by Joan Aiken
And she thought, also, how very completely her and her mother’s fortunes would be altered, if she were to marry kind, generous Mr. Browty. No more anxieties about finding seventeen shillings a week for the rent, paying for the groceries, footwear, coals, candles, and the doctor’s bill. No more trudging through wet, windy, or cold streets all over London, to give lessons to pupils who were sometimes rude, recalcitrant, lazy, untalented, or peevish. No more snubs from servants, or acts of meanness from such employers as Lady Dalrymple. There would be no more worries. But there would be no more hopes, either, she added honestly to herself. Mrs. Carteret’s safety would be assured. And she, Delphie, what would she have left to look forward to? A comfortable middle age, giving loo-parties in Russell Square to Mr. Browty’s friends, and leaving cards on acquaintances, paying calls in Mr. Browty’s carriage.
She occupied the rest of the day in these reflections, failing to come to any resolution of her conflicting emotions. Luckily Mrs. Carteret had so much enjoyed her unaccustomed and delightful outing in Hyde Park, that, in relating all its details and remembering its pleasures, she quite failed to notice her daughter’s pale face and troubled manner.
Presently excusing herself under pretext of a headache, Delphie retired to her own chamber, where, even when laid down upon the bed, she remained feverishly awake, tossing and turning herself about, staring into the darkness for upward of three hours, before at last crying herself to sleep.
7
Still shaken, next day, by her interview with Mr. Browty, Delphie was congratulating herself that at least they need not meet again for a week, during which time it was to be hoped that she would have collected her wits and spirits, and would be able to give him some kind of answer, when, looking out of the window into Greek Street, she saw the familiar carriage pull up, and Mr. Browty himself step out of it, adjuring the coachman to walk the horses if he should be more than ten minutes. With that, he disappeared inside the Baggotts’ shop.
Startled, Delphie cast a swift surveying eye around their modest establishment. All, thanks to Mrs. Andrews, was noticeably neat. Mrs. Carteret was peacefully established before the fire in the next room, with a light shawl around her shoulders, occupying herself with one of her numerous lists. Delphie herself was awaiting the arrival of a pupil. She had nothing to blush for, and was able to receive Mr. Browty calmly, when, next minute, she heard him scratching on the outer door.
“May I come in, Miss Philadelphia? It’s only I—Josiah Browty. Now, do not be putting yourself in a pelter!” he added, stepping inside. “I shan’t stop above a moment if it is not convenient—but I just thought, seeing as it’s such a fine day, and my gals gone out to the Botanic Gardens in Hans Town with their governess, why don’t I step round to Greek Street and take your Mama for an airing? It seemed to me, so much as I’ve heard of the good lady, that it was high time she and I were acquainted, and, since she enjoyed the drive so much yesterday—Bodkin said she was fair beside herself with pleasure all through the park—why should not she have it again today? But only if she’s quite up to snuff and feels the inclination, mind! I shan’t constrain her to come out if she don’t feel the thing.”
“That is exceedingly kind and thoughtful of you, sir,” said Delphie, quite startled by this unexpected departure. “Indeed, my mother feels in excellent spirits—the drive yesterday did her a world of good. But w-will you not step through and put the invitation to her yourself?”
Saying so, however, she glanced at him inquiringly, and he, correctly reading a hint of doubt in her look gave her an encouraging nod, and said,
“Now, you are not to be thinking, my dear, that I shall mention a word to her of—of what we was speaking about yesterday. That’s between you and me, and will remain so, unless it should come into your mind to give me yes for an answer. But there’s no harm in my getting acquainted with your Mama, now, is there?”
“Certainly there is none, sir,” said Delphie, smiling at him. “Indeed I think it a most delightful plan, and am wholly obliged to you. Please to come through.”
And she added, stepping into the other room,
“Mamma, here is Mr. Browty, who has done me so many kindnesses, and of whom you have heard me speak so often. And he is here to do yet another kindness—he wishes to take you driving again—since you enjoyed yesterday’s outing so much.”
