Under A Dancing Star

by Laura Wood

  Full of hope and good cheer I clamber back to my feet and head for the bathroom to wash off the grime from the lake and transform myself into a proper young lady.

  CHAPTER TWO

  It is exactly twenty-six minutes later, and all is going according to plan. I am as neat and tidy as it is possible for me to be. My clean, brushed hair is swept back in a long, smooth braid, and my soft lilac dress is perfectly acceptable, if an inch or two too short and a deep breath or two too tight. I am standing next to Mother in the hallway, greeting guests with a charming smile and making the sort of small talk that not even our fusty old vicar can find fault with.

  He is, of course, in attendance, with his equally sour-faced wife. Their attitude towards my family is a confused mix of deference to our ancient name, and spiteful pleasure in our reduced circumstances. They are vocal in their disapproval of almost everything I say and do and, unfortunately, the vicar’s disapproval often comes in the form of lengthy bible quotes.

  Now, though, I am listening sympathetically as they tell me about one of their horrible children who has a head cold.

  “Yes,” I murmur, my mind more than half on the snail hunt I’m going to have to perform under cover of darkness later on, “summer colds really are the most upsetting.”

  I feel Mother start to relax beside me, and her voice becomes increasingly musical as she falls into the role of hostess that she so enjoys.

  “Ah, Philip,” she exclaims happily. Philip Astley is our nearest neighbour – his far-more-financially-secure estate borders our own, and he is a perfectly nice, if deeply boring, man who has known my parents for years and years and doesn’t know how to deal with me now that I am no longer a small child that he can pat on the head.

  After clapping the top of my arm enthusiastically enough to leave a bruise while muttering, “Capital, capital!” he leans in to press a perfunctory kiss on Mother’s cheek.

  “Looking beautiful, Delilah, as always,” he says gallantly and Mother makes a pleased humming sound at the back of her throat before her eyes fall on the young man who is following in Philip’s wake.

  “Thank you, Philip.” Her voice is a smile now; she looks just like the proverbial cat presented with a very large dish of cream. “And this must be your nephew. I’m so glad you could come along and join the party. You haven’t been here since you were a boy. We’re sadly lacking in young company, and I know Beatrice will be thrilled to see you.” Her eyes meet mine and she lifts her eyebrows. Something in her gaze immediately puts me on guard.

  I behold the vision before me. Philip Astley’s nephew is around my age, about two inches smaller than me and possessed of the sort of blank gaze more typically found in grazing animals. None of that matters to my mother, of course, because I realize that standing before me is the heir to the Astley fortune.

  It feels suddenly as though a lead weight has settled in my stomach. This whole dinner party is a matchmaking trap and I have tripped into it as blindly as any blissfully ignorant woodland creature. I briefly squeeze my eyes shut, hoping that when I open them the scene around me will have magically resolved itself into something else. My heart pulses erratically in my chest as I conclude that my parents have moved past heavy-handed hints about marriage and decided to take action.

  “How do you do?” I manage, holding out my hand while shooting a quick glare at Mother that she blithely ignores. Frustration hums inside me.

  “Hello,” the nephew says, offering up a damp, limp handshake. “I’m Cuthbert.”

  Despite the terrible circumstances I feel a pang for him then. The poor boy never stood a chance – however is a person supposed to distinguish himself when saddled with a name like Cuthbert?

  “Beatrice,” I say, shaking his hand then surreptitiously wiping my palm on my dress.

  “Well,” Mother says brightly, “don’t let us keep you hanging around here in this draughty hallway, Cuthbert. I’m sure that you young folk have lots to talk about. Beatrice will show you in and get you a drink, won’t you, darling?”

  “Of course, Mother,” I grind out.

  “Capital, capital.” Philip Astley beams, rocking back on his heels and tucking his hands into his pockets.

