Dragonwyck

by Anya Seton

  'She's your daughter, Nicholas. Don't you ever miss her or want to see her?' cried Miranda with sudden vehemence.

  He was silent for several minutes.

  'I doubt that she would want to come here, my dear. She has been under other influences.'

  At first she did not understand him. 'You mean that Katrine wouldn't want to see me?'

  He shrugged, thinking of the outraged letters he had received from Johanna's relatives after the news of his remarriage had reached Albany.

  'I think the child may be prejudiced, and she does very well where she is. I shall run up to see her someday.'

  Miranda was silenced. It had been stupid of her not to realize that Katrine would suffer at being brought back to this scene of her mother's death, or that she might have been taught to resent Miranda as the supplanter.

  It was not only the Van Tappens who disapproved of Nicholas' marriage. All the up-river families were horrified. The topic enlivened many a tea-party in the drawing-rooms of Claverack, and Kinderhook and Greenbush. 'The scheming little upstart!' they said. 'No birth or breeding, nothing but youth and a pretty face; why must men be such fools!'

  Some, like Mrs. Henry Van Rensselaer, balked of an alliance for one of her daughters, were more bitter. There was something going on between those two—even in poor Johanna's lifetime. I saw it with my own eyes,' they whispered. 'The whole matter is disgraceful, shocking. Nothing would induce me to call on them.' Nor did they call.

  Nicholas was profoundly annoyed, but he hid it from Miranda, as he protected her from every unpleasantness, at this time. He surrounded her with an anxious solicitude, constantly ordering dishes which might tempt her precarious stomach, sending her to bed at nine, taking her for short walks or drives from which they always returned before there was a possibility of her tiring.

  He exerted himself to divert her too. Caught in the lethargy of advancing pregnancy, her intelligence obscured by a constant malaise, Miranda found all mental effort impossible. Nicholas therefore concealed his own boredom and patiently read to her by the hour—from the trashy new novels 'The Orange Girl of Venice,' or 'Nellie the Ragpicker's Daughter.'

  And in the evening he played for her—the simple and sentimental ballads that pleased her best. 'Ben Bolt,' 'The Old Oaken Bucket,' or 'Nellie Was a Lady.' And on Sundays they went to church together.

  All this contented and reassured her. Except that their scale of living was more magnificent than that of most couples, the Van Ryns represented the epitome of the domestic felicity of the time. Life was suspended, hushed into a pleasing monotony. There were no violences, no clashes. The past and the future both melted into distance.

  The outside world had become unreal. She knew vaguely that the progress of the war with Mexico was gratifying. In September there had been a victory at Monterrey, and she had wondered about Jeff. Still the thought of victory somehow seemed to include safety, and Jeff was as shadowy as everything else. Even her disappointment that her mother could not after all come to her soon vanished.

  Nicholas had reversed his decision about Abigail. If Miranda wanted her mother, she might by all means invite her. The letter had been sent at once.

  The carefully unalarming reply gave no hint of the misery that had gone into the writing of it.

  For years Abigail had suffered from periodic attacks of theumatism which she bore with a grim and silent endurance. This time the attack did not pass; it swelled her fingers, her knees, and in her right hip there was a constant grinding pain. She could barely creep around the house. She could not have endured the trip to Dragonwyck.

  Her letter minimized the pain and indicated another reason. Tabitha's time is coming soon, and I must bide with her. She hasn't a houseful of servants to care for her like you,' wrote Abigail. 'Later, very likely I can come, take care of yourself my dear child, but don't coddle overmuch. Be thankful you have such a good husband.'

  For Miranda's letters were full of Nicholas' care and tenderness.

  In November, even Nicholas' desire to protect her from any emotion which might possibly interfere with his child's development was not proof against a shattering calamity.

  When the news reached them they sat after supper in the Red Room. No malignant or superstitious influences about that room now; Miranda sometimes wondered how she had ever been silly enough to imagine that there were.

  The little harpsichord stood in its accustomed corner. Sometimes Miranda played it, finding its unobtrusive tinkle better suited to the tunes she liked than the grandeur of the piano-forte in the music room.

