Hugh Kenrick

by Edward Cline

  The thing he had felt when pressed for an answer by his father, he might have called a touch by the finger of God, had he known what that phenomenon felt like. And though the knowledge and the concomitant emotion seemed to light up his mind and all the atoms of his being, he suspected that his experience had little to do with God.

  The corridor walls were lined with the portraits of his ancestors through the centuries, men and women, as children and adults, some in equestrian settings, some with their pets, some in their gorgeous ermines. There was even a crude likeness of the first Baron of Danvers. He was on horseback, in full armor, brandishing a mace and shield, and in the background was a town in flames, a town which he and his thanes had erased for denying homage to William the Conqueror. Family legend held that when he was offered the baronetcy by an emissary of the Conqueror, on the condition that he deliver all the towns and villages in his own and the neighboring Saxon parishes, he had replied: “The town that does not swear fealty to my liege lord does not exist.” This became true. He made it so. Vires facit veritas. Force makes truth.

  That ancestor’s name was Hugh Kenrick.

  His far descendent realized that he had stopped to study the picture. The sight of it had triggered the memory of an afternoon years ago when he told a tutor that he would bring honor to his family for the first time. He was discovering now, as a deliberated action, the meaning of honor.

  * * *

  The rod that was to be used in the punishment was taken from a branch of a birch tree on the grounds. On the vicar’s advice, the Earl had the rod thawed, shaved, and soaked in water and vinegar. The advice was given by the vicar during a confidential interview granted by the Earl in the afternoon. “This treatment will make the instrument supple and increase the sting,” he had said. “Some blood may be drawn—if this is what is required to restore your standing with His Grace—as you say it is.”

  “As Sir Everard says it is,” answered the Earl. He studied the vicar. “Have you written a treatise on corporeal punishment, my good man?” he asked. “Surely, this is not the spiritual advice you led me to believe you had wanted to offer me on the matter.”

  “No, your lordship,” replied the vicar with uncertain amusement, “though I imagine that some thoughtful man has. There are books now on so many unlikely subjects. My father, who was a humble smithy, had he been literate enough, could have written you one. He was a master of wood. I was a frequent subject of his many rods, when I was your nephew’s age, and older.” The vicar paused to smile. “The rod in its many manifestations has helped make me a good Christian.”

  The Earl smiled wryly. The vicar did not recognize the twist in the mouth as a smile. “No doubt you can recommend a technique of wielding the rod,” remarked the Earl with veiled sarcasm.

  The vicar was not certain that he was being mocked. “No, your lordship, I cannot.” He blinked once, then asked, “May I witness the punishment, your lordship? The event may inspire a sermon.”

  “You may witness it, but not preach about it, except in the most general terms.”

  “Thank you, your lordship. I take my leave.”

  * * *

  A servant opened the doors to the Earl’s study. Hugh went in, and the doors closed behind him. His uncle sat at his desk. His father, Sir Everard, and the vicar rose from their seats. All were dressed for dinner, which would begin at eight. Owen, the valet, stood by the doors, holding the rod.

  Hugh approached his uncle’s desk and stopped.

  The Earl’s eyes drilled into him. “Has the matter been clearly explained to you, sir?”

  “Yes,” answered Hugh.

  “And you are cognizant of your choices?”

  “Yes.”

  The Earl leaned forward a little. “I grant you one last opportunity to make amends with an apology.”

  Hugh shook his head. “I waive the opportunity, thank you.”

  “So be it. The remaining conditions of your punishment will come into effect once you leave this room.”

  “I understand that.”

  The Earl rose to glare down at his nephew. He drew in a breath. “What will be done now will atone for the humiliation and abject disgrace you have brought to this house.” He pointed a finger at the edge of the desk directly in front of Hugh. “You will prepare yourself, sir.” When the boy was ready, the Earl nodded to his brother.

  The Baron held out a hand. Owen stepped forward and placed the rod in it.

  Hugh heard his father’s steps on the rug. And then the whoosh of the rod through the air.

  At first, he felt the pain, which, by the third stroke, seemed like a razor ploughing into his skin. After a while, he felt nothing but a dull, anonymous force that came at the end of each swish. His nerves had become as insensate as the polished wood gripped by his hands. He refused to cry out, and bit his lip. A pair of tears escaped from his eyes, as when a blast of winter wind would hit his face.

  At each stroke, the men in the room winced. All but the vicar. Hugh could not see their faces, but he knew somehow that his father’s was shiny with sweat. Then someone in the room gasped at the same time he felt a peculiar, warm sting, and he knew that blood had been drawn.

  Some time after that, Sir Everard’s voice said, “Thirty-one, Sir Garnet.”

  “I can count, Sir Everard!” replied the Baron sharply.

  “I beg your forgiveness,” muttered the secretary.

  The rod stopped whistling through the air. It was finished. Hugh turned and saw his father looking at the rod, which now had smears of blood on the end of it. His father did not look at him when he said, “When you have made yourself presentable, Hugh, you may leave.” He turned to address the valet. “Mr. Runcorn, you will see that my son returns to his quarters.”

