Through a Glass Darkly: A Novel (16 page)

   "And that is another thing," interrupted Aunt Shrewsborough. "I had no idea of Diana's plans for this marriage. Everyone is asking me about it, and I do not know what to say. Things have come to a pretty pass when my niece has a marriage planned under my nose and I know nothing of it!"

   "I am completely against this marriage," Abigail said. "Diana never even offered to discuss it with Tony, and we all know how Tony worries about the family. Roger Montgeoffry is too old, and he is far too licentious. His companions—that odious Carlyle man, that Walpole person—" She wrinkled her nose.

   "You forgot the King of England!" snapped Aunt Shrewsborough. There was a silence. Aunt Shrewsborough had made her point. "If Diana wants to marry that child to a blind, deaf, and dumb cripple, as long as the man has the money, and the insanity, to restore some of their fortune, I say more power to her! Ye gods, Abigail, have you lost your reason? Diana is ruined! Ruined! There is not a penny anywhere that is not mortgaged or owed to someone. Kit has left her in a fix I would not wish on my worst enemy. Think of Harry! At this point in his life, he faces debts he could never repay, not unless I left him my fortune—which I ought to do!"

   Abigail was silent. She wanted everything for Tony, for Tony's heirs. She wanted to build the richest, the largest dukedom in the kingdom for her son. Even the thought of a penny going to someone else, deserved or not, hurt her. Bentwoodes belonged to Tony, not some other grandchild. To Tony.

   "I am against her choice for marriage—not the reasons behind it," she said. "Tony echoes my sentiments. If we offer our home, it will look like surrender—"

   "It will look like good manners! Use your brain, woman! You can do more to influence the marriage negotiations if the principals are under your own roof than you can by exclaiming against it from a distance of several miles!"

   There was an arrested expression on Abigail's face. Aunt Shrewsborough saw it and nodded, satisfied.

   "A word here, a suggestion there, and the negotiations are bogged down. Time passes; Diana, secure here with you, does not have to accept the first thing he offers. She has time to think, and therefore time to want more."

   "She said she was going to marry Barbara to him, and nothing we could do would stop her."

   "My dear Abigail," Aunt Shrewsborough said with a sigh. "Diana has always been able to twist you inside out. She is the greediest member of this family, which says a lot, I should think, considering the family. I would wager my best diamond that she is haggling even now to increase her own share. She will push Montgeoffry just as far as she can. She has always done so to people. You get her here; offer a few suggestions yourself, and I will eat this hat I am wearing if the whole thing is not called off. Montgeoffry may look like an angel, but I doubt he has the patience of one." She stood up and shook out her gown. "I know you see the sense of what I am saying. You can always be depended on for sense. Fanny, give your aunt a kiss, and bring that new baby to visit."

   Abigail rose to walk her to the door and their arms linked. "You know what to do," Aunt Shrewsborough said softly. "Thank God you have the sense to listen to me. I despise family scandal, and we certainly need no more about Diana. I do not like that rouge color you are using, Abigail. It is too harsh. It does not do for a woman to try too hard, and I never knew a blonde that took aging well. Lighten the color, you lighten the years. I will go with you to talk to Diana, if need be. Lizzie too. We are agreed on this—Diana must come here. You will handle it? Good girl!"

   Abigail kissed her aunt's wrinkled cheek and promised she would do the right thing. She smiled until the door closed. Then the smile faded from her face. She went back to Fanny, who was leaning against the chair she was sitting in. Fanny's face was pale.

   "What do you think of my rouge, Fanny?'

   Fanny opened her eyes. "Your rouge? It is fine. Why, Mama?"

   "Never mind. Your aunt wears a wig fit only for a sixteen-year–old trollop, and then tells me—never mind! Fanny, was I wrong?"

   Fanny did not answer. Abigail paced up and down in front of the huge fireplace centered in the north wall. "It will never do for Tony to get a reputation for smallness of character." Neither of them mentioned his reputation for a small mind. Abigail shook her head.

   "It is my own fault. I ought not to have let my temper run away with me. Temper is the flaw of the Saylor side of the family, not mine. Oh dear, how will I ever convince Diana to come here? You know how she is. She would starve to spite me—"

   Fanny shook her head and smiled. "Not Aunt Diana, Mother."

