Starrbelow

by Christianna Brand

  ‘So I am,’ said Red Reddington affably: and went back to sleep.

  Lord Weyburn on his feet, cold and quiet, Sir Henry Kidd on his feet, nervously shifting. ‘My lord—in December of the year 1753, you made a wager that you would marry this lady, then Miss Sophia Devigne: and at the same time publicly declared you would make her your wife in name only?’

  ‘I did: and I now call upon her Grace of Witham to represent at least two hundred people present, who heard my vow.’

  Her Grace of Witham, decked out like a cockatoo, triumphantly on her feet. ‘Perfectly true: I can testify, all can testify.…’

  Sapphire heard her out to the end. She rose. ‘I was at that time, madame, aged not quite eighteen?’

  The Duchess looked at her blankly. ‘Why, seventeen?—yes, I daresay you were.’

  ‘And you heard this wager offered and taken, and this vow made?’

  ‘Certainly,’ said the Duchess, delighted. ‘Everyone heard it.’

  ‘And you let it go forward?’ She bowed to her, softly smiling. ‘Thank you, your Grace; that is all.’ She sat down again.

  Sir Henry also had heard the wager made and allowed it to go forward, as indeed had they all. He continued a trifle hurriedly, ‘One week later, my lord, you proposed marriage?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘And were accepted?’

  Lord Weyburn permitted himself a small, cold smile, as contemptuous as any of Sapphire’s own. ‘As to that—I had been accepted before ever the proposal was made: before even the wager was made—it having been made by the lady’s accomplice, knowing full well it was she who would enter the room.’

  Lady Weyburn sat quietly on her high-backed chair, but her hands had tightened their grip on the ivory fan. ‘I had no accomplice: I knew nothing of the wager. How could I? Who could know in advance that you would utter such a declaration?’

  ‘But as soon as the wager was made, of course, you knew of it.’

  ‘I utterly deny it,’ said Sapphire, steadily.

  ‘Very well.’ Charles Weyburn turned sharply and looked at her for the first time, fully, since they had both entered that courtroom. He said: ‘Then may I ask you this, madame—why did you marry me?’

  She opened her blue eyes full upon him and as directly looked back at him. ‘You asked me this question once before, my lord—on the night of August the first, ten years ago.’

  ‘This time,’ he said, with a face grown suddenly cold and white as stone, ‘let us have the true answer.’

  She smiled half ruefully, she gave a little shrug. ‘Why, sir, I married you—because you asked me.’

  ‘May I remind you of the words in which I asked you?’

  ‘You need not,’ said Sapphire. ‘I remember them.’

  ‘Perhaps you will not object to repeat those words to the court?’

  ‘Oh, certainly,’ said Sapphire. ‘Since you do not, why should I regard them as any way private? You called me, as I recall, a—a salted apricot.’ She paused to allow the audience the inevitable titter, taunting him with the deliberate belittling of that moment of tenderness. ‘I said that I should return to Venice. You said … You said: “Let there not, at least, be any pretence between us two.” You said that I knew I could not return to Venice, for I knew I must remain at Starrbelow as your wife.’ She gave the little shrug again. ‘What you meant is clear enough now—that I had all along intended to become your wife: but since I was innocent of such intention—’

  He cut across her sentence. ‘I further remarked, did I not, that I must be one of the very few men who actually had known at the moment he first saw her that a woman was to be his wife?’

  ‘So you did, my lord.’

  ‘What other interpretation could there be to that—but that it was a reference to your entry into the ballroom when the wager had been made?’

  ‘Why, as to that—there have been men, my lord, who have looked upon a woman and, quite simply, loved her from the first: and I was yet to learn, poor silly child, that such naïvetés as these are not for the fashionable world.’

  ‘You thought I had been struck in an instant,’ he said, with a cruel mock bow, ‘by Cupid’s dart?’

  ‘A poisoned dart indeed it has turned out to be,’ said Sapphire, bitterly.

  ‘It came from a poisoned source, madame—as you very well knew. For it came from Prince Anton of Brunswick, your vile accomplice and, as I now believe, your faithless lover.…’

  ‘Who, however, is dead, sir,’ said Sapphire, ‘and at your hand: so that I think you may spare him your epithets.’ She cut short the exchange, turning her head gracefully towards Sir Henry. ‘If you please, sir …?’

  ‘Having engaged yourself to Lord Weyburn, madame, you went almost immediately to Italy?’

  ‘My father was ill.’

