Here Comes a Candle (29 page)

When
Manningham
and Arabella emerged, still angry, from the inn a few minutes later, the
c
oachman was Sarah
’
s established friend, busy trying to make the rear seat of his clumsy vehicle comfortable for someone with such short legs. He was called about his business sharply by Manningham.
“
Must we wait for you all day, my man?
”

“
Just fancy.
”
He emerged, broadly grinning, from the back of the coach.
“
And there was I thinking I was waiting for you.
”

Watching Manningham swallow the familiarity, Kate smiled to herself. She might be able to get Sarah through this journey after all. Arabella, brought up in the South, had never understood the democratic, anti-slave Northerners, and Manningham would not learn in time how to treat these independent upstanding Yankees who actually thought themselves as good as he was. It was almost a pity, in a way, that she had abandoned the idea of trying for help, but—no—the feeling of Sarah, already nodding off to sleep against her, enjoying security again, was an antidote to this. Time enough to think of escape when they got to Washington.

THIRTEEN

Sarah bore the journey much better than Kate had feared. The coachman, Silas, her firm friend, managed in all kinds of small ways to make it pleasant for her. If these attentions also succeeded in irritating Manningham and Arabella, why, so much the better. He had, fixed his price for the trip. Take it or leave it, was his attitude, and like it or not, they had to take it.

Inevitably, taking this western route which was to avoid all the major cities along the coast, they spent their days on bad roads and their nights at one small, village
inn
after another. Kate watched almost with awe as, night after night, Arabella and Manningham contrived to irritate their hosts, she by her complaints and he by his hauteur.
When she could, she managed, by explaining Sarah
’
s condition, to achieve, at best, an early meal for the two of them, at worst a position at the big, communal table as far as possible from the other two. Thus, she was able to follow, with a kind of sympathetic horror, the worsening of their relations. For Arabella, everything was Manningham
’
s fault, while all the things that infuriated him about Americans in general, were, inevitably, part of Arabella. Watching their tiffs become quarrels, Kate began to wonder whether this ill-starred venture might not be
’
abandoned before ever they reached Washington.

The best thing, so far as she was concerned, was that Sarah appeared miraculously immune to their behavior. The days when her mother
’
s mere presence might bring on one of her screaming fits seemed to be gone forever. So long as she had Kate always with her, nothing seemed to trouble her. They did everything together, and Kate, watching Sarah
’
s cheerful acceptance of one strange meal and bed after another, even found herself wondering if this fantastic journey might not be, in some incomprehensible way, just the thing she needed. Had she been, at Penrose, too engrained in the habits of a difficult case? If only it ended right, this ruthless uprooting might even prove good for her.

If only it ended right
...
There was the crux of the matter. That was what she tried not to think about, because Sarah always grew restless when she did. So Kate thought determinedly about nothing but the farms, fields and orchards they passed, the excitement of crossing a horse ferry, or the pleasure of getting out to walk beside the coach as the horses labored up a long hill (Arabella never did so) and the reward, at the top, of a whole new prospect of smiling America.

“
Lord, it
’
s a vast country.
”
Manningham, to do him justice, always got out and walked with them, when the horses were hard-pressed.

“
Yes. Doesn
’
t it make you understand, traveling like this, day after day, how Napoleon must have felt when he took his great army into Russia and found nothing but fields, and forest, and burning villages?
”
How odd it was, she thought, turning to help Sarah over a rough bit of the hill road, to be talking thus to Manningham, of all people, Manningham, who had
...
She checked herself: these thoughts were .best left deep in the well of the mind. There
would be a time for them, later. Or—would there? Wounds heal, she thought. If you survive, that is
...
Now she did not even hate Charles Manningham, she just despised him.

But Sarah was pulling impatiently at her hand.
“
Tired, honey?
”
She swung her up into her arms.
“
Not far now to the top of the hill. Or would you like to ride with Silas?
”

The head that leaned against her shoulder shook itself vigorously, and she sighed. That one miraculous word she had spoken, that whispered,
“
Kate,
”
did not seem, after all her hopes, to have been the beginning of
any
thin
g.

“
Let me take her; she
’
s far too heavy for you.
”
Manningham had misinterpreted the sigh and tried to disentangle Sarah from her perch on Kate
’
s hip.

In an instant, she was a wild thin
g
, clinging frantically to Kate, and at the same moment Arabella leaned out of the open side of the coach.
“
Charles! Must I be shouting for you forever? I
’
m suffocating in here!
”

A rueful, almost conspiratorial smile for Kate, and he had moved forward to offer his sympathies and suggest that Arabella might enjoy a stroll in the cool of the evening.

“
The horses might profit, too, I reckon,
”
put in Silas, who was walking at their heads, encouraging them up the steep slope.

Regrettably, Arabella swore at
him
with a freedom that cast an odd light on the education of a southern young lady. For a moment, Kate thought that he was going to refuse to go any further, but all he did was laugh.
“
I reckon you
’
ll owe me danger money when we get to Washington,
”
he told Ma
nningham
.
“
The things I have to put up with. If it weren
’
t for the young ladies
...
”
He left it at that, but Manningham did not. Kate, a reluctant eavesdropper from the ladies
’
bedroom above the porch of the inn that night, heard his voice and Arabella
’
s furiously raised and c
o
uld only congratulate herself as she drifted off to sleep that except for the odd hysterical, phrase on Arabella
’
s part, she could hear only the angry tone, not the words.

