Reputation

by Lex Croucher

  She knew Frances abhorred weakness, but it couldn’t be helped; she felt weak. She had not slept properly for two days. She felt raw, and exposed, and the longer Frances stared coldly at her as if she were mad, the harder it became to form coherent thoughts.

  ‘I have nothing further to say to you,’ said Frances.

  Georgiana knew then that she had lost her; it was an all-consuming and violent hurt, like being shot through the chest. A whole summer of friendship – everything they had shared – extinguished in one day.

  ‘Why?’ she heard herself asking, and she hated that it sounded like a desperate plea.

  ‘Why?’ Frances said mockingly. ‘Why? Did you really think you could latch on to me, on to all my friends – play at being rich and well connected and important forever? This was never your world, Georgiana. You were only visiting. You were here because you amused me – you no longer amuse me. I do not derive an ounce of enjoyment from associating with girls who try to usurp me and then find they cannot keep up – who want all the fun and all the glory, but throw accusations around when they get in over their heads—’

  ‘He hurt you, Frances!’ Georgiana shouted. ‘We both know it. Jonathan knows it. And you must know that I am telling you the truth. Whatever happened, you were not at fault – he’s dangerous, and I’m sure he’s done it before. What about that girl Kitty, from last summer? What about Annabelle Baker? He’ll do it again. He . . . Jonathan?’

  She turned desperately to him for help. He was pale, his jaw set; he seemed almost as if he were about to say something, but then he shook his head sadly, looking to Frances, who met his eyes with grim determination.

  They were all in this together, Georgiana realised, and now that she was not with them, she was against them. Whatever Frances said would be the truth; Jonathan would not contradict her. They would live in this lie forever, and make their peace with it.

  Georgiana could not. She pushed past them both. She stood in the dining room, tears of frustration wet on her cheeks, looking to Cecily. To Jane.

  ‘You know I’m telling the truth, don’t you? Why don’t you say something? Why don’t you do something for once? You were my friends,’ she said pathetically.

  Cecily was crying, a hand pressed to her mouth, but would not meet her eye. Jane would, but her face betrayed nothing. Christopher had the audacity to smirk.

  They made Georgiana feel like a child throwing a fit. It was as if she had stepped into a nightmare; or rather, that she had woken up from a long dream in which they had actually cared for her, and been faced with the reality in front of her.

  ‘Get out of my house,’ Frances said, her arms crossed.

  ‘Please, Frances—’

  ‘Get out of my house,’ she said again, each word enunciated clearly.

  Georgiana glanced around the room one last time – she looked at Jonathan, whom she had believed was a true friend, but he only cast his eyes down at the floor – and then she gave up.

  She walked from the room, barely able to see her feet in front of her through her tears. She heard Christopher’s laughter behind her – cruel, careless, dismissive. She had almost made it to the driveway when she stumbled and fell into the stinging gravel, exhaustion and distress overwhelming her. She kneeled sobbing where she had landed, making no attempt to get up, feeling that her legs would not be able to hold her steady. The noises coming from her sounded almost animal; she clapped a hand to her mouth to try to quieten them, but something inside her had been shaken loose, and she could not stop.

  She had expected anger, and upset, yes – but some very foolish part of her had imagined that she would be able to have it all. To say it aloud, and still keep Frances in some small way.

  But Frances could not face what Jeremiah had done to her, and Georgiana could not turn away from it. The ways in which they could survive this were incompatible; their realities had diverged. To accept Georgiana into any part of her life would be to accept that it had all truly happened just as Georgiana said it had – and that wasn’t something Frances was prepared to do.

  Georgiana was still choking out sobs into the ground when she heard footsteps crunching on the gravel; suddenly Betty had her, was pulling her into her arms, shushing her, stroking her back as if she were a sickly infant.

  ‘There, there,’ she murmured, letting Georgiana cry, patting her slightly clumsily on the head. ‘It’ll be all right, you’ll see. What’s that saying? It’s always darkest before . . . something. Oh, gosh, what is it? Darkest before the light? That doesn’t sound – well, anyway, the point is that it’s rather dark now – but it won’t be dark forever.’