  “Yes, milord.”

  Owen held one of the doors open for Hugh, and they went out together.

  The Baron first approached Sir Everard, but then changed his mind and walked over to his brother. He held out the birch rod. “Here is the proof of repentance required for His Grace. Please, present it to his…factotum.”

  The Earl’s eyes narrowed, but he shrugged off the insult to himself and the secretary. He drew himself up, took the rod, and smartly presented it to Sir Everard. “Your evidence, Sir Everard—and my apologies.”

  “All duly noted, I’m sure,” said the secretary. He examined the rod, bowed his head, and left the room without further word.

  Garnet Kenrick turned to the vicar. “Unless you are apprenticing for a position in hell as Satan’s lackey, vicar, the spectacle is finished, and there is no more for you to see.”

  The vicar blushed, sputtered an incomplete word or two, and glanced at the Earl, who stood looking at him with an expression as stony as the one with which he regarded his nephew. The cleric said to the Baron, “I forgive you the jest, milord, under these most stressful circumstances.” Then he quickly left the room.

  The Baron next turned to his brother. “Are you satisfied, Basil?”

  The Earl started at the use of his Christian name. He could not remember the last time it had been used. “Dear brother, well, you see what the situation is, and I—”

  “We will discuss this no more, Basil,” said the Baron. “Ever.” And he left the room.

  * * *

  The pain suddenly seized his legs like a douse of scalding water. Hugh buckled, and violently clutched at a table they were passing, almost knocking over a candle. He leaned on the table with both hands, able to stand, but unable to move his legs. His eyelids fluttered, and the hall seemed to spin.

  “Allow me, milord,” said Owen. The valet bent and picked up the boy, heaved him over one shoulder, and walked calmly to the western wing. In Hugh’s room, he lay the unconscious boy gently face down on the bed and removed his coat, breeches, and shoes.

  The Baroness came into the room and rushed over to her son. Owen let her inspect the swelling red stripes and the blood on her son’s body. The woman let go an awful cry of pain that had not c
ome from the boy. Then the valet inclined his head, reached into a pocket of his coat, and held out a small round tin box. “If you will permit me, milady,” he said.

  “What is it, Owen?” she asked, not taking the box.

  “It is balm, milady. Apply it liberally to all the affected parts. Expose the wounds as little as possible to the air, which will aggravate the wounds and prolong the pain.”

  The Baroness frowned, but took the tin.

  “The balm was prepared by Mrs. Jervis in the kitchen, milady, at my request. It is composed of herbs in an aspic of buttered cream. It is most effective. Master Kenrick should be able to move about in a day or two. With discretion, of course.”

  “Thank you, Owen.”

  The valet paused, swallowed, and went on. “It may be impertinent to say so, milady, but while the staff of this house, and that of his lordship the Earl, will obey his lordship’s instructions regarding the treatment of Master Hugh henceforth, I feel it…important to convey to you and to the Baron—through you, at your pleasure, of course—that our actions will not reflect our true hearts.”

  “Oh…?”

  “For myself, milady, I feel obliged to say that if circumstances occur which require me to choose between my dismissal and regarding Master Kenrick as a leper, I should choose dismissal.”

  The Baroness nodded her head once in acknowledgment. “Thank you, Mr. Runcorn. Take care to see that such a choice is not necessary. The Baron and I value your service.”

  “Thank you, milady. Will that be all?”

  “Yes. Please send for Bridget.”

  Bridget came in a moment later, and found the Baroness gingerly applying the balm to her son. “I will be detained by the dinner this evening, Bridget,” she said to the governess. “You will come back here at ten and apply Owen’s salve anew.”

  “Yes, milady. How is he?”

  “He will heal. Go about your duties now, Bridget.”

  The Baroness remained for a moment, stroking Hugh’s damp hair. After a while she rose and went to her son’s desk. She saw an open notebook and idly read one page, then another. She read the first sentence: “I would die, inside, and nourish a wrong.” And she read the last sentence: “I have brought honor to my family, and to myself, for the first time.” She put a hand to her mouth to stifle a cry. For the first time, she understood her son. She guiltily took the notebook and left the room.

  * * *

  The dinner was a brilliant, gay affair, as the Earl had hoped it would be. The Duke, his companions, and the guests behaved as though nothing untoward had happened. Bons mots lit up the glittering company’s conversation, competing with the candles that flickered magically on the silver and china service that was laid on the fine cambric. The Baroness had made a gift to all the women guests of blue silk fans on which had been painted sweet Williams, and these fluttered in time with the bons mots. She had even had delicate vases of carnations and blue auriculas from the greenhouse placed on the table and sideboards. The conversation shifted from the Duke’s adventures on the tour, to the popular discontent with the adjustment of the calendar in the coming September, in which eleven days were to be skipped in order to bring England into conformity with the Gregorian calendar, to a miscellany of other, triter subjects, all governed by the Duke’s careering interests.

