Authors: Mark Dunn
Tags: #Literature & Fiction, #British & Irish, #Historical, #Dramas & Plays, #Genre Fiction, #Drama & Plays, #Historical Fiction, #Irish, #Scottish
James remained mum.
“Do you know?”
“I have myself a good guess about it, ma’am.” James said this without looking at Mrs. Taptoe. He stared down at his boots, one of which he scraped repeatedly upon the doorsill in an act of empty purpose.
“Is it Tripp and my housemaid Umbrous Elizabeth?”
“Yes, ma’am. I believe that it is them’s what’s making the noisy voices we’re hearing.”
“Are they frolicking?”
A pause, and then a mortified nod of the head from the Feral Park servant.
“Well, why ever I must wonder, do they not frolic less noisily? They are loud enough to be heard by Sir Thomas and Lady Jane far up the hill! That ‘unh, unh.’ That rutting animal noise. Dear me, I have never before heard such a cacophony emanating from Cupid’s Grove. Yet I am happy for Tripp and Elizabeth that they are able to enjoy sportive communion with one another, and listen now, how quiet it has become. Perhaps they have finally tired themselves out or they have come to their climactic finis, although Elizabeth usually concludes with a hymn of some sort. Ah, there now I hear the hymn. But I will not acquit them in full; they should not have sent you off on such an impractical errand as to seek a fourth for a rubber.
I
do not intend to play cards within a barn, nor, I think, should Miss Peppercorn. They ought to have been more mindful of the unfeasibility of the request. Do you not agree, Anna?”
Anna would not find her voice for a moment longer.
“Run along now, my good man. I should like to talk to your mistress again outside your presence.”
Having dismissed the servant, Mrs. Taptoe returned to her tiny chair and resumed her chat with the young woman she now regarded as her niece. “The solicitor Mr. Scourby—now, he may assist me with the legal changing of my name, do you not think?”
Anna nodded.
“Anna, my dear, your cheeks are crimsoned to a hue I have seldom seen even upon a baboon fundament.”
What Anna wished that she could say if syllables could be successfully assembled upon her tongue was that she was all but certain now that she was not yet ready—no, not nearly ready at all—to become the wholly unblenching protégée of Mrs. Guinevere Taptoe. There was far too much that the gentlewoman took for granted in the carnal nature of the human animal which would require time for Anna to settle by, to accept with sang-froid, to inure herself to. She would be a willing pupil—this much she knew for fact— albeit a slow and cautious one.
The remainder of the visit between the two women was expended in the discussion of Anna’s interest in the clerk Aubrey Waitwaithe and his far less demonstrable interest in
her
. “The dinner, however, is an excellent means by which to draw him out and discover if he may favour you in equal measure. Many a man of diffident character has been emboldened to speak the truth of his heart when under the influence of the helpful offices of wine and spirits!”
Anna laughed. She was beginning to enjoy Mrs. Taptoe’s piquant observations, or at least the affability with which they were warmly delivered. It would take time for her not to colour at the woman’s excursive expatiations upon the human propensity for pleasure and mischief in its many forms and fashions, but she vowed at that moment to open herself up to whatever Mrs. Taptoe wished to convey, thereby coming to a better understanding of the general nature of those who lived and frolicked and wolf-howled and, if she were to believe her father, sinned most hurtfully and most grievously behind their masks, beneath their tables, and within the dark corners of their rusticated, provincial lives. Through Mrs. Taptoe, Anna had met the bright and
happy
face of human nature. At present, the conduits to man’s
darker
proclivities remained to be discovered.
The next morning Anna woke to discover that her father was nowhere to be found within the Feral Park mansion-house. None of the servants knew of his whereabouts, and a brief turn about the park did not ferret him out. Recollecting the time that young Delilah Botham fell into the old well upon the grounds of the ruins of Northmount Abbey adjacent to the park, Anna asked Mrs. Dorchester, the cook, to prepare for her a breakfast basket of fruit and boiled eggs, and she set off to learn if her father had, himself, met with harm upon the abbey grounds. Should her search take her through the whole of the morning, the fruit and eggs would offer the necessary sustenance required for her to make her return.
During her walk to the abbey, Anna recalled, also, the occasion of Elwood Epping’s young ward Lucy Squab’s falling accidentally into the very same well. The word
fell
here is perhaps generously employed. The young woman was more accurately
wedged
into the aperture, and tightly so, as the well was narrow in diameter and Lucy was…not. The result was entrapment of the sort in which one’s head projects over the stone brim of the sweepless well and draws the attentive cruelty of neighbouring gipsy children such as the ones who discovered and then taunted Miss Squab. This particular entrapment drew, in addition, the attentive vexations of Lucy’s guardian, Mr. Epping, who succeeded in freeing his young ward only through the diligent application of tallow, and the laying of hands upon parts of Lucy’s person with such industry, purpose, and familiarity as to necessitate the publication of the couple’s banns within the parish church the succeeding Sunday.
