It was a balmy afternoon, the sky as blue as porcelain, only a handful of flies buzzing above the midden, and the fields beyond the garden bubbling with skylarks. ‘Just the weather for an excursion,’ she said. ‘A promenade, will refresh us both. ’Tis is no weather to be pining indoors. I will tell you all the news as we go.’
‘’Tis all one to me,’ Nan sighed, but she put on her bonnet, left baby Johnnie in Bessie’s care, and allowed her friend to lead her from the house.
At Sophie’s suggestion, they took a river boat to the City, past the Physic Gardens where the scented herbs were blooming in such sun-soaked profusion that the air was fragrant right down to the water’s edge, and past the nursery gardens and apple orchards of Lambeth, where the fruit was red on the trees, and under Westminster Bridge where a group of city gentlemen were taking an argumentative stroll, and so on to the Arundel stairs. But Nan didn’t seem to notice any of it, which was a bad sign. Perhaps Mr Easter was right.
As they docked at the Arundel Stairs, Sophie decided to open their conversation by a little gentle criticism of Mary Wollstonecraft since that lady was fair game among all the other female visitors to Mr Johnson’s. ‘I cannot take her seriously, my dear,’ she said. ‘She might be a very clever woman, that I grant you, writing books the way she does and working on the review for Mr Johnson, but her stockings are so invariably wrinkled and I swear she hasn’t taken a brush to that hair for weeks.’
But Nan wasn’t interested. ‘’Tis an odd woman,’ she said dully, and her tone didn’t encourage Sophie to continue.
‘I have read her book,’ Sophie said trying hard. ‘She has the poorest opinion of men, my dear. According to her, marriage is nothing but bondage and we would all do well to avoid it.’
‘Indeed.’
‘It seems to me,’ Sophie said trying again, ‘that she don’t want to be attractive, like all the rest of womankind. She goes out of her way to be a frump. ’Tain’t natural’ Surely Nan would rise to that.
But she didn’t. In fact she had so little to say, that finally, when the two women had disembarked and were strolling up Arundel Street towards the Strand, Sophie decided that Mr Easter had cause for his concern, and that the time had come for a direct question.
‘You have been melancholy too long, my dear,’ she said. ‘Pray tell me what ails you.’
‘I do not know myself,’ Nan confessed, walking slowly and sadly beside her. ‘Would that I did.’
‘Then tell me what it is that gives you the most pain to think upon,’ Sophie suggested.
And the suggestion released a rather surprising confession. ‘My life en’t nothing but babies,’ Nan mourned. ‘Three in four years. Nothing but babies. And I tell you, Sophie, I can’t stand no more on ’em. I’m fair wore out.’
‘But Annie and Billy are such little ducks,’ Sophie said. ‘I thought you loved ’em to distraction.’
‘Aye, so I do,’ Nan said, but she looked more anxious than loving. ‘’Tis the other. A changeling, Sophie, I swear it. I cannot love un for the life of me.’
‘You need a trip abroad to lift your spirits, that’s how it is,’ Sophie said taking her arm. ‘Heinrich and I travel to Switzerland within the month and I declare I feel full of enthusiasm merely to contemplate it. You should visit Paris, my dear. I warrant your melancholy would be cured there, aye and in a trice too. You may depend on’t.’
But Nan signed. ‘Mr Easter wouldn’t hear of it. We never travel abroad.’
‘You may leave Mr Easter to me, my dear,’ Sophie said. ‘He has asked for my advice d’you see. We meet at Galloway’s a’ Thursday. And if that ain’t more opportune, I should like to know what is. Should you like to see Paris, think ’ee?’
A trip to Paris would be uncommon pleasant, there was no denying it. ‘Could it really be arranged?’
‘With ease, my dear, I promise you.’
Even the idea of it was lifting Nan’s spirits. ‘Then I do believe I should,’ she said.
‘’Tis done,’ Sophie promised, smiling at her. ‘Now as to this matter of babies. Babies can be prevented.’
Now this was the most extraordinary idea. A dream. Oh, if only she could be sure that she would never have another baby like Johnnie. What a relief that would be! ‘Prevented? How?’