Mrs. Carteret acknowledged the introduction graciously. She was employed with a pencil and numerous small pieces of paper, but she put them aside, stood up, and curtsied, and said how much obliged she had been to Mr. Browty for the loan of his carriage. Today she had on her tabby silk (which Mrs. Andrews had washed out in soapwort after its drenching on Mrs. Carteret’s walk to St. Paul’s, and which had come up as good as new); she looked charming, with her hair glinting through a tatted cap.
“But you are busy. I interrupt you,” said Mr. Browty anxiously.
“Not at all, sir; I am merely planning the menu and the quantity of wine and flowers required for a ball of three hundred persons for my daughter’s coming out,” Mrs. Carteret explained placidly. “But it is of no moment if I leave off for a little; the ball is not to be held until three weeks from now.”
“My mother—my mother very often amuses herself with this kind of planning,” Delphie said.
Mr. Browty laughed heartily and said it was a kind of planning he greatly enjoyed himself.
“When I give a ball for my gals, Mrs. Carteret, I shall apply to you for advice. But now let us be off! I hear Miss Philadelphia’s pupil in the next room, and she will be wishing me at Jericho.”
Delphie, abandoning her pupil for the moment, ran down the stairs after them with a quantity of shawls, but Mr. Browty assured her there was no need for them: he had enough fur rugs in the carriage to wrap up half a dozen Esquimaux.
“I’ll bring her back all right and tight in a couple of hours, Miss Philadelphia, don’t you fret your head!”
She was able to wave them off with a light heart and ran up the stairs again, smiling to herself as she wondered what they would find to talk about.
Since she had an hour’s free time at the end of her lesson, she was about to do some shopping, and had put on her bonnet and taken up a basket, when Jenny Baggott came panting up the stairs, big-eyed.
“Lor, Miss Delphie, you’ll never guess! It’s him! Himself! Him as I’m not to speak of! A-wishful to see you, and asking is this where you reside!” Jenny stopped to get her breath. “What shall I tell him, love? Shall I ask him to step up? Shall I say as how you’re at home? Just fancy his coming here! I was never so surprised in my life as when I saw him come walking into the shop and say, ‘Does Miss Carteret live here?’ Sister was going to say yes directly, but, ‘Wait a moment!’ says I, ‘Wait, and I’ll just inquire.’ ”
“Do you mean that Mr. Penistone is here?” said Delphie, very much astonished.
“That I do! Ain’t it famous! Though I will say,” added Jenny, “he do look in a fair tweak about something. Let’s hope as seeing you will set him to rights and put him in a better skin—that is,” she added hopefully, “if you wants to see him, Miss Delphie?”
Delphie said that she would be pleased to see Mr. Penistone, and awaited his arrival with a fast-beating heart. She did her best to quell her agitation. After all, it was probable that he merely wished to reclaim his ring. She heard his rapid step on the stair, he knocked, and next minute was in the room with her. She felt, rather than saw that he gave a swift glance around, then his eyes were on her face.
“Good day, sir,” said Delphie calmly. “I am glad that you are come, as I have been wanting to return your ring to you; you must excuse me for having forgotten to do so when we parted. I had meant, again, to give it to you at Lady Dalrymple’s but—but Lady Dalrymple led you off rather suddenly. However, I have it for you safe. Here it is.” And she pulled it out of her reticule, and held it toward him.
He made no move to take it. He was, as Jenny had remarked, looking decidedly put out. His bla
ck brows were drawn together with a line between them, his mouth was rigidly compressed, and a muscle twitched in his cheek.
“I am come to give you a highly awkward and unwelcome piece of news, ma’am,” he said abruptly.
Delphie raised her brows.
“If it is that my uncle has recovered from his deathbed, I know it already,” she said coolly. “But I can hardly regard it as unwelcome if it gives him time to make his peace with God before his final dissolution.”
To her surprise, Mr. Penistone gave a slight, grim chuckle.
“Well, no, that was not the information I had in mind,” he said. “Though I can hardly blame you for regarding his recovery as unwelcome, since your mother’s allowance is contingent upon his death.”
