Feral Park (59 page)

After an interval of rest and punch came something that Colin called “The Grecian Crane,” and when it was announced by Gemma, there was an approving eruption of delighted anticipation throughout the saloon. This dance had also been amongst those taught to nearly everyone in the room, and nearly everyone, therefore, knew just what to do. Each of the participants joined hands with two neighbours to form a great linked circle. When the signal was given and the music begun—a lively, bouncing air—Colin, who was linked on the one side to Miss Pints, dropt his clasp and pointed; she was to be the first leader. Blushing and tittering, she began to skip across the room in step with the music, with her other hand still joined to that of her Mr. Denny—a skip, and then a hop and then a slide, every thing perfectly coordinated with all who followed: behind Mr. Denny, a shopgirl with deep pits upon her face, behind
her
a lady’s maid with a bulbous, warted nose and wavering eye, behind
her
a horse trader with longitudinal scar down the cheekbone, and behind
him
thirty or more others! Round the perimeter of the room Miss Pints skipped and hopped and then pulled her chain back into the centre and underneath the arched arms of a couple in the middle—Mr. and Mrs. Epping!—all following the leader through the vault of arms—those who were ahead of the Eppings in the chain—and finally Mrs. Epping being required to twist and spin herself and to go under her own arm to great laughter and to the especial hilarity of her husband, who could not help pecking her affectionately upon the cheek as she turned toward him. Round the room the chain wound and joined its ends and formed a circular carole and all moved in and all moved out, and then the chain was broken and someone new—Mr. Dorchester, the cook’s son—with an ill-formed chin and pirate patch—now leading the way.

Anna, who had hitherto stood and watched, could play stationary observer no longer; she seized the free hand of the pursy and goitrous poulterer who was last in the chain, and Dr. Bosworthy took Anna’s other hand, and motioned for Miss Drone to receive
his.
She coloured and shook her head in protest, but was captured nonetheless, and took up briefly the “ultimate” spot in the long chain, as it moved faster, the tempo of the music quickening. A circle was formed anew and then was broken by Dr. Bosworthy, who released Anna’s hand and pointed to her to lead the way in a fresh chain. Everyone cried, “Yes, yes! Take us, Miss Peppercorn! Take us about!” Mrs. Taptoe, sitting against the wall, cheered the loudest of all, whilst making a merry pinwheel of her necklace. Now Mr. Peppercorn and Miss Younge and May Dray made
themselves
links in the chain, which had broken into an exuberant, high-spirited run through the entire Feral Park mansion-house—out into the hall and all about, and when Mr. Maxwell opened the front door out they all flew, out onto the lawn, this joyously giddy, frolicking and romping human procession bearing faces that were blemished and scarred, possessed of eyes that were cloudy or opaque, and noses that were more snout or beak—all the faces of all the guests becoming now only one single thing together: beautiful—
only
beautiful. There was laughter and sparkle and flash and shine and playful gambol and tender affection with hands clasped tight, and arms held high, and there were tears of unbridled elation from nearly every single one to think that such a thing could ever be—that one could feel so perfectly free, that loneliness and ill-treatment and disparagement and lovelessness in this one glorious, moonlit Midsummer Eve could be so thoroughly banished and so successfully replaced by pure, ineffable happiness! Out onto the terrace with their instruments came the Dalrymples to be better heard, as Anna wound her chain through the orchard trees. Conies hopped and scattered from the path as the dancers traversed the paddock, then passed through a shrubbery and in and out of the milk barn and then encircled a stew pond, as if there were a maypole rising from its centre.

Into the heart of the night they ran, and the night smiled and approved, and when it was over and the last note had been played, all fell upon the sod in a jumble of exhausted mirth, and Miss Pints received her very first kiss— harelip to harelip—from Mr. Denny, and Miss Younge her first from Henry Peppercorn. Even the scar-faced horse trader was to receive a kiss by Colin Alford, placed right upon his stubbly cheek, and the trader did not object, for Colin had put his lips directly upon the disfigurement, which had surely never been kissed before!

