Mistress of Darkness

by Christopher Nicole

  'Yes, sir. I was fortunate enough to score some runs.'

  'Ah. And the spectators came crowding round to shake your hand and buy you beer, as usual. Aha. And this girl was amongst them? By herself, by God?'

  'Of course not, sir. She was with her foster parents. They are old friends of the vicar. And she was good enough to smile at me and congratulate me, as were they.'

  'And you fell in love on the strength of that meeting?'

  Matt felt his cheeks burning. He dared not look at Georgiana. 'I couldn't get her out of my mind, sir. So I wrote her a letter, saying how much I had liked meeting her, and asking if I could call.'

  'And?'

  'I received a reply, saying that she would very much enjoy receiving me. So I paid a visit to her house, and was turned away at the door.'

  'By God,' Robert said. 'By God.'

  'Did you not then break down the door?' Georgiana inquired, looking out of the window.

  'Well, I ... I did not wish to cause a disturbance. I returned home, and wrote her again, asking if I had in some way offended her, and to this there was no reply. I thought perhaps my letter had gone astray, and so I wrote a third time, and again there was no reply. So I concluded that she had regretted inviting me in the first place.'

  'Which made you love her the more,' Robert declared with some satisfaction. 'She could not have understood who you were. We'll soon change her tune, boy. And if she is as handsome as you claim, we'll have her as a Hilton, eh? We could do with some fresh blood, by God. Eh, Georgiana?'

  Georgiana merely sniffed, and continued to stare out of the window. The coach was slowing before a small house situated on the lane bordering the park. 'I think this will be the place, Mr. Hilton,' the driver said.

  'You'll wait,' Robert said, and thrust open the door. He did not wait for either Matt or Georgiana, but marched up the steps and dragged on the bell. Matt attempted to hand Georgiana down, but she avoided his arm and followed her stepbrother. Matt brought up the rear, the leaden pit in his belly growing with every second. Yet he did so badly wish to see Gislane again, even if it involved a fracas.

  The door was opening, and a maidservant curtseyed. 'Your business, sir?'

  'My business,' Robert bellowed. 'Why, I have come to call on your employers, child.'

  'Do they expect you, sir?' she asked, squinting as if to indicate that it was still a trifle early in the morning for social calls.

  'Of course they are not expecting me,' Robert shouted. 'Tell them that Mr. Robert Hilton, of Plantation Hilltop in Jamaica, has come to call.'

  'Mr. Hilton? Oh, dear.' The girl glanced past Robert to Georgiana and then Matt. 'Oh, dear, I am afraid Mr. and Mrs. Nicholson are not at home, sir.'

  ‘Not at home? Not at home? By God. Stand aside, girl. I'll have no more subterfuge here. Where should they be, by God, if they are not at home of a morning?'

  'Sir...'

  Robert placed his hand in the middle of her apron and removed her from in front of him.

  'I beg of you, sir,' Matt said. 'There is no cause for violence.'

  'Nor will there be,' Robert agreed, and stepped inside, Georgiana at his shoulder. 'You'll be Nicholson?'

  The man, grey-haired and thin, but with a weather-beaten complexion and a pronounced stoop to his shoulders, was just emerging from the door of the study. 'I am, sir,' he said, quietly enough. 'May I inquire the meaning of this outrage? You'd best ask Mr. Gray to attend me, Betty. And tell him to bring a couple of his apprentices.'

  'Ah, bah,' Robert said. 'Remain here, girl, and save your master an embarrassment. My name is Robert Hilton, sir.'

  ‘I heard you announce yourself, sir,' Nicholson replied. ‘I assume you are a relative of that young man. Well, sir, he is not welcome in this house.'

  'My dear sir,' Robert said, with remarkably good humour. 'Clearly you are labouring under a misapprehension. This young man, as you suppose, is my cousin. But more than that, he is my heir. So you met him while he resided at the vicarage in Dorking, and no doubt supposed he was penniless. But I am Hilton of Plantation Hilltop in Jamaica, and of Plantation Green Grove in Antigua. And judging by your colour you are not unfamiliar with those places.'

  'I am well aware who you are, Mr. Hilton,' Nicholson said, 'and I must repeat...'

