The Potter's Niece

by Randall, Rona

  ‘Out, Mamma.’

  ‘That much is obvious. What a thing to do, and on such an occasion! Your disappearance was noticed, to my embarrassment. I had to go in search of you repeatedly, returning each time with excuses which sounded quite unconvincing.’

  Peeling off her damp clothes, Olivia said lightly, ‘I’m sorry, Mamma — but who noticed?’

  ‘Everyone!’

  ‘Surely not. It seemed to me that everyone was too intent on their own pleasure to bother about others’.’

  ‘There you are wrong. Agatha marked your absence, and not surprisingly. She has gone to a deal of expense and is entitled to good manners from her guests. Being a member of the family doesn’t mean you can behave badly on social occasions. Naturally, she wanted to know why you’d disappeared, and to where.’

  ‘As to why, she should ask her son.’ Olivia indicated the ruined ball gown, lying where she had tossed it.

  Phoebe gasped.

  ‘Dear God, what’s happened? That gown cost me a fortune!’

  ‘Then look to Lionel for recompense. He was responsible, not I.’

  ‘I don’t believe it. Lionel would never romp through a dance like a hooligan.’

  ‘He didn’t do it in the dance. He did it when trying to rape me. You look outraged. So was I.’

  ‘I’m outraged because I don’t believe a word of it!’

  ‘I thought you wouldn’t. In your eyes, Lionel can do no wrong. But in case you fear the worst happened, I can assure you it didn’t. One advantage of being hoydenish is the ability to fight off such men as my cousin. I hope my fingernails and teeth left visible marks.’

  Phoebe stormed, ‘You must have invited it! No man attempts familiarities with a woman unless encouraged — ‘

  She broke off. She, if anyone, knew that to be untrue, but why recall her husband’s brutish ways now? She rallied and continued emphatically, ‘Lionel is too much of a gentleman to force unwanted attentions on a girl.’

  ‘You really believe that, don’t you?’ Shrugging, Olivia pulled on a robe, gathered up her riding clothes, and laid them aside for cleaning. ‘Believe what you wish, Mother. I am going to bed.’

  ‘You are doing nothing of the sort! You are returning to the ballroom, and there you will apologise to your aunt and behave as a daughter of the house should. Everyone will be watching, including Grandmother Charlotte. It’s especially important that you remain in her good graces, now she’s so old.’ Opening a closet door, Phoebe chose a gown and flung it on the bed. ‘Dress quickly, and I’ll send Hannah along to do as best she can with your looks.’

  ‘Poor Hannah, is she still up?’

  ‘Of course. And will be until I retire.’

  Olivia turned away. ‘I’ll deal with my looks myself, but I’d prefer not to face that crowd downstairs.’

  ‘That I can well believe. Did anyone see you fleeing the ballroom with your gown in ruins?’

  ‘It didn’t happen in the ballroom. I doubt if even Lionel would go so far as that! As for my appearance, his must certainly have betrayed him, unless he removed signs of your costly enamels — and that would be difficult.’ Olivia smiled a little at the recollection of her cousin’s fine brocade streaked with wash-ball, carmine and black kohl. ‘He looked a spectacle, and serve him right. Lechers deserve all they get.’

  ‘I’ll listen to no more! You are forever maligning him. You have lied about him since childhood and you are lying now.’ Phoebe whirled away, then halted. ‘Where did this mythical attack take place?’

  ‘There was nothing mythical about it, and it took place in one of those curtained nooks designed for dancers to rest in, down a passage from the ballroom. Lionel chose the most distant of all.’

  ‘And you, being intent on compromising him, went willingly.’

  ‘And he, being intent on compromising me, dragged me there. Unfortunately, he is stronger than I, but at least I bettered him in the end.’

  ‘You’re making all this up. Really, Olivia, you can be very irritating at times. Now hurry up and dress, and do try to make yourself presentable. Use some of my preparations again and get Hannah to bind up your hair. Meanwhile I’ll go back to Agatha and pretend that nothing is wrong.’

