Ignoring his wife’s glare, Bradfield paused and slurped a spoonful of soup, spilling a large droplet upon his purple damask jacket, which was already much spattered with the residue of good dinners. If Bradfield expected to gather encouragement from his host, he was sadly disappointed. Montfort stared at him bulbous-eyed, scowling, silent. The ladies on either side were equally aloof. His sister, Margaret, seemed preoccupied. Elizabeth, his wife, lowered her eyes and shifted uncomfortably in her seat.
All this while I was standing ramrod-still by the sideboard, waiting for the footman’s signal to clear away. I should say here that I’d never waited at table before and had only stepped in when pressed by Mrs. Cummings. She was in a fluster on account of Miss Alleyn, in her capacity as housekeeper, thoughtlessly giving three of the staff the night off. On top of this, the second footman had fallen unaccountably ill (Mrs. Cummings blamed the potency of the ale at the tavern). That left only Connie and a scullery maid to help in the kitchen and the footman to serve. Thus she’d begged for my assistance “just till the dessert is on the table,” and foolishly I’d succumbed. Now, standing here in a scratchy wig, squeezed half to death by scarlet livery and gold tassels, like some ridiculous confectionery box in a shop window, I regretted my acquiescence.
How different was this chilly assembly from the raucous jollities at the Blue Boar or the Fountain. Were it not for Partridge’s inconvenient absence I should have been there—or, even better, I should have been at the playhouse with Alice. I yearned for the throng, the gaudiness, the cacophony of song, the air thick with the smell of roasting meat, boiling puddings, tobacco smoke, and sweat. I yearned, above all, to distance myself from this dismal gathering.
Bradfield’s gawking expression showed me he was taken aback by Montfort’s mood, but he didn’t inquire the reason for it. Perhaps he didn’t dare. Perhaps he already knew what lay behind it. At any rate, not wishing to squander his storytelling talents on an unappreciative recipient, he shifted his attention towards the other end of the table, where he caught Lord Foley’s eye. Foley was clad in a black velvet suit that gleamed with the luster of moleskin, untouched by any imperfection. A froth of milky lace accentuated his skull-like face with its great beak of a nose and dark-socketed eyes. He gave Bradfield a vague half smile, all the encouragement needed for that gentleman to hasten on with his narrative.
“I have it on excellent authority his mistress is always vastly good for two or three days after his Sunday sermon, but by the time Thursday comes all the effect is worn off.”
Catching the joke, Lord Foley bared his wolfish teeth. Given an instant longer he might have responded with some clever witticism, but Montfort unexpectedly interrupted.
“You do not want to leave your mistress with Foley even till Thursday, for I wager he’ll have her himself, itch or no itch. Ain’t that right, Foley?” Montfort had turned an ominous shade of puce, and his breathing was labored, his expression thunderous. Sensing his master’s mood, the lurcher, until then asleep under Montfort’s chair, began to stir.
Foley pointedly avoided Montfort’s gaze. Taking a corner of his damask napkin, he dabbed a droplet of soup from his lower lip. He turned to Montfort’s son, Robert. “You intend to leave for Italy soon, I understand.”
Robert was dissecting a woodcock. Detaching its head and long pointed beak with extraordinary delicacy, he laid it on the edge of his plate like a wreath on a gravestone before responding to the inquiry.
“I hope to depart by the end of the month. I’m filled with as much impatience to be gone as my family are keen to be rid of me. Don’t you agree, Elizabeth?”
This last question he addressed to his young stepmother, who was seated between the bulky forms of his father and himself. Her voice was soft and rather high-pitched. She spoke rapidly, as if afraid she would be told to be quiet. “I am sure you will find much to entertain yourself, Robert. As for your family’s eagerness to be rid of you, I cannot be the judge of that—but I shall be sorry to see you go.”