  She and Nicholas sat on either side the center table in the warm circle of lamplight. At her request he was reading to her. Miranda absently netted a purse, while she listened. The story filled her with a pleasant melancholy, and it delighted her that Nicholas should read so tolerantly this novel of religious faith and the love of Jesus. How he had changed! she thought, looking affectionately across the table at his dark head. It was exactly as it said in these books they read. Conversion followed upon the touch of baby fingers.

  They both looked up at the sound of galloping hoofs on the drive. 'Now, what could that be?' wondered Miranda without much interest. She turned startled to look at her husband, who had uttered a sharp exclamation. He threw the book on the table and stood up.

  The door burst open and Dirck Duyckman, Nicholas' baliff, clattered in. His moon-face glistened, his disordered homespun suit was flecked with horse-sweat. 'It's bad, sir. Very bad,' he cried, trying to get his breath.

  Miranda stared blankly from one to the other. She saw a quiver pass over Nicholas, then he lifted his head. 'Out with it; don't stand there blabbering!'

  The bailiff passed a grimy handkerchief over his face. 'Young is in, sir. He's to pardon 'em all—the skunks! Even Boughton! The state constitution's to be changed. It's the end, sir. The end of the Manor.'

  Miranda gasped, her frightened eyes flew to Nicholas, who stood as though carved from the granite on which Dragonwyck rested. Last week he had driven over to Hudson on election day to vote. But he had told her nothing of the election's importance to them. He had expressed no doubts that Governor Wright might fail of re-election or that John Young, passionate anti-renter, might sweep the state.

  'What does it mean, Nicholas?' she whispered. 'I don't understand.' As he did not answer, but continued to stand rigid, his narrowed eyes looking through both of them without seeing them, she turned to the bailiff, who shuffled uneasily, casting a nervous glance at Nicholas whom he had always feared.

  'It means, ma'am, that the Manor can't hold together no more. The farms must go to whoever wants to buy 'em. The down-renters have won at last.'

  'Never,' said Nicholas quietly.

  This calm assertion frightened the bailiff far more than if Mr. Van Ryn had shouted and cursed as any other man would. He moistened his lips. You can't help it, sir. 'Twill be law. The Van Rensselaers have given in already. They say as how the patroon even said it was a good thing.'

  'Perhaps it is, then, Nicholas,' put in Miranda timidly, hoping to wipe from his face that frozen look. 'If you refuse to sell, won't it mean a great deal more trouble, and after all would it make so much difference? We'd still have all these acres around the house.'

  He wheeled on her, glaring at her with fury.

  'You little fool—d'ye think because a prating idiot in Albany says so that I'll give up—' His eyes fell to the white lace shawl which concealed the slight distortion of her figure. 'I beg your pardon, my dear,' he said in his normal voice. 'I'm being exceedingly thoughtless.—Dirck—' he turned to the goggling bailiff. You may go.'

  The man went out muttering. If the patroon wanted to battle law and the entire country, that was his business. He was pigheaded enough to try. But I'll have no part of it, thought Dirck; I've got my bellyful of threats and bloodshed and shots in the dark. Out West I'll go. Be my own master for a change.

  Miranda readily forgave Nicholas his anger. She knew that the manor system meant more
to him than it did to the others, and that to him any curtailment of power was unthinkable—literally unthinkable, in that he would refuse to recognize the possibility. She partially understood that the manor was to him a symbol. It was his kingdom and his birthright. Had he been the King of Naples or Prussia his attitude would have been no different.

  But this was not Europe, and America was not a kingdom but a republic. Willingly or not, they were subject to the laws of the democracy in which they lived. The manor was a hang-over from the past, not even the past of this country but an abortive offshoot from medieval Europe. The expanding republic had lopped it off like any other dead branch.

  Miranda did not realize how much of her ready acceptance of the situation she owed to Jeff. When he had been at the farm he had sometimes talked of the evils of the manor system, and she had closed her mind in a stubborn resistance mixed with contempt. But she had heard, nonetheless.