It was some time before anyone was ready to pick herself up and return himself to the house. To lie beneath the moon in communal bliss was too perfect an arrangement to see finished too soon. Eventually, however, the dancers brought themselves to their feet and brushed themselves off and headed themselves back inside.

The exception was Dr. Bosworthy, who remained upon the grass, crawling this way and that as if searching for something within the leaves. “What is it you have lost, Doctor Bosworthy?” Anna asked.

He need only glance up at her to provide the answer; it was his lower dental plate, which had become dislodged and somehow escaped his mouth during the last moments of the winged flap of the Grecian Crane. “We will find your false teeth, Doctor,” said Anna dropping to her knees. “Do not despair.”

“I will not despair, but they must be found,” said he. “I fashioned them myself and
for
myself. There are none like them in the world.”

“Aye, they looked so real; I never would have thought that they had not been naturally grown within your mouth.”

“I have always had very good teeth,” said he, patting the grass next to him. “The upper plate, as you can see, is in excellent condition for a man of my years. But I did not anticipate the effects of the white phosphorus upon human bone when I created my formula for the friction match, and upon my mandible in particular.”

“My dear Dr. Bosworthy, were
you
the chemist who was responsible for the match that set Mr. Dray upon the road to financial ruin?”

“How delicate you put it, my darling girl. I thought that I had corrected the problematic formula through reformulation of the compound, but, alas, the jaws of those who worked with it continued to glow and persisted in falling off. I finally threw up my hands and admitted defeat, and I made a point of giving back to Mr. Dray every penny I took from him for the formula, but it was hardly enough to save him. Fortunately for
me
, the ill effects were limited only to the loss of my lower teeth and some periodontal difficulties that inconvenience me to this day. Some say that the phosphorus poisoning has also made me mad, but I am almost certain that I was already that way before I learnt how to make my face to glow in the dark. Oh, look. Mrs. Epping has found my false teeth. Thank you ever so much, Mrs. Epping! Now I shall have more than soup for my supper!”

Anna gave herself a moment to digest the fact that it was none other than Dr. Bosworthy who had put events into motion which eventually brought her into this world. She allowed herself to think of how inextricably one’s life is intertwined with the lives of others—with their goals and their dreams, their disappointments and failures, their achievements and triumphs, and this realisation humbled and astonished her. However, her astonishment was vacated in the very next moment by the sight of Miss Drone, whose eyes were moist and red.

Anna walked alongside her aunt as the two made their way with the others back to the mansion-house.

“Miss Pints has had her very first kiss from an attentive young man,” said she.

“Yes, I saw that,” said Anna with a tender smile. “Are you not happy for her?”

“I am
most
happy, niece. But I am also feeling a little sorry for myself. Should she attach, things will change between us, I fear.”

“But they should be better for her, and is this not your foremost wish?”

“Aye. Even to the point of accepting my own loneliness after she goes. But it will take time to make the adjustment.”

“But how can you ever be lonely, Aunt Samantha, when you and I shall always have one another? And there are new friends you have made in just these last few days. Dr. Bosworthy, as an example—has he never told you the macabre yet riveting story of his friction match? He would, no doubt, enjoy sharing every detail with you, now that he has his teeth back in and can speak more comfortably.”

Miss Drone pulled her niece to her side and squeezed her with affection. “You are a good girl to think so readily of my own happiness. Mind the cony. He seems unwilling to move from our path.”

An hour later John Dray and his new bride arrived in the company of Mr. Nevers. The couple had come to bid their adieus and to thank everyone who had made their marriage possible. The assembly drew back to give them room to dance a special wedding dance. It was a waltz. Colin Alford shewed the steps, which were quite easy to pick up, and Mr. Dray, dancing the part of the groom, and Mrs. Dray, dancing the part of the bride, took their three-quarter turns about the room to “oohs” and “ahs” and some soft gloved applause and a smattering of whispered comments in a commendatory vein. What had been a special night for everyone in the Feral Park saloon seemed an even more special night for the newly-wedded couple, he slightly feminine in his strides, she a little masculine in her own.

