The Sisterhood

by Penelope Friday

  “I talked to Nan.” Gently, Charity disentangled her hand from Isobelle’s.

  “Not me? Harry, I am hurt!”

  “Isobelle, it’s more serious than that. I wanted to speak to you so desperately, but I did not realise until I talked to Nan that…oh!” Charity dashed a hand across her face. “I shall not cry, I shall not!”

  “Tell me, dear one.”

  “Fotheringay’s fortune. It comes—”

  “Goodness, is he thoroughly undone? Gambling? Are you to be impoverished?” Isobelle’s questions burst out excitedly.

  “No. Nothing like that. Oh heavens, it’s worse. His money comes…from sugar.”

  Isobelle frowned. “That is a great comedown. I thought something was dreadfully wrong!”

  “Isobelle, from the plantations, from the West Indies! From slavery!”

  “Many people’s do.” Isobelle looked quizzically at her.

  “But not us. To think that I have wanted so much to have slavery abolished—those meetings, that reading—and all the time I was living off slave money, blood money.”

  “Embarrassing, certainly,” Isobelle agreed.

  “Worse than that. Every part of me rebels! And yet, what can I do?”

  The room was small. Charity wanted to pace back and forth but could only take a couple of steps in any direction before having to turn back. And Isobelle… Isobelle was standing in the middle of the room, as calm as anything, apparently unable to realise what a real crisis this was.

  “Harry,” Isobelle said gently. “Look out there, at all the ladies and gentlemen dancing. Do you not think that at least a quarter of them are slave owners? It is part of life. An unpleasant part, certainly, but not uncommon. In a perfect world, of course there would not be slaves, but we do not live in a perfect world.”

  “I thought you understood. I thought you cared!” Charity flung at her.

  “Oh, Harry dear! You do take everything so seriously,” Isobelle complained, half-amused still. “It is business. Heaven knows what gentlemen get up to in the name of business. Can’t you just put it aside for the moment and come and dance?” She reached for Charity’s hand and then placed a kiss on the palm. “Forget it. Forget him. Why, you are barely related to Fotheringay. Just pretend you don’t know, and we can go on as before. It is not as if you will want to take him to task about it!”

  “No. And he is going over there, to the Indies, soon,” said Charity dully. “I will not have even to see him, let alone speak to him.”

  “Well, then. All the more reason to celebrate. And,” she added laughingly, “to be grateful to slavery. It cannot be all bad if it is taking Fotheringay away. Come, let us go and dance.”

  Charity watched numbly as Isobelle left the room. How could she take it so lightly? How could she? Surely that could not have been Isobelle speaking those words! Surely the lady who had accompanied her to the first Abolitionist meeting she attended could not be as unconcerned with slavery as she seemed. Charity remembered Nan’s shocked reaction, unwillingly comparing it with Isobelle’s. Nan understood about slavery. But surely Isobelle was no less humane than Nan? How could she be so unaffected by Charity’s crushing revelation? She had hoped—no, she had been sure—that Isobelle would understand. Charity had needed her to sympathise. Neither had happened. She had come to Isobelle to help mend the tear in her heart; instead, it had been torn still further. As she walked slowly back into the ballroom, the candles in the room seemed to burn too brightly. The heat made her feel almost faint, and the noise assaulted her ears.

  “Rebecca,” she said quietly to her sister, “can we not go home? I am not feeling well.”

  For the sisters, the ball was over, and for Charity, so was her peace of mind. It was with a heavy heart that she readied herself for bed.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  By the next morning, Charity had recovered her spirits a little. It was not fair to judge Isobelle too harshly for her lack of understanding. As she had so rightly said, many of her friends and acquaintances must be slave owners too. She had had to learn to live with it, to understand it was possible, as the Bible said, to hate the sin but love the sinner. Charity’s background was so very different. Her father’s money had come from land owned in England—a land free of slavery for many years now. To her, the idea of slavery had been a vague one, something other people did in other countries. To Isobelle, it was a fact of life. Nan saw it in a different light, certainly, but she had the descriptions her sailor brother had given her of slave ships to consider. She was a little closer to having seen the true horrors of slavery. No, Charity told herself as she washed her face and hands that morning, it was unfair to judge Isobelle.

