Sarah's Story

by Helen Susan Swift

  As I watched, unable to restrain my smile, Mr Howard enfolded Charles in a tremendous hug that lasted at least two full minutes. 'Charles, my dear, dear boy.'

  'I think they know each other,' the second soldier said to me, and repeated the words to the sun-tanned sergeant. 'They know each other.'

  The other officers were equally pleased, nudging each other and exchanging murmured comments.

  When at last Mr Howard released Charles he looked to me. 'Sarah my dear; you found him. I cannot thank you enough. What can I say? What can I do in return?'

  My smile was probably a trifle uncertain. 'I think that Charles would like to know who he is,' I said. 'And what he is doing here. There are so many questions.'

  Mr Howard started. 'He is Charles Durand, of course, Master of the sloop Les Hanois out of St Peter Port in Guernsey. He is my adopted son.'

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  We gathered in the tap-room of the Horse Head, me, Charles, Mr Howard, Molly, Hugo Bertram and Mother, all cosy beside the roaring fire and with brandy punch and rabbit stew in front of us as we mulled over the events of the past few weeks.

  'So Charles is from Guernsey,' I said. 'That would explain why he speaks French so fluently.'

  'He has grown up with both languages,' Mr Howard said, 'as have most of the population of that island.' His smile was more relaxed than I had ever seen.

  I nudged Charles. 'If we had known that, we could have saved us all a great deal of trouble.'

  'That is true,' Charles said, 'yet think of the stories we can relate.'

  I coloured a little, 'yes, and the stories we will never repeat.' Realising that Mr Howard and my mother were both looking intrigued, I closed my mouth and said no more.

  'So you really thought I was a French spy?' Mr Howard roared with laughter as I told him I had followed him to Limestone Manor that day so very long ago. 'Dear God in all his glory, I am the very opposite! I work for the British government.'

  'I heard you speaking French to some people.' I had not forgotten that beautiful, elegant French woman or the other man who had been with Mr Howard that day.

  Mr Howard supped at his punch. 'We were studying maps of tidal currents and places where this young man,' he patted Charles on the shoulder, 'could have come ashore. I never believed that he was drowned. He could always swim like a shark.'

  Charles gave an uncertain smile. 'I am glad you found me, Father, yet I still do not remember. I have a name La Longue Rocque, in my mind, and the image of a very beautiful lady.'

  'La Longue Rocque,' Mr Howard smiled. 'That is an ancient standing stone in Guernsey only a mile or so from our house, which is also named after it.' He shook his head. 'The elegant woman can only be your mother. My wife. I have sent for her and she should be landing at Ventnor this very evening.'

  'I would like to see her,' I said.

  'We will ride along in half an hour or so,' Mr Howard said. 'Les Hanois is due on the tide.'

  'My ship!' Charles said. 'I wish to show her to Sarah.'

  'You love her more than life itself,' Mr Howard said.

  'I do,' Charles said, and he was looking at me in the most peculiar manner.

  I noticed Mr Howard's expression as he looked from Charles to me and back again.

  'So, Charles, you were washed ashore and have been hiding in Wight all the time and nobody thought to tell me; well well.'

  'I did not know who you were,' I reminded. 'For all I knew you wanted to kill Charles, or take him over to France to join the army or put him in prison.'

  Mr Howard nodded and ran his gaze down me from the top of my head to the tips of my toes. Once more I knew that I was being scrutinised. I prepared to rebuff any plans Mr Howard had to seduce me; I had enough of that sort of thing from Captain Chadwick. Indeed, I thought, the sooner that Mrs Howard arrived on that boat the better I would like it.

  'How about the French?' Mr Bertram asked. 'That was an unexpected surprise.'

  'Not so unexpected, perhaps' Mr Howard said. 'They have been threatening a raid for some time. We knew they do not have the resources for a full scale invasion, although they are building up barges in all the ports on their side of the Channel. This raid was merely to test our defences, and spread alarm and despondency among our population.'

  I thought of Captain Nash and James Buckett. I could not imagine men such as them being alarmed or despondent at anything the French may do.