  No woman could have a more exasperating daughter, Phoebe thought angrily as she retraced her steps. That trumped-up story about Lionel was too ridiculous to be true. Not only in looks did he resemble his father, but in character too. Joseph had never committed an ungentlemanly act in his life, of that she was certain. As head of the Drayton family after the death of their father, he had set a fine example in all things, leading a moral life and working diligently. If he had ever had an inclination to philander he had had no time to indulge it, but in any case it had come naturally to him to lead a righteous and sober life. Philandering and loose living had been Max’s prerogative, and had Joseph known the type of man he really was, he would never have chosen him as a husband for herself.

  She thrust aside the unwelcome recollection of Max, with his lusts and his insobriety. Mercifully, he had gone out of her life, leaving her to an enjoyable state of widowhood. Dear Joseph had predicted that marriage into the Freeman family would mean a life of luxury for her and, as always, dear Joseph had been right. Virtuously, she was glad she had revealed nothing to him about that dreadful marriage night, though she had been unable to conceal, later, some of her husband’s sins.

  Joseph had been greatly shocked. ‘My dear sister, you surely don’t mean that he enjoys unnatural practices?’

  But all sexual activity had seemed unnatural to her, so of course she had nodded, eyes downcast in embarrassment and shame — and, as she had expected, Joseph’s heart was moved in pity and anger. He had taken Max to task at once, demanding better treatment for his sister, whereupon Max had embarked on his mad-brained trip around the world to avoid making the goodly settlement on her which Joseph demanded by way of compensation for her sufferings. In the end, that had not mattered. As her brother predicted, she was looked after by the Freemans. She was a member of the family, wife of the heir, and therefore secure in every way.

  And fully did she deserve every penny of it, she thought as she tripped lightly back to the ball. The short months of her marriage had earned her the right to all this — the Tremain grandeur, the Tremain wealth — and through her daughter she could confidently expect even more of it for the rest of her life.

  Reaching the ballroom, she was thankful to see Agatha being led onto the floor. She had no desire to listen further to her sister-in-law’s reproaches, as if she, Olivia’s mother, were to blame for the girl’s lack of good manners. By the time the dance was over Olivia should be back, so let Agatha reprove her if she wished. She herself had done her duty and could relax again.

  But a partner claimed her and led her to the group which included Agatha. The dance was a quadrille which, after the first five figures, brought them face to face in a cross-measure, Agatha bouncing in an ungainly fashion while she, Phoebe, tripped the measure delicately, head high and smiling. At this point they exchanged partners, which was greatly to Phoebe’s liking, for she had noticed the man from afar — a distant Freeman relative whom she had last seen years ago at Agatha’s wedding, a handsome man who had lost nothing of his good looks. Only a touch of silver at the temples marked the passing years, plus the lines which so unfairly added interest to a man’s face but only age to a woman’s. He also had a prosperous air.

  ‘Mistress Freeman.’ He bowed over her hand and they moved into the next figure, his dark eyes smiling down at her, his mouth curving. ‘You don’t recall me, I fear.’

  ‘Indeed I do, sir. You were at the marriage of my brother — ‘

  ‘ — to my cousin Agatha. My name is Acland, and I remember you well. May I say that you’re as lovely as ever, quite untouched by the years?’

  ‘You flatter me, Mr Acland.’ She fluttered her eyelashes. ‘I am a staid widow.’

  ‘What a waste!’ he murmured, admiration in his eyes. She blus
hed becomingly, a habit she had retained from the days when her innocence had enchanted everyone, including Maxwell Freeman. He had been her Prince Charming, but had not remained so.

  She thrust the memory aside. Why recall her husband at a time like this? It could only be due to Olivia’s shocking reference to rape, of which her brother’s son could never be guilty, but which Max (in her opinion) had inflicted without compunction. Had the girl inherited some of her father’s sinful lusts? Had her outrageous story been due to some dreadful desire for carnal experience, such as Jessica had indulged in with Simon Kendall, bringing disgrace on the name of Drayton? Could her daughter be as wanton as her own twin had been?

  The pressure of Acland’s fingers brought Phoebe back to the moment, and confusion engulfed her. Not for years had she lacked such composure. Throughout the next figure of the quadrille, which each of the four pairs performed as a separate dance, she was aware of the man in a surprising fashion. He made her conscious of her womanhood. She wanted him to touch her, not merely to admire her, which was all she had ever wanted before.

