The Sleeping Fury (12 page)

Charlotte suddenly abandoned her tactics. “Mamma,” she said persuasively, “I am writing to Alfred this morning to accept him; and you are writing to Beatrix, aren't you, to invite them for Easter?”

Lady Hadlow melted. “You are a wicked, scheming creature,” she said. Suddenly she became stern again. “But I shall not ask
him
” she said.

“Mamma,” said Charlotte,” I insist.”

“My dear Charlotte, you don't know what you're asking. To see that odious, vulgar little man treating Beatrix with the familiarity of a … no, Charlotte! It's out of the question. You must spare me that.”

Having achieved so much, Charlotte was willing to be generous, especially since she had realised, from her mother's last remark, that to ask Beatrix's
husband at first might actually impede a reconciliation. “But the baby must come,” she said.

Lady Hadlow did her best to appear indifferent. “Oh, the baby! The baby can come, poor mite!”

• • • • • • • •

The letter to Alfred took long to write. Charlotte sat at her desk, alternately absorbed in writing and in gazing upwards with eyes fixed intently on the motions of her mind. She wished to lay bare to Alfred her inmost thoughts and feelings. His love for her, she felt, deserved nothing less than the most perfect sincerity in return, and she was trying to be, above everything, honest. The thought of his love for her, which had at first troubled her, troubled her no longer. It warmed her heart. She felt that keen enhancement of life which comes of being loved, and her heart overflowed with gratitude to Alfred. At last she had finished. She laid down her pen, took up the letter, and read it through.

“MY DEAR ALFRED,—I promised to think, but how difficult it is to think deliberately, and what good does it do? I
did
think for the whole two hours between Templeton and Paddington, but it was something else than thinking that helped me at last to decide. How I wish you were here, so that we could talk and I could tell you all I want to tell you, and
must
tell you! I was so bewildered when you spoke in the brougham yesterday that I could do nothing but seem cold and foolish and ungrateful. I am going to try, now that I am calm, to tell you everything as
honestly as I can. I have never been in love, but I have imagined to myself, as I suppose every girl and boy has, what it must be like to be in love, and have even pictured my
beau ideal
. Did you ever suspect me of such romantic absurdity?

“I believe it is possible to know what it is to be in love without ever having known love. Does this seem to you ridiculous? I am going to be quite honest, Alfred, and confess to you something which may seem very foolish. When I let myself dream of that imaginary young man, I have feelings deeper and more stirring than any I have known for a real person; deeper, much deeper, Alfred, than my feelings for you. How it pains me to say that, and to confess, as I must in honesty confess, that I am sure I am not in love with you. I like you, I love you as I would love my dearest friend, and, indeed, except for Lady Mardale, you are my dearest friend. I asked myself yesterday in the train whether your death or hers would cause me the greater grief, and I knew at once that I could more easily bear to lose you. That is not being in love, is it?

“When you took hold of my arm that day when we walked to Rimple, I felt at once the presence of something which seemed to me to spoil our friendship, and, though I no longer feel that now, I felt it again yesterday in the brougham. Perhaps this was natural. Perhaps it was simply the shyness and awkwardness of an inexperienced young woman; but I do not think so. But I do want to marry and to have a home of my own and the companionship of someone I am fond of. That
sounds rather cold and calculating, doesn't it? But I can say more than that; I can honestly say that I like and respect you, Alfred, more than any man I have ever known, and I do so want to make you happy. I should be happy with you; I feel sure of that. I cannot imagine us ever quarrelling or growing tired of each other's company; and if, after all that I have just told you, you ask me once more to marry you, I will say ‘Yes' whole-heartedly, or with all of my heart except that little blind corner which cries out for its romance. But now you must be as honest with me as I have tried to be with you, and unless you are sure, from the bottom of your heart, that you want me still, and as I am, you must write and tell me that you think it better that we should not marry. Dear Alfred, how can I tell you how grateful I am, and shall always be, for your love.”

• • • • • • • •

A year and a half later, when Charlotte had just turned twenty-one, she and Alfred were married.