  'It did not work,' I said.

  Mr Howard shook his head. 'We have been preparing for it. Our people in France sent us notice that it might happen soon so I had the Volunteers pretend to scour the fields for smugglers and Frenchmen while they were learning the lie of the land in case the French came, and I had a regiment of regulars based here before they are sent off to the West Indies.'

  'You had?' I said. 'You are an important man, Mr Howard.'

  He shrugged in the French fashion. 'I hope to live here soon,' he said. 'I have bought Limestone Manor. My people in France notified us that the French would pick on it as it was imposing and deserted.'

  'And I brought poor Charles right into their arms,' I said.

  'It was not your fault,' Charles said, 'and anyway, it all came right in the end.'

  'I will be happy when Charles memory returns,' Mr Howard said, and stopped. 'Well, we will see what transpires once that happens.' He looked at his son, and then at me. I wondered if he guessed that we had been lovers. I did not care if he did.

  'Shall we go?' Mr Bertram said. 'There is a fair wind from France this evening so Les Hanois may be in at any minute.'

  It is only a few miles along the coast road to Ventnor and it was still light when we arrived. The place was in a buzz after the recent attempted invasion, with Mr Howard and the Volunteers the toast of the inhabitants. I saw Captain Chadwick in deep conversation with a blonde beauty and wondered if she was in line for his next bigamous wife, and then Kitty appeared with her smile wider than the Channel and her eyes bright with friendship.

  'Sarah!' Her embrace was as warm as anything we had shared before. 'Come and meet my new beau. He is a lovely young man…'

  'I can't Kitty,' I said. 'We are waiting for Charles' mother to arrive.'

  'Oh my Lord! Has Charles got a mother?' Kitty looked over to Charles with her eyes wide, then, suddenly realising what she had said, she put an elegantly gloved hand to her mouth. 'My, am I not the silly one! Of course he has a mother. What I meant was: has he remembered who his mother is?'

  'Mr Howard is his father,' I hissed, and then Charles joined us with smiles for Kitty and an anxious look out to sea.

  As always there was a plethora of sails visible; I had thought that the French scare might have put people off travelling but it seemed that the reverse was correct. There must have been twenty five vessels in view, from lug-sailed fishing craft to one large three-master that was either an Indiaman or a Greenland ship homeward bound for London. Not that it mattered for Charles only had eyes for one vessel. He actually snatched a spy-glass from his father's hands in his eagerness to examine her.

  'Look,' he pointed her out to me, while refusing to relinquish hold of his spy-glass or even lower it from his eye. 'Is she not a beauty?'

  Of course all I could see was a pyramid of sails and a speck beneath, but I agreed anyway. One must, you know, if one seeks to keep the peace with one's man.

  As Les Hanois came closer, I could see that she was indeed a beautiful vessel. Sloop rigged, she sailed with a bone between her teeth and her sails bulging under the same southerly wind that slapped the waves against the harbour wall and showered us with periodical splatters of spray.

  'Your mother is in the bows,' Mr Howard had managed to borrow or steal another spy-glass from somebody.

  'Oh!' I heard Charles exclamation. 'Oh! I know that woman.'

  I also knew that woman. It was the same elegant woman I had seen in Limestone Manor. She was standing right at the figurehead of a naked Venus and of the two she was by far the more beautiful and more
elegant. She stepped ashore with that same grace I had noted all these weeks before and Mr Howard was first to greet her.

  I watched them embrace. I watched Mr Howard tell her something and she straightened up as if struck and literally marched toward us as Charles ran forward to meet her.

  I could not hide my smile as mother embraced son and son embraced mother in as touching a reunion as any I have ever seen.

  'Mother,' I heard Charles' voice even above the hubbub of the harbour and the call of circling seagulls. 'Come and meet Sarah, the woman that I wish to marry.'

  Mrs Howard's eyes sought out mine through that crowded harbour. They were as green as her sons, calm and very serene. She nodded to me, only once, and then she smiled. I knew that everything would be all right, unless the curse did not strike as it had on my previous two wedding attempts.