  I lead Cuthbert through to the drawing room, wishing that my bones would crumble to dust so that Hobbs could sweep me up and dispose of me in his typically discreet and efficient manner and I wouldn’t have to participate any further in this scene. There are around a dozen people in here, locked into the never-ending cycle of small talk. Father is presiding over the drinks trolley and he gives me a knowing look that indicates this is part of a tremendous scheme and he’s very pleased with its progression. He stops just short of rubbing his hands together in glee. I lift my chin and treat him to a cool, quelling stare. His expression falters a little.

  My father is bluff and hearty, with a bristling moustache and watery blue eyes. He taught me to ride, one thing that we both love, although he was disgusted by my refusal to join the hunt on the grounds I thought it a barbaric exercise in cruelty. And I have never seen him more furious than the time I laid down false trails to draw the dogs away from the fox they were hunting, leaving them chasing their tails in circles. “What does a girl want with all those brains?” I have overheard him sigh more than once.

  “Ahem!” He clears his throat now. “So, this must be the famous Cuthbert!” He slaps the poor boy on the shoulder with such enthusiasm that he stumbles.

  I think the truth of the situation is starting to finally dawn on Cuthbert and he darts a frightened, rabbity glance between me and my father. His hand goes to his collar, as though it is too tight.

  “How – how do you do, sir?” he manages, his voice feeble as weak tea.

  “Let me get you a drink, Cuthbert,” I say firmly, taking pity on him. I can see that it is going to be up to me to navigate us through this particular storm – Cuthbert doesn’t seem like a very take-charge sort of character.

  “Oh, th-thank you,” he stutters, his neck flushing a mottled red as his Adam’s apple bobs up and down gratefully.

  While Father is occupied with someone else I pour out two glasses of punch, stiffening Cuthbert’s with a splash of something stronger which I hope will provide him with some Dutch courage.

  “Thank you,” he says again, taking a deep gulp and then dissolving into a coughing fit. It’s possible that I overdid it on the liquid courage front and I pat him on the back.

  “Everything all right?” Father asks, turning back to watch us rather beadily.

  “F-fine, sir,” Cuthbert manages.

  A loud dinner gong sounds, the noise rippling through the room and causing an already overwrought Cuthbert to jump several inches in the air.

  “Better knock the rest of that back,” Father says jovially, pointing at Cuthbert’s drink. As he turns away for a moment I whip the glass out of Cuthbert’s hand and empty the remains into a nearby potted fern.

  I am rewarded with a grateful, if tremulous, smile and – much to Father’s obvious delight – Cuthbert offers me his arm to escort me into the dining room.

  Dinner is just as painful as I anticipated. The food is marginally better than usual, as we are out to impress, but our cook has never met a vegetable she couldn’t boil into submission. I am seated between my mother and Cuthbert, and Mother keeps chivvying our talk along with encouraging little conversation openers.

  “Beatrice, Philip tells me that Cuthbert is a keen philatelist; isn’t that fascinating?”

  “Yes,” I wade in grimly. After all, none of this is Cuthbert’s doing. “Do you have any particularly interesting stamps in your collection?”

  “Er … not really,” Cuthbert mutters, the mottled flush making another appearance. “I don’t really collect them myself, you see. Uncle just gave me some of his old scrapbooks…” He trails off miserably.

  “Mmm,” I murmur, drawing an infinity sign in the gravy on my plate with my knife. At one end of the table I notice Father is deep in conversation with Mr Ast
ley about the hunt, a subject on which they could happily spend all night agreeing loudly with each other. The vicar is making some sort of disparaging comment about the moral fibre of his parishioners to the woman next to him. The vicar’s wife is telling the story of the head cold again in a rather carrying drone.

  Their voices seem suddenly to clamour over one another, filling my head with the endlessly repeating pattern of polite conversation. I grind my teeth together, feeling an itch spread across my skin. A longing to jump to my feet and run as fast as I can, as far away as possible, sweeps over me.

  Instead, I force myself to concentrate on the conversation on either side of me.

  “Oh, Cuthbert!” Mother is saying, shaking her head, a roguish twinkle in her voice, “there’s no need to be so modest; I’m sure a young man like yourself will have no trouble in running the estate. What you really need, of course, is a wife who knows how these things work: a young woman of good breeding with experience in such matters. Wouldn’t you agree, Beatrice?” The look she gives me is pointed. There’s steel behind her words.