  ‘And were absent almost all the time between the day of betrothal and that fixed for the wedding: so that there was no opportunity for Lord Weyburn to endeavour to release himself from the consequences of the bet?’

  ‘Or for me to recognize,’ said Sapphire, ‘that the bet had been made; that all was not well.’ And she said almost piteously, shrunk back for a moment to that tormented young creature of ten long, bitterly experienced years ago, ‘But when he was cold and—and undemonstrative, I thought it but the manners of a world I did not know.’

  ‘At any rate, on May 27th, 1754, you married him: or went through an invalid ceremony of marriage—we will come to that later. And immediately after the ceremony, Lord Weyburn left you, after handing you a note with the words—’

  ‘You need not remind me of the words, Sir Henry: I remember them well enough,’ said Sapphire: and the melancholy fell away from her, she said with a flash of her own old irony that she appeared to be credited with but a poor memory for the major events of her life. ‘The note empowered me to collect the sum of a thousand guineas owing to Lord Weyburn from my “accomplice”.’

  ‘Precisely. May I ask you now, my lady—if you were so innocent—what did you think of that note?’

  She looked back at him sadly. ‘Ah, innocence!—why, yes, Sir Henry, I think we may say that innocence was ended then.’

  He stared at her, electrified. He said sharply, ‘Innocence was ended, madame?’

  ‘If by innocence we mean ignorance: ignorance of the cruelties of the world. For it was then that I enquired, it was then it was explained—the trick that had been played upon me: it was then, indeed, that I understood that a trick had been played upon Lord Weyburn also.’

  ‘And what did you then do?’

  ‘I wrote to his lordship in the care of his lawyers: I told him that both I and he had been tricked.’ She sat with bent head, the hands holding the white fan, quiet in her lap: she lived again the pain of those days when she had awaited, first eagerly confident, at last with diminishing hope dwindling to an agony of despair and disillusion, his return to her. She said quietly: ‘He did not reply.’

  Sir Francis nudged Squire Reddington in the ribs. ‘Here, Red, wake up! We’re coming to our part in the mischief.’

  Reddington sat up, rubbing blearily sleepy eyes. ‘What?’ What? Where’s the rest then? Where’s Pardo?’

  ‘Here at your side, you fool,’ said Sir Pardo, laughing.

  ‘Where’s the rest? Where’s Franks?’

  ‘Under the sod, poor brute: only you and I, Red, are left of the founder members of the Treasure Seekers’ Circle. Anton of Brunswick’s gone, and as for Honjohn—Honjohn’s a married man, turned respectable now and will not sit with old friends. But they were gay days, eh, Red? Ah, sure,’ he said, with his own old lilting brogue, ‘they were the gay days in that spring and summer of ’54.…’

  ‘In the June of 1754, madame, did you form friendships with certain—gentlemen?’

  Sapphire sat erect, smiling again, hands folded, the tip of her fan just touching the gleaming edge of the mahogany table. ‘Why, yes, Sir Henry: yourself, as I recollect, among them.’

  Sir Henry Kidd’s
bright eyes swivelled sideways, he jerked on uneasy toes, he briefly bowed. ‘It is true that I had the honour of your ladyship’s acquaintance: but I speak now of certain others, of Lord Franks of Baronshart, Sir Pardo Ryan, Squire Reddington of Rede Manor in the county of Gloucestershire—were not these gentlemen among your friends?’

  ‘Were then: and are now,’ said Sapphire. ‘Except for Lord Franks, who is dead.’

  ‘Was Lord Franks—such a man as Lord Franks—your friend?’

  ‘Lord Franks is dead, Sir Henry.’

  ‘Do you know under what circumstances?’

  ‘He took his life,’ said Sapphire.

  ‘In despair at the pass to which his debaucheries had brought him?’

  ‘And therefore, we may leave him to the mercy of God, sir, and need not tear his poor memory to pieces here.’

  ‘I seek only to establish that he was no fit friend for a lady of virtue.’

  ‘Oh, as to that,’ said Sapphire, shrugging, ‘you may find unfit friends enough among my connection, without desecrating the graveyards to look for them.’ And she laughed and glanced round behind her. ‘Come, Reddington, Sir Pardo, Greenewode, the rest of you—are you all too drunk to stand up and take a bow?’