Anna did not expect to see her father similarly indisposed, but she did recollect from her youthful exploration of these ruins an abundance of hiding places, and should Mr. Peppercorn have desired to secrete himself somewhere therein, a thorough search of the premises would not prove an altogether unproductive endeavour. “I am glad, therefore,” thought Anna, “to have not only the eggs but an apple and pear as well. Perhaps I should also have brought a slice or two of cold beef, but turning back now would be a bother.”
Once upon the abbey grounds Anna set herself diligently to the task of finding her father.
“Papa! Papa, dearest, are you about? Your mysterious absence is a puzzle and a vexation!” Down into the well Anna called these words in an attempt— successfully prosecuted—to eliminate from her fretful thoughts the farfetched possibility of his residence there. As she took bites upon an egg, she continued to summon her father elsewhere in her largest voice. Through the dilapidated, roofless structures that comprised the old abbey she moved hither and thither, in and out, and behind and round, until she found herself within the remains of the rude chapel and face to face, at long last, with none other than Mr. Peppercorn himself! He sat in the Hindu style behind the ancient weather-worn pulpit, eating an egg of his own procurement and looking quite guilty.
“You have found me, daughter,” said he, his face coloured with the shame of disclosure.
“Papa, dear, why on earth did you chuse to worry me so? You knew that when I came down to breakfast this morning and you were not at table I would wonder and then fret and then go about looking for you, and this is exactly what I have done, much to my filial displeasure.”
“Yet I remembered, dear Anna, how much you enjoyed your brisk forenoon walks, and I assumed that looking for me would not constitute such a chore—indeed, that you should even make a game of it—and we should arrive at some common place by and by, and laugh and be merry.”
“But did you not foresee the opposing possibility that prior to such a merry denouement I might grow increasingly agitated?”
Mr. Peppercorn shook his head, and then correcting himself, nodded with remorse. “I suppose now that only a dolt would not have. Your father is an ogre, as well, for having put you through this trial. Please forgive my thoughtlessness.”
“Forgiven,” pronounced Anna, happy to release herself from ill feelings of her father and celebrate without qualification his discovery. “And you are not an ogre.”
With attending care Anna helped her father untangle his legs, and raise himself to his feet. The two took seats upon the only pew within the open chapel that had not been carried off by the resourceful gipsies to be used for furniture or firewood. There each ate his and her eggs—which numbered over half a dozen—a consequence of the large and productive poultry-yard at Feral Park, as well as the Peppercorn fondness for hen eggs—in an atmosphere of silence infringed only by the soft smack of thoughtful chewing.
After a moment or two of further rumination the father asked, “Have you any salt, Anna?”
“I salted my eggs before venturing out,” replied the daughter. “Did you neglect to do likewise? Here, take one of mine. An egg without salt is an egg without savour.”
Taking the egg with a grateful nod: “It is so peaceful and quiet here, at this time most especially. I see why the monks preferred the spot.”
Anna nodded and chewed a newly extracted egg without comment. She was happy that her father did not address the egg with a funny voice as he often did at the breakfast table. Only the morning before, he had said to his eggs, fried crispy and brown: “Good morning, tasty eggs. You will not grow into hens and roosters but you will find a most compensating welcome by my hungry gullet! Down, down and yum yum!”
A moment later, Mr. Peppercorn trod again upon the communal silence: “Daughter. Have you any ham?”
Anna shook her head.“Nor have I kippers, nor toast, nor even a pot of twist. I have nothing but eggs and then an apple and a pear to cleanse the palate. Now I dissemble. I
do
have something in addition to that which I have previously mentioned: I have a strong aversion to fathers who treat their daughters with such contemptuous thoughtlessness!” (For Anna had
not
sufficiently banished ill thoughts of her father; they continued, in fact, to insinuate themselves destructively upon her.)
Mr. Peppercorn’s brow contracted. In a shrinking accent he said, “I have been odious, to be sure, in failing to inform you of the final address of my morning ramble. Yes, yes, daughter, reprove me as much as you feel necessary. I will not gainsay your right to do so.”
“Failing to tell me of your whereabouts is not the only intelligence you have withheld from me, Papa. Do you not carry a great weight upon your heart from your interviews with the person of mystery who burdens you with the most terrible things to plague your soul? But do you not—even to your added detriment—keep every syllable of such revelations to yourself, when your daughter would, with all certainty, offer you nothing but comfort and succour in exchange for the disclosure?”
“To be sure it is a convenience that you raise this matter, for I have been thinking of this very thing, being especially mindful of my previous decision to keep all within myself. As my daughter, perhaps you share certain rights to my own confidences—even those confidences confided in me for the purpose of being kept in confidence. For are we not as father and daughter yoked in closer league than most other relations, even those of other familial bonds? Does a son ever confide so easily in his mother? Or a mother unbosom fully of herself to her son (except during lactation)? Or mother and daughter for that matter— often at odds with one another, the daughter resentful of chastisements and corrections from the mother in the way, for example, that she may direct her household, the mother mum as to the difficulties she foresees for the daughter, for no marriage is without its imperfections and impediments.”
