The Imaginary Gentleman (17 page)

T
WO DAYS WENT BY IN
which Laura could not see any member of her family without receiving a loving smile, a kindly word, and more indulgent looks than she could well stomach. She began to long for a return of Edward's saturnine humour or a taste of Elspeth's vinegar to spice the new sweetness of her existence. Even Sir Richard excelled himself, seemingly unable to understand that his soulful looks, intended to reassure her of his sympathy, were an uncomfortable reminder of her humiliation.

For much of the night it rained heavily. In the morning the garden was too wet for walking, and Laura stayed in her room, reading by the window. She heard the footsteps of someone on the flagged terrace below and looked out. Her brother was walking up and down along the side of the house, in that small area dry enough to preserve his well-polished top boots. She found herself smiling at the comical view of just the top of his hat and his broad shoulders, with his boots appearing one after the other in front. It was not only the peculiar perspective that amused her, for his walking had an oddly purposeful air. Something is different about him, she thought. Oh, I see! She watched him for a few moments; then heard the door open. Elspeth came in.

“What are you looking at, Laura?” she said. Laura beckoned her. Elspeth looked out and was struck immediately by what had excited her sister.

“Our brother is walking without his stick! How many turns has he taken?”

“I think three or four at least.”

“I hope he does not over-exert himself.”

“I doubt it. This past week he has been forever out walking alone—no doubt discarding his cane when he was not observed.”

Elspeth clapped her hands. “This secrecy of Edward's is at one with his determined independence.”

“Yes.”

Elspeth put her arm around her sister's waist. “We will not be disturbed by little secrets such as this.” She drew Laura's head down to her and kissed her cheek. “It has taken your unhappy experience at Lyme to make us, all four, all in all to one another, as we always were.”

“Four?”

“Our cousin Richard is one of our happy quartet.” Elspeth stroked her sister's cheek and Laura pulled away.

Her sister continued, “It is my dearest wish and Edward's, that Richard will be not only cousin, but brother!”

Laura removed the soft hand that lay upon her neck but Elspeth grasped her hand. Laura jerked herself away.

“Make us all happy, dearest Sister!” said Elspeth. “Put all this terrible anxiety from our minds!”

“Anxiety?”

“Did you not read the pamphlet, Laura? It seems you are embarked upon an unhappy career of self-deception.”

Elspeth insinuated her arm about Laura again and whispered, “Only a day or two since, you were avowing that … a certain gentleman … may have been done away with! Now, though you may not be ready to admit it, you begin to see the truth.”

Laura sharply pushed Elspeth back at arm's length. “This is the motive of your new-found kindness for me! You are deceived, Elspeth, if you think that marrying Richard can make me happy.”

“Happiness in marriage is much overrated, Laura. The husband has his occupations and the wife hers.” She looked at her sister shrewdly. “It is the unhappy truth that spinsters are regarded as of not
much use in the world. They have missed their true role as helpmate for a husband. On reflection, I understand why this failure is enough to cause disorder in the mind.”

“What of men in the same predicament? Are they also gone mad for want of a wife?”

“The sages do not speak of them.”

“How interesting!”

“Never mind men, my dear. The remedy is within your reach. You must marry Richard.”

“No.”

“I say you must or I cannot answer for the alternative!”

Laura turned away from her. Elspeth walked about the room, admiring herself in the mirror as she passed it. She noticed that an unattractive firmness had taken over her looks, and softened her expression.

“Happiness does not require any great passion on either side. In fact, the scholars do teach us that an excess of passion in a woman can lead to madness.”

“We go mad with passion and without it, according to you.”

“How you twist my words, Laura. I meant that the passions are the enemy of Woman: we have not the constitution to withstand them. Marry Richard! There is no risk there.”

Elspeth sat on the edge of the bed with her feet upon the counterpane, admiring the effect of the lacey frills of her wrap spreading white foam across the white bed. Laura sat silent and withdrawn in her chair.

“When you are married, you will no longer be under the supervision of your relations. You will look back with amazement upon your present servitude.”

Laura looked up sharply. “Marriage can be a more bitter servitude, Elspeth.”

“That would not be the case with Richard. You will bend him to your will.”

Laura did not reply. Elspeth pulled out a small booklet, which had been concealed in her sash. She dropped it on the bed, saying, “I will leave you now.”