  There was a flutter of fans and a flourish of snuff-boxes, a ripple of excitement ran through the court: the notorious Lady Weyburn, it seemed, was getting into her stride. Behind her, half a dozen gentlemen stood up, laughing, and bowed this way and that (a little astonished, secretly, for the most part—for, save Reddington and Pardo, the rest had not set eyes on her for years) and bowed to one another with mock congratulations and sat down again. And a motley crew, indeed, they were, and on the whole unlovely—the gay rakehellies of ten years ago, grown already, too rapidly ageing, into middle-aged roués, taking their dissolute pleasures now without joy, without the youth and the laughter that had lifted them once above mere brutishness. Sir Cecil Prout, he who had stolen her Grace of Witham’s petticoat—foolish, effeminate, spiteful; Lord Greenewode, hollow-faced, fever-eyed, living from day to day at the brink of the grave; Francis Erick, the blue eyes bleared and the bright hair lustreless—kept clown, toady, clinging to the hems of his dying patron’s winding-sheet.… And Reddington.

  ‘Mr. Reddington—you were neighbour to Lady Weyburn at Starrbelow?’

  Red Reddington tumbled unsteadily to his feet. ‘I was, sir.’

  ‘And are to this day?’

  ‘To this day? Why, ’tis true, sir, I have not moved house. My family have been some four hundred years at the manor, we’ve grown used to the place.’

  ‘You were a friend of Lady Weyburn?—I speak now of the early summer of ’54.’

  ‘I was then, and I am still.’

  ‘You were then and you still are.’ Sir Henry echoed it in the approved courtroom manner; his bright eye swivelled. ‘You have agreed, tacitly at least, Mr. Reddington, to Lady Weyburn’s description of you, among others, as no fit person for a virtuous woman to admit to her friendship?’

  Mr. Reddington gave an ironical, unsteady small bow. ‘Oh, certainly, sir.’ And he bowed again, with his hand on his heart, to Lady Weyburn. ‘And count it the more gracious that for many years now, this virtuous woman has admitted me to hers.’

  Sir Henry sneered. ‘You refer, sir, to Lady Weyburn?’

  ‘Why, of course: I see no other virtuous woman here,’ said Red Reddington, and sat down with a bump.

  Witnesses. Witnesses from the inn at Camden, buxom mothers who in those days had been giggling wenches, not entirely unknown to Squire Reddington and Sir Pardo: to give evidence of having seen her ladyship misconduct herself with the gentlemen, together and severally: of hearing of her locked by the hour together in a private room at the inn with one or other of them, of wine and laughter, of kissing and squeezing in dark corners, of coquetry on the lady’s part and boldness in the men.… Of a quarrel one evening, all parties being in drink, when Lord Franks, him that was now dead, had assaulted her ladyship and her ladyship had thrown a glass of claret in his face and thrown the glass after it and his friends had fought with him, and her ladyship intervened and afterwards there was kissing and fondling and making up.… Of terms of love, of sly glances behind the backs of other lovers, of disarranged dress.…

  Lady Weyburn waited till the last woman had done. Then she stood up. ‘I remember you—you are Laura from the inn: for whom the gentlemen, I think, had another name, which did not sound dissimilar. Now, Laura—I will ask you: what harm did I ever do you?’

  ‘You dun me no harm, my lady,’ said Laura, puzzled.

  ‘Save that when I came among them, the gentlemen sat with me in the garden of the inn, and there were, for a while, no tumblings in the haycocks: no ribbons from London, no pieces of gold? And this you have not yet forgiven?’ She paused.

  Laura cried out shrilly, ‘You throw back dirt for dirt, moi lady, and ’tis easy to do: but me, oi’m a decent woman and was a good wench.’

  ‘You are a decent woman? Married now, I dare say?’

  ‘These eight year,’ said Laura, proudly.

  ‘And have a quiverful of fine children, is it not so?’

  Laura lost colour a little. ‘I have children, my lady.’

  ‘The eldest is twelve years old, Laura, is he not? The second is ten? Who pays for their maintenance?’ She shrugged; she looked round, laughing, towards the ragged two rows of her erstwhile associates. ‘Well, well—we will not give old friends away. Now, Laura—I threw a glass in a gentleman’s face?’

  ‘That you did,’ said Laura eagerly, glad to be on safe ground again. ‘I see you with my own eyes.’

  ‘And why was this? What had the gentleman done?’

  ‘’Twas Lord Franks done it. He—he chucked your ladyship’s chin.’