  'Geoffrey? What is the matter?'

  The woman who appeared at the head of the stairs was small and grey-haired, her face lined with anxiety as much as with age. Robert Hilton's gaze encompassed her for only a moment, before passing on to the girl at her side, while Georgiana snapped her fan shut with an expression of anger, and Matt started forward to stand beside his cousin. Gislane Nicholson was even more beautiful than his memory of her, a tall slender girl with magnificent midnight hair, long and straight, reaching almost to the middle of her back, quite undressed save for a parting in the centre of her scalp. Yet the hair, splendid as it was, was no more than a part of the whole picture which was her face. Her forehead was high, her nose a trifle small, with nostrils which flared as she breathed, her mouth wide and flat, her chin smoothly rounded. Her neck was long, and like the rest of her complexion absolutely white, without a blemish of any sort. Her gown was a simple blue which swept the floor, and effectively disguised every fact about her body save that it was slender and that she possessed long legs, but it was sacrilege to suppose a face so perfect could possibly belong to anything less than a perfect body, and although she looked calm and undistressed by the commotion downstairs, her eyes, black as her hair and wide-set, moved from one to the other of the three invaders, stopping when they reached Matt, and allowing her mouth the faintest elongation which might just have been a smile, before her expression once again faded into impassivity.

  'By God.' Robert Hilton at last removed his hat. 'Your servant, Mrs. Nicholson. And this will be Gislane? By God, sir. My cousin has fallen in love it seems, madam, and before this minute I had doubted his judgement was mature enough to be respected.'

  'You are not welcome here, sir,' Mrs. Nicholson said.

  'So your husband has been informing me, madam. But that was before he understood my identity.'

  'And now you are less welcome than before, Mr. Hilton,' Nicholson said. 'I must ask you to leave, or I will not hesitate to bring an action against you for trespass.'

  Matt glanced at Georgiana; he could not believe that Robert still kept his temper. But Georgiana was staring at Gislane, her brows tight with anger.

  And still Robert smiled. 'Am I then such an ogre, Mr. Nicholson? I assure you, sir, that such is not the case. In any event, should you call out His Majesty's Life Guards, I shall not leave this house until I have been introduced to the young lady. My name is Robert Hilton, Miss Nicholson, and I am honoured to make your acquaintance.'

  Gislane looked at her foster mother, who gave a quick nod. The girl came down the stairs, slowly, her left hand holding her skirt free of the steps.

  'You flatter me, sir.' She held out her right hand with an almost regal gesture. Her voice was soft, but she pronounced each word very clearly.

  Robert took the hand, gazed at it for a moment, and then kissed the knuckles. 'And do you share your parents' distaste for my name?'

  Colour flared in the pale cheeks, but Nicholson came to her rescue. 'My foster daughter has little knowledge of the world, Mr. Hilton. Whereas I have a great deal, and some of it was gained in those West Indies which are the source of your fortune. I am sure Mr. Hilton there is a pleasant and personable young man who would make Gislane an excellent husband, were he otherwise employed. But he is the son of a planter, sir, and the heir to another, as you have just declared. He is a slave owner, sir, and is shortly to become a slave driver, which to me is the same as being a slave torturer and a slave murderer. The wife of such a man must either leave him or subscribe to his brutality. I would neither wish to see any young woman under my protection suffer a broken marriage nor find herself turning into a second Messalina.'

  He paused for breath, and Matt felt Georgiana's hand o
n his arm as they both waited for Robert's outburst of anger. But Matt could not stop looking at Gislane, and now she returned his gaze, a suggestion of real distress in her eyes.

  And Robert continued to smile, although his red face had deepened to purple. 'As you say, Mr. Nicholson, it does seem as though our differences are irreconcilable. My cousin will no doubt find a more willing receptacle for his heart, in the course of time. My apologies, sir, for bursting in on you with so little ceremony. My apologies, madam, for disturbing you. Miss Gislane, it has been a pleasure, which I trust for your sake will never be repeated. You'll excuse us.'

  He turned for the door, and Georgiana turned with him. Matt hesitated, once again glancing towards the girl, but this time her face was closed. He gained the fresh air, passing an utterly bewildered Betty, but her amazement at the scene she had just witnessed was no greater than his.