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  T

  he next morning Georgiana awoke confused and puffy-eyed after sleeping for twelve long hours. She sat for a while at her tiny dressing table in a patch of mid-morning sun, gathering her resolve. Things had veered quite spectacularly off track, but it was within her power to take charge of the rest of her story. It would simply require her to do something that she had been avoiding for almost the entire summer: telling the truth.

  The first step was to talk to Mrs Burton.

  ‘He is a scoundrel. A cad. I cannot believe he did such a thing to you, you poor dear,’ her aunt said tearfully, after Georgiana had recounted the entire tale of what had taken place between her and Jeremiah. Mrs Burton had heard it before, but second-hand and rather abridged from a distraught Betty; the extended version seemed to affect her deeply, and Georgiana found herself in the strange position of having to comfort Mrs Burton, rather than the other way around.

  ‘I’m all right, Mrs Burton. Or . . . I will be. But you’re right, he is a scoundrel. And the thing is . . . I think everybody else ought to know it, too.’

  ‘Are you sure?’ Mrs Burton said, reaching for her hand. ‘Once it is out, Georgiana, it can’t be put back in.’

  ‘I know,’ Georgiana said grimly. ‘But that’s as true for him as it is for me. I might lose the good opinion of everybody in this town, but if he does, too, it will all be worth it.’

  ‘All right,’ said Mrs Burton bracingly. ‘All right. I shall write . . . Well, I shall write to every decent person I know. And . . . and I shall write to his mother.’

  She sounded so fierce that Georgiana was inordinately glad to have her in her corner. Her aunt could have gone against her, could have asked her to keep it all under wraps to protect them from shame and ridicule; the fact that she had not, when she lived and died by what the neighbours thought of her, was bravery and loyalty beyond what Georgiana had dared dream.

  ‘I must warn you – people will certainly talk, Georgiana, and I have no doubt that they will say many terrible things about you in return. He will not let this go unanswered, and his family will defend their name to the end. But we shall know that we are right. I hope it will bring you some solace. I know it certainly will for me.’

  True to her word, Mrs Burton dedicated herself to her letters for almost the entire day, bent over her husband’s desk writing and rewriting for hours until she was happy with what she had crafted. Mr Burton was banished outside for a very long walk; Georgiana thought he seemed quite pleased to go. She came in for paper and ink of her own at one point and kissed Mrs Burton affectionately on the head, causing her aunt to startle a little and make a funny sort of shrieking sound.

  Upstairs in her room, Georgiana wrote her own letters; she wrote to Jonathan, and to Cecily. She even wrote a letter to one Miss Annabelle Baker, and on a hunch addressed it to the Order of St Lucy. It seemed utterly hopeless, but she could not rest until it was done. She did not expect a single reply. She could only hope that something in her words might appeal to a secret, soft part of them that wanted to do good – or at least the part that hated Jeremiah Russell almost as much as she did.

  The last letter she wrote was the easiest.

  Dear Thomas,

  First, I must thank you once again, and also send my sincere thanks to your excellent horse.

  Second,
I think it is fair to say that Frances and I have severed ties for good. I regret the manner of our parting – but never fear, for Betty and my aunt have taken good care of me; they have perhaps been over-attentive, if there is such a thing. I have been made to eat lots of fortifying bread and cheese, and take many long baths.

  It is probably scandalous to tell you so – about the baths, I mean – so I hope you are satisfactorily scandalised.

  I have decided to tell the truth about Jeremiah. I hope that you will understand my reasons for doing so and not feel tainted by your association with me. Even if you do, I must pretend to be strong in my convictions, pretend not to mind what you think and tell you that I do not care an ounce if you disagree. Frances has chosen differently, but I cannot think badly of her for it. There is no right way, I think, to do this – only what is right for me.

  Please call soon. I long to see you, and I don’t think my aunt will ever let me leave the house again. Left to her devices I may shortly expire, smothered to death under a pile of bread and cheese.