Delphie blushed, but, rallying, inquired,
“Has Lord Bollington changed his will again, then? Is that what you are come to tell me?”
“No, ma’am; so far as I know the will stands; no, I am afraid that my disclosure is of a more distressing nature still.”
“Well, I am quite at a loss to guess what it may be, and can only wait for you to enlighten me,” Delphie said, though her heart had begun to beat even more uncomfortably fast.
“It is the most damnable coil imaginable,” he said. “You will have to forgive my language. It seems that the person who performed the—the—our marriage ceremony was no play-actor, but a real bishop from overseas; that the licence was a perfectly valid one; and that we are, in fact, man and wife.”
“What?” cried Delphie. She added faintly after a moment, “I hope you are jesting, sir?”
“It is no jest, I assure you,” he replied bleakly.
“That man a real bishop? We are really married?”
“So it would appear.”
“But—but—” said Delphie. “But how did all this come about?”
“My cousin Fitzjohn says it is all a chapter of accidents. He had asked the bishop (who had of course come prepared to read the real marriage service over me and my cousin Elaine)—Fitzjohn had asked him to read some curtailed form of the service which would sound enough like the real one to deceive my uncle, but would not be valid. And then, not to use the real license which I had procured, but merely to write our names on a piece of paper. But, either Fitz did not make himself fully understood or—or—I do not know what! It seems that the bishop—who must either have been half-seas over or queer in his attic—did neither of the things requested, and so you and I are tied together in a legal knot.”
He stopped, glaring at Delphie as if it were all her fault.
She said, coolly enough,
“Well, it does not signify, after all! I believe that in cases where—where the marriage has not been consummated, it is not at all difficult to have it dissolved again, if both the parties are in agreement. If you can make arrangements to have this done, sir, I shall be greatly obliged to you.”
“Ay, but it is not so easy as that,” said Mr. Penistone gloomily.
“Why not, pray? Are you quite sure about all this?” said Delphie. “Have you been to see the bishop?”
“Oh, Lord, yes. He is staying in London now, with the Dean of Westminster, before setting sail back to Bengal—from which I wish he’d never set out!” exclaimed Gareth wrathfully. “No, he said he’s as sorry as could be, but it’s all as tight as—as oakum. He didn’t fully understand what we had to repine about—for my cousin Fitz, it seems, not wishing to shock him, had not told him of your substitution for Elaine—but merely spun him some tale about Elaine’s scruples as to not being married in a proper church, and her wishing to defer the ceremony until it could be done with all the trimmings. And if that was all that worried us, the bishop said, we need have no concern at all, for we could get married again in St. George’s, Hanover Square, or anywhere else, as soon as we pleased!”
“Thank you, no! Once is quite enough! Your cousin certainly seems to have mismanaged the whole affair,” Delphie commented.
“Ay. He, too, said he was as sorry as could be!”
“But, after all, there is no need to fall into despair. A dissolution will solve the problem, will it not?”
“But then,” said Gareth grimly, “my uncle will get wind of the matter! And he will realize that it was all a take-in! And what will his feelings be then? No, I fear we cannot have recourse to a dissolution.”
Delphie gazed at him, silenced. After a short pause, she said, blankly,
“You mean that we are married and must remain so?”
“That is precisely what I mean! We can do nothing until my uncle dies.”
Delphie began to be extremely angry.
“I never heard of anything so outrageous in my life! It may be all very well for you—I understand that you—that your circumstances—that you were in no particular hurry to enter the married state. But what about me? What about my circumstances?”
“Well? What about them?” inquired Mr. Penistone, giving her an annoyingly cool appraisal. “Do not tell me, Miss Carteret, that if you had had a devoted admirer waiting to drag you to the altar, you would have been quite so willing to take part in that piece of play-acting last week! Every feeling would have been offended.”
“Every feeling was offended,” snapped Delphie. “And—as it happens, sir—there is a gentleman whose proposals I am considering at this moment.”