Arabella was visibly subdued in the morning, and the
journey went more easily after that, but they were all deeply travel-weary and proportionately relieved when Silas waved his whip in an easterly direction one heavy August evening and said,
“
Baltimore
’
s over there, I reckon. Two days now should see us home, I guess, if all goes well and we don
’
t run into your friends.
”

This was directed at Manningham.
“
My friends?
”
he asked.
“
What do you mean?
”

“
Why, that tarnation British squadron that
’
s been raising Cain down here on the Chesapeake for the last year. The word is, they
’
re to be reinforced, now the war
’
s over in Europe. Well, I reckon that stands to reason, don
’
t it? Anyways, don
’
t expect to find yourself just the most popular man in Washington, speaking the way you do. If you run into any kin of the womenfolk were attacked at Hampton last summer, I
’
d cut and run, if I were you. Those Virginians are mighty touchy where their honor is concerned, and I don
’
t guess you
’
re much of a dueling man.
”

“
Insolent!
”
But Manningham said it under his breath. Already the journey had taken longer than he had expected.
“
We can
’
t afford to quarrel with the man—
”
he explained to Arabella that evening.
“
We must
get
there as fast as possible—and if he were to leave us in the lurch here
...
Suppose we were to find your husband there before us!
”

“
Suppose what you like!
”
Arabella no longer even pretended to keep her temper with him.
“
I can think of nothing more likely. Jonathan won
’
t have wasted his time running over every side road and patronizing every filthy, bug-infested inn he can find. He
’
ll have gone the direct way, never fear, and be waiting for us.
”

“
Yes, maybe, but he won
’
t find us. You did say, did you not, that he knew nothing about your cousin
’
s house?
”

“
Of course I did. He
’
s never even heard of her. And as to the house, it
’
s not in Washington at all, but a couple of miles out on the brow of a gorge called Rock Creek. Once we get there, he
’
ll never find us, but just be so good as to explain to me how we are to get there. You know as well as I do that Kate Croston means to make trouble the moment we reach town, and that oaf of a driver will side with her; and Sarah will have one of her screaming fits and draw people in from miles around—and then what will become of us?
”

He laughed.
“
Give me credit for having thought of these hazards too, my love. And admit that we could not have made the journey without Mrs. Croston.
”
Now that they were approaching Washington he was
ma
k
ing
a determined effort to improve the strained relations between them. He had not gone to all this trouble merely to lose the money he meant to have with her because of a little quarreling on the way. Sometimes, it was true, when she was at her most captious, he found
hims
elf
wondering whether it was all worth it, but then, despite what he
had told her, the chances of his ever having to marry her—or even being able to do so, were slight enough to be negligible. And money he must have before he returned to England to face his creditors.

So he put out a tentative hand to play with the hair that grew in stiff golden curls about her temples, and wondered, as he felt her instant response to the touch, whether he had made a mistake in his handling of her. Her response, in Boston, to his first cautious approaches to love-making had been so instant and so violent that he had lost interest at once. She was his for the taking when he decided to have her. For the moment, he had convinced himself, it would be best to leave her on the alert for his least caress. Only—it did not seem to have worked out like, that. She had said nothing when he acquiesced, night after night, in the arrangements of small inns that found it easiest to sleep their male and female guests in separate dormitories. Only, each morning her temper had been worse than the last. And now they were near to Washington and the moment of crisis. And—he was not sure he could count on her.

He looked around. It was almost dark now, and they were alone on the inn porch. His hand was still mechanically playing among the crisp curls at the back of her neck and
h
e could feel her body respond to each tiny movement. Kate
’
s hair, he thought, with an irrelevance that disconcerted him, would not be tough like this; it would be soft, yielding to the touch; he would want to pull it, to make her cry for mercy...

This was madness. He moved his hand down to a smooth, cool shoulder, and noticed belatedly that Arabella had changed into an unusually elegant gown. Oh well
...
that settled it.
“
You
’
re very splendid tonight, my love.
”
He murmured it into her ear, and was aware, as he did so, of the heavy, cloying odor of the make-up she wore, and of the fine lines that showed beneath it. Kate would not smell like that, nor look so. Kate
’
s skin was firm and brown, ripened by the sun. Suddenly he was back in her father
’
s house: the body slumped once more across the table, the candles guttering, and Kate—Kate fighting for dear life in his arms,. biting, scratching, altogether delicious
...
Oh, why in the name of God had she not been there next day when he woke resolved to marry her at once?

Arabella was not fighting. She was leaning close against him now, the crisp curls tickling his chin.
“
I thought I
’
d never be alone with you again,
”
she said.

“
And I, too. These dreadful country inns. If you knew the nights I
’
ve lain awake, dreaming of you
...
But it will be all over soon, my love, and we
’
ll be together for always.
”

“
Oh, Charles, you really mean it. I
’
ve been a fool. I—I began to wonder whether you really cared; whether it was not all a mistake; all for nothing.
”

“
Care!
”
This was danger indeed.
“
Arabella, my love, look at me.
”
With a hand that was not quite as gentle as he had intended, he forced her chin up so that he could gaze down into her eyes with what he hoped would pass for passion.
“
Do you not realize what anguish this journey has meant for me? What longing? What torments? But how should you know of the nights I
’
ve lain awake, tossing on my bed (and that was true enough, he thought, on these devilish American feather beds)
thinking
only of you,
”
he finished, pleased with himself.