  So that brings us back to the scene with which I opened this account, when Kitty and I were hurrying down to the chapel at Knighton Hazard. If you remember I had recounted my words on that occasion:

  'I had an idea that may remove the ill luck from my weddings,' I said, blithely aware that I was further stretching Kitty's inquisitiveness. It is a well-known saying that curiosity killed the Kitty. Well, I had no intentions of ending poor Kitty's life, but I had no qualms about torturing her imagination.

  'So tell me!' She stamped her foot in irritation which, you may imagine, pleased me no end.

  'I shall take them down!' I announced, as if I had discovered a way of ending Bonaparte's threat to the world once and for all. 'And that will put an end to it.'

  'You shall take what down?' Kitty wailed in utter frustration, and so I told her.

  I had no intention of ruining my third wedding in the year, so I determined to take no chances. Anything that may act against me would be removed. I stormed into the chapel full of resolution and passion and stared about me at the beautiful room. It was redolent with poignant memories as I studied the stained glass windows and the small door through which the vicar had walked. I stepped forward and ran my hand over the altar that came from some pagan Roman site but which I had been assured would not do any harm to a Christian wedding. Other items in that room, I thought, might be less harmless.

  'Mr Bertram,' I said, with one hand on my hip and the other pointing to the portraits that flanked the doorway. 'These two people, Mr and Mrs Ebenezer Bertram were the first to be married in this building; am I correct?'

  'You are correct, Sarah,' Mr Bertram sounded mildly amused. 'But please remember to call me Hugo.'

  I had forgotten that. 'Yes, all right, Hugo.' It seemed strange using his first name; the syllables sounded clumsy on my tongue. 'And how many other weddings have been performed in this chapel?'

  Hugo Bertram pursed his lips. 'There have been about half a dozen weddings in total, including mine of course; and two of yours.'

  I nodded. 'Quite so.' I pointed again to the portraits. 'You will note that the gentleman is in full hunting rig while his wife is most elegantly dressed, as if she is going to a ball? That may indicate that they are not entirely compatible with each other's life styles.'

  'It may,' Hugo agreed patiently.

  'Did they have a happy marriage?' I asked. 'Indeed, did their marriage last?'

  Hugo shook his head. 'They had a most unhappy time together,' he said. 'Their marriage produced ten children but I believe they did not share a bedroom except to extend the family, and after the last child was born they moved to separate wings of the house. Eventually she left him to his hunting and shooting and moved to London to become the paramour of the Duke of somewhere or other.'

  I nodded. 'Were the other marriages in here as unfortunate?'

  Hugo pursed his lips. 'Yes they were, now you come to mention it. My father and mother used to stand in the great hall throwing insults and crockery at each other before he left for the colonies, and my wife left me for a sugar planter in Jamaica, thank God.' He shook his head. 'I pity that poor man. Let's hope that your next wedding has more success.'

  'It will,' I promised, speaking more grimly than I had intended. 'I don't want these reminders of a failed marriage looking down on me. I think they put a curse on marriages here.'

  Hugo looked very disappointed. 'Do you wish to be married elsewhere? I was rather looking forward to another of your weddings in my home. They are such exciting events!'

  'You misunderstand me, sir,' I said. 'I have every intention of marrying here. However I have no intention of having these two faces glowering down upon me.'

  'Then I shall have them moved,' Hugo said at once. 'The servants will take them down tomorrow.'

  Well, as you will know by now, I am not a great hand at having others do for me what I am perfectly capable of doing for myself, so I was up the ladders within an hour and I woman- handled these portraits to the ground. They were heavier than I had imagined though, so both Hugo and Kitty had to help. Where was Charles you may ask? He was at sea, recovering his memory in his beloved boat. Or his beloved sloop, rather.

  The wedding took place on Christmas Day 1803, with a fine sprinkling of snow and the chapel decorated with holly leaves, some ivy and enough mistletoe to satisfy the kissing propensities of every couple in the Back of Wight. I am a firm believer in old fashioned Christmases with greenery and carols, candles and feasting to brighten up the long dark nights.

