The Gypsy in the Parlour

by Margery Sharp

  I woke because Fanny Davis was standing by my bed.

  She held a candle: its light threw dark shadows under her eyes; her short dark hair, newly-brushed, haloed her head with smoke. She was wrapped in Charlotte’s Paisley shawl, but no plum-colour reflected from it on her cheeks, they were white as wax. White-faced, smoke-haloed, Fanny Davis stood over me; and this was the first time I felt afraid of her.

  “Dear little friend!” said Fanny Davis softly. “Do I startle you? But wake up, dear; you and I must positively have one moment’s little talk.”

  I pulled myself up, pressing my shoulders hard against the bed-head; Fanny Davis sat down at its foot. Her fingers sheltering the candle were so thin, I fancied I could see the bones.

  “For you mustn’t, you know,” continued she softly, “talk quite so much of poor Miss Blow. It may give a wrong impression. It may bring Charles trouble. When he and I rule here, naturally you’ll be our most welcome little guest; but not if you’ve made trouble.”

  I assured myself I had no reason to be afraid. But I didn’t immediately answer, in case my voice should prove less brave than my spirit. Fanny Davis, watching me, smiled.

  “Let me help you, dear,” said she gently. “If there’s still a struggle in that loyal little breast, let Fanny help. I’ve no doubt in the world Miss Blow did all she could to win your affection, to insinuate herself into your good graces; but consider with what motive? To enlist you on her side in her ridiculous design to marry Charles. That he had no such design is certain—for if he’d wanted to marry her, what prevented him? Certainly not the lack of his mother’s consent!” said Fanny Davis, with a little laugh. “It was his engagement to me, dear, which he chose to keep. Now do you see your foolishness?”

  I still couldn’t answer her. All she said sounded so sensible, so likely; yet it didn’t tally with what I knew of Clara Blow. I still thought that when Clara gave me buns it was out of sheer good-heartedness, not to insinuate herself into my graces.—The implication in any case unflattering. Yet had not Fanny herself, in the course of our first conversation of all—which the present, more momentous one so oddly paralleled in night-shaded secrecy—had not Fanny herself sought my favour with a bag of sweets? Did all adults, in fact, rate all children so low? Did Fanny, in short, know what she was talking about? I had lost confidence in my judgment. I had been so blind, in regard to Fanny and Charles, that my thoughts ran malleable as the wax that slid down Fanny’s taper.…

  If I had strayed far in thought, so it seemed had she. As though forgetting that she waited for an answer from me, suddenly, softly, she spoke again.

  “The first night I ever spent under this roof,” said she softly, “do you know what an odd thing I did?”

  I waited. I waited most eagerly.

  “I couldn’t sleep,” pursued Fanny Davis—almost as though speaking to herself. “I got up, and dressed, and went out. By the kitchen-entry, like a servant … But I walked all round the house. I remember standing under the crab-tree, in the little court below what was then your room, and looking up at the windows. Do you know what I thought, then?” asked Fanny Davis, suddenly bending back to me. “As I stood looking up at this great, proud, overbearing house?”

  “Yes,” said I. “That you wanted it.”

  She laughed a little.

  “For what? There’s the real joke.—What I thought, then, was but that I at least would never be its servant. As I saw all Sylvester women, even Mrs. Toby. I thought it better to be mistress.” She paused, her face oddly rapt. “Did my spirit, even then, unaware, reach out to Charles? Perhaps,” said Fanny Davis softly, “indeed, perhaps.…”

  I stirred uncomfortably. With a swift return to lightness, she laughed again.

  “And very knowledgeable my spirit was, dear, for mistress I certainly shall be!—Now do I see you deciding to be sensible? I think I do.… Always my little friend, from the very first days! And my little messenger to Charles as well—which Mrs. Toby, upon reflection, mayn’t find quite so endearing as I do. But you shall always find a welcome with me: and one of the first things I shall do will be to put you back in your old pretty room.”

  Without, suddenly, a cock crew.—Just as I was at last about to speak, to protest I was sure my Aunt Charlotte didn’t blame me, I was sure she’d keep on inviting me to the farm for ever, a cock crew; and Fanny, always startled by any country-sound, slipped swiftly to her feet, and dipped to my pillow.