The door closed and Laura went over to the bed to read the title:
Hysteric Disorders of the Female Mind
by Dr Albert Mellbone. Touching it only with a finger, she flicked it to the floor and kicked it across the room.

She walked back to the window. In the meadow below, she could see Sir Richard walking across to meet his steward, who had come in by the side gate. They stood not far from where Mr. Woodruff had stood when he emerged from the Hollow.

Mr. Woodruff had his back to me, she thought. I drew him the way he appeared to me as he turned. At what moment did I realise who he was? The picture was drawn so soon after the incident—that may tell me why I thought he was Mr. Templeton.

Laura sat at the table, every movement seeming to be of utmost importance. She took out her key, turned it in the lock and slowly opened the lid. In the act of reaching into the little space, her hand froze. The sketch that had been teasing her with its presence, which she had lately screwed into a ball, was missing. The small shelf was empty. Slowly, not believing it, she searched every drawer and shelf of the desk. The sketch was gone.

Laura jumped up and hurried over to the fireplace. She picked up the poker and thrust it into the ashes remaining from the evening before. They crumbled to the consistency of sand so that she could not tell if a paper had been recently burned there. She had not done so herself—she was certain.

Someone has opened my desk, she thought. Was it locked this morning—yes, certainly, for here are the keys … my journal!

She slid open the secret drawer and took out the book, testing the brass catch—there was a trick to opening it, but another could solve it with patience.

But her desk? Could someone have tampered with it?

Laura carefully turned the desk around on the table so that the light fell upon it from the window. She could see no scratches there. The spare key was carefully concealed in her bedroom at St Austell. It was still in its hiding spot when she last left the place, a month before, she was sure.

She heard a rushing sound in her ears, felt her heart bounding in fright.

I am mad, she thought. I do not recall even moving that sketch. If it were not for my other errors, I would be quite sure.

She looked vacantly around the room.

Mr. Templeton does not exist, she thought. I have created him and believed in him. Even more, I thought him less false than anyone I have ever known.

Her lips felt bloodless, her temples buzzed. Dizzy, she leant her forehead against the cold glass. She heard a groaning sound, coming it seemed from her own lips, as she staggered to the bed and fell, face forward upon it, her hands to her head.

S
IR
R
ICHARD HAD DECIDED TO
accompany the ladies to the viewing of the smallest Johnson, and they walked, for the vicarage was scarcely half a mile away.

Their visit reached its climax when a servant carried in little Harriet and placed her in her mother's lap. A sturdy mite, the babe thrust out her plump little arms towards the visitors, with every expectation of a warm reception. The proud mama held the child standing up, straightened her dress with one hand and turned her slightly side-on the better to admire her herself.

While Sir Richard and Elspeth were full of praise, Laura was unable to speak at first. In her mind's eye, she could not rid herself of the picture of little Susan, dirty and discarded. She had felt pity for Susan, yet had not reached out to touch her, as Jane Woodruff had done. Now there was a sensation along her arms, as though her skin ached with the desire to touch this pampered child.

“She is beautiful, Mrs. Johnson,” she said.

“God is very good to me.” The mother paused. “Would you like to hold her?”

“May I?'

The servant lifted the babe from her mistress's lap and deposited her on Laura's. The child pulled herself upright, put her little arms around Laura's neck and laughed into her face. Sir Richard moved his chair close to Laura's and reached out to touch the baby's hand, which at once curled around his finger. He said some baby nonsense to make her laugh again.

Elspeth regarded the domestic scene with a certain pleasure until she saw Mrs. Johnson's eyes on her, and adopted an obvious air of nonchalance. Their eyes met in complicity.

At that moment, Laura was aware of her cousin's closeness, of his face not twelve inches from her own. Raising her eyes, Laura saw the interest she and Sir Richard provoked in the other ladies, and at once relinquished the babe to the nurse.

 

Mrs. Evans hummed a lullaby all the way to the manor house, frequently squeezing Laura's arm against her side.

As they entered the hall, Sir Richard picked up the letters and leafed through them.

“A letter for you, Laura!” He handed it to her before Elspeth had a chance to react.

Laura turned it over, reading the direction, and caught her breath.

“Aunt Fielding!”

“I do not wish you to hold unsupervised correspondence at this time, dear Laura,” said Elspeth, looking suspiciously at the baronet. “You will allow me a chance to read it, Laura?”

Laura smiled in a way that hinted at consent and put the letter in her coat pocket. Elspeth hesitated, then began to glide upstairs. “Come with me, my love.”