   Abigail stared at her daughter. "You are correct, Fanny. Diana always does what is best and most convenient for herself. All we have to do is convince her that it is best she be here—"

   "Well, it would certainly look more impressive to Lord Devane."

   "So it would…I wonder whom I could offer in his place...Wharton…"

   "In whose place, Mama? Wharton married in March."

   "Carr Hervey has a younger brother…"

   "What are you thinking about, Mama? Are you really going to try to stop the marriage? Aunt Diana would never give Bentwoodes to Tony, not unless he married Barbara himself—"

   "Bite your tongue, Fanny! I would sooner see Tony married to the Devil than to anything of Diana's!" Abigail gathered her thoughts together. "She might be amenable to certain arrangements, if they are presented properly. I think a group of us ought to see her, not just me. I seem to bring out her worst…not that she has a best…Hervey…."

   "Why not Carr himself, Mama? He is due to inherit an earldom."

   "Nonsense! A second son will do quite adequately for Barbara. The Alderleys are not what they once were. Cash…or an allowance…a yearly allowance against the property…. the Newcastles might have a cousin hidden away in a village somewhere…"

   "Mama, whatever are you planning?"

   "Tony and Harold could sponsor the divorce…I wonder exactly what Roger is offering her…It must be a pretty penny…Fanny, you look pale. Have you been resting as you should?"

   Fanny sighed. "Yes, Mama. But somehow, this time, I cannot seem to regain my strength—"

   "Three babies in three years would make anyone tired!" Abigail spoke sharply. The square, stubborn line of her jaw, hidden by youth when she was a girl, and by flesh now that she was a woman, was apparent at this moment to anyone who might look at her. She loved her children, and she worried about them all. But only Fanny had to face death each year. Tony would never have to, and Mary was years away from marriage. She remembered the pain of her childbirths. Time blurred some of it but enough remained seared on her mind, a throbbing cord that only had to be touched to vibrate.

   "I hope Harold understands your tiredness."

   Fanny looked away. This was not a subject she and her mother agreed on, but she did not have the strength to argue.

   "He should have more regard for you," Abigail was saying, her mind now completely off Diana and the marriage. "You cannot, you must not go on having a baby every year. It will ruin your health, your looks—it has already begun to ruin your figure. Has your maid been making the green tea caudle recipe your grandmother sent?"—The Duchess had recommended a quart of strong green tea poured into a skillet set over a fire. Added to this were four beaten egg yolks mixed with a pint of white wine, grated nutmeg and sugar. The mixture was stirred over the fire until very hot, then drunk out of a china cup.

   "Yes, Mama."

   "Do as I did, and make him understand that his attentions are not welcome—for your own sake, Fanny."

   "Mama, please."

   Abigail looked at her daughter. Fanny reminded her so much of herself, except that she had never been that gentle. "I do not want you to die," she said softly.

   Fanny smiled at her. "I will not die, Mama. You did not."

   "A part of me did," Abigail said. Fanny reached out and took her mother's hand and pressed it against her cheek. Abigail was silent. All her planning, all her plotting would not protect her daughter from death. She had to leave that to the Lord. And she did not trust Him. "I will greatly multiply thy sorrow," He had told Eve, "and thy conception; in sorrow. thou shalt bring forth children; and thy desire shall be to thy husband, and he shall rule over thee." A poor way to handle things, Abigail had always thought, particularly for Eve.

* * *

   It took Abigail only a few days to construct her strategy, days which she knew worked to her advantage. It had been easy to learn that Diana was living on the last of her resources, that she had not yet signed the marriage contracts, but was holding out for more money. Nor will she sign them, thought Abigail, confidently. She had already instructed Tony and Harold to begin a counterrumor that the Tamworths were distraught over Diana's sense of false pride, that they had offered their home and been refused. Tony and Harold were to talk about it at the various coffeeshops: Tom's, Will's, Button's, White's, St. James's. They were to mention it on their club nights, casually, to a friend or two, in between eating their beef steaks and drinking their ale and singing their club songs. Enough people would overhear and repeat it. Aunt Shrewsborough and Lady Cranbourne were to shake their heads regretfully and talk of it in front of their servants. They were to mention it to various friends in the strictest confidence. This meant so many different versions of the same rumor would meet and collide that no one would know what the truth was.

