Cry of the Peacock (22 page)

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Upon returning to the townhouse Abbie found James newly arrived and going through the post.

“Ah, there you are, Mother,” he said, and kissed her on the cheek. “And Miss Gray!” He approached to bless her with a similar token, but stopped short upon receiving a disapproving look from his mother. David too appeared a trifle annoyed.

“Tell me how you are,” he asked of Abbie instead. “You look extraordinarily well.”

“I’m very well,” she answered laughing. “Are you home to stay?”

“Heavens, no. I’ll have to be back for lectures on Monday. But I nearly forgot! You, my dear, have a letter. Is it from your sister?”

“Yes,” she said, and wondered at his question. He appeared reluctant to let it go.

She opened the envelope and read, while James greeted Katherine and then his brother.

“You’ve forgotten how to write, then?” James asked David rather pointedly.

“The skill has completely left me,” was David’s curious answer.

Abbie made a greater effort to attend to her letter. It was not the best of news.

“What is it?” Katherine asked of Abbie.

“Oh. Nothing,” she said, and wished she had a greater talent for disguising her emotion.

“Nothing is wrong, I hope?” James asked and looked truly concerned.

“Oh. No,” she said and smiled dismissively. “It’s just that I was hoping my sister, or one of my aunt’s staff, might fetch me tomorrow.” But her aunt was yet unwell, and with Hetty so near her time… “It seems she can spare no one.”

Lady Crawford sighed audibly, and the crease in her brow returned. “Oh, dear,” she said.

“You were going tomorrow?” James asked.

“Yes, only…”

“She doesn’t have anyone to companion her,” Lady Crawford finished for her, and with unveiled frustration. “Unless, that is, Katherine will agree to stay another day.”

“I could go with you, you know?” James answered enthusiastically, and before Katherine could offer any reply on her own behalf. “I’d like to become reacquainted with your sister. Properly, that is.”

Abbie didn’t quite understand what need James had for the qualifying phrase. “If you want to reacquaint yourself with my sister, I’ll simply have to bring her here.”

“That’s a capital idea! Why shouldn’t you? Why shouldn’t she, Mother?”

“Well of course she must, if she can,” Lady Crawford answered, though reluctantly. “But if Miss Mariana cannot find the time to fetch her sister to her, I’m not sure how much more likely it will be that she can come to stay.” It was a point that even Abbie dared not deny. “I think perhaps it would be best, after all, for Katherine to attend you. If she will.”

“Of course I’ll be happy to companion Abbie wherever she might wish to go,” Katherine answered.

“It’ll do her no harm to go alone,” David said, intervening. Which surprised Abbie very much. “We’ll see her into the carriage, and her sister, or one of her aunt’s staff, will see her safely out again. And on the return it will be the reverse.”

“Yes, yes. Very well,” Lady Crawford conceded reluctantly. “I don’t want to hear any more about it. But if there is a to-do from your father, I’ll leave it to you to explain.”

“I’ll look forward to it,” David said. He offered a respectful bow of his head before excusing himself from the room, leaving Abbie, and James, too, to stare after him, in confusion.

A
BBIE ARRIVED AT her aunt’s anxious to see her sister, but she was informed by Mrs. Giles that Mariana was in conference with Mr. Meredith and the doctor, and she could not receive her. Rather than waste time in idle waiting, Abbie went up to her aunt’s room.

“You’ve come back, have you?” Aunt Newhaven said as Abbie entered.

“Of course I have,” Abbie answered and took a seat beside her. “I cannot forget how good you were to me. The Craw–” She stopped herself just short of speaking the forbidden name, and reworded her sentence. “I have come to Town for a little holiday, and of course have stopped in to see you. How are you, Aunt?”

“You might have written,” was her only answer.

She had tried to write, but had always found it an impossible task. What to say that her aunt would wish to hear? Would she have liked to know that she was being groomed for Society? Doubtful. That she had been singled out by Ruskin, that he wished to marry her? Such news could hardly be welcome to her. “Mariana tells me you have been unwell of late. I hope it is nothing serious.”

“I find I cannot bear all the noise,” her aunt answered, though Abbie had to wait for it. “The work is necessary, but it is often more than I can endure. Fortunately I have Mariana,” she said, and this time looked very pointedly, at Abbie. “Were it not for her…”

“I’m glad to know she is such a help to you,” Abbie said and meant it.

“She is a good girl, dutiful and grateful.”

She felt the sting of this, as it was no doubt intended she should. “I would have been happy to do my part had I been able to stay. I did not leave of my own accord. You know that.”

“You were eager enough to go when the opportunity presented itself.”