It was an August afternoon at Haughton. The warm yellow stone of the beautiful classic front glowed as if built of sunlight. Doors and windows were flung open to the garden, giving glimpses in the dim, shadowy interior of a fragment of a tall cabinet, the gleam of a mirror, or the cool lustre of a china vase; yet it seemed as if the place was deserted, for no one stirred in the house or along the garden paths, and not a sound broke the summer silence—that silence which is made up of the hum of bees and the croon of hidden stock-doves.

But the place was not deserted, for under a great beech-tree on the lawn, half hidden and wholly sheltered by its drooping boughs, two women were sitting in basket-chairs near a rustic table. One of them, the elder, was a large, untidy woman dressed in dark blue. Obviously she was not interested in her personal appearance, for her hair was carelessly arranged and her dress carelessly put on. There was no attempt to make the most of what was still a considerable beauty. There was something untidy and unrestrained even in the expression of her face, as though she were disillusioned and a little cynical about life. She looked at least forty, though in fact she was just over thirty.

The younger woman was quietly but beautifully dressed in black. Her attitude, as she lay back in the
basket-chair, and her pale face with its dark eyes and large, handsome mouth, had a natural dignity and all the elegance and restraint that her sister lacked. A book lay on her lap, and she was gazing abstractedly before her. The other, seeing that she was no longer reading, spoke.

“Where's Mamma, Charlotte?”

Charlotte Mardale turned her head. “Indoors, I think, Bee.”

“Probably writing letters,” said Beatrix a little grimly.” She is no doubt writing to poor Cousin Fanny. ‘I hope you are keeping a careful watch on Jenkinson's bills. The one I paid before I left home included four items I had not ordered. Tell Hobson to be sure to have the sprinkler on the lawn for at least an hour every evening while this heat lasts.'”

Charlotte laughed. “You're always down on Mamma, Beatrix.”

“Not seriously, Charlotte. Really I've been very fond of Mamma ever since I escaped from her, and in many ways I admire her immensely. She would have done extraordinarily well in the Army. You know, Charlotte, she treats us still as children. She was at me again this morning about my dress.”

“Quite right, too, Bee. You dress abominably, and you take no care of your looks. Look at your lovely hair—flung up like a haystack.”

Beatrix laughed her old tomboy laugh. “It's all very well for you to talk, Charlotte. You have money and a position to keep up. I can't afford to be smart.”

“Nonsense, my dear Beatrix. You're not a pauper. Without spending a penny more than you do, you
could dress twice as well, and it costs nothing to pay a little attention to your hair and at least to put on your dresses right way round. You seem to ignore the fact that you're a very handsome woman.”

Beatrix's eyes flashed for a moment; then she smiled bitterly. “I really don't much care nowadays, Charlotte, whether I'm handsome or hideous. What does it matter?” She sighed. “One loses one's gusto as time goes on.”

Laying one arm along the arm of her chair, she turned more intently to her sister. “Confess, Charlotte, that, even for you, life is not what it was. Honestly, does it come up to what you expected when you married? I've no business to ask you such a question; but there it is, I've asked it.”

Charlotte raised her dark, serious eyes. “Yes, Bee. I can honestly say that I'm not disappointed in my marriage.” She spoke the truth, yet her conscience pricked her, telling her that, to be really truthful, she should have added that she had not been in love with Alfred when she married him and so had not demanded much. But she could not tell Beatrix that; to do so would have seemed to her a kind of disloyalty to Alfred.

“Nor in life at all?” persisted Beatrix.

“Oh, one had such romantic ideas about life as a child,” answered Charlotte. “But I'm content. One looks at life differently now, of course.” Again her conscience pricked her, reminding her of the small, secret voice which still sometimes cried out for love as in the days of her girlhood. But that was a romantic dream; indeed, she reflected, it was strange that at her age, and after nearly seven years
of happy married life, she had not yet thrown off that childish illusion.

Beatrix nodded her head grimly. “Very differently, alas!”

The pain and disillusionment in her tone touched something in Charlotte. She laid her hand affectionately on the arm that still lay along the arm of the chair. “And you, my poor Bee,” she said; “you are disappointed, then?”

Beatrix's eyes filled with tears. “Hideously!” she said, with tragic emphasis.

“You don't love him any longer?”