  The reaction was unfamiliar and therefore alarming. She had never responded to a man in such a way; never had such thoughts. That was why her marriage night had been so dreadful and why she had been shocked when, even in the carriage conveying bride and groom to the wedding breakfast, Max had attempted liberties she had never expected. That was when her beautiful fan had been broken, wielded against a hand groping up her skirts. She had learned to endure his approaches later, but distastefully, begrudgingly, making it plain that she felt defiled.

  Her daughter had been conceived in such a way, but mercifully life had spared her more. Max had let her know how he felt before taking himself off, even accusing her of being frigid, which she considered an unjust accusation considering she had yielded her body to him despite her distaste. That was something he should have been grateful for, and so she told him, adding that if he never came back she wouldn’t be sorry.

  Naturally, she never told anyone about that scene. She claimed that he had deserted her without warning, leaving a callous note which, very naturally, she had destroyed. And, very naturally, Charlotte and Ralph Freeman had been distressed for her and done their best to atone ever since. As well they should, she considered — particularly Charlotte, cocooned in riches.

  Acland released her with reluctance when the cross-measure came again, holding onto her fingers until the very last minute and following her with his eyes, his expression eloquent. She looked back at him, bewildered but excited, then he was revolving with his new partner and she with one she scarcely saw. She couldn’t think what had happened to her, but she wanted it to happen again. She felt as if she were glimpsing something for which she had waited a long time — a baffling thought considering that widowhood suited her so well. Until this moment nothing had disturbed her contented and trouble-free state, except a problem daughter who seemed impossible to marry off. In all other ways she lacked for nothing, wanting only to achieve behind-the-scenes power at Tremain, so this unaccustomed emotion, this physical awareness, took her by surprise. It was almost as if life were urging her to seize an experience before it was too late.

  ‘Thank God you’ve washed that muck off your face.’ Ralph Freeman said bluntly to his grand-daughter. He had never been a man to mince his words and, with old age, had become more forthright than ever. ‘You look a damn sight prettier without it.’

  ‘I’ve never been pretty, Grandfather, and never will be.’

  ‘Or so says your mother. Phoebe was always a silly piece, unlike her twin whom she considered plain because she lacked her own simpering looks, but Jessica was a handsome young woman with a deal of courage. Come to think of it, Livvy, you’re not unlike her.’

  ‘You mean Aunt Jessica? I’d like to know her better, but of course — ‘

  ‘Of course it’s difficult when your mother persists in nursing a lifelong grievance, though what she has to fret about God only knows. Jealousy, that’s the root of it. Always was.’

  ‘I can’t let you say that.’

  ‘Because it would be disloyal to your mother? But a man may criticise his family, so you can’t stop me. It’s also the privilege of age to speak its mind.’

  ‘I imagine you always did.’ Olivia laughed. She loved the old man and enjoyed his bluntness, but she always felt disloyal to her mother when listening to any disparagement of her.

  Ralph Freeman stroked his grand-daughter’s hair. ‘I like it loose like this, my dear, and to hell with fashion — an attitude you obviously share. And I’m glad you’ve washed that hideous frizz out of it.’ He let a long strand slide through wrinkled fingers. ‘It’s still damp, but the heat in here will dry it well enough.’ He chuckled. ‘I’ll warrant it’s the first time in Tremain history that a young woman has fled from the ballroom to wash her face and hair.’

  Olivia caught his hand and held it. She wanted to tell him that the state of her hair was due to riding furiously in the rain, and why, but the feel of fragile bones beneath parched skin halted her. To distress an old man with the story of his grandson’s bad behaviour would be unkind, so she merely pressed the frail hand affectionately.

  He, in turn, was aware of her young one, smooth-skinned and strong. The touch awakened chords in his memory, echoes of his own youth and his whirlwind pursuit of dear Charlotte, whose hands had once been as young and unwrinkled as this one. She had remained his dear Charlotte ever since, though the fire of physical passion had long died. Theirs was now a warm, companionable relationship, built on understanding and the mutual dependence of a long marriage, but only one of their children had had the good fortune to make such a match. Amelia and Martin would achieve what he and Charlotte had achieved; of the other two, Agatha was a widow and Maxwell dead, though Charlotte persisted in believing otherwise. She had idolised their son and to a doting mother an idolised child could never be lost.