  They had arranged to meet to walk together in the park, and when Charity saw Isobelle again, she felt her heart leap inside her. Isobelle was so beautiful and so much fun. Nothing she could say or do could be that wrong.

  “Harry!” Isobelle greeted her warmly. “Now, why did you run away so quickly from the ball last night? Was your sister unwell? I have seen, of course, that she is in an ‘interesting condition’.”

  “No, Rebecca is quite well, in the circumstances.” Charity found it a little bit of a struggle to sound natural, but she hoped that she was making a fair impression of it. “We just…preferred to go home.”

  “Well, I do hope that Lady Kingston didn’t notice. To come to her ball and stay less than an hour! Criticism indeed!”

  “I was not feeling altogether the thing,” Charity said truthfully. “I will of course explain that to Lady Kingston if need be.”

  “Oh, I was only teasing you.” Isobelle tucked a hand through Charity’s arm companionably. “Did you see the crush? I don’t imagine she had time to notice anything.”

  “That’s good.”

  They walked a little way. The flowers were not at their best at this time of year, but the park was full enough of ladies and gentlemen taking a morning promenade to make up for it. Of the light muslin dresses of the ladies, many had sprigs of flowers patterned across them. They were almost, Charity thought absently, more floral than the gardens themselves. She spotted Emily and Jane chatting seriously a little way distant. Isobelle had clearly seen the same thing.

  “Shall we go and speak to them?” she asked. “Or would it be unkind? I would hate to interrupt a conversation about the relative merits of a few bits of mouldy old stone, or whatever it may be that they are discussing in such depth!”

  “Isobelle, you are awful!” Charity remonstrated. “Do you care nothing for the works of the ancients?”

  “Very little, I’m afraid,” Isobelle said unapologetically. “A few bits of stone here, a beheaded statue there. Give me modernity. Colour, life, music! Give me fun!”

  “You do have a point,” Charity admitted. “So often the statues are incomplete. It is sad.”

  “It is sad, and I do not like sadness. So come, Harry, let us talk about something else. Did you really say last night that Fotheringay was going away?”

  “Yes. After the baby is born. He thinks he may be gone for a year or more.” There was a certain reserve in Charity about speaking of it, bound up as it was by with the issue of slavery. She tried to put it to the back of her mind.

  “How splendid! And he might die out there, you know,” Isobelle said in a hopeful tone. “They say the climate does not suit everyone.”

  “I don’t want him to die,” Charity objected. “But I confess,” she added, smiling, “that I do not regret his proposed absence. The sooner the better, as far as I am concerned!”

  But she would have done anything to take back that last line a few days later. Fotheringay’s departure was dependent on the birth of his child, and it had been believed that Rebecca had another month at least before her lying in. When her pains had started unexpectedly, Rebecca had first declared that it was nothing. Then, as they had progressed, getting worse and not better, she had grown suddenly silent on the matter. Fotheringay, for once showing some concern, had sent for the midwife,
and Rebecca had retired to her room with the woman. But a couple of hours later, the midwife herself had spoken privately with Mr Fotheringay. Shortly after that, a doctor was called.

  No one had time to explain anything, and Charity was left hanging, uncertain of what was going on, afraid for what it might be. Death in childbirth was no rare thing; the death of the baby would be preferable but still devastating to her sister. But if only—if only Rebecca lived, anything would be acceptable, Charity told herself.

  She paced the drawing room, heart pounding. It was now several hours since the doctor had been sent for. Rebecca, she knew, had had no intention to have a medical man present at her lying-in. Yet the doctor was here. What was happening? Charity had even steeled herself to ask Fotheringay (the frigid silence between the two of them remained otherwise as strong as ever). He had muttered a testy “I don’t know” before barricading himself in his study. Charity would not have been surprised if he had answered that way deliberately to provoke her, but something about the fearful expression on his face suggested that he had spoken nothing but the truth. Gentlemen have little place at a birth, Rebecca had once told Charity, apparently assimilating maternal knowledge through the sheer fact of being pregnant. Fotheringay was as ignorant as Charity herself. Indeed, Charity thought, this might perhaps be the one and only time she and he were in sympathy, though his concern was for the unborn child and Charity’s for Rebecca.