When her sister turned at the landing, Laura slipped outside, just before the footman shut the great door. Fingering the concealed letter, she went quickly around the corner of the house and into the
forest. She stopped and looked back, saw that no one was following her, and took out the letter.

It was thinner than those she was accustomed to receive from her aunt. Her hands trembled as she began to open it.

No … not yet. I must go to the top of the hill, where Elspeth cannot reach me, she thought.

She reached the summit quickly, sat on the seat, and, still catching her breath, slipped her finger under the seal, breaking it. She unfolded the letter, written on one sheet, which formed the envelope. It was very short and a chill moved along her arms when she knew the reason.

Laura sat unseeing and unfeeling for a few moments. The one person who may have been able to prove the existence of Mr. Templeton
was, against all chance, no more. The weight of sadness slowly spread through her, a heaviness in her bosom, an ache in her throat and darkness in her mind.

The view before her seemed foreign. She shivered. I am a stranger here, she thought. I look at this familiar scene as through glass.

In the distance, the fields and woods seemed blurred, only the rocky prominence still stood in jagged clarity. She put her hands to her head.

From the corner of her eye, she caught a glimpse of a servant's livery—Jonathon! She turned and he was gone. As though her ears were blocked, she heard dimly the sounds of his hurried footsteps.

I have not spared a thought for my aunt's loss, she thought. I will pray God to aid her. I pray God to aid me.

The chill of the day slowly crept into her, and she felt colder and colder. At last she could see the view no more, even the trees about her seemed shadowy, as her tears cloaked the ground about her.

She leapt up and turned to the opening of the path, to find the tumbling mist following her, falling down the hill around her feet.

Halfway down the path, she met her cousin.

“Laura! Why did you not come in sooner?”

“How did you know?”

“Jonathon told me where you were. You know the mist falls suddenly here.”

“Oh!” She looked around, as the mist rising around their legs, rolled down the hill.

“I thought … I thought it in my mind.”

“Nay—you are just distracted.” He squeezed her hand and drew it into his elbow and began to lead her down. “Bad news, Laura?”

“Mrs. Gurdon is no more.”

Sir Richard patted her hand. “Had you hoped for news of …?”

She leant her head towards him. “I hung on to a thread, Richard. I have been greatly in error, and know not what is to become of me.”

“Nay—it is not so bad as that.”

“I found something missing from my desk—which I always keep locked.”

“What has been taken?”

“Only a sketch. I wanted to look at it again and it is gone!”

“Perhaps you discarded it or left it somewhere.”

“I never would have left it for another to find. Perhaps I burnt it.”

He sensed her mounting fear.

“No ill will befall you, Laura.”

“How can you promise that, Richard?”

“Through the recommended prescription, my dear … marriage. I will never abandon you or send you away.”

She laughed a little—mirthless and embarrassed. “That is too much sacrifice altogether. You would tie yourself to me from a sense of chivalry?”

“Think you that I have nothing to gain?”

The clammy chill of the mist thickened around them, as they stood facing each other, silent for a moment. He took her hand. “I can be happy as your husband, Laura. We know each other very well.” He grimaced in self-deprecation. “We take little risk of
un
happiness.”

“You are too good to me, Richard.”

“Laura,” he said, “you are not permanently … ill, and if you did prove to be so—well, we would face it together.”

Together, she thought.

Sir Richard looked at the damp, spongy grass. “I would kneel to you, Laura, but …”

“Do not be so silly,” she said.

“Then imagine it so, dearest Laura.” A look of utter solemnity came over his features.

“Laura—loveliest of women—will you do me the great honour of consenting to be my wife?”

Laura looked at him, his face more dear than foolish these days. She glanced towards the house where her sister awaited her. Perhaps she would crouch in wait for all the rest of Laura's life. Perhaps I will descend into madness altogether, she thought, and pass all the years to come in the company of lunatics.

The alternative arose before her of an eligible establishment, a kindly husband and the chance to hold her own child in her arms.

“Yes,” she said.

“Yes?” He reached out his arms as if to enfold her.

Fear leapt up. “Pray let me think, Richard.”

“Take all the time you need. You are tied to nothing, dear Laura. Only I am tied to my promise.”

“That is too much, Richard.”

“No, no, you need a little time to be used to the idea and you will see its blessings as I do.”

He offered her his arm again and they entered the house.