The Spanish Bride (48 page)

As luck would have it, Madame Dupont was able to offer Juana a pair of tolerable rooms upon the first floor. Her terms, to the wife of an officer engaged for seven years in helping to bring about the ruin of the Corsican Monster, were most reasonable. She was very sympathetic when she heard of Juana’s temporary widowhood, and privately assured Tom that he need have no qualms at leaving his sister-in-law in her charge. Since the Angel, being situated in the Strand, was a noisy inn where it was almost impossible to sleep at night, it was arranged that Juana should remove to Panton Square without loss of time.

Tom, who was obliged to report his arrival in England to the army medical authorities, was relieved to have found a safe harbourage for Juana. He promised to visit her frequently, if the doctors did not clap him into hospital; warned her that she would very likely receive a visit from his married sister, who lived just out of London, at Clapton; bade her be a good girl; kissed her in a brotherly fashion; and took himself off.

He was not condemned to a hospital, but as Juana seemed to be quite comfortable in her lodgings, he thought he should take a journey into Cambridgeshire to visit his family. Feeling very much as though her one sheet anchor were being taken away from her, Juana said bravely that of course he must go. Being well aware of his besetting sin, she added that considering he had not written to his father or sisters for years, the least he could do was to visit them without an instant’s loss of time.

‘You know, if you cared to come with me they would be delighted to see you,’ he suggested. ‘Oh, no! Please, no, Tom!’ she said. ‘You have such a large family, and it quite frightens me!’

‘Well, I daresay you’re right, but there are only eleven of us, besides Grandmamma and my aunts. And Stona’s married now, you know, as well as Alice; and my sister Eleanor writes that Charlie lives with my Uncle Davie almost entirely.’

But even this assurance failed to persuade Juana to go with him. She sent instead her humble duty to her father-in-law, and the trifles Harry had purchased for his sisters in Bordeaux, and sped Tom on his way with adjurations to explain to his family what her reasons were for remaining in London.

2

With the departure of Tom for Whittlesey, Juana, having enjoyed the luxury of crying bitterly in the privacy of her bedchamber, resolutely bathed her swollen eyes, and determined at once to occupy herself in learning to speak English. Madame Dupont not unnaturally thought that a female would be a better teacher for her young guest than a man, but after enduring several depressing hours in the company of a genteel spinster, employed for many years at a Seminary for the Daughters of Gentlemen, Juana announced that she liked men better than women, and begged Madame to look about her for a suitable professor. Miss Price bridled when Juana’s excuses were conveyed to her, but she was really quite relieved to be rid of a pupil whose unconventionality bordered, she thought, on impropriety. Since the few English phrases at Juana’s command had been picked up from the rank-and-file of the Light division, it was no wonder that the poor lady should feel a certain degree of dismay. The circumstances were explained to her, of course, but the notion of a female’s following the drum was so repugnant to her, that she could not rid herself of the belief that Juana must be a very ungenteel young person.

Madame Dupont next found Mr Frederick Stone for Juana, an elderly gentleman with a sense of humour, with whom she professed herself very well satisfied. He made her read Thomson’s Seasons aloud to him, and while her tongue struggled with the difficult English words, her imagination followed Harry across the Atlantic, or dwelt again amongst the Pyrenees. She could almost hear the challenge to Portuguese sentries: ‘Sentre alerte?—Alerte soy!’ and came back to the unhappy present to find Mr Stone correcting a mispronunciation.

Several wounded acquaintances from the Light division were in England, and she received visits from those who were well enough to go about town; but most of them had gone on leave to their homes in different parts of the country; nor were any of them, with the exception of Colonel Ross, of the 3rd battalion, close friends.

She soon learned to find her way about the bewildering streets of London; and she would very often accompany Madame Dupont on her shopping expeditions. She would not. admit that London was comparable to Madrid, but secretly she was much impressed by it, and quite gasped when Madame took her to the Pantheon Bazaar, in Oxford Street. Hyde Park she thought very pretty, but when she went for walks there, and saw the smart London ladies floating along in their diaphanous gowns, on the arms of dandies who would have put to shame all the Counts in the army, she felt very lonely, and sometimes had to wink hard to stop the tears coming into her eyes.