  Charity was sure—fairly sure, at least—that she would take an interest in Rebecca’s baby once it was born. At the moment, however, she found it difficult to care much for someone she had never met. Not when the doctor had been closeted upstairs with her sister for so long.

  Charity stood in the centre of the cluttered room and looked ruefully at the piano. If she could only sit down in front of its keys and distract herself with music, it would at least apply a little balm to her worries. But the room lay directly beneath Rebecca’s, and she was not certain whether this might disturb her sister. On no account would she do anything that might negatively affect Rebecca’s health. Instead, with a deep sigh, she returned to her pacing, leaving a track mark across the luxurious shag carpet.

  Finally, she heard footsteps on the stairs that did not belong to a maid. She hurried to the door and looked anxiously up and the descending doctor. Fotheringay was doing the same a little further on. They must look like puppets, Charity thought, to the gentleman observing their behaviour.

  “Well?” snapped Fotheringay.

  “I am glad to tell you, sir, that the birthing was successful. Your wife is currently resting, and is very tired. She must be cared for very carefully over the next few—”

  “Never mind that,” Fotheringay interrupted. “The child. The child, man!”

  “You have a healthy daughter—” The doctor stopped for a second as Fotheringay gave a disgusted grunt. “And,” he continued, “a healthy son.”

  Both Charity and Fotheringay stared at him.

  “Good gad, twins?” Fotheringay asked disbelievingly.

  The doctor nodded solemnly. “Twins. They are small babies, twins always are, but healthy, both of them.”

  Fotheringay strode to the staircase. “Well, let me past, man. Let me past. I have to go and see my son.”

  The doctor looked as if he was keeping quiet only by force of will. He must, Charity thought, be used to gentlemen’s obsession with boy children. She wondered whether he had mentioned the mother and daughter first deliberately. If so, she thought she might have found the first man she actively liked. She gave him a swift smile.

  “And his wife, and his daughter,” she said. “I will be happy to see them. My sister, Mrs Fotheringay, particularly.”

  He returned her smile. “I am glad to hear it. Mrs Fotheringay will need to be kept very quiet for some time to come. I was pleased to hear that the nursemaid was already engaged and on the premises. First births are often the most difficult, and twins more difficult still. Mrs Fotheringay was very brave, caring little for her own pain and more for the babe. Or in fact, as it turned out, babes.”

  Charity nodded. “She would be. When may I see her?”

  “Tomorrow, perhaps. The excitement of the children, and the visit of her husband…” He trailed off, and he and Charity exchanged a knowing glance. “At least, maybe for five minutes tonight,” he amended.

  A door upstairs closed with a bang, and tuneless humming preceded Fotheringay down the stairs.

  “Off to wet the baby’s head,” he said cheerfully. “My son. Jolly good show. And I’ll book tickets for the Indies tomorrow.”

  With that, he was gone. A meaningful silence remained in its place. The doctor, knowing his position, could make no comment, but Charity had no such professional qualms to prevent her.

  “It’s the best thing,” she said briefly. “The sooner we get him out of the country, the better. Mrs Fotheringay might not admit it, but it’s true nonetheless. Good riddance.”

  The doctor gave a discreet cough. “Well,” he said. “I will leave now. My bill will be here tomorrow morning, and…”

  “Address it to him. That way he can be of some practical use,” Charity said. The relief of knowing that her sister was alive and as well as possible had made her more forthright than she otherwise might have been to a stranger.

  “I feel sure that you will make certain that Mrs Fotheringay is looked after properly.”

  “Yes,” Charity said soberly. She thought of her patient, brave sister, who was now a mother twice over. “That I can certainly do.”

  “It has been a pleasure meeting you, Miss…?”

  “Bellingham.”

  “Miss Bellingham. Please excuse me.”

  Charity reached out a hand as he went to pass her. “Thank you,” she said. “For caring about my sister as well as the birth of the baby…babies,” she corrected herself.