  “Now sleep, if not beauty-sleep, for both of us!” she cried softly. “Good night, little friend!”—and kissed me, and was gone.

  CHAPTER XX

  1

  In one thing at least, among all my miscomprehensions, I was perfectly right. I wasn’t to be blamed. When I joined my aunts at breakfast their looks were kind, exonerating me; and that although, as I saw at once, they knew. Charlotte must have talked long, over-night, with Grace and Rachel; they were grave and heavy-eyed, silent and deeply troubled. But I was once more in their confidence, as they were in each other’s; the realisation helped me through my bread-and-butter.—As Charlotte cut it for me I saw, for the first time, a clumsiness in her motions: she took up the wrong knife, too blunt, let it slip against the crust and cut her hand; left a smear of blood on the cloth as she pushed the board across to Grace, who silently received it. The year before, Rachel at least would have been loud in sympathy, the day before, Grace bitter in mockery; now neither uttered a word. My uncles apparently noticed nothing; perhaps they had grown used to their wives’ silence; the quality of their own was unchanged. They didn’t know. If it was not a matter for children, no more, I soon understood, was it a matter for men.

  It was a matter for the Sylvester women.

  As soon as the males had tramped out my Aunt Grace warned me against any rash speech, in especial to Tobias.

  “Charlotte being fearful,” said she plainly, “lest he do Charles an injury. If there be one crime Sylvesters do hate and despise above all others, ’tis deceitfulness; and Charlie have deceived all two mortal years. ’Ee won’t remember, my dear, though maybe Rachel do, time Matthew entered into secret negotiation wi’ they Pomfrets as to selling our ten-acre field: they making so brave an offer for it. Tobias laid he out wi’ one blow upon the moment of revelation. And as to poor Stephen, ’twould so horribly shock he, till all be most fixed and certain best say no upheaving word. Charlotte, bind up that wound.”

  It was strange to hear Grace take the lead; but Charlotte sat withdrawn in thought—silent, passive, will-less, seemingly, as her father-in-law at the last, in that very chair, had sat before her. Her hand still bled a little; from time to time she looked at it, pressed it against her apron, and let it lie. The look I had glimpsed on her face the night before, a look, most new to her, of withdrawal, seemed already the settled cast of her countenance; the new lines already engraved. Grace by taking up the burden of leadership did Charlotte kindness; as my Aunt Rachel, in her degree, poured Charlotte a last extra cup.—It was my only consolation, to see them thus re-united, no longer at odds, at last come together again. My own readmittance to their confidence I felt almost undeserved; but as we sat about the breakfast-table—the men gone out, Fanny furnished by Rachel with a tray—I felt myself for the first time, as we talked together so gravely, truly one of the Sylvester women.…

  “’Tis so hard to credit,” sighed my Aunt Rachel, “I credit it scarcely yet. Have Fanny also deceived we two mortal years?”

  “And would two years more,” said my Aunt Grace.

  “It was what the French call the coup de foudre,” I put in. “I think that means it’s like a thunderbolt. I mean, when Fanny and Charles fell in love, at the Assembly.”

  “No doubt but Charlie’d turn any head living,” agreed Rachel unhappily. “’Ee didn’t see he, my lamb; but for dancing, and deportment, and brave Sylvester looks, him outshone all.… What remains mysterious to I be how her so turned his?”

  “Didn’t Charlotte say herself, on Fanny’s first coming, her charm be
felt by males solely?”—This was my Aunt Grace; speaking however without the least malice; speaking rather as a doctor of a disease. “Moreover, Fanny in her peacock gown were no poor sight.…”

  “Which Charlotte purchased for she her own self,” sighed Rachel—again, unmaliciously; diagnosing. “I do believe maybe that compassed it, Grace; for I saw Luke’s eye also on her bosom; so cunningly displayed it were, the blue showing off its milk-whiteness, I saw Luke’s eye stray also. ’Tis certain Fanny have a charm for males.”

  “Question be,” said Grace sharply, “how far ’twill overbear all else. Can her put Charles so at loggerheads with all Sylvesters, to wed without his parents’ blessing? Which Charlotte at least I be sure will never give?”

  But no promptings roused Charlotte. She might not have heard a word we said. She had—withdrawn.

