by Sue Reid
‘Ferdy, I don’t think you do,’ I said. I wondered if Flo had told him that I had turned David down. She had looked so happy. I was afraid that she had, and that she had encouraged Ferdy to hope. Flo was so attached to her brother that she couldn’t understand how anyone might not feel the same.
‘Please,’ he said, humbly.
I nodded. He opened the door to the morning room. I walked in ahead of him, and sat down on a chair. He stood in front of me nervously.
‘Miss P-Penelope. Penelope,’ he said again.
‘Yes, Ferdy.’
‘Wou-wou-would you do me the honour of becoming my wife?’ The words tumbled out as if he was hardly in control of them at all. I could hear how exasperated he was with himself as he struggled to express himself. Poor Ferdy, I thought.
‘It’s a great honour…’ What was I saying? I looked up at him. He looked desperate. This was going to be harder than I’d thought. Forget the formal words, I thought. Just say it.
‘Ferdy, I can’t marry you.’
He looked at me as if I’d driven a knife into him. I’d wounded him cruelly, but I hadn’t wanted to. I’d never thought that he’d mind so much. ‘I’m so sorry, Ferdy.’ I felt tears spring to my eyes.
‘Ca-ca-.’ Again he was struggling with the words. His face was flushed. ‘Can’t you … can’t you think about it?’ He looked at me pleadingly. ‘Everyone wishes it. My sister. Your uncle and aunt.’
‘Oh, Ferdy, this has nothing to do with them,’ I said. ‘This is about you and me.’
I just could not understand why he wanted to marry me.
‘Ferdy,’ I said, as gently as I could. ‘We wouldn’t be happy, you know. We’re too different. I don’t want to be a countess and spend the rest of my days being waited on, going to parties, to Ascot and Goodwood,’ I said vaguely, hardly knowing what I was saying. ‘You couldn’t give me the life I want. I want to travel. I want to see the world – have adventures.’
‘We could t-travel,’ he pleaded. ‘I am rich. We could go wherever you wanted.’
I shook my head. ‘No, Ferdy.’ He hadn’t understood. I could never marry him. He was too young, too untried. And I felt he always would be. Birth and money would always protect him from adversity – from life itself.
‘I love you,’ he said. ‘I loved you from the first moment I saw you.’
Oh, Ferdy. No, you don’t. That’s not love. You don’t know me, you haven’t even tried to get to know me. You’d grow to hate me, before you were ever able to love me.
‘But I don’t love you, Ferdy,’ I said. ‘I don’t love you – at least not in the way I need to love you to marry you. I am so fond of you, Ferdy … but…’ I sought for what to say, ‘like a brother.’
‘A little brother?’ he muttered.
‘A very dear brother.’
‘There’s someone else, isn’t there?’ He looked at me. I realized he was no longer stammering now that he was so much in earnest.
But why wouldn’t he give up? Did he think that because he was rich he could have whomever he wanted?
‘This is about us, Ferdy. You and me.’ I couldn’t think what else to say. I was getting weary. I stood up. ‘I am very grateful to you, Ferdy. I hope that we will always be friends.’ I held out my hand. He barely touched it.
I opened the door and quietly let myself out. In the hall I stopped. Aunt was standing there, an expectant smile on her face.
‘Well,’ she said. I felt sure she knew that Ferdy had proposed – and had no doubt about the outcome.
‘I can’t marry him, Aunt,’ I said.
She looked astounded. I had turned down the future Earl Waterlow.
‘I don’t love him, Aunt. I can’t marry someone I don’t love.’ I tried to walk past her but she came after me.
‘Ferdy Waterlow could give you a very good home. What more do you want?’ she said as if I hadn’t told her.
‘Someone I love,’ I said defiantly.
‘Love,’ said Aunt half to herself. ‘Just like her mother.’
How could she? How could she?
I burst into tears.
‘Penelope,’ she said gently. ‘I am sorry. Let us talk about this quietly. Come!’ She held out her hand. I wouldn’t take it.
‘Go away,’ I sobbed. ‘You don’t care about me. You never have. You don’t even try to understand me.’
Aunt looked dumbfounded. I didn’t care. I ran up the stairs to my room. I couldn’t stay there. I had to get away before they broke me – before the fate Mother had avoided became mine.
I hurried from door to chest to wardrobe, flinging a few things into a small dressing case, tears still running down my face. I unlocked the case where I kept Mother’s things. There were the letters… I barely hesitated before tearing open the envelope of the oldest one. I recognized Aunt’s handwriting. Some of the words were too faded for me to read. But the meaning was clear enough.