She glared challengingly at Mr. Penistone.
“What am I supposed to say to him, pray?”
“Oh, well, of course,” said he after a moment or two, “that does put the case on another footing. I regret the predicament that you are in.”
“You cannot regret it more than I do, sir! But what, if I may ask, are the circumstances relating to yourself, which make it so imperative that you retain your uncle’s favor? At such a cost to us both?”
“I am not at liberty to discuss that aspect of the matter,” he said curtly.
“In that case,” remarked Delphie, in a voice shaking with indignation, “I see no purpose in continuing this discussion. I shall wish you good day, sir.”
“You forget,” he said, a smile of annoyance curling his lip, “that, as we are now man and wife, I have authority over you. I may remain here, if I choose—even take up residence.”
“You are no gentleman if you choose to do so!” Delphie fairly blazed at him. “Let me tell you, sir, that I would sooner be married to—to that piano, than to you! Please take your departure, before I am obliged to call my friends from downstairs!”
“Calm yourself, miss—ma’am; I am going, directly. But I fear that it may be necessary for us to meet again at some time to discuss the—our situation,” he said stiffly. “Rest assured that I bitterly regret the necessity—quite as much as you may, indeed! I have not the least wish to force myself into your company, I assure you. But nonetheless I think I should give you some direction to which you can apply in case you need—in case you need to talk to me.”
“A most unlikely contingency, I dare say!” said Delphie as he wrote an address on a card, which he then laid on the piano.
“Oh!” she said, reading the address on it, which was in care of a bookseller’s, in Shepherd’s Market.
“You seemed surprised, ma’am?”
“I had thought—but it is of no consequence,” said Delphie, who had recollected Lady Dalrymple saying—”Lives with his mistress in a house in Curzon Street.”
He misunderstood her.
“I do spend some part of my time at Horsmonden Manor, but business affairs, at present, keep me for the most part in London.”
Gaming, no doubt, thought Delphie. She remarked coldly,
“It is of no consequence to me how you pass your time, cousin. Allow me to wish you good day.” She then somewhat spoiled the flow of this peroration by adding, “Oh, but what about your ring? Had you not better have it back?”
“It seems to me,” he said, “that you had best keep it for the present. It was my mother’s ring. I am sure it can come to no harm with you.”
“I will keep it tied up in a handkerchief,” said Delphie.
He bowed stiffly and took his leave. At the door he turned to say,
“By the by, I greatly enjoyed your singing the other evening, cousin. Your performance was delightful.”
Then he closed the door and she heard him run down the stairs.
Delphie was divided in mind between a wish to sit down and indulge in a burst of tears, and an irrational desire to observe Mr. Penistone from the window as he walked away down Greek Street. Fortunately, she decided on the second of these alternatives, for when she looked out, she saw that Mr. Browty’s carriage had returned, and her mother was just alighting, with his assistance. Reflecting how extremely awkward it would have been if the pair of them had returned to find her in a crying fit, Delphie made haste to get out the bread-cake and bottle of sherry, which was all they had to offer visitors. But when her mother came in, she was alone; Mr. Browty, with most distinguished consideration, had seen her as far as the door and then returned to the carriage.
Delphie could not but be relieved.
Mrs. Carteret was in excellent spirits, and full of chat as she returned to her fireside seat.
“A most engaging man—not quite a gentleman, perhaps, but so full of consideration!—most truly thoughtful and obliging! Had promised to return and take her for another outing whenever she wished it—had said he greatly enjoyed the drive too—full of interesting conversation—tales of his life in the East—described the house in Russell Square, also—quite a curiosity to see it, she must confess!”
After she had been settled in her chair for a little while, occupied in gazing happily at the flames rather than returning to her previous lists, she suddenly remarked,
“Philadelphia!”
“Yes, Mamma?”
“Such a curious thing! You remember the other day we were talking of my cousin Gareth Penistone, who died in the Peninsula? Well, I really believe I must have seen his ghost! But what could the ghost of my cousin Gareth have been doing walking down Greek Street?”