  “Dear soul!—and what of Stephen?” cried Rachel—even her mild tones almost impatient. “How’m Stephen to fare here, how’m he to bide here even, seeing his own betrothed Charlie’s bride?”

  “Seeing she walk nightly to Charlie’s bed,” said my Aunt Grace crudely. “Think of that, will ’ee? No male flesh and blood’s to endure it—even so sainted a flesh as Stephen’s may now appear. ’Twill drive he from home. First of all Sylvesters, him’ll be driven from his home.”

  “I think also of the young ones,” said Rachel. “Charlotte did once proclaim Fanny a likely breeder: after her two years’ sickness, can us think so still? But to fall in love, seemingly, strikes she down; I say that to carry a nine-months babe be utterly beyond her powers. And ’tis now more than ever before the farm do need a new, strong generation.”

  “Would ’ee call home your own two from Canada?”

  “My two be faring so bravely.” (I must repeat it, not one of these exchanges carried a hint of malice. My Aunt Rachel stated a fact: her two were faring so bravely, they’d sent her at Christmas such a beaver muff as Frampton never saw.) “So stoutly they’m making their way, to recall they would be a most wrong act,” said my Aunt Rachel, almost sorrowfully. “It must rejoice we to know the same of yours—and of Charlotte’s second also. Charlie be here at hand, returned as though by Providence.”

  “Not if he’m to wed Fanny Davis,” said Grace.

  So we talked, in grave unhappy tones, my Aunts Grace and Rachel and myself, round the remainder-cluttered breakfast-table, my Aunt Charlotte still saying nothing; until presently, as from all our talk no more emerged than the catastrophe’s completeness—diagnosis, not remedy—we too fell silent. Grace could take the lead only so far; my Aunt Rachel follow only in lamentation. So we fell silent.

  —And so, incredibly, heard the parlour-clock strike. It hadn’t struck for two years, its chimes stopped to spare Fanny’s nerves. It was a piece of sheer impishness on her part, to pause and set them off again, on her way downstairs.

  2

  She entered with a light and sprightly step: cool and trim, her short hair neatly combed over her forehead, her dress, mysteriously less limp, freshened by a little white lace collar.—There was nothing grand in all this, it was no more than any clever woman could have done for herself. The effect produced was disproportionate. As my aunts, three big, aproned women, rose instinctively to their feet, Fanny might have been the mistress of the house visiting her kitchen.

  “Good morning,” said she, smiling. “You see I practise my powers.… I suppose they all know, Charlotte?”

  This was the first time, I noticed it, she ever called my Aunt Charlotte anything but Mrs. Toby. If Charlotte noticed too, she gave no sign.

  “All know,” she agreed. “Us have just been discussing ’ee; ’ee and Charlie.” She turned back to the table, and from it carried a pile of plates to the washing-up bowl. The china clinked as she moved; and Fanny Davis, looking after her, smiled again.

  “And what all know, all don’t quite like?” she suggested lightly. “In time no doubt I shall have gratitude, for bringing Charles home again!” She sat down: all my aunts being on their feet, this gave her more than ever the air of the mistress; in kind, explanatory tones, she continued. “For it’s quite obvious things can’t go on here as they are,” said Fanny Davis. “But for my illness, I must have acted long since!—you good creatures growing more toil-worn every day, and the farm on its rapid way to ruin!”

  Across the stillness, for no one immediately spoke, anger rippled like a catspaw over water. I saw my Aunt Rachel lift up her head incredulously, the colour flame in Grace’s cheek; while Fanny sat and smiled.

  Grace found speech first.

  “Leaving we for the moment aside,” said she, “and what do ’ee know of the farm, may I ask?”

  “Only what all Frampton knows,” said Fanny Davis carelessly—but with what deadly aim! “As to general mismanagement, you know, and bad judgment, and all that. As to Luke and Matthew spending rather much time in the George, on market-day; Tobias such a sad lack! I’m told old Mr. Sylvester went quite the same way,” sighed Fanny Davis, “but he, of course, could lean on Tobias.…”

  This no one answered. There was no answer. What Fanny had gleaned from her gossips was no more than my aunts must long have known, though without ever openly admitting it; even I had perceived the life of the farm as it were slowing down, losing momentum. Fanny Davis couldn’t be answered because she spoke the truth—and not least as to my aunts themselves. They did now seem toil-worn, old and patient and toil-worn, slow-moving and silent, with no more laughter in them … But only since Fanny came!—I nearly cried this revelation aloud, as I suddenly perceived the whole sequence of events since she first set foot in my aunts’ parlour. That I had been most beguiled of all made my disillusion but completer. “Only since she came!” I wanted to cry; but what was the use? She had come. She sat amongst us now, small, trim and composed, fronting the three big Sylvester women with utter assurance; smiling at them.