Dear Penelope, I read. Your letter wounded me deeply. Surely you can see that we can never receive Alan here. The family was deeply insulted by your marriage. However, you are my sister and I love you as my sister. If ever you change your mind … that country is a dangerous unsafe place in which to bring up a child…’
Even then Aunt could not bring herself to write the word – India. I sat with the letter in my lap. I looked at the date. It had been written about the time I was born. So Aunt had offered to have me brought up in England, or to be a home to Mother and me if she chose to leave Father. What sort of choice was that? I felt proud that Mother had spurned it. So what had made her change her mind? Why had she agreed in the end to send me here? Aunt had told me it was her dying wish. That Mother had regretted her decision to marry Father and run away with him to India. Let her think that if she wanted to. I hadn’t believed her then, and I still didn’t. I picked up another letter – the most recent one – and scanned it hastily.
I grieve to hear of your sickness and pray daily for your recovery. I have always regretted that you did not return to England…
There! She hated India. What other proof did I need?
My offer to take the girl remains open. Please will you consider it? What if sickness were to claim her, too?
‘What if sickness were to claim her, too?’ Was that why Mother had agreed to let me go? Had Aunt planted that fear in her? A young lady needs a lady’s example, Father had said. But had that been the truth – the whole truth?
I’d probably never know, but deep down I felt certain it had never been Mother’s dying wish to send me to England. At best she’d felt she had no choice.
But I did. I had a choice.
I stuffed the letters back into their envelopes and left them on the bed. When I’d gone, Aunt would find them and she would know why I had gone now, too. I didn’t need to leave a note. Those letters were explanation enough.
I went to the door, and opened it. I almost fell into Baxter.
‘Miss Polly?’ She looked at my tear-stained face, at the dressing case in my hands. At the coat over my arm.
‘Baxter,’ I said. ‘I’m going out.’
‘What – with a case, miss?’ she said. ‘Oh no, Miss Polly.’ She put a hand out to stop me.
I burst into tears again. ‘Let me go! I must go.’
She took my arm. ‘What’s wrong? Where are you going? Please wait!’
‘No.’ I shook her off. ‘No, I can’t.’
I pushed past her and ran to the top of the stairs. I hurtled down them, not caring who saw me. One of the footmen opened the door for me. I don’t know what he thought. I didn’t stop to think.
I ran round to the stables.
Fred was there, but he wasn’t alone. He was talking to the head groom. Did it matter now if anyone saw us together? But I made myself slip back out of sight until the groom had gone, then I called softly to Fred. He wheeled round. His eyes fell on me, on the dressing case, on the coat over my arm.
‘What’s happened?’ he whispered. ‘Are you going away? You look…’ He sho
ok his head bewilderedly.
I know. I look like a mad person. I feel like a mad person.
His eyes were anxious and strained.
‘Are you going away?’ he asked me again. ‘Please – tell me.’
‘Yes I am – with you.’
He looked startled. I’d thought he’d smile. I’d thought I’d said what he’d always wanted to hear. I was prepared to give up my life at Langdown Manor to be with him.
‘No, look, something’s happened, hasn’t it? We’d better talk.’
‘Yes,’ I said urgently. ‘I must talk to you.’
‘It will have to be Starshine’s stall,’ he said. His calmness soothed me. I could feel that my hair was coming down in places, and I tucked some stray hairs back behind my ears.
‘That’s better,’ he said. I could see that he was completely perplexed. Soon, soon I’d explain. He’d understand. He had to. I’d make him.
I followed him into Starshine’s stall. He leaned back against the wall and looked at me, waiting for me to speak.
‘Fred,’ I said. ‘I’ve had a proposal. I turned it down, but Aunt…’ I turned my face away. ‘She wants me to marry him. I can’t marry him. He’s like a boy. I feel as if they’ll put me in a cage. I feel…’
Was anything I was saying making any sense to him? He still looked so bewildered.
‘If it’s because of me…’ he said.
I felt cold creep through me from my toes to my head. Was he saying he didn’t care? ‘It’s not just about you,’ I said. ‘It’s about the life they want me to live. I can’t marry him. I can’t marry any of them. I can’t stay here, Fred! They don’t care about me. They don’t understand me. My cousin Arabella hates me…’ I began to weep.
‘Oh, Polly,’ he said.
I was still clinging to the dressing case. I felt Fred take it from me. His arms were about me. He stroked my hair. I wiped my eyes.