  After all, she thought with feminine practicality, the breaking up of the Manor would affect neither their wealth nor their home, and it would certainly turn a hostile tenantry into peaceful neighbors.

  If only Nicholas would accept defeat for once. She looked at him wistfully and knew how futile this hope was. He would never accept a thwarting of his will in any matter, great or small. If he seemed to do so, it was only that a stronger and more hidden purpose might be served.

  'I don't see what you can do, Nicholas,' she said quietly. 'If it's the law now that you must give up the farms.'

  'I shall never give them up,' he returned with equal quiet. The Manor will go intact to my son.'

  But it's impossible, she thought. Did he really think that he could fight against the whole country single-handed? Even Nicholas could not do that. And Dirck had said that the Van Rensselaers, who had far larger holdings, were already accepting the inevitable.

  He walked over to her and resting his hand on her shoulder said: 'Miranda, can you doubt that I am always master of circumstance? Would you be here with me, bearing my child, if I were not?'

  She looked up at him, startled. His words were true enough, and yet it seemed that his voice carried a dark and secret emphasis. It was as though she heard a warning bell from shoals muffled by fog, a faint and sinister tolling from far away.

  Her eyes widened. Why do you look like that, Nicholas?' she whispered.

  He took his hand from her shoulder and smiled quite naturally. You must worry about nothing, my love. Nothing. The Manor affairs are my concern. You needn't give them another thought You must go to bed now; it's getting late.'

  He bent and kissed her forehead.

  She obeyed him silently, walked past him and up the great curving stairs.

  In her room, Peggy awaited her as usual. The peaked little face had filled out in these months, had acquired a pixie-like prettiness. She was happy at Dragonwyck, happy in her service to the lady of the manor. The other servants liked Peggy, for her ready Irish tongue was quick but never wounding and her infirmity touched them. So they forgave her the little important airs that sprang from her position as the mistress's personal maid, and they forgave her her jealous refusal to let anyone but herself tend Miranda.

  ''Tis late ye are tonight, mum,' the maid said anxiously when she saw her mistress walk in, her blonde head drooping. Ye'll not be too tired?'

  Miranda smiled vague greeting and did not answer. The misty fear which had seized her when Nicholas touched her shoulder had receded, but it had left a clinging wisp of disquiet behind.

  She dropped wearily into one of the needlepoint chairs, closing her eyes while Peggy brushed the loosened hair in long, soothing strokes. After a while physical comforts brought direct physical peace. The cedar-wood fire crackled cheerily and gave out a faint fragrance. The room was in exquisite order as Peggy had been taught to keep it. The great bed's sheet had been turned down, and a hot brick wrapped in flannel subdued the iciness of its lavender-scented linen. Peggy had forgotten nothing, the hot milk which Miranda must drink, the exact placing of the pillows so that they might best support a body that had grown clumsy and hard to rest.

  'Better now?' asked Peggy tenderly as she tucked in the blankets and arranged the coverlet.

  Miranda started to nod, then gave an exclamation of surprise. Her hands flew to her abdomen. 'Peggy,' she cried, 'what was that?'

  The little maid paled. 'It wasn't a pain?'

  Miranda shook her head. 'No pain. A queer fluttering like a bird inside there.'

  Peggy clasped her hands. 'Oh, the saints be thanked! I've been so worried, mum. 'Tis life you're feeling, lady dear. Your little baby moving within you.'

  Miranda pushed down the covers and gazed at herself in amazement.

  'It never seemed real before,' she said, half laughing, half bewildered. During all these months of illness and lethargy, the baby had been an intellectual concept, nothing more. Even the furnishing of what had used to be her own old room as a nursery had given her no realization of the baby as a new and separate entity.

  A thrill of awed gladness came to her now, an anticipation so poignant that it erased the last traces of the uneasiness which Nicholas had caused her.

  'Why did you say you'd been worried, Peggy?' she asked dreamily. 'This sensation is wonderful, nothing to worry about.'

  The maid hesitated, but it could do no harm to tell now that everything must be fine. ''Tis late you are in feeling it, mum, with you going into your seventh month. I've been watching you and waiting these six weeks.' She did not add that she had fortified her own considerable knowledge of midwifery by anxious consultations with Mrs. MacNab, the housekeeper.