‘By vinegar and sponge, my dear. You must read Mr Price’s admirable pamphlet. There is no need nowadays for any woman to breed against her wishes. These are modern times.’
What miraculous news! It warmed Nan simply to hear it. ‘If that’s the case,’ she said, ‘then tell me what I must do.’
Which as they walked into the bustle of the Strand, arm in arm in their soft cotton gowns, with their embroidered kerchiefs draped artlessly about their fine white necks and their embroidered caps arranged artlessly above their fine thick curls, looking the very picture of genteel womanhood, Sophie Fuseli did.
‘I shall buy a sponge this very afternoon,’ Nan vowed, quite cheerfully. ‘Where is the nearest apothecary?’
She bought her prophylactic sponge in St Martin’s Lane, and that night she persuaded her embarrassed spouse that although it might look rather odd dangling from her waist on its long string, once it was in position he wouldn’t know it was there. ’Twont do you no harm,’ she said, ‘and ’twill do me a power of good. You don’t want scores of babies, now do you? Not when you got three good uns.’
By now, William Henry was beginning to wonder whether he had been wise to confide in such a sophisticated lady as Sophie Fuseli, but he gave in to his wife over this delicate matter because her melancholy did seem to be lifting at last and he would have been loathe to do anything to cast her down again. But he went to his meeting at Mr Galloway’s in some trepidation.
And was agreeably surprised by Mrs Fuseli’s good sense.
A change of scenery was the standard and obvious remedy for melancholy. Had I not been timid by my very nature, he rebuked himself wryly, I should have thought of it long before now. ‘Where would you suggest that we travel?’ he asked Mrs Fuseli.
‘Why, to Paris, sir,’ was her immediate answer. ‘Where else?’
Paris sounded rather alarming given the volatile state of the French mob these days, but he thanked Mrs Fuseli kindly and said he would certainly consider it.
That night after sponge and vinegar had been put to the test for the very first time and he had found to his considerable relief that it was not as off-putting as he’d feared it would be, he broached the subject of a possible holiday abroad. Tentatively, of course, in case she did not approve.
‘Mrs Fuseli is of the opinion, my love, that a trip to the continent is an uncommon good restorative.’
‘That I can believe, sir,’ she said, smiling to encourage him, for he was being very cautious about it.
‘Would you care to travel abroad, little one?’
‘Oh, indeed I would.’
‘To Italy perhaps? Or France?’
‘I should love to go to France. We could visit Paris. ’Tis the seat of fashion, so they do say, and a fair city.’
It occurred to him, watching her bright face, and glad to see her eager and excited again, that he had been much the same age as she was when he’d first seen the city of Paris, a stripling, just come of age, and now he was fifty-one and settled in his ways. I’m a pretty dull sort of fellow for a wife so young and passionate, he thought, I must grant her this, hazardous though it will most certainly be. But he was cautious to the last. ‘The baby would have to be weaned,’ he warned, ‘for we could not take him with us.’ He was remembering how adamant she’d been that Billy should be fed for fifteen months like his sister.
But she waved that difficulty aside. ‘He shall have his first titty-bottle tomorrow, I promise.’ Weaning young Johnnie would be no hardship, no hardship at all. After all, it wasn’t as if he enjoyed her milk.
‘’Twould mean a sea crossing,’ William Henry warned again. ‘And in the winter time, too, we must not forget.’
A sea cros
sing! Even the words were so exciting they lifted her spirits. She could see herself sailing away like an explorer, in a dark cockleshell boat, further and further into the challenge of the sea, leaving all the petty miseries of home behind her. No yowling babies, no dirty clouts, just her and the wild sea and a foreign country where established order had been stood on its head and the nobility sent packing and the king himself arrested and imprisoned. ‘I would love it,’ she said, turning to look straight at him. ‘’Twould be an adventure!’ And her face was fierce with the excitement of it.
‘Then the matter is settled,’ he decided. ‘As soon as the baby is weaned and all arrangements made, we will travel to France. We could only stay for a week or so, you understand, for I have much business to attend to.’
‘Oh, Mr Easter!’ she said. ‘Do you mean it? Do you really mean it?’