‘Oh, Fred, can’t we just leave? Now?’ I looked at him beseechingly. ‘What is there to keep us here anyway now?’
‘We can’t!’ he exclaimed. ‘You know that. How would we live?’
‘I have some money. We could go to India,’ I said eagerly. ‘Father would help us.’
‘Polly.’ Fred took my hands in his. ‘I’m not living off anyone. I want to make my own way in the world.’
‘We can make it together,’ I said. There had to be places where no one would care who we were or where we came from. Where hard work, energy and endeavour were respected more than social rank and wealth.
He shook his head. ‘We can’t leave – just like this.’ I felt tears start to my eyes again. He stroked my cheek. I took his hand and kept it there. ‘I know you’re upset. But, Polly, they cannot make you marry anyone you don’t want to. Really, they can’t.’ He shook my hand gently. ‘You don’t have to marry anyone ever, if you don’t want to.’
‘What am I to do? I can’t stay here!’
‘Polly,’ he said, ‘I’ve been thinking a lot about us. We’re both so young.’ I was beginning to feel as if I’d proposed and he’d turned me down. ‘Now that Mam’s dead…’ He swallowed. I knew how painful it was for him to say those words, for I found it painful, too. ‘…and the children are at Uncle’s, I’m free to make my own choices. I was going to tell you this soon anyway.’ He hesitated. ‘I’m leaving Langdown. I’m going away – far away.’
I’m going away. What was he saying? Couldn’t he take me with him? How could he even think of leaving me behind?
‘On your own?’ I managed to whisper.
‘On my own. Polly, I’m going abroad – to Africa. I want to look about me, find a job…’
I was feeling almost as if I had stepped into the past, as if it was Mother and Father who were talking, not Fred and me. I pushed the thought away. That was the past – their past. Not us, not our future. That still lay ahead.
‘Can’t I come with you?’
Mother had run away with Father.
He shook his head. ‘No, Poll. It would be too dangerous. I don’t know where I’ll be sleeping, under a bush probably. Or if we’d even have enough to eat. Can’t you see that it’s impossible?’
Then why did he have to go away? Didn’t he love me? I could never leave him so easily.
I let go of his hand that I’d been clasping and rested my head against Starshine.
‘It’s for the best, Poll.’
For whose best? Yours, or mine?
‘We can never be together here,’ he said. ‘I can’t bear to see you, knowing that. It hurts too much. Always having to meet in secret. Never knowing when I’ll see you. Always having to pretend. I can’t go on like this, Poll. I can’t.’
‘So you do care, a bit.’ My voice was muffled against Starshine’s coat.
‘Oh, Poll, you know I do.’
But I felt as if I could already see the ocean separating us. Mile upon mile of water, as far as the eye could see. As if he was speaking to me from a long long way away. I swallowed.
‘Why Africa? Why does it have to be so far away?’
‘Because I could have a future there. There is a future there for young men like me. If I work hard…’ He smiled, but he wasn’t smiling at me, he was smiling at something far away, something I couldn’t see, something I couldn’t share.
Would I ever?
‘Will you come back for me?’ He would never know how hard it was to ask him that.
He stepped towards me, and took my hand in his.
‘I’ve something I’ve been wanting to give you,’ he said. He felt in his pocket and I saw him draw something out. He slid it on to the fourth finger of my left hand. I gazed at the simple band of gold on my finger. ‘It was Mam’s,’ he said. ‘Will you keep it safe for me…?’
‘Then?’
‘Yes, Poll. I will come back.’
He leaned his head close to mine. I studied his features one by one. Then I kissed the ring and entwined my fingers with his. ‘I will never take it off,’ I said.
I picked up the dressing case. If I was careful, I’d get back to the house before anyone else saw me. Baxter would say nothing, some of the other servants might gossip, but it would blow over. And Aunt? Arabella? As I looked at the ring on my finger they seemed to dwindle. I could face them even now.
‘When will you leave?’ I said. I felt sick just asking that. I dreaded what he might say. But I had to know.
‘I’ve to ask his lordship.’
‘So, not yet?’
‘Not yet.’
We smiled at each other. We squeezed each other’s hands. Then we let them go.
I’d see him tomorrow. He’d be here in the morning. And the morning after that. It wasn’t goodbye. Not yet. And I had his promise. It shone on my finger. He would come back for me.
‘I’ll see you tomorrow,’ I said.
While some events described and some of the characters in this book may be based on actual historical events and real people, this story is a work of fiction.
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Published in the UK by Scholastic Ltd., 2012
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Copyright © Sue Reid, 2012
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