Taming of Annabelle (23 page)

Perhaps if she had not seen
Cosi Fan Tutte
she would not have believed her husband would go to such lengths. But she had not seen Harriet with Sir Guy. She had only seen her with the
Marquess. She thought of his cruel and erratic behaviour after her wedding night. She had put it down to a result of her use of Lord Sylvester’s name. Now she began to see his actions as
those of a heartless aristocrat, hell-bent on making fun at the expense of others.

By the time the Marquess arrived to take his wife to the opera, she felt completely indifferent to him. Never in her whole life had anyone treated Annabelle so cruelly. She answered all his
compliments with a shrug and sat in rigid silence during the opera.

On the road home, he at last burst out with, ‘What on earth is up with you, Annabelle?’

‘You forget,’ she said icily, ‘I am to be trained in the conventions. You are to call me my lady at all times and I shall call you Brabington.’

‘Did last night mean nothing to you?’ he demanded furiously.

‘I would rather forget about last night, sirrah!’

‘And why, I wonder? Did you realize too late the wrong man held you in his arms?’

‘If that is how you care to see it.’

He seemed to loom over her in the coach as he half rose from his seat, his bulk large and threatening.

She shrank back and he muttered an exclamation of disgust and rapped on the roof with his stick. As the coach rumbled to a halt he leapt out without waiting for the footmen to let down the
steps.

‘Where are you going?’ shouted Annabelle. ‘To Lady Coombes?’

‘Why not?’ he shouted back, striding off into the night.

A footman sprang down and shut the door. The carriage rumbled forwards and Annabelle sat fighting back tears.

There would have been one great flaw in Sir Guy Wayne’s assessment of human nature if the couple had said they loved each other. But that was what rankled in each bosom, and that was what
made each so ready to believe the worst of each other. Both Annabelle and her husband felt they had wasted all their tenderest love and passion on a frivolous, unworthy object.

Now all Annabelle wanted to do was to get away, away from this man who did not love her, to escape before he could torment her further.

All at once she decided to go home to Hopeworth. She would immerse herself in parish duties. But a saner side of her mind told her to have a good night’s sleep and perhaps things would
seem not so bad in the morning.

But in the morning, two things happened. A letter arrived telling her curtly that she was refused vouchers to Almack’s.

Annabelle was young and inexperienced enough to feel the social slight more than most. What cut most deep was that her husband had taken no steps to ensure her acceptance.

And then her cousins, Josephine and Emily Armitage, arrived. They had received their invitations and were in
alt.
They were carefully courteous to Annabelle, for, after all, she was now a
marchioness, but they could not refrain from several silly and jealous remarks and the sisters finally seemed to Annabelle to epitomize all that was worst in London society, vain and silly and
cruel.

After they had left she called Jensen and told him the travelling carriage was to be prepared to take her to Hopeworth. She then called him back and told him that she was ordering him not to
tell the Marquess of Miss Evans’ visit. Annabelle was determined that her husband should not realize how much he had hurt her.

She ordered Holden to pack her trunks and warned the maid she would be expected to put up at a country vicarage in more uncomfortable surroundings than she had been used to.

But Holden had worked for society for a long time and was used to the vagaries of the quality. She judged, rightly, that her master and mistress had had a quarrel, but she was sure it would soon
be put to rights, and so resigned herself to rusticating in the country for a little.

She looked startled when Annabelle said that she would not be taking any of the Brabington jewels. They were to be left in her husband’s room.

Then she sat down to write the Marquess a letter. She told him that she could not bear to live under the same roof any more and wished for a separation.

Coldly and efficiently she went about the preparations for the journey, her face hard and set.

The day was sunny and warm. The streets of London seemed to be thronged with happy carefree people as she slumped in the corner of the travelling carriage, looking out at them with dull
eyes.