‘Aye, little one. I do.’ It would probably turn out to be a very grave mistake, but how could he deny her?
She flung her arms about his neck and rewarded him with rapturous kisses. ‘That’ll be the experience of a lifetime,’ she promised.
He found her excitement quite touching. ‘Now,’ he said, smiling at her, ‘we must build up your strength. I shall feel anxious on your account, my dear, until you are quite restored to your customary health and vigour. By Christmas you will be quite yourself again, I’m sure.’
So Johnnie was weaned and took to a titty-bottle full of Bessie’s special pap with remarkably good humour. And although it was a long and gradual process, by the middle of November, Nan was free of him and Bessie had pronounced him quite ready to be left.
And then, just as all their preparations had finally been made, news came from France that tossed poor William Henry into frantic indecision. King Louis XVI had tried to run away and had been recaptured at Varennes and brought back to Paris again under armed guard. And two weeks later, at the beginning of December, London learned that he had been arraigned to stand trial for his life before the Convention of the National Assembly.
The news caused an outcry in England, and Mr Johnson’s supper table was loud with opinion about it. Some said that a king, being inviolable and sacred, could not be tried at all, others claimed that his attempted escape had constituted an abdication and so left him liable to the law, while others maintained that they heard there was evidence from papers found hidden in an iron chest that he was actually plotting the overthrow of the revolution and had spent more than thirty thousand francs to that end.
‘’Twill be the most important trial since 1649,’ Mr Wotherspoon said with satisfaction. ‘Would I could be there to see it. You travel to France in a week or two, do you not, Mr Easter? I must say I envy you.’
‘I had intended so to do,’ William Henry admitted. ‘Howsomever, I do wonder whether it would be entirely wise, given the present situation.’
‘’Twould be as wise now as at any time since the revolution,’ Mr Johnson said. ‘At least this matter is being tried by law, which is a deal less bloodthirsty than war or revolution, you will allow.’
‘A deal more civilized, certainly,’ William Henry comforted himself. ‘’Tis true! ’Tis very true! But how if they decide on execution?’
‘My dear friend!’ Mr Johnson said. ‘We should not impugn the French with such folly. They are a civilized race. They will choose exile, which is bad enough in all conscience, but the obvious alternative in the circumstances, since the mob must be placated.’
‘Justice is adept at finding the least harmful solution,’ Mr Wotherspoon put in happily, ‘at least in the more serious cases with which it has to deal.’ He spoke as though Justice were a personal friend and the expression on his face showed how confidently he expected a merciful outcome.
Sitting in the mellow shadows of Mr Johnson’s green supper room, William Henry allowed his fears to recede. The French would choose exile. Of course they would. He was sure of it.
And that was Nan’s opinion too, when he asked her rather tentatively whether she would like him to postpone their trip for a month or two.
‘Why no, sir,’ she said. ‘That ol’ trial’ll be an added spice, you’ll see. Why we could get tickets and go and watch un. Think of that! ’Twill be more than Sophie Fuseli could do, for she’s in Switzerland. I’ve a-trimmed my bonnet, do come and see un. Will it be grand enough for Paris think ’ee?’ She was quite her old determined self again, leading him up the stairs to their bedroom, her face bright.
So despite his misgivings, their preparations continued, for he hadn’t the heart to disappoint her now. Four weeks later they set off for Dover and the packet boat to France.
Chapter Ten
In France at last! It was almost too good to be true. Yet here they were. It had been an excitement to Nan just to see that brown coast growing on the horizon as the packet boat creaked towards Calais, and now, as she came tripping down the gang-plank behind her whey-faced husband, she was chirruping with pleasure.
Everything was new and different here, just as she’d known it would be, brown fields instead of green, louvred shutters across the windows, curved tiles on the roofs, quaintly dressed people speaking a foreign language. Why even the air smelt foreign, of spices and garlic and very strong onions, as well as the usual medley of horses and sweat and dirty clothes.
‘En’t you glad we come, Mr Easter?’ she said.
But William Henry said he needed rest and a warm bed.