There was something heart-rending in the dry, prosaic tone of Beatrix's reply. “He seems to me now, Charlotte, nothing more than what Mamma said of him when she met him in Harrogate—just an ordinary, vulgar little man.”

“Oh, Bee!” Lady Mardale cried out in pain. “Your beau?”

“Yes, my beau! If he had been a little less of a beau it would have been more fortunate for both of us. We soon found out that we did not really care for one another. It was he, Charlotte, who found it out first. Perhaps, if he hadn't, I should never have found it out at all.”

“My poor Bee! But at least there's little Bob.”

“Yes, I
have
Bob. If Bob had not been born I should have left him long ago—run away again, Charlotte. What a triumph that would have been for Mamma, especially as I should have had to run home. There was nowhere else to run to. It is a little cowardly, I know, to blame others for one's own mistakes, but, all the same, I have often thought
that if Mamma had been a little more tolerant we should have found out our mistake before we married. Even if she had not consented to an engagement, she might have allowed us to see and write to one another. It would have been easy to say that we must know each other a little better before becoming engaged. It was her antagonism that roused mine. Mamma and I, you know, Charlotte, are very much alike in some ways.”

“I remember thinking, Bee, when Mamma and I were here, the summer after you ran away, that if Mamma had been like Lady Mardale instead of … well, like Mamma, you would never have gone.”

“Ah, but dear little Lady Mardale was a saint. When I got your letter last April, Charlotte, I felt that something unutterably precious had gone out of our lives. If Mamma had been like her …” She paused, and then a humorous smile lit up her face. “Well, I, for one, would not have been like myself. We were far too well brought up, Charlotte. I try never to say ‘Do this' and ‘Don't do that' to Bobby; and you can imagine, my dear,” she added, laughing, “how difficult I find it. Now I'm sure Alfred was not brought up on ‘Do's' and ‘Don'ts.'”

“But probably, Bee, Alfred did not require it, and I think we
did.
We needed some sort of discipline. In many ways, you know, we were rather fools, and I don't think we can blame Mamma for that. She was certainly never a fool.”

“No, indeed. If she had been a little more of a fool and a little less of a—”

“An Ebernoe.”

“Precisely, an Ebernoe; we should all have been happier and better.”

At that moment Lady Hadlow appeared at the top of the front door steps. She stood for a moment scanning the garden; then, catching sight of her daughters under the beech, she came briskly down the steps and across the lawn.

Charlotte watched her mother, smiling affectionately. “Isn't she marvellous, Bee?”

“As alert and important as a sergeant of the Guards. And in a moment, no doubt, she will be uttering words of command.”

“Charlotte,” called Lady Hadlow, “Lady Rod-mell has just rung up to ask if you are at home. I told Carson to say yes. She is driving over to tea. Beatrix dear, do go and change that dreadful old dress. Put on the nice grey I gave you, and for goodness' sake get Elizabeth to put you into it. I do like to see my daughters at least decent.”

“If you would only be content with
that
, Mamma,” sighed Beatrix, getting out of her chair. “Come and sit here, and try to keep out of mischief while I'm away.”

“Poor Beatrix,” murmured Lady Hadlow, gazing after her retreating daughter, “she looks little better than an old-clothes woman.” Then she turned to Charlotte. “Whatever is the matter with Carson, Charlotte? He looked as if he had seen a ghost when he spoke to me just now about Lady Rodmell's telephone message. Ah, he's coming out.”

Carson, tall, important, and respectful, came towards them across the grass. “Might I speak to you
a moment, my lady?” he said to Charlotte, casting a fleeting glance, as he spoke, at Lady Hadlow.

Charlotte, realising that he had something private to say, rose from her chair and went with him out of the shadow of the beech-tree.

“Excuse me troubling you, my lady, but something very unpleasant has happened. For the last week, my lady, I have been missing some of the silver—spoons and forks. I check them once a month, and last Saturday, when I did so, I found four large forks and six tablespoons missing. I said nothing, but I checked them again on Monday and found that two more forks and two dessertspoons had gone. I thought it best to mention the matter to Mrs. Portman, and she and I took steps to find out if any of the servants had been thieving. I have just found out that William, the footman, has been taking them.”