   She also decided that Aunt Shrewsborough was right: there was strength in numbers—and in surprise. As her famous father–in–law had always believed, attack the enemy before he can attack you. That way you choose the time of battle and the place.

   Four days later, Abigail's troops were assembled in her blue drawing room, drinking tea, eating toast and biscuits, and arguing amongst themselves: the aunts, Tony, Fanny, and Harold. The braver members of the family bolstered the faint of heart.

   It took two carriages to settle everyone comfortably. There was much running to and fro by the footmen for hot bricks and more fur throws. The aunts were argumentative and kept ordering everyone about, so that people were colliding with each other and undoing what the others had done. And it had begun to snow. But nevertheless, Abigail kept calm and managed to coax everyone in. The carriages started with a lurch. They would not stop until they reached Covent Garden.

   Barbara and her mother were playing cards when the knock sounded at the door. It was Aunt Shrewsborough, rapping at it firmly with the handle of her cane. She and her sister, Elizabeth, had been frail, pale, porcelainlike beauties in their youth. Now they were tiny, wrinkled women fond of wearing too much makeup and too many jewels, and they were as delicate as iron hitching posts. Both had buried several sets of husbands and birthed numerous children and were as strong as oxen in spite of it all. They wore their rouge and black patches as boldly as they had done twenty years ago, oblivious of the fact that they were like caricatures of themselves. The rouge might crust inside the wrinkles, the powder might cake. They did not care. In their own minds, they were still twenty and beautiful.

   All of the women had on cloaks or tippets trimmed with soft furs. Pearls peeked from their ears, around their necks, around the fingers of their soft, fragrant, crushed leather, fur–lined gloves. There was enough money represented in jewels and lace and furs to support several families for a year. Harold and Tony were dressed more quietly, though both of them wore new wigs under black hats with broad brims and gold lace hatbands. Each of them had the fashionable snuffbox (a picture of a popular actress painted on the inside lid of Tony's, while Harold's had a mirror) inside a pocket. And each of them had an expensive gold watch, with its seal and watch key and handsome outer ornamental case attached to their breeches with gold chains. Everyone looked sleek and prosperous and powerful. Abigail had almost dressed Tony herself. And she had carefully coached him on what he was to say. (Sometimes—not often, but sometimes—he surprised her. This morning he had said, "Always thought Aunt Diana should be here with us." "Why did you not tell me?" demanded Abigail. He shrugged. "Thought you would be angry.")

   At the sound of the knock, Diana had become perfectly still. She and Clemmie exchanged a long look. Barbara knew what this all meant now. Diana lived in fear that her numerous creditors would finally track her down, like hounds running the fox to earth. She expected no visitors, received no one but the lawyers, and their visits were never unannounced. But then again, there was Meres. It was his job to skulk around outside and keep an eye out. If someone was knocking at the door, it was because Meres thought it safe—or because he was down the street, drinking in a tavern. Diana nodded abruptly. Clemmie went into the hall and opened the door, and when she saw the crowd of relatives before her, her mouth hung open.

   "Announce us, you fat slug!" snapped Aunt Shrewsborough, moving past her.

   Clemmie came to the parlor door. "It is your family," she got out, before they began to spill around her into the room. The family stood clustered at the parlor door, their eyes taking in the condition of the room, which was once more bare. Barbara felt herself blushing.

   Diana stood up. "My trick. You owe me five shillings," she said softly to Barbara. "Stand up and smooth out your gown. And for God's sake, smile."

   "I do not have any money—"

   "I will take it out of your dowry. Aunt Lizzie…Tony…Harold… Fanny… Abigail." Her husky voice grew flatter and flatter as she enumerated the names. She made an ironic curtsy. Aunt Shrewsborough held a handkerchief scented with orange water up to her nose and looked around the room again. It was worse than she had imagined.

   "To what do I owe this visit?" asked Diana, still standing by the table. No one had yet moved to close the space separating them. Clemmie stood off to one side, her eyes barely visible inside the fat of her cheeks, moving back and forth between the two groups. "Surely it is not a welcome to London, for I have been here nearly a month. Will you not all sit down—no, I do not have enough chairs. We burned them to keep warm. I will not offer you refreshments. As you see, my facilities to entertain are quite limited."