  He sighed and released his grand-daughter’s hand. He was now seventy-six and well aware that the process of aging had been speeded by self-indulgence — not the wild indulgences of youth, but indulgences of which Phoebe disapproved in a man of his years. He loved the good things of life; good wine, good food, good company — ‘But God save me from a good woman,’ he had once confided to Charlotte when Phoebe was out of earshot, ‘and God pity any man married to one,’ and when his wife had protested that surely she could be classed as a good woman he had laughed and declared that beneath her autocratic air she, thank God, was not of the stuff that Phoebe was made.

  ‘Had you been, you could never have defied your family to marry a man like me and I could never have thumbed my nose at the lot of ‘em for a girl who wanted to be set on a pedestal, untouched, unsullied — which, I suspect, is how our daughter-in-law expected her husband to treat her.’

  Though Max had been a big disappointment in many ways, lacking in ambition because the Tremain wealth had cushioned him against life’s harsh realities, unwise in his choice of friends, wildly extravagant and an incurable gambler, Ralph Freeman suspected that Phoebe’s saintliness was to blame for his worsening behaviour after marriage and for his final departure. How could any man live up to a wife who wore her virtue like a halo, framing a long-suffering face which hinted at innocence defiled? Before marriage she had been a pretty, dimpled little thing whose simpering ways advertised her purity. She had enchanted Max, whom she had obviously regarded as a paragon. His behaviour at the wedding had no doubt been the first thing to nudge him from that pinnacle. Along with that of his inebriated friends, it had admittedly been shameful.

  Or had the intimacies of marriage finally toppled him in her esteem? Her petulant mouth, her coldness of eye, and her hitherto unsuspected avarice had developed rapidly after she had become Mrs Maxwell Freeman, and though she had forever clung to her innocent airs and guileless ways, the wisdom of age convinced her father-in-law that greed had grown from a desire for vengeance.

  In short, he disliked her very much. The only good th
ing she had ever done, in his eyes, was to produce a daughter who seemed to have inherited none of her parents’ shortcomings. His own marriage had had its ups and downs, but had been successful because despite the difference between Charlotte’s aristocratic upbringing and his own, she had accepted his simpler, more down-to-earth approach to life. She had never tried to change him, never wished him any different. Theirs had been a love match, and it was his proud boast that fifty years of marriage to a handsome woman was responsible for his continuing appreciation of the opposite sex. Whenever he said that, Charlotte would smile indulgently. She would also laugh when Phoebe made so bold as to reprove him, reminding him of his years and declaring that it ill became a man of his age to make such an admission, to which he would retort, ‘I’ll be a long time dead, daughter-in-law, so I may as well enjoy the things which add zest to life, while I’m still here.’

  ‘Things like gout, for instance?’

  ‘Occasional bouts are a cheap price to pay for pleasure — ‘

  ‘Pleasure is to blame for them, which I doubt.’

  The malady wasn’t troubling him tonight, thank God. He had led Charlotte onto the floor for the opening dance and for several since, tripping a measure with her as lightly as in his youth, and she as gracefully. He had then dutifully partnered dowagers and duchesses and lesser baronesses, for amongst the Tremain relatives and friends were many titles, and he had even coped with lumbersome Agatha who, poor thing, had grown stouter than ever with the years. He had also tolerated Phoebe’s winsome prancing, smiling benignly as she prinked and pirouetted, for all the world as if she were a young bride at her first Tremain ball. Now he placed a hand beneath Olivia’s elbow and said, ‘I haven’t had the privilege of dancing with my grand-daughter — Lionel has seen to that.’

  Her quick colour didn’t escape him. Whether it was a flush of dislike at the thought of that young man, or of awareness that he was intent on seduction (which was as plain as a pikestaff to an old man as shrewd as himself) Ralph couldn’t tell, but he hoped it was the former. Lionel was by no means his favourite grandchild, despite impeccable manners whenever his grandparents were around.