The dance was nearly over when the sound of gunshots rang out from a short distance away. Gemma commanded the musicians to stop their playing, and all grew quiet except for an apprehensive murmur here and there. Mr. and Mrs. Dray stood where the dance had left them, which was in the centre of the room, neither seeming to know what to do. Within a moment Tripp and his brother Trapp stumbled in, each perspiring and winded and shaken and afraid.

To Anna, Tripp said, “I have broken my brother out of gaol. The constable and his men are on our trail! Hide us, Miss Peppercorn!”

Yet there was no time for Anna even to answer. Within an instant, Constable Whitaker and three of his deputies were inside the mansion-house themselves, and charging through the hall and into the saloon.

Tripp and Trapp turned to make their escape as pistols were raised and aimed. Before the constable could demand that the two fugitives hold to where they were, one of his deputies, eager to do good, squeezed the trigger of his gun. The crack of gunfire was joined and then succeeded by several frightened screams, most of those in the room seemingly too shocked to do more than gape and cringe.

Tripp and Trapp did not flee, but instead turned their look to John Dray, who fell crumpled to the floor. Felicity Godby Dray screamed and dropt to her knees to cradle her wounded spouse.“Where is the surgeon? Is there a surgeon?” she cried. Others rushed over, the constable and his deputies dropping their pistols to their sides and staying put. The surge created a barricade between the lawmen and the brothers, which allowed the latter to slip away. The deputies moved forward to pursue, but were called back by the constable.

“We will attend to them later,” he said to his men. “Let us first procure a surgeon for the poor man.”

A surgeon was easily found, for Mr. Jackson of Berryknell was in attendance at the ball, to be on hand should any medical difficulties arise from amongst the more delicate guests.

The bridegroom was gently lifted from the floor, carried to the drawingroom, and put upon the sofa. Mr. Jackson promptly inspected the wound, with Felicity standing by as nurse. Outside waited everyone else.

Henry Peppercorn was livid with anger at the constable. “How dare you come uninvited into my home with guns firing away!”

“It could not be helped, Mr. Peppercorn. The man is a fugitive and his brother now an accomplice in crime. I am clearly within my legal rights.”

“But one of your men has shot a guest!”

“His aim could have been better, I will admit it.”

There was more of this between Constable Whitaker and Mr. Peppercorn before Mr. Jackson emerged to say that there was good news and bad. This statement invited further buzz and whisper from amongst the anxious guests within earshot.

“The good news is that the bullet has barely pierced his side. As far as I can tell, it has totally missed all of the important organs.”

“Praise God,” said Mrs. Taptoe.

“The bad news is that this man has breasts.”

“Breasts?” asked Mr. Peppercorn.

“I can put it no other way. Nay, perhaps I can: it appears that Mr. Dray is not a ‘mister’ but a ‘miss.’”

Buzz and whisper had now become mumble and gasp, each auditor registering surprize, shock, disbelief.

Gemma appeared the most disturbed of all. She addressed Miss Godby: “Is this true? Is my cousin John, in truth, a woman?”

The bride, who would now
not
be a bride, nodded. “She is
Johanna
to me.”

Gemma now turned to Anna: “Did
you
know this?”

Anna nodded.

Gemma then addressed her younger sister May: “And you—had
you
also been informed of our cousin’s true sex?”

May shook her head. “I was never told. But he did always seem, well,
ladylike
in his gait, and the way he—rather,
she
held her teacup.”

As Mr. Jackson returned to the drawing-room, he said, “Man, woman—it matters little with respect to the serious injury that
could
have resulted from that bullet. Let us all be grateful, and permit me to return to the patient. Someone get me hot water and bandages, and a sewing kit, if you would.”