Before, God had been in his Heaven and everything had been very much all right with the world. Now Annabelle began to be haunted by the Old Testament God of vengeance, and, by the time her weary
journey home was over, she was convinced that divine punishment had been visited on her for her jealousy of Minerva and for her wicked plans to seduce her brother-in-law.

A schoolgirl had left Hopeworth vicarage such a short time ago. It was a cold and rigid woman who arrived home.

Mrs Armitage attributed the change to Annabelle’s high marriage and was duly impressed. Even the sharp-eyed Deirdre simply thought that Annabelle had become very high in the instep and
failed to see the suffering which lurked under the cold and fashionable exterior.

Holden good-naturedly resigned herself to accepting quarters in a small attic room and cheerfully began to advise the Armitage sisters on dress and manners. A governess had not yet been found
for them and so Mrs Armitage was delighted to have this unexpected mentor for the girls.

The vicar did not arrive back till late evening. Mrs Armitage had said he was about his duties, but it turned out he had spent an unsuccessful day’s fishing.

He listened carefully to Annabelle’s explanation for her homecoming. She said the Marquess was too taken up with military duties to escort her throughout the Season, and that since she
missed her home she had thought it would be a good opportunity to pay them a visit.

The vicar was sharp-set and did not want to think about anything but food. But as he pushed his plate away at the end of the meal, he thoughtfully picked his teeth and studied Annabelle’s
calm face.

He seemed to finally come to some conclusion, for, as Annabelle was explaining that she thought she would pay some calls on the morrow, he said, ‘Don’t make any plans, Bella. I will
talk to you in the morning.’

Annabelle looked at him sharply, but his ruddy face seemed quite bland as he poured his sixth glass of port with steady concentration.

She spent a restless, sleepless night, waking up at dawn in a sweat after a particularly vile dream in which she was standing at the altar at St George’s, Hanover Square, holding the train
of Lady Coombes’ wedding gown, and Lady Coombes was marrying the Marquess of Brabington.

The morning dragged on. She tried to keep away from her sisters who were too full of questions about the glories of fashionable London.

Her father appeared before her like a stout jack-inthe-box. He looked at her carefully, at her white face and sad eyes.

‘Get your bonnet, Bella,’ he said roughly. ‘We’re going to pay a call.’

Annabelle sat beside her father in his open carriage, only vaguely aware of the warmth of the sun and the glory of the golden day.

The vicar swung round in front of Squire Radford’s cottage
ornée
and helped Annabelle to alight.

The Squire’s soft-footed Indian servant said his master was in the garden and led them there.

The Squire was amazed to see Annabelle, his eyes darting from her face to the vicar’s.

He waited until they were all seated at a round table under the gently moving leaves of a sycamore tree. The Indian servant brought madeira for the vicar and lemonade for Annabelle and departed,
leaving the silent company studying each other.

A little brook at the foot of the garden chattered over the pebbles on its way to join the River Blyne. Far away a dog barked and the hedges and trees were full of birdsong.

But winter was present in Annabelle’s face.

‘This is very pleasant,’ said Squire Radford when his servant had left. ‘I am surprised to find you in the country, my lady, with the Season only just begun. But you are
welcome, very welcome. And Charles, too. Is there any special reason for your call, my dear Charles?’

‘Yes,’ said the vicar curtly. ‘Her.’ He jerked his head in Annabelle’s direction.

‘Dear me!’ He turned to Annabelle sympathetically. ‘You are in trouble, my dear?’

‘No,’ said Annabelle.

‘Yes,’ said the vicar of St Charles and St Jude.

‘I am here because my husband is engaged in military duties,’ said Annabelle in a high voice, unlike her own.

‘They’ve quarrelled,’ interrupted the vicar, ‘and Bella’s breaking her heart.’

Annabelle looked at her father haughtily and then her face seemed to break apart until she bent her head and burst into noisy tears.

The Squire made helpless little sounds of distress, but the vicar said callously, ‘Leave her be, Jimmy, or we’ll never get to the bottom of this.’