Montfort glared at his son and his wife. A moment later, wheezing furiously, he heaved himself to his feet, shuffled past me to the windows, and pulled back the curtains. Nothing gave him as much pleasure as the prospect from this room, he declared, and he refused absolutely to have them drawn for the rest of the evening. Catching the nasty set of his mouth, none of the assembled company dared remonstrate that there was nothing to be seen of the prospect since it was dark outside, or that the fierce cold he’d let in caused them unnecessary discomfort. The ladies pursed their lips, shivering in silence as goose pimples rose on their décolletage. The men too fell silent. Montfort, still shadowed by his sleepy dog, lumbered back to the head of the table and lowered himself slowly into his chair.
At the far end of the table, Foley alone was undaunted by his host’s foul temper. He rekindled his conversation with Bradfield. The subject matter was inaudible, but to judge from Foley’s black brows jerking up and down like startled spiders, it was a question of some drama. A short interval later and the rest of the assembly had mustered the courage to resume a subdued chatter. The attorney Wallace attempted to attract the attention of Miss Alleyn, who was rapt in her nephew Robert’s account of his imminent voyage to Italy.
Miss Alleyn, her thin nose reddened by the sudden burst of cold, was trying to question Robert on the details of his journey, but, apparently oblivious to her, he was deep in conversation with Elizabeth on the subject of Rome. In the midst of this exchange he leaned over to her, whispered a confidence, then continued with his description. Soon after that I heard a loud snort and a strange growling sound issued from Montfort’s lips. Robert paused and turned to his father, his brow wrinkled in puzzlement.
“Are you well, sir? You appear out of sorts. Does your gout trouble you?” he inquired solicitously.
“If I find myself indisposed, I would thank you not to add to my unease by your interrogation. You may fancy yourself a physician, but that is no more than a flight of your imagination.”
Robert was startled by the harshness of this retort. “I did not intend to add to your discomfort. I am merely concerned for your well-being.”
“I will choose when and with whom I wish to discuss my well-being, Robert,” responded his father bitterly. “And as for you, Elizabeth, I will thank you to remember your guests.”
As if she’d been slapped, Elizabeth flinched and lowered her eyes. She was coiffed with an elaborate white-powdered wig interwoven with silk rosebuds and leaves, and her gown was of crimson silk trimmed with black lace. The richness of this garb seemed only to heighten the pallor of her powdered face. A black beauty spot had detached itself from her upper lip and trembled precariously before falling to her breast. She stroked the ringlet of white hair that lay on her shoulder, as if touching something soft in the face of his harshness offered some small consolation. Then, though plainly shivering from the cold, she took out her fan and began fanning herself as if feverish with heat. This evident distress failed to move her husband. Turning to the roast partridge on his plate, he pierced its golden skin with his fork, hacked off a large section of succulent meat, and began to chew.
It was not the first time I’d witnessed Lord Montfort speak roughly to Elizabeth, and I confess his treatment of her rankled with me. Perhaps I was being foolishly unworldly in my distaste; after all, what husband is not masterful on occasion? Is it not a man’s God-given right to be ruler in his own household, to demand obedience of his spouse whenever he deems it necessary? Yet in this instance something in the disparity of their ages (she was only three years older than his son), something in his physical grossness and her fragility (I could not help picturing his vast belly crushing her birdlike frame) struck me as profoundly distasteful. How had such an unlikely match come about? I’d quizzed Constance, a fountain of knowledge on such subjects, and learned a little of the sorry tale.
Some five years earlier, aged seventeen, Elizabeth, the youngest daughter of a respectable merchant, had attended a summer
ball. Henry Montfort, widower, owner of this fine estate, and father of one motherless teenage son, had clapped eyes on her sweet, innocent form and determined to be the first to enjoy her. According to Constance’s enthusiastic account, this was an easy enough challenge. Elizabeth was little match for Montfort’s guile. She was swiftly persuaded to drink too many glasses of champagne and to accompany him on a moonlight promenade, which led to her brusque deflowering beneath a marble nymph. Some time later Elizabeth’s father had discovered his daughter wandering the gardens in distress. Having established what had taken place, he threatened uproar unless a marriage was hastily effected. Thus within a matter of weeks had the hapless Elizabeth left her comfortable, sheltered childhood and the parents who doted on her, to become the wife of Lord Montfort. Thus ever since, I deduced, had she been bullied and ill-used by her husband.