“Even that of yourself and my Mamma?”
“Nay,
that
, my dearest, proved exception to the rule. For your mother was an angel in all things but the wings. To be sure, she was not a woman of advanced intellect—the manner of her death providing sufficient evidence to this fact— yet she was in all those other attributes which perfect a marriage a wondrous joy and a treasure to my heart.”
Anna smiled. She took great pleasure in hearing her father speak so highly of her demised mother. It warmed her to know that she was brought into being as the product of such a deep and abiding love between heart-mates.
“But you and I have never had the slightest difficulty in our bond. My hesitation, therefore, in opening all channels for discourse between us I now attribute only to a father’s desire not to sadden his daughter to the point of disabling disconsolation—so that you will not some morning, or perhaps
every
morning hereafter, find yourself in retreat to a place such as this very ruined abbey to do that which you now see your father doing much to his discredit, and that is to keep close company with the most morose and dejected thoughts. Because only ten minutes before your arrival, dear Anna, I was wiping away the tears which visit me upon frequent moments of private contemplation—tears that will never adjust by an appreciable measure the course of the sad lives of those who are the most adversely affected by the behaviour of our many Payton Parish malefactors.”
“But why, Papa, must these victims
remain
victims? Are there no avenues for redress and recourse or perhaps even gratifying revenge available to
any
of them?”
“Perhaps in some cases, yes. But in other cases, I fear not.”
“Tell me, then, of a case in which correction and amendment may be possible. Allow me to do for you what you have done for your divulging friend— share some of the burden upon the soul.”
Mr. Peppercorn thought upon what his daughter had just said, and then he thought upon it for a moment longer as he finished the last of the eggs.
Finally he said, “There is a family within the parish…”
“Yes, Papa. Now you must not withhold names from me, or it will do neither of us good.”
“I must give you names?”
“Why, of course.”
Mr. Peppercorn took a pear from the basket and bit into it, the juice dribbling down his chin. “But before I begin my story, are you aware that gipsy children come into this very abbey and make water upon the sacred woodwork?”
“I do not doubt such mischief, Papa, but the place no longer serves as sacred ground, so be not troubled upon that account.”
“Then what have we here round us?”
“A place which
once
was a religious abbey, but now serves as telling spot— father to daughter.”
“Before I begin my story, you must tell me how went your visit with the most unfettered Mrs. Taptoe.”
“You are temporising, Papa, but I will answer: Mrs. Taptoe is more delightfully forthcoming in her stories and opinions than I ever remembered. She has invited me into her own confidence and I have accepted the invitation. We plan upon my next visit to speak of many things previously unspoken between two women of good breeding. I was given a start, at intervals, in the previous hearing, but I hope to be less and less inclined to take offence in future. So you see, Papa, that whatever you tell me will shock me less and less as time goes on, and perhaps through our ease of exchange we will explore ways together to bring succour to those most in need of rescue from the wave of loathsome bilgewater than has latterly washed over our beleaguered parish. Now. Please spare me from another ‘before I begin’ and I will be most appreciative.”
With a nod and another bite from his pear: “You know, I believe, the Henshawes—occupants of Moseley Manor, just to the east of the village of Smithcoat.”
“Yes, Papa, each of the daughters unmarried, two in their third decade and the youngest, I believe, still in her second. I met them briefly—did I not?— when they were on holiday from their schooling in London.”
“You have a good memory, daughter. And do you recollect their names?”
“Dear me. The oldest, Nancy, I recall. The others—perhaps you should simply tell me.”
“The middle child: Sophia. The youngest: Eliza, just now eighteen. Then there is the mother, of course.”
With a nod: “A very pleasant and agreeable woman as far as I can tell from the brief rencontres I have had with her in Berryknell village.”
“As are the daughters. Each resides in Moseley Manor with the mother now, their schooling completed, but suitors unfortunately in troubling absence. You know Moseley Manor, as well. Large and stately and all but palatial—one of the architectural jewels of the parish.”
“Oh, yes. I attended a pony party there, did I not? When I was five or six.”
“Most excellent memory, daughter! And you recall, as well, that only a short time ago death removed the father from that happy home?”
“Ah, yes—a victim of putrid fever, I believe he was. I remember something of it from talk in the village and from the newspaper.”
“The circumstance was such that with his demise, the estate and the significant fortune attached to it, being regrettably entailed, were transferred directly into the hands of Mr. Henshawe’s only male heir—the nephew, Charles Quarrels—thus bypassing the three Misses Henshawe entirely. Along with his own mother, Mr. Quarrels moved apace from apartments in London to Moseley Manor, where mother and son have taken up residence even before a proper period of mourning has transpired.”
“And are readying themselves to put the three girls and their mother out! How monstrous are these entailed hereditaments that so odiously oppress the women of this country! I have a mind to become a Wollstonecraft agitator on the morrow!”