  The carriage door stood open, and Georgiana was climbing in. 'Come on, come on,' Robert said, irritably but still speaking in a lower tone than was usual with him. 'The morning has been wasted, and I have been made too much of a fool of already.'

  Matt sat down, the door closed, and a moment later the carriage rumbled away from the door. 'I do not understand.'

  'Faith, Robert,' Georgiana remarked. 'I hope you are not about to have a fit. How you managed to keep your tongue before such insolence ...'

  'Insolence,' Robert said, the old familiar growl returning to his voice. 'I know that puling upstart now. Geoffrey Nicholson, by God. I'd not distress you unduly, Matt. I was in love myself, once. But you may take my word that you are fortunate I was present to prevent any misfortune overtaking you.'

  'I do not understand you, sir,' Matt said coldly. 'I do not see how any man of spirit could have reacted otherwise to our invading his home.'

  'Aye, he is a man of spirit,' Robert agreed. 'I'll grant you that.'

  'And Miss Gislane is a girl of rare beauty and charm, would you grant me that?'

  'Beauty, certainly. And beauty usually creates charm, at least in the mind of the admirer.'

  'Well, then, you'll appreciate my regret at the whole incident. I must now start from the very beginning again in my attempts to convince both Miss Nicholson and her parents that I am not the ogre they consider me.'

  'You'll do no such thing,' Robert shouted.

  'I at least, sir, will have no wife chosen for me merely because she commands wealth or position or happens to be the heiress to a sugar plantation,' Matt declared. 'I will marry for love, sir.'

  'Then go and find someone worthy of your love.'

  'Sir? In what possible way can Gislane be unworthy of my love?'

  Robert gave a short laugh. 'For at least one very good reason, boy. The girl is a nigger.'

  CHAPTER THREE

  THE LOVERS

  'You seek to provoke me, I think,' Matt declared. 'But you'll have to try harder. The conception is utterly ridiculous.'

  Robert glanced at Georgiana. 'You saw her.'

  Georgiana nodded.

  'And what would you say?'

  'She is too white.'

  'Oh, for God's sake,' Matt shouted. 'Do you think in six years I have forgotten what a Negro looks like?'

  ‘I think you never knew just what constitutes a nigger,' Robert said. ' 'Tis any person of black blood. Your charmer Gislane may be high yellow, but she is yellow just the same. I would estimate she is a mustee. Do you know what that is?'

  'I really am not interested,' Matt insisted.

  'You'll listen none the less. When a white man and a Negress spawn, the offspring is called a mulatto. Am I right?'

  'Hark at him,' Georgiana said. 'Why should it not be a white woman and a Negro?'

  'Hold your tongue, you impudent harlot,' Robert shouted. 'The thought is impossible, except in your diseased brain. Now then. Matt, when that mulatto, supposing it is a girl breeds by a white man, we have a quadroon, eh? And when that quadroon girl breeds by a white we have an octoroon. And when that octoroon is brought to her bed, we have a mustee. That is to say, the girl is probably one-sixteenth black blood.'

  'You think Nicholson is actually her father, by an octoroon woman?' Georgiana asked.

  "Very likely he is. But that is irrelevant. The law says that any one of those combinations I have mentioned, supposing the mother is a slave, is born a slave, and remains one until she is manumitted. It is not until we arrive at the child of a mustee and a white, that is a mustifino, that the child is legally born free, whatever the status of her parents.'

  'Oh, what rubbish you do talk,' Matt said. 'And now you have given your foul insinuations the lie from your own mouth. Did Gislane look like a slave to you? Have you ever seen a slave could meet your eye with such perfect composure? Did Mrs. Nicholson treat her like a slave? Even supposing there is the smallest fraction of truth in your insinuation, she is at the very worst a mustifino.'