  “Yes, Mother,” I say evenly. “Perhaps placing an advertisement in The Times would be a sensible way of filling the position.”

  Mother forces a laugh then, a shrill, nervous sound, and casts me a look of warning. We both know I’m building up to being outrageous. I was fully prepared to behave myself tonight, but this set-up with Cuthbert is enough to try the patience of a saint. Really, it’s her own fault.

  I think I might be about to start enjoying myself.

  “Ah.” Cuthbert clears his throat, his uncertain gaze moving anxiously between us. “What – what do you like to do, Beatrice?” he asks, rather desperately, as though trying to steer the conversation back to stable ground. “As a hobby, I mean?”

  I lean forward on my elbows and flash him a brilliant grin. “Oh, Cuthbert,” I say. “I’m so glad you ask.”

  “Beatrice…” Mother begins, all her senses obviously awake to the danger of the situation, but it’s too late now.

  “Actually, at the moment I’m making a study of the Lampyris noctiluca, or the glow-worm, as you would call it in common parlance.” I sit back in my chair. “It’s their mating habits which I find particularly fascinating.”

  My voice rings out clear as a bell in the quiet room.

  “Mating habits?” Cuthbert’s flush deepens, and he darts an anxious glance at my mother, whose eyes are widening helplessly. I realize that even the vicar has turned in my direction.

  “Yes,” I say. “Mating habits. By which, of course, I mean the sexual coupling that leads to reproduction.”

  Cuthbert’s mouth is slightly agape, his fork hanging limply from one hand. The others at the long table sit in frozen silence.

  “It’s the female glow-worm who emits a bioluminescence in order to attract a mate, you know,” I continue chattily. “In fact, the more a female glow-worm glows, the more attractive a mate she becomes, as greater luminescence indicates increased fecundity.”

  “F-fecundity,” Cuthbert repeats in a dazed whisper.

  A groaning sound comes from the end of the table, where Father sits with his head in his hands. Mother’s face is ashen. The rest of the party are staring at me with round, unblinking eyes.

  “Yes,” I say, turning slightly so that I am addressing all of them. “Fecundity.” I roll the word around in my mouth. “Or fertility. Which is, of course, innately desirable in a mate when considering copulation for the propagation of the species.”

  “I think this conversation is unsuitable for the dinner table, Beatrice,” Mother cuts in now rather raspingly, having recovered something of her voice.

  “I think this conversation is unsuitable for a young lady, regardless of the time or place,” the vicar thunders in his dramatic, Sunday-sermon roar and Mother flinches.

  “Oh, no,” I say earnestly. “Why should young women be left out of such conversations? After all, Vicar, we’re the ones who must become mothers ourselves, if the human race is to continue at all. It’s in the Bible, isn’t it? Be fruitful and multiply and all that.” I wave my hand airily. “So, you must agree that to keep young women in ignorance when it comes to acts of sexual congress is nothing less than irresponsible.”

  “Acts of sexual congress!” the vicar’s wife whispers, as Mother sways in her chair.

  “Exactly.” I smile at the whole table, showing off my teeth. “I couldn’t have put it better myself. Wonderful dinner this evening, Mother; I must pass on my compliments to Cook.” I spear a carrot neatly on my fork and pop it in my mouth as the roar of disapproval finally breaks around me.

  CHAPTER THREE

  “I don’t think it went that badly at all.”

  My pronouncement is met by a groan from Mother, who lies prone on the chaise-longue.

  The dinner party has limped miserably to its polite conclusion, salvaged only by Mother’s over-bright chatter. After she kicked me under the table, I became mutinously silent. Once the obligatory after-dinner brandy had been drunk by the men, and the ladies had forced icy, polite conversation in the parlour, the guests all made rather hasty exits into the night and Father disappeared to his study to smoke cigars “in peace”.