It was the first disappointment to her that they didn’t get either. The hotel was a terrible place. They ate their supper in a room that was little more than a barn, with an earth floor and a blackened ceiling and draughts howling in through the cracks in every shutter, while the people round them shouted at one another in their nasal language and paid no attention to them at all. And although their bed was impressively tall and heavily curtained, the mattress was made of straw and they soon found they were sharing it with a colony of bugs. They woke bitten and exhausted to discover that there was only grey bread and coffee for breakfast.
William Henry was so cast down he could barely speak. To start the day without hot chocolate was insupportable. Indeed it was!
‘Only one more journey,’ Nan said, determined to be cheerful as they set off to meet the diligence that would take them to Paris. ‘One more journey and then we shall be there. Think of that! They’re bound to serve hot chocolate in Paris. Paris’ll be different altogether.’
‘’Tis a mortal long journey!’ he sighed.
‘What’s the French for brandy?’ she asked, practical as ever.
She was making a very great effort to enjoy this holiday and to be as cheerful as she could, for he’d gone to a deal of trouble to arrange it for her, the dear man, and besides it took her mind away from the aching void she felt now that she was away from her children. She missed them all so much, even little Johnnie, which was rather a surprise. But it wouldn’t have done to have said so. That would have looked like ingratitude.
The coach was a second disappointment to them. It was as uncomfortable as the hotel had been and ridiculously crowded. There were seven people seated inside where she would have expected four in England, and a rough, smelly lot they were too. The man on her left smelt of pigs and was far too fond of spitting, while the woman opposite, who had a wall-eye and a vacant expression spent the entire journey chewing lumps from a most repellent blood-coloured sausage. But she kept her opinions to herself, for it wouldn’t do to let her husband know she didn’t approve.
It was nightfall before the sausage was consumed and they had reached the outskirts of the city. And Paris was the biggest disappointment of all.
This time there was no distant sunlit view to whet her appetite and charm her senses. One minute they were driving past damp fields smelling of manure, and the next they were inside the city which was dark and oppressive and smelt like a cess-pit. It had begun to rain, a close-packed spitting precipitation that filled the air and obscured their vision. It was true the road they followed was lit afte
r a fashion, but not in the way London was illuminated, with triple lamps set at regular intervals along the full length of a street. Here light was provided by a haphazard collection of ancient oil lamps and open torches, arranged without order or direction so that travellers passed from relative clarity to pools of ominous darkness. Cracked wagons and mud-smeared carriages racketted beside them and everywhere they looked dark foreign faces shouted and swore and scowled like gargoyles in the intermittent light.
‘They’re an ugly-looking lot,’ she said cheerfully to Mr Easter.
Her outspokenness alarmed him. ‘We would be better not to comment upon it,’ he said, glancing fearfully at the other occupants of the coach.
‘Them!’ his wife said unabashed. ‘I warrant they speak no more English than I do French. We may speak as we please in such company.’
‘My dear!’ he said, much alarmed by her temerity. ‘There is a dangerous spirit abroad. I do not think we should provoke it.’
‘They en’t understood a word,’ Nan said, flashing a bold smile at the sausage eater to prove her point, and being answered immediately by an affably toothless grin. ‘See?’
‘Who knows who may understand whom in these streets,’ William Henry said, anxiously. ‘There is an atmosphere to this place which I do not like at all. Oh, not at all. Do you not feel it?’ He shuddered. ‘Oh ’tis all as I feared ’twould be, my dear. Would we were not here.’
‘’Tis on account of it bein’ night-time,’ she said, determined not to allow him the chance to regret their journey. ‘All the villains come out night-time. That’s what ’tis. Be different by day, you’ll see. We shall see all the heroes of the revolution by day.’
But next day when they set out to view the city, and buy presents for the children, and perhaps to see the King’s trial, heroes were in very short supply, although the streets were crowded with citizens all dressed with self-conscious cockiness in the new, bold uniform of the Parisian proletariat, the men in long straight trousers, like the kind worn by watermen, only striped red and white or blue and white, the women in striped skirts and coloured aprons and neat plain bodices that showed no sign of stays being worn underneath, and both sexes sporting bright red triangular caps and red, white and blue cockades.
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