  'I am trying to be reasonable about this, boy,' Robert announced. 'Because she appears free here in London is of no consequence - that law I was speaking of is a West Indian matter. If you paid more attention to what was happening in the world around you, and less to your little bits of wood, you'd know that there is a body of misinformed and misdirected opinion in this useless country which is opposed to the very idea of slavery. Do you know who inspires it? That lunatic Granville Sharpe. God save me from the sons of the clergy. At least their fathers read the Bible and understand that certain things are ordained by God. But Sharpe has created so much agitation that at last he has won the point that slavery and English freedom are incompatible, and that other lunatic Mansfield, how he ever got to be Chief Justice is a total mystery to me, gave a judgement a few years back that any slave becomes free the moment he sets foot on English soil. What was the nigger's name?'

  'Somerset,' Georgiana said. 'James Somerset.'

  'There was the blackguard. Can there ever have been more open invitation to absconders? The only saving grace is that they have to find some other blackguard to carry them across three thousand miles of open water in the first place, and few of them can command such a price. But the fact remains that whatever the combination of colour in her veins, this Gislane Nicholson is free merely by living in England. By God, we'd soon have her on her back were she to set foot in Jamaica.'

  'Sir, you nauseate me,' Matt said. 'In fact, I am one with the Nicholsons on that. And with Mr. Sharpe. The very concept that a girl like Gislane could be made into a ... a whore because of the colour of her skin makes me wish to vomit. I refuse to consider the matter further. She is very obviously as white as any of us, and will remain so until she is proved otherwise, at least in my eyes.'

  The carriage had arrived at the house, and he got down without giving Robert time to reply. Richards the butler held the great door ajar, and Matt threw his hat and cane in the corner. But Robert was immediately behind him.

  'You'll listen to me, by God,' he declared. 'I am not finished yet. In here.' He stamped into the withdrawing-room, and Matt, after a moment's hesitation and a glance at Georgiana, who stuck out her tongue at him, followed. It really made no sense to quarrel with Robert.

  'Proof, you say,' Robert declared, taking up his stance before the empty grate. 'Again, sir, your years in England have taught you to be less observant than you should. Tell me this, sir. Have you ever kissed the lady's hand?'

  'Why, no,' Matt said. 'It did not seem appropriate on the one occasion we met before.'

  'Well, I suggest that should you, by any mischance, meet her again, you do so. And as you bend your head, study her fingernails.'

  'Oh, really, Robert, what am I to tell from that?'

  'Well, sir, study your own. Observe the colour. Rest them on that table, sir. You will discover pinkness close to the white edge, and pinkness close to the cuticle, while the centre of the nail, unless pressed on the table, will be almost white. Now sir, with your Gislane, the pigmentation is altogether darker, especially close to the cuticle. You will find it very nearly purple.'

  '
And that is proof of colour? Rather is it proof that she has somewhat richer blood in her veins than I.'

  'Scoff if you like. It is based upon years of observation of the Negro. I could add to that the unnatural whiteness of her skin. No doubt you will argue that but proves she is altogether more delicate than you or I, or Georgiana here. But can you argue against her hair? Surely you have observed that, boy. It is one of her most striking features. And when first you met the girl, as I recall, it was on a cricket field, when surely there was a slight breeze blowing. Now I have but to go poof...' and he did so, 'to set Georgiana's wisps trembling. But did even a fair breeze disturb your Gislane's hair? Does it not strike you as being of an altogether different texture to yours or mine? Each strand of it, you would find were you to examine it closer, is somewhat thicker man ours, and tends to stay against its neighbour. There again is the mark of colour.'

  'Oh, what nonsense,' Matt said, but he could not stop himself frowning. The unnatural neatness of Gislane's hair had struck him from the first; he had put it down as resulting from the unnatural calm of her character.

  'Then what ails you, boy?'

  'Robert, I am sorry I lost my temper. I understand that you consider you are doing the best for me in attempting to turn me against Gislane. And who knows, you may very well be right, and she has some West African prince as a distant ancestor. Where you are wrong is in supposing that it matters to me one jot. She is the most beautiful creature I have ever seen. She is the most desirable creature I have ever seen. I love her with every part of my body. I shall always love her. Sometimes I feel that I have always loved her. I shall pursue and many her, no matter what it costs.'

  Robert stared at him. 'You will do no such thing, sir, if you wish to remain my heir.'

  'But even if she is a mustee, as you claim, it lies within our power to set her free, and remove the taint of slavery forever. In any event, you yourself have pointed out that her children will be free, no matter who the father, providing he is white.'