Connie was less sympathetic than I to her plight. Elizabeth had her consolations, did she not? What were these consolations? I demanded. Connie spelled them out for me: Elizabeth was rich; she was mistress of this grand house; she had friendship tendered to her by Miss Alleyn, who viewed her as the daughter she’d always longed for. And then (here Connie paused theatrically) there were other consolations. “What do you mean,” I cried precisely as intended, “ ‘Then there are other consolations’?” Connie winked knowingly, but more than that she wouldn’t say.
I was rinsing cutlery and glasses in the urn specially fitted for the purpose (Mr. Chippendale does thriving business in such accoutrements for the well-appointed dining room—the most popular being a matching pair, one lead-lined for rinsing, the other fitted for storing cutlery), when the sound of Foley and Bradfield guffawing at the other end of the table distracted me. Foley’s lips glistened with grease, and his cobweb cuffs swirled as he gestured with a drumstick caught between bony thumb and forefinger. He had finished eating, and his plate was piled with white-picked bones. Bradfield listened avidly; suddenly grasping Foley’s witticism he was racked with convulsive laughter. Morsels of half-chewed flesh spurted from his lips, adding to the ancient encrustations on his belly. To Lord Montfort the sight of this messy hilarity was insupportable. His face flooded deeper crimson than his wife’s garb.
“Foley,” he snarled, “you may well jest. You are leaving my house the richer.”
There was a long pause, during which I froze, not wishing to draw Montfort’s fury by an injudicious clattering of spoons. Montfort’s vitriol must have been as unmistakable to Foley as to me, but he ignored it, turning instead to engage his wife in conversation. “My dear Jane, do you catch sight of this picture of the Veduta, is it not quite as ravishing as that of San Daniele I purchased last spring?”
The snub served only to incense Montfort further. “Sir,” he spat, “I would ask you to respect my presence. You may make a fool of me at the gaming table but not at my dining table.”
“I was not intending to make a fool of you in either environ, Henry,” responded Foley suavely. “If your losses are so insupportable to you, I suggest you desist from future play at White’s. Take up cribbage in the saloon instead.”
“I should desist from inviting you to my house.”
“That of course is your prerogative. Provided of course our business is successfully concluded…”
“It soon will be,” said Montfort. Then he fell silent, his chest heaving as he glared malevolently around in a manner which was, if anything, even more alarming than his voluble rage. Stabbing what remained of his partridge with his knife, he ripped a leg from the carcass and bit into it. Rivulets of pink juice coursed down his chin and soaked his cravat. Slowly he wiped himself with the back of his hand, then turned to his attorney, Wallace.
“The documents are in order, I take it.”
“Indeed, Lord Montfort,” replied Wallace. His hand trembled as he spooned butter sauce onto his potato. “As they were from the moment of signing, before witnesses, as stipulated—”
“Nothing can be done to alter them. They are all legally binding. Yes or no?”
Wallace’s frog eyes blinked rapidly. He dropped the spoon in the sauceboat, where it slid beneath the surface. “They are all sanctioned and viable.”
“And should I die this night, would remain so?”
“I sincerely hope nothing will befall your lordship this night, but no, the time would have no bearing. The document would still stand. Unless of course you were physically indisposed…for instance as we discussed earlier…if for instance you were to take your own—”
Montfort held up his hand to silence him, turning in the opposite direction as he did so. He caught his sister staring intently at him. Embarrassment etched itself across her face as she realized she had been apprehended listening to his conversation. I could not but sympathize with her predicament. Montfort’s face ripened from red to purple. He rose unsteadily to his feet. Miss Alleyn was an uncommonly tall woman, towering over her brother by several inches. Yet now, with his barrel paunch looming like a battering ram at her eye level, she was utterly overwhelmed.
“Damn you, Margaret! Do you eavesdrop on my private discussions? Is this behavior to be endured? You are as insupportable as everyone else in this room, even if the subject is beyond your comprehension.” His words were slurred from the strength of the emotion he felt.