They waited until Annabelle had cried herself out and had blown her nose.

‘I’m sorry,’ she whispered.

‘Very well,’ said her father bracingly. ‘Out with it. The whole story. Start from the beginning about how you was in love with Sylvester.’

‘Oh, father,’ wailed Annabelle, ‘if you knew
that
, how could you let me make such a fool of myself?’

‘I’m still waiting to hear how much of a fool you’ve been,’ said the vicar drily. ‘See here, Jimmy, this madeira’s prime stuff.’

‘Really Charles,’ protested the Squire, and turning to Annabelle, ‘Go on, my dear, we are only here to help you.’

Annabelle opened her mouth and began to talk.

She talked and talked while the sun climbed higher in the sky and the birds fell silent. She told them everything,of her jealousy of Minerva, of her falling in love with her husband, of the
trick he had played on her.

‘By Gad!’ cried the vicar angrily. The Squire saw his friend was about to burst out and tell Annabelle that they had told her husband to behave wickedly, so he rose quickly and
helped Annabelle to her feet. ‘You must leave us to discuss this,’ he said gently. ‘Go to my library and have a little rest. You will find it has all been a dreadful mistake. Go
now.’

Annabelle felt so weary after her confession that she felt she could sleep for days. She did not see what she or anyone else could do to mend matters, but she obeyed the Squire and left them to
their discussion.

‘He went too far,’ began the vicar wrathfully.

‘My dear Charles, pray calm yourself,’ said Squire Radford. ‘I am persuaded the Marquess had no hand in this so-called trick.

‘You are not thinking coolly. Now, we will go over Annabelle’s story again, bit by bit.’ They turned it this way and that; Annabelle had told them about everyone she had met
and about the two humiliations of Sir Guy Wayne.

‘Now don’t you think,’ mused the Squire, half closing his eyes against the sun and putting the tips of his fingers together, ‘that either Sir Guy or Lady Coombes would
have more of an interest in tricking Annabelle? It must be someone who knew the marriage very well, else why would they not think that the Brabingtons would confront each other. Annabelle did not
even tell Brabington that the woman had called. I think he should be told that.’

‘Very well,’ said the vicar, ‘we’ll write to him.’

The squire sighed and looked around his sunny garden. ‘No,’ he said reluctantly, ‘we must go, Charles. Today.’

‘A pox on all daughters,’ grumbled the vicar, heaving himself out of his chair. ‘They’re worse than foxes any day. Now foxes at least give a man some sport.’

‘Well,’ smiled the Squire, ‘this is in the nature of a hunt. Come Charles. There is no need to tell Annabelle our plans.’

But the pair met with a setback as soon as they arrived at Conduit Street. The Marquess had already departed for his estates in the country and had left no word when he would
be returning.

‘There you are,’ said the vicar with gloomy satisfaction, ‘that shows he ain’t got his eye on any lightskirt. Mind you, ’tis no wonder they quarrelled. A saint
would quarrel faced with the mausoleum atmosphere of this house. Did you ever seen anything so cold and gloomy?’

‘Where to now?’ asked the Squire.

‘Lady Coombes,’ said the vicar. ‘I have her direction.’

Lady Coombes was startled to receive a call from the vicar of St Charles and St Jude but concealed her surprise under her usual haughty manner.

But she could not conceal her surprise or anger when this clergyman asked her abruptly, ‘D’ye know a lightskirt called Harriet Evans?’

‘Really sir,’ said Lady Coombes. ‘You should ask your son-in-law. He was once
épris
in that direction.’

‘Were you?’ demanded the vicar, studying her closely. ‘Were you taken with Brabington?’

She flushed to the roots of her hair, then closed her mouth like a steel trap, and called two footmen to eject her unwelcome visitors at the double.

‘Now what?’ said the vicar crossly. ‘That one’s mean enough for anything.’