  “Copulation,” Mother moans, one arm flung across her forehead. The word hangs so dramatically in the air that I have to smother a laugh, turning it into a cough. “You said copulation in front of the vicar. I’ll never hear the end of it. He’ll work this into Sunday’s sermon and everyone will know why, and somehow it shall be all my fault that you behave outrageously and talk so improperly. Honestly, Beatrice, how could you? It’s completely inappropriate for a young woman to discuss those … those sorts of things. Especially in polite society.”

  “Oh, well, it’s not as if the vicar doesn’t know what the word means, for goodness’ sake,” I say stoutly. “He and that horrible wife of his have two equally horrible children, so they must have done it at least twice.”

  “Beatrice!” Her horrified tones come from between the sofa cushions.

  “And it was in an educational context,” I continue. “I was simply trying to explain…”

  “Yes, that’s quite enough of that,” Mother snaps, drawing herself up to a sitting position. “I do not wish to relive the conversation.” She glares at me. “This is the final straw, Beatrice. I’ve had all I can take of you behaving like a hoyden, scandalizing our neighbours, scrambling around the countryside in a complete state, collecting creepy-crawlies in jars and stuffing your head with Latin – and goodness only knows what those books are about, given the sort of conversation you find appropriate for the dinner table…”

  I have to contain another nervous wave of laughter at the idea of my scandalous Latin reading. (As if I don’t know about the questionable romance novels she keeps hidden behind the plant pots in the greenhouse. Now those have been illuminating reading.)

  “Well, I am sorry,” I say, feeling the sharp sting of regret that always inevitably follows my bad behaviour. “I know it was wrong of me, but I just couldn’t help myself. I mean, really, Mother, Cuthbert?”

  She regards me in icy fury. “Cuthbert Astley was your last great hope, my girl!” She waves a finger dramatically in my face.

  I snort derisively, even though a cold hand clutches at my heart at the desperation in her voice. “Cuthbert Astley is not likely to be described as anyone’s great hope, Mother, last or otherwise.” I keep my tone deliberately light.

  “Oh, that’s just like you, Beatrice,” she exclaims, and I hear real worry in her voice. “You’re so pleased with yourself, but what will become of you when your father and I aren’t here to look after you?” She sniffs, pulling a rather crumpled white handkerchief from behind one of the sofa cushions.

  I sink down on to the ground beside her and take her hand. “I’m sorry,” I say. “I know you worry, but honestly, I don’t think a husband is the answer. I could get a job, like I talked about…”

  It’s Mother’s turn to snort now. “A j
ob,” she scoffs.

  “Well, why not?” I say. “I could join a profession. Plenty of women work, doing all sorts of things.”

  “Not women in your position,” Mother says firmly, and she rubs her forehead tiredly.

  I know that she would never understand my desire to work. Or even to study. The thought of studying, of going to a university to learn, perhaps even about science or medicine, from real experts, is a sudden ache in my chest, and I press my hand there for a second, as though trying to contain the feeling.

  I haven’t even tried to talk to my parents about it. I know they wouldn’t approve, and it’s not as if I can afford to go anyway. Somehow, I can’t bear to have them dismiss this idea as they have done my others – it feels too precious.

  “Please, darling, do stop teasing me,” Mother continues, oblivious to my train of thought. “You know my nerves can’t stand it.” And she begins to cry again, real tears which make me feel awful.

  “Now look what you’ve done, Beatrice!” Father booms from the doorway where he has appeared. He crosses to Mother’s other side and takes her hand. “This is all your fault.”

  His words are like a match to the kindling, setting something big and angry inside me alight. “You two are clinging to some ridiculous version of the past,” I snap, out of guilt as much as anything. I jump to my feet. “There’s a whole generation of young people out there who are changing things and living exciting, modern lives, but here we are, living in this mausoleum. It’s like time has stopped here and I can’t stand it!”

  “Stop being so hysterical.” Mother’s voice is shrill. Clearly there’s only one member of the family who is allowed to have nervous episodes.

  “I’m not being hysterical!” I say, taking a deep, shaky breath and trying to speak more calmly. “But you two are trying to raffle me off like some prize-winning mare without any consideration for what I want…”