  I chose the Reverend Barwis to perform the ceremony again, partly to establish some continuity in my weddings and partly because he was reputed to be Molly's father and I liked to watch his face as Moll sat in the front pew while he preached about fidelity. Little things like that amuse me. He gave a little start as I rapped on his door and asked if he would officiate.

  'You are back to the altar again then, Sarah; third time lucky I hope.'

  'It will be,' I promised. 'My previous attempts were only trials.' I tried not to smile at the expression of shock on the Reverend Barwis' face.

  I will not attempt to describe the wedding; you know what they are like and anyway I have already written about two of mine. There were some differences of course, as well as the lack of portraits on the wall above us. The groom was as much in love with me as I was with him, which helped a great deal, and there were no inconvenient other wives to worry about; or sudden orders for my husband to go and get himself shot by unhappy deserters. I fretted a little as I endured Reverend Barwis solemn admonitions to be faithful, tried not to smile at Molly's outburst of coughing and promised to love, honour and obey, although the last item in that list may take a little stretching from time to time.

  As we gathered together after the ceremony, my mother gave Charles the obligatory mother-in-law peck on the cheek. 'Now this one is a better man for you,' she gave her approval. I am sure there was a genuine tear in her eye that time. 'I only wish that your father was here to give you away.'

  'Mr Bertram, Hugo rather, did a fine job,' I said. I tried to steer the conversation onto other things, because mention of Father always made Mother sad. Luckily Mr Howard came along at that moment.

  'Did you realise, Mr Howard,' I said, 'that at one time I had thought you were interested in becoming my third husband?'

  'I am glad he was not,' the elegant Mrs Howard had overheard my words and glided over to say her piece. As always she made me feel like a country bumpkin with her grace and charm. 'My husband has spent the last five years of his life searching for a suitable wife for Charles. He actually sent me a long letter all about you and your friend Katherine.'

  'Katherine?' I was blank for a moment. 'Oh Kitty: of course.' So that was that little mystery all cleared up. Out of curiosity, I asked, 'how did we both measure up?'

  'Oh very well indeed,' Mrs Howard said. I suppose I should call her by her first name now, but you know her better by that one, so I shall continue to use it. 'Adam was quite enthusiastic about you.'

  'So am I,' Charles said, proving his words with a kiss that did not need mistletoe. There was an outburst of cheering from the congregation and some
copy-cats as well, with copy-Kitty foremost in the kissing department.

  'And now to the wedding breakfast,' Hugo said, 'and let us hope for no untoward interruptions this time.'

  'Perhaps we should lock the door, no?' Mrs Howard said. 'Just in case?'

  Mr Howard's start was a little too natural to be an act. 'No,' he said. 'We will not do that. It is Christmas; not a day for locking anybody out of the house.'

  As we entered the great hall of Knighton Hazard I found it even more elaborately decorated than on my two previous weddings, with great boughs of evergreens and enough food to feed the French, should they care to invade in friendship rather than animosity. Once again I took my place at the top table and once again I tried to quell the memories of the past events that had taken place in here.

  I leaned across to Charles, 'you are not already married are you?'

  'No, I am not,' he said.

  'Or do you have any other surprises to spring on me?'

  'No surprises at all,' he assured me.

  'And you are not awaiting a call to join the army or the militia or the Volunteers?'

  'I am not,' Charles assured me, smiling.

  Yet even with that solemn promise my heart gave a great jump when, about half way through the meal, somebody banged with great force on the door.

  'Oh Lord in Heaven,' I said, looking over to Charles. 'Here we are again.'

  Reaching for my hand, he patted it in reassurance. 'It will be all right,' he said. 'You are not alone now.'

  'Mrs Bembridge,' Mr Howard sounded a little strained. 'Could you answer that please?'

  I thought that strange that Mr Howard should ask that in Hugo's house, particularly as Hugo was always the perfect gentleman and also employed at least a dozen servants for such tasks.

  'Yes of course,' Mother said, surprisingly docile. I think everybody in the hall watched her walk past them to the great door. She struggled with the handle for a second and then threw the door wide open. Cold air carried in a blast of snow and then a man stepped into the hall.