When Tom came back from Whittlesey, she greeted him in English, saying proudly: ‘’Ow do you do?’ which made him laugh at her.

‘Do not queez me!’ she scolded. ‘I spik very well already! And now we will talk in Spanish, please. Was your father well? Were your sisters glad to see you?’

Yes, Tom had received a much warmer welcome than such a neglectful son deserved, but he said it had been melancholy to see his home without his mother. However, Betsy was a famous housekeeper; Eleanor, dear, dreamy soul! was the same as ever; and little Anna had grown out of all knowledge.

‘She’s rather like you, only older, of course. They all sent their love to you, and Eleanor—she’s our scholar, you know—gave me a letter for you, written in French. My father wishes so much that you would go down to live with them, but I said there was no chance of that. My sisters would give their eyes to see you! They would have me describe you to them over and over again, and Betsy said she was convinced of your being a female of the noblest character! Such a good joke, Juana!—they are quite afraid of your being like the haughty Spanish dames one reads about! Nothing will make them believe all Spaniards are not so! Then they would pronounce your name wrong, sounding the J as we English do. It sounded quite odd, and not a bit like you. And now I have to go out to Clapton to visit my sister Sargant! It is a great bore, but I promised my father I would do so.’ ‘Yes, of course, but tell me, Tom: are the horses at Whittlesey? Is Tiny well?’ ‘Oh, by Jove, if I was not forgetting! My father told me to say that Tiny is in famous shape, but he wonders that Harry should mount you on such an unmanageable horse! Old Chap is still poorly. My father fears he will never be good for much again, but never mind! he has his eye on just such a hunter as would suit Harry.’

‘And the hounds? Are they well?’

‘Yes, and Lola has whelped again, and my sisters are quite wild about the puppies. I tell them they will spoil them if they fondle and cosset them so much, but they don’t heed a word I say, of course!’

He went off again soon afterwards to visit his sister, but not before he had squired Juana to watch the procession of the Allied Sovereigns, who had come to London on a visit to the Prince Regent. Tom hired a window, but he agreed with Juana that it was hardly worth the expense, not one of the magnificent persons bowing so graciously to the cheering crowds being able to hold a candle to old Hookey.

His lordship had had a dukedom conferred on him, and had been appointed, besides, Ambassador to the Court of King Louis XVIII. Napoleon having retired to Elba, under polite supervision, it might have been supposed that his lordship’s troubles were at an end. Nothing of the sort! Ferdinand VII, restored to his kingdom, had no sooner been established in Madrid than he began to behave in the most tiresome fashion, dissolving the Cortes, setting up the inquisition again, and pursuing the Liberates with the most relentless persecution. If Ferdinand was determined to rule as a despot, there was naturally only one thing to be done: Field-Marshal the Duke of Wellington must be sent as plenipotentiary to Madrid to reason with him. The Duke, whose rigid sense of duty never permitted him to decline to perform any service demanded of him for the good of the state, accepted the charge, but thought, at the end of a visit full of flattery, banquets, and processions, that he had done very little good.

Returning to France, he took leave of his army in a General Order, dated 14th June, at Bordeaux. He arrived in London on the 23rd of the month, and joined the Prince Regent, the Emperor of Russia, and the King of Prussia, not to mention Marshal Blücher at Portsmouth, where they were engaged in reviewing the Fleet.

Laboriously spelling out this news in the Gazette, Juana said that of course it was gratifying to think that the war was over at last, but that the thought of the Squire’s taking leave of the army was so melancholy that it made one almost wish that peace had not been concluded. ‘The Squire?’ said Mr Stone.

‘Oh, that is what we call Lord Wellington!’ said Juana superbly.

A faint smile hovered on Mr Stone’s lips; he had never seen his pupil so animated, for she was generally rather listless, and given to heaving deep, sad sighs. He saw that when the conversation turned on army matters her mournful eyes brightened, and he drew her out a little, asking her what the army thought of all the new peerages. ‘Lord Niddry, for instance: Sir John Hope!’ he said.