  ‘And for that, I—wanton and promiscuous—dashed my glass of wine in his face? A claret glass you say it was? And I threw the wine, and dashed the glass in his face?…’

  ‘I saw it with moi own eyes,’ said Laura, stoutly, ‘and the blood drip down my lord’s face and his face so pale.…’

  ‘Very well,’ said Sapphire again; and she smiled at the girl, but quite kindly, and said: ‘Sit down, Laura: you have done your best.’ She turned: ‘Sir Henry Kidd—I find I must look for protection to an unlikely source. You knew me, I think you have acknowledged, in those old days: and at that time—the exact time of this incident—had also some acquaintance, at least, with Lord Franks?’

  ‘Reluctantly,’ admitted Sir Henry. ‘But, yes, I had.’

  ‘You observed, no doubt, the scars on his face, caused by these bleeding wounds which the claret glass had made?’

  He was silent a moment. ‘It is true there were no cuts, when I saw him, new or old: the girl no doubt mistook the red wine for blood.’

  ‘And cherry brandy for claret?’ suggested Sapphire, sweetly: and she smiled at him, her own, old, wicked smile, not the smile of tolerant half pity she had given the girl. ‘The court no doubt will believe you, Sir Henry, when you tell them that you never at that time saw me with any but a tiny cherry brandy glass in my hand.…’

  Witnesses. Witnesses to the wildness, the recklessness, the wantonness that for a brief season has divided the town between shocked horror and shocked amusement: witnesses to disreputable friendships, to noise and laughter, to depleted wine-cellars in the house in Berkeley Square, to gambling parties lasting till the dawn.… Servants swearing they had seen her ladyship misconduct herself in this situation and that; servants swearing her ladyship misconducted herself not at all, save in over-much laughter, over-much gaiety, over-much freedom and fun.… Witnesses to her having entertained gentlemen only at Berkeley Square, witnesses to her having entertained, on the contrary, actresses of vile reputation, all the rag-tag and bobtail of Town.… Witnesses to having approached Lady Weyburn with amorous advances and having had knuckles rapped for it, to having made this proposition or that, and been laughingly, flirtingly, teasingly, but unequivocally, repelled. No wit
nesses (naturally enough) to having been honoured with her ladyship’s favours: whatever the gossips and the servants might say.

  ‘Your ladyship in those days possessed a pair of ruby buckles?’

  ‘I possess them still.’

  ‘Was it not a boast of Lord Franks that no woman’s virtue was proof against a pair of jewelled buckles?’

  More than one woman in court moved her feet, unconsciously hiding them away beneath the hem of her dress; Laura’s own (garnet) buckles had long since gone to pay for comforts for a sick child. ‘I believe it was a saying of Lord Franks’.’

  ‘Did not Lord Franks send you such a pair of buckles?’

  ‘He did: with an apology—they were reparation for an insult.’ She paused to let Sir Henry enjoy a moment of triumph. ‘I accepted the apology—but returned the gift.’

  ‘Having, however, asked him for such a gift.’

  ‘I had said to him, idly, that I craved a pair of buckles—they were the rage at the time and I had none: I later bought some for myself.’ But she was puzzled. ‘Lord Franks is long dead: who, then, has told you this?’

  One who had listened, sick at heart, perched up on the driving-box of a coach on that crazy, far-away night, to the boastings of a wounded man. ‘Why this fuss about a kiss in public?—she’s ready enough with them in private, as we all doubtless know.…’ And, ‘If her stick of a husband isn’t here to give her gew-gaws, let others do it in his place.’

  ‘Upon the occasion of your masquerade as highwaymen, Lady Weyburn—who drove the rear coach?’

  ‘The coach? Why, what has that to do with the buckles? ’Twas only dear Honjohn—he drove the gentlemen home.’

  ‘You refer, I believe, to the Honourable John Fair?’

  ‘The Honourable John Fair, yes: most aptly named so. But it is a shame,’ said Sapphire, smiling, ‘to tell tales of his youth against him here.’ And she looked round the packed, bright room, leisurely, until she found him, his prim little wife sitting anxiously beside him. ‘He was very young,’ she said. ‘Let the rest look after themselves, who were so rash as to associate with Sapphire Weyburn in those days; but he was young and green and though he nowadays thinks it best, I believe, to deny my acquaintance, I beg leave to defend the memory of that young man I long ago knew: and say, in the words of Sir Andrew Marvell, that he “nothing common did or mean”—in all those memorable scenes. I loved him for it then: and now, if I may, I thank him. Do not drag him into this.’ She sketched him a little, undulating curtsey, half mocking as was everything she did. The prim wife turned away her head; but he stood up and bowed with a blush of shame; and had no evidence to offer, after all. He had loved her, with a boy’s love, long ago.