Yes, she had been, and with her aunt’s bitterness and gloom enduring still, Abbie was reminded why. When she had exhausted every avenue of conversation, had delivered all the news she thought her aunt might be interested to hear, and still received nothing more for her efforts than cool indifference, she bid her aunt good day and returned downstairs to find Mr. Meredith waiting in the hall. Mariana yet remained with the doctor.

“Is everything all right, Mr. Meredith?” she asked him. “My aunt is not terribly unwell, is she?”

He was apparently surprised to see her. “Miss Gray. I didn’t know you had arrived.”

“Yes, I’ve been visiting my aunt. Will you tell me how she is?”

“It’s no very serious matter. At least we have no reason to believe so. She’s been having headaches lately, and some dizziness. And her heart…”

“Yes, Mr. Meredith?”

“Well, there is a slight irregularity, but the doctor believes there is no cause for any great concern.”

Though she had been assured not to worry, there was, nevertheless, an ominous portent to this news.

“Her moods, I think, are her greatest affliction. But, as I said, it’s nothing serious. It is very good to see you, and to see you looking so well.”

She remembered David’s suggestion with regard to this gentleman. She wondered at it, but did not wish to give it more thought than it deserved. “Thank you, Mr. Meredith,” she said.

For a moment there was nothing but awkward silence, and then: “You
are
well? And happy?” he asked her.

“I am, thank you.”

“There is nothing you want for?”

“Nothing at all,” she answered. “The Crawfords take exceedingly good care of me.”

He appeared to doubt her, or them, perhaps, even still, and she found herself a little irritated in consequence.

“How is Miss Summerson?” Abbie asked, anxious to change the subject.

“She is well enough, considering. You might see her if you like.”

“I would like that very much.”

He bowed and went in search of her, while Abbie made herself comfortable in the best parlor. It was an entirely different room now. The papers were in aesthetic florals and naturalistic foliage. Much of the knick-knackery was gone, and the room was clean and comfortable. There was much to admire, and she did, wondering all the while at her sister’s industry.

The sound of a clearing throat recalled her, and she turned to find that Mr. Meredith had returned with Miss Summerson.

“I’ll let your sister know you are here,” Mr. Meredith said, and he bowed before leaving the room. She watched after him a moment, wondering at his manner, and David’s suggestion regarding it, but remembering Hetty, and her object in seeing her, she turned and addressed her warmly.

“Hetty, it is so good to see you,” she said. “You are looking very well. Your time must be getting near. How are you feeling?”

“Like a stuffed pig,” Hetty answered, and took the seat that was offered her. “But I’m very well, thank you.”

Abbie then proceeded to bombard her with questions. Was she happy here? Did she have everything she needed? What were her plans? How did she hope to support herself once the baby was born? She was pleased to learn that Hetty meant to take advantage of the opportunities offered by Newhaven house, but was somewhat dismayed at her decision to find a home for her soon to be born child.

“How can you bear it?” Abbie asked her. “How can you bear the idea?”

“Don’t ask me that,” she said. “I try not to think on it. All I know is that I am not prepared to be the mother this child needs. There is no respectable life for a woman with a child and no husband. If I had some money of my own, I might find someone to care for him. Some’d say it’s right I suffer for my mistakes. It ain’t fair. I didn’t want it, you know, to be left this way. I don’t want to give up my child. It nearly kills me to think on it. But what else can I do?”

“I don’t know,” Abbie said quite honestly, and considered the questions yet left unanswered. “Your father spoke to me, Hetty, of the man responsible. Is he right to lay the blame for your predicament upon the landlord’s son?”

Hetty looked, for the moment, ashamed, but only hung her head in answer.

“Will you tell me about it? Will you tell me what happened, and how we might go about trying to make it right?”

Still, she was silent.

“Hetty, please. I know it’s difficult to speak of such things, but I only want to help if I can. I have some influence now, with the family, and it would make me very happy if there was some way I could be of assistance to you. In order to do that, though, I’m afraid I must know the story. Will you tell me?”

Hetty hesitated only a moment longer. She sniffed, cleared her throat, and began. “He said he would marry me,” she said. “And I believe he would’a done it once.”

It puzzled her that James would be so democratic, so willing to go against his family in such a way. Did it speak for him or against him, though? It surprised her more that Hetty would refuse him. Abbie asked the question that might help her to understand.

“I had my reasons to doubt him,” Hetty answered, “but you know how some men are. ‘No’ just weren’t enough for him.”

“What do you mean, Hetty?” Abbie asked, growing increasingly alarmed.

Hetty looked away and then down at her hands as she folded and unfolded them before her.