  The doctor broke out of his professional demeanour. “An extremely nice lady, your sister,” he said unexpectedly. Then, slightly pink in the cheeks, he left.

  For a moment or two, Charity gazed after him. She was not sure what she would have expected in a doctor—and certainly in a Fotheringay-approved doctor—but the man had not been it. And Rebecca was recovering, and the twins… Her thoughts broke down there, lost in a whirling mass of emotions. Turning to the stairs, she ran lightly up to spend her allotted five minutes with her now much-increased family.

  Just outside the doorway, she paused. She was almost afraid to go in, which was ridiculous. It was Rebecca in there, her gentle older sister. Nothing to be afraid of. And yet…and yet…Something mysterious and magical had happened in that room in her absence. Something Charity would never experience herself: that moment when one person became two—or, in Rebecca’s case, three. And so she paused, wondering whether she would see the same sister she had always known or something new, different, incomprehensible. Telling herself not to be stupid, she pushed open the door and looked across at the bed.

  “Charity!”

  Rebecca looked flushed and untidy, and very tired, but she was still Rebecca. No stranger faced Charity.

  “Becca.” Charity went over the bedside and gave her sister a gentle hug. “How are you? I’ve been so worried.”

  “I’m fine,” her sister said, smiling, gesturing to the nurse to leave them alone together. “And oh, Charity, look!” She gestured to the Moses basket where two tiny babies lay, squashed a little together. They were wrinkled like old ladies, one with little tufts of blond hair, the other with a soft, fair down upon its head. “Aren’t they beautiful?”

  Charity went round to examine the babies more closely. Tentatively, she reached out a finger and stroked the cheek of the closer child.

  “Which is which?”

  “The tufty one is our boy. The downy one is my girl.”

  Charity noted the different possessive phrases: the boy was “ours”, the girl “mine”. She wondered how the girl would feel, growing up, knowing that she was so much less important—unwanted, al
most. She was suddenly filled with a fierce protectiveness for the girl. Then she shook herself. The girl would have Rebecca. She would have no doubt that she was loved and important to her mother.

  “Do they have names?”

  “Mary does. She’s the older, you know.” It had never occurred to Charity that there were older or younger when it came to twins. “As for my baby boy, I like Patrick, but Thomas thinks it’s too Irish, or not genteel enough.”

  Charity gave a snort. “As if he’d know about things like that.” She stopped herself. “Sorry, was that catty?”

  Rebecca’s mouth twitched, and Charity knew she was holding back a smile. “A little.”

  “You’re right. If I have to criticise Fotheringay, I have many more routes to go than that,” Charity agreed.

  There was a stifled noise as Rebecca tried to hold back a giggle. “That was not the message I was trying to get across, dearest!”

  Charity laughed. “Well, I shall stop criticising your husband altogether and instead praise you.”

  “And the children.”

  “And them,” she agreed. She bent down to kiss Rebecca lightly on the cheek. “I was only allowed five minutes, and they’ve more than passed. I don’t want to tire you. But oh, Becca, twins. How clever of you!”

  Rebecca grasped her hand. “I’m glad you came,” she said. “So glad. I am tired. But I’m so thankful I have you with me here, there aren’t words for it. I know we’re not a family for talking much about emotions, dearest sister, but I love you very much.”

  Charity squeezed her sister’s fingers for a few seconds before letting go. “And I you. Sweet dreams—all three of you!”

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Within a week of the babies’ birth, Mr Fotheringay had made arrangements to sail to the West Indies. Charity did her best to hide her pleasure, but she strongly suspected that beneath her concerns about coping alone, Rebecca felt similarly. Having admired his son on the day of his birth, he had had barely more than a few fleeting glimpses of him since. Rebecca told Charity that Mr Fotheringay had eventually agreed to Patrick’s name, though, with the addition of his own Thomas as a middle name, so the children could be christened when they were old enough to leave the house. His daughter, it was clear, he had only seen by default: she shared a crib with Patrick, so he could hardly see one without the other. His mind at rest about his heir, however, he clearly felt no need to stay in the country with business calling his name from abroad.