A shrug of the shoulder disposed of Niddry. ‘We do not know very much about Hope, but it is a fact he was taken prisoner at Toulouse, which naturally made us Light Bobs laugh a good deal. And as for Cotton, whom they have made Lord Combermere, everyone knows that he wanted a peerage months and months ago, and was very angry because it was not given to him. We call him the Lion d’Or, you know, but he leads our cavalry very well. And everyone says Graham deserves anything, because he is an excellent soldier, though not, of course, to be compared with Wellington, who, I assure you, would never have allowed himself to fail at Bergen-op-Zoom! But poor Sir Thomas—I mean, Lord Lynedoch—left us because he was going blind, and it was not at all fair to send him to Holland in charge of that expedition. As for Daddy Hill, my husband says he is a most capable General, and I expect he will be glad to hear of his peerage. But I know he will say that dear Colborne deserves more than just to be made an ADC to the Prince Regent! For there is no one like Colborne!’ Her expressive eyes sparkled, but the mere mention of Harry and Colborne immediately reminded her of the change in her fortunes, and she was obliged to turn away to hide her sudden rush of tears from her instructor.

Such persons as delight in hearing of the mildly scandalous activities of Royalty, were edified, in July, to read of the Princess Charlotte’s sending her suitor, the young Prince of Orange, to the rightabout. Not having the smallest interest in the Princess, Juana merely said that the Prince of Orange was a wispy creature, with a startled expression, and no chin; and that she for one did not blame Charlotte for refusing him.

There was no news yet of the arrival of Ross’s expeditionary force in North America. Dreams of shipwreck began to disturb Juana’s nights. She felt herself so entirely cut off from Harry that sometimes a dread of never seeing him again would haunt her to such an extent that she could not shake it off. At every turn she missed him, so that sometimes she could fancy herself but half-alive.

That was the impression Mrs Sargant formed of her, when, towards the end of July, she had herself driven to town for the express purpose of calling upon her sister-in-law. Mrs Sargant was only twenty-five years old, but a decided manner, and the natural air of consequence belonging to a young matron, made her seem much older. She had a great look of Harry, and something of his quick way of speaking. When she was ushered into Juana’s parlour, in her best pelisse, and gown of French muslin, clasping in one hand an absurdly small parasol, she found her unwilling hostess shrinking instinctively behind the table, and looking so young and frightened that she could scarcely bring herself to believe that she was really confronting Harry’s wife. She exclaimed in astonishment: ‘Is this possible? Can you be my new sister?’

‘I am Juana Smith,’ said Juana, conscious of her plain, round morning-dress, and uncovered head.

‘My dear! You must forgive me! I had pictured you—different! though why I should, I’m sure I don’t know! You must let me make myself known to you: I am Harry’s sister Alice. I daresay he may have spoken of me!’

Juana murmured Yes, but it was Tom, not Harry, who had spoken of Mrs Sargant. ‘Alice,’ had said Tom, ‘is the only person Harry stands in awe of!’

Not a very encouraging introduction, nor did Mrs Sargant’s brisk, competent manner do much to allay Juana’s nervous qualms. The two ladies, having embraced, sat down opposite to each other, on either side of the empty fireplace, and embarked on a laborious conversation, which, since Juana’s command of the English tongue was negligible, rapidly deteriorated into questions and monosyllabic answers.

Mrs Sargant, trying in vain to kindle a spark in her timid-looking hostess, privately wrote her down as insipid, and wondered what Harry could have seen in her. She was pretty, she supposed, but lacked animation. Her voice was certainly good, very low and musical; her figure decidedly elegant; her ankle particularly well-turned; but what was there in all this to make Harry tumble head over ears in love with the child? Allowance had to be made, of course, for her inability to express herself in English, but Mrs Sargant thought she might have exerted herself to answer more fully questions put to her about Harry. She detected a certain stiffening when she mentioned her brother’s name, and did not guess that it concealed a bursting heart.

Just as she was wondering whether she could with propriety take her leave of this disappointing sister-in-law, the serving-maid opened the door, announcing the arrival of two gentlemen. The next instant, a very tall officer, followed by a shorter and much stouter one, both dressed in Rifle green, entered the room, and Juana had flown up out of her chair with a shriek of joy.