“Do you mean to say he forced himself, Hetty?”

She nodded her head and a tear fell.

Abbie was on the verge of tears herself. She was shocked, too. Perhaps her aunt, after all, had not been so wrong to fear for her. And yet it was still very hard to believe.

“I was able to hide my condition for a long time. Of course I could not hope to do it forever, and when it became known, they sent him away. Now Father holds them responsible. He thinks they should have made it right, do you see? That they should have made him marry me as is right and proper.”

“But you could not have. You know that.”

“After what he done, do you mean?”

True as it was, that was not what Abbie had meant. Perhaps they had somehow got it into their heads that they would raise Miss Summerson as they had raised her.

“If James would only agree to provide for us,” Hetty went on, “I’d be ever so grateful, but things don’t always turn out as we’d wish.”

“If I knew what to do… Perhaps if I were to speak with him.”

“With James? Do you know where he is?”

Abbie nodded. “He’s here in London.”

Hetty looked a trifle alarmed with this, but Abbie didn’t stop to ask why.

“Perhaps if he were reminded of his responsibilities,” she suggested. “If he calls himself a gentleman—”

“A gentleman, miss?”

“Yes, of course.”

“James Benderby?”

“Benderby?” Abbie echoed.

“Aye. Who were you talkin’ about, miss?”

“I thought we were talking about James Crawford.”

“Mr. Crawford?” Hetty laughed out loud. “Aye, Miss Abbie. That’s a good one. Mr. Crawford may have his bit of fun, to be sure. Most of them do. But he’d not look twice at me, I promise you.”

Abbie could barely disguise her relief. The matter was yet serious, however, and so she made an effort to attend all that Hetty said.

“He taught my James a lesson though and make no mistake. Gave him a thorough what for and then sacked him on the spot. And so you see, Father blames Mr. Crawford for dismissing him when he ought to have made him marry me instead. But they’d already tried that, and I wouldn’t have him.”

“You refused him?”

“Perhaps it was wrong of me, Miss Abbie, but I couldn’t help thinkin’ I was sure to regret it. After he’s used me so, how could I give myself to him, and no getting out of it again if I did?”

“You’re not wrong, Hetty. No one has the right to force their will upon you. One way or the other, we’ll find a way to help you. You will see.”

Abbie embraced Miss Summerson tightly, then went to find her sister. Mariana was just coming to find her when she met her in the hallway.

“Abbie!” Mariana said and embraced her sister. “I would have come earlier, but I was hoping your time alone with Hetty would prove to be productive. I didn’t wish to interrupt. Was it?”

“It was indeed,” Abbie answered. “It’s all a misunderstanding. Of course you must have realized it already, but I have to say I’m very much relieved. You ought to have told me, you know.”

“A misunderstanding?” Mr. Meredith echoed.

“What was I to tell you?” Mariana asked her, clearly confused.

“Hetty’s story, of course. She has told you, certainly.”

“My rapport with her is not what yours is. I did not pry. And to be honest, I simply assumed you were correct in your supposition, and in Mr. Summerson’s accusations. Do you mean to tell me you were mistaken?”

Abbie related the story as Hetty had told her, though perhaps in a somewhat more concise and comprehensible manner.

“So James Crawford is innocent,” Mr. Meredith said. There was no hint of relief in his voice.

“Oh, dear heaven!” Mariana exclaimed. “I was so horribly rude to him when he came.”

“As you should have been,” Mr. Meredith answered. “Setting up watch like a second rate detective.”

“James has been
here
?”

“Not to the house. I met him on the street. I haven’t the faintest idea why he came.”

“How very curious. I wonder what his purpose was.”

“Perhaps it was the same as Mr. David’s after all.” Mariana suggested.

“James is not the judge he once was, Mariana.”

“And David? You have mentioned him repeatedly since his arrival. Have you conquered him yet?”

“What makes you think I have any intention of conquering him?”

Mariana looked at her rather suspiciously for a moment. It lasted only a second, but it was far too long. “What of Ruskin Crawford?” she asked relenting from the one subject to latch onto the other. “You’ve written of him, but you’ve yet to give me any details.”

Mr. Meredith’s face visibly clouded with this, and Abbie felt for the first time that David, after all, might not have been entirely wrong. She regretted it. Her relationship with Mr. Meredith had never been free and easy. What would it be now?

“I will tell you all about it, Mariana,” she said, and wished to tell her nothing at all. “But first you must show me all that you have done here. The house is so different! I want to know all that goes on here, what occupies your time, and if there is any way I can help you while I am here.” As Abbie implored her sister, she drew her from the room, leaving Mr. Meredith to watch her retreat.