  “So you see why you owe me gratitude,” said she. “For if Charles doesn’t soon return to take command, I for one can’t conceive what’s to become of you all.—Dear me, you’d need a whole almshouse!” cried Fanny gaily. “It might be called the Sylvester Arms!”

  It was a dangerous moment, while she laughed. But it passed. Grace had moved only one angry step when a sound from Charlotte halted her. Charlotte had but broken a cup, she did not speak; still, the momentary check gave Fanny time to skim prettily, safely on.

  “But Charles shall return,” she assured them, “and for your part you mustn’t, you really mustn’t think too hardly of me. Hearts, alas, can’t be controlled!”

  “Nor appetite?” said my Aunt Grace—a little danger still in her voice. “Nor appetite, Fanny Davis? I b’aint speaking of the lusts of the flesh, Fanny Davis; but of the lust, or appetite, for mastery; which I in my time have striven with, to its casting out.…”

  Fanny’s response to this last challenge was unhesitating. With a most smooth, engaging motion she rose and dipped over upon Charlotte.

  “Be cross as you like!” she cried vivaciously. “This is where I find understanding, in my good Charlotte!” Charlotte stood passive, merely knocking the handle off a cup. “See even the lightest task too much for her!” cried Fanny Davis compassionately. “The first thing I shall do, as mistress here, will be to hire some young local girl to relieve her at the sink. For shame, Charlotte!” fluted Fanny Davis. “If I’ve no servant for you yet, at least let Grace or Rachel take her turn!”

  —I still, to-day, cannot believe my Aunt Charlotte capable of deliberate false-dealing; yet while she stood there so humbly, fumbling about her humble task, she had undoubtedly disguised from us all her true formidableness. My heart was torn for her; Grace and Rachel watched her anxiously. What we had all forgotten was the Sylvester inability to do two things at once. (Yet how often had I remarked on it, in my uncles!) Charlotte, now Sylvester to the marrow, had been thinking. She had been thinking steadily, as we were soon to discover, for the last hour. The bread-knife slipped because she was thinking, not of bre
ad; thinking of something else, she let even her blood flow unstanched.… I do not know who was the more startled, ourselves or Fanny Davis, when Charlotte, most placidly cracking a last plate clean across, finally ceased to think, and presented the result of her thought.

  “Grace and Rachel will take their turn sure enough,” said she, “while I be at London.”

  CHAPTER XXI

  1

  It is extraordinarily difficult to convey, so long after, and now that running up to London has become in all parts of England no more than an excursion-commonplace, the impact of my Aunt Charlotte’s placid reply. (The impact all the greater for the placidity.) To-day, Mothers’ Unions, Women’s Institutes, members of the Women’s Voluntary Service, descend on London in amiable hordes: conveyed by chartered coaches to inspect royal wedding-gifts, applaud local choirs, or just for the ride. Individual women resort thither no less freely, to meet friends or fight a sale. Native Londoners, if not of absolutely sinister appearance, can hardly cross Whitehall without directing some pleasant countrywoman to the Army and Navy Stores. But at the time of which I write, to visit London was a considerable undertaking—and this though the train-services were already excellent. The adventure was rather moral. To simpler, remoter communities, (amongst which ours about Frampton must be counted), London and Babylon still called cousins. Even setting foot to platform at Paddington, our own West Country terminus, one forded a dubious stream. At the Great Exhibition of 1851, (the last occasion of any widespread venturing), several well-known local personalities had their pockets picked. One went to London to a death-bed—if one had a relative so misguided as to die there—or, if one was a more than usually important farmer, to the Fat Stock Show. That I travelled regularly back and forth was a local wonder, productive of prestige to the Sylvesters, an exaggerated estimate of my parents’ income, and equally exaggerated prophecies of my own early demise.…