  Yours – really, truthfully,

  Georgiana

  The reply came that very evening.

  Georgiana,

  It would be a monstrous shame for you to die after I went to so much trouble to fetch you heroically from the moors. Please do not undo all my hard work at once; endeavour to stay on this mortal plane for at least a little while longer.

  I hope you know that I will, of course, support you in this. I find I am the sort of fool who will support you in anything, unconditionally. If you ever feel inclined towards becoming Prime Minister, I will ignore the mockery of my peers and paper the town with posters of your face, persevering even when they begin to throw the rotten fruit and vegetables, &c.

  I will come to call urgently, if only to pry the bread and cheese from Mrs Burton’s benevolent hands.

  I am politely ignoring the part about the baths.

  Yours unreservedly,

  Thomas

  Mrs Burton was a little anxious when an invitation came for Georgiana to join the Hawksleys for dinner. She could not blame her aunt, and did not resent the time she spent reassuring her that Thomas’s father really would be in attendance, and that she had nothing to fear at all from her visit. For a while it seemed likely that she might be banned from going at all, as recompense for her outrageous behaviour over the summer; but by supper Mrs Burton had relented, for she was a romantic at heart.

  Once she had been talked round and her qualms had been settled, Mrs Burton actually seemed to take delight in the whole thing, and helped Georgiana get ready with enthusiasm, even lending her some of her finest jewellery.

  Georgiana felt sick with nerves all the way there. She had attempted to prepare herself for the sight of Thomas’s house, feeling that months of parties in the most decadent of surroundings may have numbed her to the extravagance of large buildings, but it took her breath away all the same. They reached it by way of a long, winding driveway, enclosed on all sides by trees, creating a lush archway that opened up to reveal a grand estate. The house was cut in worn cream stone, smothered prettily by the ivy that grew unchecked. A small flock of servants descended on them to make sure the carriage, horses and driver were well taken care of, and just the sight of them was enough to intimidate her; but then Thomas was striding out of the door, his smile unrestrained, and all of her fears melted away.

  ‘I feel I could have asked them to carry me to the house and they would have held me aloft and not put me down until I reached the dining table,’ she remarked, as he took her hand and helped her down out of the carriage.

  ‘Nonsense – they only do that for me. You, they would drop.’

  Mr Hawksley senior was thrilled to see her, kissing her hand with much aplomb. The three of them sat down to dinner in a large, airy dining room that could have easily seated sixty. Thomas watched, smiling, as she fell back into an easy discussion about literature with his father. Eventually, after the main course, there was a break in conversation, and Mr James Hawksley cleared his throat.

  ‘I recently received a letter, Miss Ellers, from your aunt; it laid out some shocking facts about our friend Mr Russell.’

  ‘No longer our friend,’ Thomas said forcefully. ‘I only regret it took me so long to see it.’

  ‘Oh, Thomas. You’re too hard on yourself,’ his father said. ‘You are not responsible for all the ills of the world.’

  Thomas sighed and shook his head, as if he refused to believe it.

  ‘I’m afraid to say that I have also already received a letter from Mrs Elizabeth Russell, who was once a good friend of mine, as Jeremiah was to our Thomas. She is determined to spread the word that Jeremiah is a good man, from a fine, upstanding family, and that any accusations that indicate otherwise are of a scurrilous nature. She did not paint a particularly pretty picture of you, it must be said, although she did not use your name. Would you like me to pass on the letter?’

  ‘No, no. That’s quite all right,’ Georgiana said quickly.

  No good could come from reading that letter. She had known, of course, that this might be coming, but had perhaps naively hoped that the Russells might be too embarrassed to address the rumours directly.

  ‘I know it may not seem it, but I believe it is a good sign, Georgiana,’ Thomas said earnestly, reaching for her hand. ‘If it had not reached them many times, through many respected channels, they would have simply ignored it. That they feel they must write to defend him means that some people – people whose opinions they respect – must believe you.’