Miss Alleyn retracted her neck into her bony shoulders and twisted her napkin helplessly, unable to meet his accusing glare. A pulse in her neck throbbed visibly. “Henry, I overheard nothing. I was merely concerned—as we all are—for your well-being.”
Her contrition only added to his fury. “Do not treat me like an imbecile! Is it for this I have shown you hospitality these past years? Without me you’d have starved, as you still might if I choose to abandon you.”
“But, Henry,” she stammered, “I have never forgotten how much I owe you. I depend on you. You have been the most generous of brothers to me. I did not intend to cause you distress. I simply chanced to hear the conversation…. It meant nothing, as you have acknowledged. I could not understand…”
Montfort lowered over her, mute yet threatening. His eyes seemed swollen with rage, the expression in them wilder. Did I detect a flicker of lunacy? When he spoke it was to spit out his final rebuke.
“What use is exerting myself over such conduct? Your disgraceful actions are no more than I might have expected. I believe you will drive me mad if I remain in your presence. I am leaving now, and understand this, all of you, I mean it when I say under no circumstances do I wish to be disturbed.”
Then, with the eyes of the entire company upon him, he marched from the room, crashing the door closed behind him.
After the echo of his footsteps had faded, his ill-humor remained in the room like some noxious odor that even a spring breeze cannot erase. The footman and I stood uncomfortably guarding each side of the serving table. Guests and family stared at the food congealing on their plates. At length Miss Alleyn calmed herself sufficiently to signal to John, who signaled to me to clear away the plates. Meanwhile Robert did what he could to break the chill.
“Ladies and gentlemen,” he began hesitantly, “I apologize for my father, who as you see is indisposed. He hasn’t been well these past days. I trust his ill-health won’t intrude upon your enjoyment of this evening.”
“But what has caused his indisposition?” demanded Elizabeth, alarm ringing in her voice, distress raw on her face. “This evening was arranged at his desire. The library is completed for him to unveil to his guests as he intended. Yet today he ordered the room to be left dark, the fire unlit. What has changed? Has he taken leave of all his senses?”
“I have asked myself the same question, sister,” concurred Miss Alleyn, her pinched face still showing the strain of her brother’s verbal assault on her. “I confess I am no closer than you to comprehending it.”
Foley and Bradfield looked conspiratorially at each other and nodded. Foley cleared his throat with a small cough. “I believe I may be the cause of Lord Montfort’s indisp
osition.”
Miss Alleyn regarded him uncomprehendingly. Elizabeth’s eyes widened. “In what way, sir?” they demanded in almost perfect unison.
“Ladies, I cannot—should not—spoil these happy festivities with such discussion—besides it is a matter of confidence between Lord Montfort and myself.”
“Come, come, Lord Foley, we have already noted the circumstances are far from festive. And it appears that only Margaret, Robert, and I—his immediate family after all—are ignorant of these affairs,” cried Elizabeth.
Whether or not Foley would heed her plea she never discovered, for as in some playhouse melodrama, at that precise moment the servants’ door creaked open and Mrs. Cummings entered carrying an array of syllabubs on a platter. Lord Foley suspended his narrative as Connie and the scullery maid followed, bearing similarly delicious burdens. Murmuring something about attending to the kitchens, Miss Alleyn rose and left the room.
Some fifteen minutes later Mrs. Cummings and her entourage had replenished the table with rinsed cutlery and finger bowls, spice cake, compotes, tarts, and port jellies that gleamed like garnets in crystal bowls. But even these delicacies did nothing to alleviate the stifling cloak of ill-humor that lingered over the gathering. I stood there with aching limbs and heavy heart. I longed to remove my wig and shoes and enjoy a glass of ale with my feet up before the fire. I thought of how I’d recount the dismal conversation I’d just heard for Connie to make her laugh. Yes, I confess, at that moment the gloom of the party struck me as so bizarre as to be almost amusing.
Needless to say Mrs. Cummings had no intention of letting me go. How could she? She was still rushed off her feet, she implored me, for heaven’s sake, to stay “just till the port was out.” What difference could a few minutes make?
The Grenadillo Box: A Novel Page 5