ll have to stay on your own because I am having a mansion built and when it is ready I am moving into it. Everyone has games rooms now for billiards and cards, and a drawing-room for entertaining. It is most inconvenient to bring my friends here.’
‘Tuts, your father always met his friends in the tavern or the Coffee House. We entertained here in my bedroom. What was good enough for your father should be good enough for you, sir.’
She believed the new mansions were calculated for show, not convenience.
‘Times change, Mother. Times change. But no one is forcing you to leave. You can stay on here or come with us. Whatever you prefer.’
She would have preferred to stay but her sight was failing and she wasn’t nearly so spry as she used to be. It might prove a worry being on her own. Old Kate, the servant, had one foot in the grave herself and wasn’t much use to anybody any more. So she had agreed that when the time came she would move. But she had done so with bad grace.
‘Tuts, there’s far too much gaming nowadays.’ She shook her head as she poured the tea. ‘Fancy having to get yourself half-killed to pay off gambling debts. It’s disgraceful. Having a gaming-room is going to do our Andra no good at all.’
Annabella was inclined to agree with her in this. Andrew had never been very successful at anything and gaming could prove a risky diversion for him. She had already lost some money herself at hazard and far and quadrille but she didn’t believe that she would ever become obsessed like some and get herself into financial difficulties. Half the time it wasn’t like a game at all, or at least it did not coincide with her idea of a game. Too often the players were devilishly serious, huddled avidly together, eyes sharp or wary, fingers cautiously placing a card down or tossing it with affected negligence, or knuckles whitening with tension as they gripped them close. Personally, she much preferred musical entertainments and dancing and concerts and, of course, conversation. A visit to Robert Foulis’s new Glasgow Academy of Fine Arts in the Faculty Hall at the University was also most enjoyable in her opinion. She delighted in strolling around admiring the paintings, engravings and drawings and chatting and exchanging opinions with any other ladies and gentlemen who happened to be there.
She liked to read too but literature was not a matter of widespread interest in a trading community like Glasgow. There were few books to be had. They were sold in little shops that concentrated mostly on chap-books, sealing-wax, stationery and fishing rods. Displayed alongside these items were college classics in grey pasteboard covers, devout works like The Balm of Gilead, Rutherford’s Letters, Boston’s Fourfold State, and Gray’s Sermons.
Of course one could also get books from Robert Foulis who printed the classics and works of poets, or via the cadger from Edinburgh. But it was seldom now that anyone had to wait for special articles from Edinburgh. No one even needed to rummage through a miscellany of articles in an ill-lit booth to find what they wanted, although there were still plenty of booths supplying shoes, lanterns, stay-laces, silks and a hotchpotch of other bits and bobs. Now there were new shops in the Trongate. There was a silversmith, a haberdasher, a shoemaker, a mantua-maker, a shop that sold gloves and a shop that sold breeches. The walls of the shops were erupting with signboards. Dangling and creaking in the air from poles were red lions, blue swans, cross keys, golden fleeces, golden breeches and golden gloves. There was also a shop in which a mechanic who called himself an optician mended and sold spectacles, fiddles, fishing rods and tackle.
Annabella also enjoyed the normal gossip of ladies over the teacups and attended many merry and light-hearted tea parties and supper parties and entertained in similar fashion in Mungo House.
‘I wonder who those gentlemen were?’ she asked now as she sipped at the cup of tea Letitia had handed to her. ‘I don’t think I’ve seen them before. Of course I couldn’t see the pugilist’s face for all that monstrous blood. But I didn’t recognise the other.’
Griselle said to Phemy,
‘Is he not the old Laird of Meadowflat’s son? Did we not meet the family at an assembly while Annabella was away?’
Phemy eagerly nodded her pocked beaky face.
‘Yes, I remember. My gudeman was with me that night and he and the old Laird had such a pleasant talk.’
‘Are you catched by him, Annabella?’ Griselle helped herself to another piece of cake. Tall and long-boned like her mother, she had become heavier of late with puffy purple cheeks and a quivering double chin.
‘Heavens no!’ Annabella laughed. ‘I was just curious. I thought I’d already met all the men worth meeting in the town.’
Letitia eyed Annabella disapprovingly.
‘It’s high time you were married again, mistress, instead of flitting about like a butterfly from one to the other.’
‘Gracious heavens! Flitting from one to the other? You make it sound as if I’m enjoying a large number of lovers but I am not.’
‘You’ve had your fair share,’ said Griselle primly.
‘I happily agree. And I hope I’ll continue to have my fair share until I’m a very old lady. Indeed until the day I die.’
Letitia shook her head.
‘Tuts, Annabella, have you no shame?’
‘None at all,’ Annabella confessed cheerily. ‘But I must remind you that it is possible to have friends of either sex without needing to cultivate affairs of the heart.’
‘I still say it’s time you were safely married before you lose your looks and your chances.’
‘Pooh!’ Annabella said disdainfully. ‘No woman with wit, a racy tongue and a capacity for enjoying life, need fear the coming of wrinkles and grey hairs.’
‘I keep telling our Grizzie the same thing,’ said Letitia, keeping to her
original point. ‘It’s time she was married again.’
‘It’s manners to wait till you’re asked, Mother.’
‘Tuts, I’m sure our Andra could arrange a match.’
Grizzie cast her eyes upwards.
‘Mother, Andrew hasn’t been able to arrange a match for himself.’
Letitia sniffed.
‘Any woman would be lucky to have our Andra. He’s been well-placed since his father passed on. The only trouble is he’s a wee bit shy at the courting.’
‘What he needs,’ said Annabella, ‘is a spirited woman to take the initiative.’
Letitia sighed.
‘If something isn’t done soon I can see me with all three of my bairns at a loose end. Phemy’s gudeman’s on his last legs. It’ll no’ be long till she’s a widow woman.’
‘Mother!’ Phemy wailed.
‘Facts are facts, mistress. The Earl o’ Glendinny’s old enough to be your father and the Lord gathered your father in years ago.’
Just then the door creaked open and old Kate creaked in. She always wore her tartan plaid in the house now because she suffered acutely from the cold. It was draped over her head and hunchback and round her leathery long-nosed face and crossed over and fastened at her chest.
‘Aye,’ Letitia added when she saw the old servant, ‘and here’s another one living on borrowed time.’
‘I’ll maybe outlive yersel’ yet,’ Kate cackled. ‘Hurry up and finish yer tea. I’m waitin’ to rinse oot the dishes.’
‘You’ll do no such thing,’ Letitia snapped. ‘These are my best china cups and saucers. I’ll wash them myself.’ Then turning to Annabella, ‘Could you go another wee drop?’
‘No, I’ll have to be away. I want to have a stroll down by the hiring fair before I get a chair home.’
The Tobacco Lords Trilogy Page 82