  ‘I suppose that is so. I’m not sure it makes me feel much better, though, knowing I am being slandered across the county.’ Georgiana felt too hot, and took a calming sip of her wine. ‘Sometimes I feel I am making too much of a fuss over this, and that many people must think so.’

  ‘No. You are perfectly in the right here, my dear,’ Mr Hawksley said firmly. ‘There will always be those who do not believe you – or those who do believe you, but who dismiss the entire affair as harmless, boyish fun – but I doubt there is a person among them who would wish to be harmed as you were. And there lies the truth of the matter – you were harmed.’

  Georgiana’s hand reflexively twitched towards the bruises at the base of her neck, browning and starting to fade, although the real harm Jeremiah had done had left no discernible mark. She suddenly felt she was going to cry, and dug her fingernails firmly into her palm to try to stop herself. Mr Hawksley seemed to notice.

  ‘Thomas, will you please go and request the port? In fact, you may fetch mine, from my study. You know where the key to the cabinet is kept.’

  Thomas glanced at Georgiana, but got to his feet obediently and left the room.

  ‘Miss Ellers, I cannot pretend to imagine what you are feeling at the moment,’ Mr Hawksley continued, ‘but I assure you that you have the support of the Hawksley men. Then again, I’m sure I don’t need to tell you that – Thomas seems quite besotted with you.’

  He said it with such a roguish glint in his eye that Georgiana laughed, despite herself. His expression became serious again.

  ‘I know I have put far too much on Thomas’s shoulders. I may seem like a delight to be with now, but I assure you, I have dark days. Very dark days. Thomas has weathered them all, despite the same losses weighing heavily on him. I’m sure he has told you, of . . . ah . . . the misfortune we have encountered, as a family. I have not seen him enjoy the company of others for a very long time. He has hosted no friends here at Highbourne. When Rashmi – my late wife – was alive, this house was always so full of joy. She was used to having family around. I know she felt very cut off when she moved here, so she tried to be everyone and everything to her boys. She didn’t want them to miss out on anything – we celebrated Diwali and then went straight into preparations for Christmas. It always confused the servants, but by God, Edward and Thomas loved it.’ He sighed. ‘That boy who was so full of laughter has been absent for a very long time. He rattled around the house
, went for long rides, spoke very little. He only went out into society to serve as my chaperon, to keep me from mouldering away in my study.’ He smiled sadly. ‘It has not been fair on him. He has fathered me, when it should have been the other way around. I do not say this so that you may pity him, or to put undue pressure on your shoulders – but it is wonderful, Miss Ellers, to see him light up again. You have given him the possibility of happiness – the knowledge that it might still exist for him. I am inordinately thankful to you for that.’

  ‘I worry . . .’ Georgiana said quietly. ‘I worry sometimes that I am more trouble than I am worth. I have not behaved very well this summer, Mr Hawksley. I try not to blame myself for what happened with Mr Russell, but sometimes I wonder if I didn’t deserve it, after all I have done wrong. And – and I do not wish to cause Thomas more bother, when he has already been through so much.’

  ‘Oh, dear child, I cannot comment on what has come before or how outrageously you may have acted, but I know with complete certainty that you could never be at fault for the actions of Jeremiah Russell, and I know this – Thomas is not a man to shy away from something simply because it is difficult. You are not a problem; you are not trouble. You are someone my son has taken a liking to – I am rather fond of you as well, although I daresay not nearly as much as he is – and whatever it is you face now, if it is right that the two of you are together, you will face it as one.’

  ‘I . . . Thank you, Mr Hawksley.’

  Georgiana was so overcome she hardly knew what to do with herself, but she contented herself by getting to her feet and kissing him on the cheek.

  ‘Of course, of course,’ he said, blushing and waving her away, looking pleased.

  ‘Thomas has been rather a while looking for the port, has he not?’

  ‘Yes,’ he said mildly. ‘He would be. It has been nigh on four months since I lost that key.’

  Chapter Twenty-Nine