  The Earl was in his glory, while the Baron and Baroness were subdued. The empty chair between the couple was to have been occupied by Hugh. Everyone noticed the vacancy, but coldly averted their eyes. Rear Admiral Harle alone sympathized with the couple’s reticence. Fortunately, the Baroness had seated him next to her husband, and the admiral was able to communicate his thoughts under all the chatter. “His Grace is becoming rather boorish, I must admit,” he remarked in a low voice. “I have been on the road with him for a week now, and his company has grown tiresome.”

  “I can see how that might be true,” ventured the Baron with caution. “However, that does not excuse my son’s actions.”

  The admiral smiled. He had not known his motive was so transparent. “Perhaps not,” he replied without conviction. “Although I myself have lately mistaken His Grace alternately for a Drury Lane clown and a Smithfield cattle-drover.”

  The Baron merely smiled, also without conviction. “How do you plan to spend your day tomorrow, Sir Francis?” he asked in a tactful change of subject.

  The admiral took a sip of claret. “We shall tour the Poole Harbor. I will propose to His Grace that we hire a boat that will take us out to the Channel, so that we might appraise the vicinity from an invading enemy’s vantage point. I had intended to ask you or the Earl for assistance in the matter.”

  “I know of several men in Poole who would lend you their smacks.” The Baron gladly put down his knife and fork, and finished his glass of Madeira. He had no appetite, and had been eating for appearance’ sake. “Poole Harbor is sandy. We have a schooner, but it puts in at Weymouth more often than it does Poole, on account of the shifting bottom, which often is made impassable by the tides.”

  “So the Admiralty maps tell me.”

  “As for fortifications, I’ve always thought that either the Purbeck or Poole neck would be ideal for them. Or Brownsea Isle itself.”

  “My thoughts precisely,” said the admiral. “Will you accompany us?”

  “It would be my pleasure, Sir Francis,” said the Baron. “Unfortunately, I must accompany Fawkner on an inspection of our herds.”

  “Ah, that business! Then, his lordship, your brother?”

  The Baron shook his head. “My brother does not like the sea. It rollicks his stomach, and he will not risk the indignity of the consequences.”

  Later, after a dessert of blancmange and Pomfret cake, the company at the long table grew restive. The servants hastened to keep the epergnes refreshed with sweetmeats and the silver wine fountains flowing from the stock in the cellar. Cumberland consulted his pocket watch, then rose abruptly and proclaimed: “Leave us, dear ladies, so that we mere men may knock back a sinful ginful, and discourse on the disreputable without risk of offending your dainty lobes!” He nodded and bestowed a smile on Vicar Wynne. “You, too, sir, if you fear the profane.”

  Miss Harris giggled.

  The vicar blanched. “I have, in my time, Your Grace, heard seamen swear, and harlots catalogue their arts. Profane talk is no stranger to my callused ears.”

  The Duke laughed. “Ah! A man of the world and the cloth, whose collar and station require him to warn us against cussing and knocking-shops! Behold, company, a veritable St. Augustine here! No doubt it was this God’s gillie—forgive the Scottish term!—who prescribed the chastening of the Childe Aristides!”

  The allusion to Hugh Kenrick’s whipping was unmistakable. Everyone understood it, even the servants standing at the ready beneath the paintings, who, having little in the way of a classical education, knew nothing about Aristides the Just, the ancient Greek general and jurist who was banished from Athens for shaming its law courts. The Baron, the Baroness and the Earl did not know what to make of the remark; it could have been an inadvertent compliment, an offhand insult, or the tactless consequence of too many draws from the wine fountain. Sir Everard Fawkner sat immobile, staring at a painting on the wall.

  “Forgive me, Your Grace,” answered the vicar nervously, “but you have been ill-informed. I did not prescribe the punishment. I had the mere honor and duty of refining it.”

  “Much the same thing,” quipped the Duke with a mischievous chuckle. “Your hand could be seen on the reddened rod of Mars—metaphorically speaking.”

  Garnet Kenrick looked up with new interest, first at the flustered vicar, then at the insouciant mien of Fawkner, and finally at the supercilious composure of his brother, the Earl. The Earl caught his eye, but glanced away. The Baron stared at him now with a venom in his glance that he disguised only with great effort.

  At this point, because she did not wish to prolong the vicar’s baiting—though she thought he deserved it—and because she
suspected her husband’s thoughts, because they were very likely her own—the Baroness chose to rise. All the other women rose on the signal. “By your leave, Your Grace,” she said with a bow of her head.

  “Retire, fair lady,” replied the Duke with a wave of his glass. “And, I must say this: If I cannot esteem the good Baron there for his contumacious progeny, then I must envy him for his taste in alluring conjugality!”

  The table laughed dutifully. Garnet Kenrick blushed, but inclined his head in acknowledgment of the crude compliment. The men at the table rose in courtesy, and the Baroness led the procession of gowns from the great hall. Maud Harris turned once and winked provocatively at the Duke.

  When the women were gone, some of the men drew out their pipes and snuffboxes. The servants busied themselves with decanting harder liquor than what was acceptable at dinner. Cumberland fell back into his chair. “Well, Lord Basil, have you any good racers hereabouts?”