  Miranda, protected both by ignorance and this new bliss, laughed placidly. 'Well, perhaps he's a very plump baby and was too lazy to move sooner.'

  Peggy laughed too. But as she pulled the curtains and placed the screen before the dying fire, she draught, The Holy Blessed Mother grant that she's right, and that it isn't that the poor mite was too feeble to make himself known.

  A stormy November full of sleet and hail became a cold snowy December. It was after all unnecessary for Nicholas to make overt resistance to change on his manor, for as yet the new laws had not been passed, nor the new Governor taken hold. It was in fact to be eight years before the last of the litigation and state suits against landlords for the trying of titles finally simmered inro peace.

  In the meantime the tenants, having won their point and certain of eventual victory, settled down again more equably than they had for years.

  On December sixth, the Manor House was again thrown open for the Saint Nicholas Day feast to the children. This year none of the neighboring river families' children were invited. Nicholas had no intention of risking refusals. Had it not been for Miranda's condition, he would before this have concentrated his will on the subduing of these families who dared hold aloof. He would have invited important guests from New York, enlisted the aid of old Martin Van Buren, and given a ball of such dazzling brilliance that the countryside would have come out of curiosity if nothing else.

  As it was this must wait until spring, when Miranda had recovered and there would be an heir to Dragonwyck.

  The children of the tenantry, however, flocked to the party—nearly a hundred of them. Their parents were no more averse than the rest of the world to getting something for nothing, and many of them had sadly missed this festivity last year when the Manor had been shut. There was no denying the patroon did them well. Cunningly hidden in the gilded sabots there were gifts and candies for each child. There were showers of marzipan bon-bons in the muslin sheet suspended from the ceiling which Nicholas ripped open for them with the traditional crook. There were unlimited supplies of gingerbread and olykoeks fried to a succulent crispness, there were flagons of beer and rum punch.

  After the ceremony, Nicholas moved amongst his people exerting his magnetism upon each one, flattering them with personal inquiries, expressing his pleasure at seeing them. By not the slightest word or gesture did he indicate knowledge that ma
ny of these had been his bitter enemies, and had spent the past two years in violent struggle to escape from his hold.

  His attitude of benevolent interest was precisely as it had always been during the ten years of his patroonship, precisely that of his father and grandfathers back to the first patroon in 1640.

  When the last crowded wagon left, its runners gliding swiftly through the new snow, Hans Gebhard's fat wife looked down at her three happy children. They snuggled in the straw like puppies, their hands clutching the fine gifts they had received—a doll, a singing top, even a pair of skates. On their tongues still lingered the reminiscent delights of cake and candy.

  'The patroon's naught so bad, Hans,' said Mrs. Gebhard to her husband thoughtfully.

  'Don't you dass to call him the patroon, now that we're quit of him!' Hans turned his sour face angrily on his wife. 'Have ye forgot Klaas, woman? Will a few sweets and baubees wipe Klaas from your noddle and how the Van Ryn used him?' He spat morosely in the snow.

  Aye, thought Mrs. Gebhard, poor Klaas that had cut his wrists and died when the patroon turned him off the farm two years back on rent-day. Hans' own cousin Klaas had been, and the whole business mighty bad.

  'Still and all 'tis done with now forever,' she said. The manor rum punch filled her stomach with a pleasing warmth. She was tired of ill-will and recrimination. There would be no more rent-days; come July they'd likely own their own farm at last. No more kermiss neither! The thought struck her like a blow. That had been something to look forward to all spring—the Fourth-of-July Kermiss; the games and the feasting, the rivers of cold, delicious beer.

  She cast a nervous glance at Hans, afraid he might somehow guess her traitorous repining. Once having started she could not stop the disquieting thoughts. You couldn't but own the patroon had saved them a good bit of worry. There was the shipping of crops to New York. For that he'd made all arrangements, sending the stuff from the farms in one lot. They'd have to manage for themselves now, each farm as best it could.