The Eden passion

by Harris, Marilyn, 1931-

  Beyond the arch, he saw the beloved face of his young clerk, Bobby. What a joy therel He softened his tone. "Guests, Bobby. See to them."

  The young man nodded, his eyes reflecting and sending back Humphrey's love.

  Pleased by this brief interlude, Humphrey leaned closer to the window for a better look, taking pride in his ability to place any carriage, any gentleman in his proper class.

  Now, as the cumbersome conveyance rolled closer, he decided, regretfully, not titled. No coat of arms. Hired, most likely, out of London. And the driver appeared to be nothing more than a crude country boy.

  Humphrey leaned closer, one hand massaging his bald head, his eyes a little blurry from too much brandy.

  Another tradesman-turned-gentry, no doubt, a plain bastard who by some stroke of fate or fortune had acquired a pretty mountain of coin and now expected the world to fawn at his feet.

  Well, he didn't like it and again he took up his customary position at his customary table, where he sat each night, drinking too much brandy and dwelling on the misery of his entire life.

  Sadly he lifted his eyes to the handsome black iron gates across the road, the entrance to the grand estate known as Hadley Park. There, as he knew all too well, was the beginning of his grief-ridden life.

  Quickly he averted his eyes long enough to pour another snifter of brandy. He sipped and realized with new regret that the grand world across the road had changed as well; Lord Powels dead, Lady Powels dead, Lady Harriet, who apparently had survived her crucible, as good as dead, at least to him. She'd disappeared shortly after her ordeal. Where, Humphrey had no idea, though he'd tried hard enough to find out And with everyone dead or absent, the old uncle had moved in, a total recluse.

  But it wasn't the uncle who occupied Humphrey's thoughts. As always, it was her, the missing Lady Harriet, and now he lifted his glass and wished her a plague of disasters, as acute as those which she had caused him to suffer.

  With his eyes half-closed, Humphrey rested his head on the table, his mind still occupied with the graceless world in which he was forced to serve his penance as an innkeeper.

  An innkeeperl He moaned audibly. Once he'd had such dreams. With his eyes closed and his brain beginning to melt under the effects of the brandy, he saw her again, Lady Harriet, that beautiful little girl from his childhood, riding her spirited pony to the very edge of the road and looking down upon him where he was cutting weeds.

  He'd never seen such a vision. And how happy he'd been when she had come to the road the next day, and the next and the one after that, her loneliness as great as his own.

  What harm had he done, what offense that warranted his father coming upon him in his cellar room, binding him to the bed, and with mindless anger delivering an untold number of lashes to his back with a horsewhip, all the time shouting down on him that he was to remember his place.

  With his head down, he suffered a painful ringing in his ears, as though an invisible alarm had gone off, the mind of the fourteen-

  year-old boy still recoiling, trying its best and failing to protect itself against such pain.

  And the next day, workers from the estate had commenced building the stone wall that still stood, the barrier which had separated him forever from his dream.

  Beyond him in the entrance hall he heard voices, the familiar one of his clerk, Bobby, and another one, strident, demanding. Almost undone by old grief, he turned his head toward the distant, elegant Georgian lines of Hadley Park looming sideways in his vision, the entire rich yellow limestone estate bathed in the becoming pink light of dusk.

  Suddenly his eyes fell on the fourth-floor window and he remembered the time, about sixteen years ago, that he'd kept a constant vigil on those attic windows.

  Slowly he raised up, remembering clearly the grand scheme which, if only fate had been generous enough to let work, might have provided a very different conclusion to his miserable existence.

  But no! As always fate had not shown the least inclination to generosity, and not only had the aborted plan cost him one thousand pounds, but he'd suffered new humiliation as well at the hands of one Mr. Edward Eden.

  As the memories continued to march over him, he felt as battered as though he'd just been freshly assaulted. Was there to be no period in his entire life in which fate would say, "Now, Humphrey Hills, you may have it as you please. Set the pace, call the tune . . ."

  Suddenly he raised up and shouted, "Bobby?"

  A serving maid near the kitchen steps asked, "Shall I fetch him for you, Mr. Hills?"

  "Is he still with the new guest?"

  "Yes, sir. As far as I can see."

  He heard the fear in her voice and fed on it. "More brandy," he shouted, gesturing toward the empty decanter. As again he heard a reassuring flurry of footsteps, he bent low over the table, trying to hear the distant conversation. Outside the window, he saw the boy driver just unloading the trunks from the top of the carriage, a handsome lad.

  Without warning he felt his breath failing him. At the moment when he thought he could not endure any longer, he heard a voice, the one voice in the world capable of comforting him, and felt a hand on his shoulder. "Worse tonight, eh? Here's succor."

  He looked up and saw a fresh decanter of brandy on the table,

  took note of the white, well-tended hand wrapped around cut glass, then looked slowly up into Bobby's face, with his bland, wide-set blue eyes, fair unruly hair, like an angel.

  "Oh, God, Bobby," he moaned, shaking his head. "There are times when I don't think that I can survive."

  "Of course you can," came the reply.

  Then Humphrey felt the hand move with tenderness to his neck. "Now, more than ever," came the voice again. "You will survive. I shall see to it."

  Humphrey closed his eyes in a spasm of enjoyment, the first respite he'd had in over an hour. Yet there were dragons even in that moment, his fearful realization that the serving girls were watching. "Careful," he whispered to Bobby.

  Under the gentle chastisement the young man withdrew his hand and slid into the seat opposite him. Humphrey shouted at the still-gaping, stupid-faced girls, "Be about your business. Go on with you. Look in on the new guest. See to his needs."

  "Sluts!" Humphrey muttered after they had disappeared, and looked up to see Bobby grinning.

  Alone, Humphrey took a moment to feed on the face opposite him, a remarkable face combining the beauty of a woman in the features of a man.

  "Oh, Bobby," he whispered, and looked away from the fair face and the awareness of the acts they performed each night between the linens of Humphrey's bed.

  "My, how gloomy we are this evening." Bobby smiled, and for a moment Humphrey resented the glibness in his tone. Generally Bobby was sympathetic to a faulty had been from the beginning, when Humphrey had shared with him the whole dismal tale of his various misfortunes. And Bobby had shared a tale or two of his own, the son of a rich northern banker from Newcastle, well-educated, whose father had followed him one night to a male brothel, a "distasteful scene," as Bobby had put it, resulting in his expulsion from the family.

  It had been the young man's intention to make his way south to London, where in that rich and varied world all things were possible. But instead he'd stopped for a night's lodgings at the Mermaid, and he'd stayed the night, the week, the year, and seven years later, there he sat.

  Humphrey shook his head, feeling his own demons withdrawing

  under the balm of Bobby's closeness. "What an incredible pair we are/' he mused sadly.

  "Oh, not so incredible, Humphrey." Bobby smiled, lifting a small piece of folded paper from the pocket of his crimson satin waistcoat. "Just blessed," he concluded.

  "Blessed!" Humphrey scoffed, refilling his own glass and pouring one for Bobby. "Under no circumstances would I assign that designation to either of us," and he lifted his glass and drank deeply, his eyes over the glass rim fixed on his beloved's face. "And the new guest?" Humphrey demanded, his attitude businesslike, though aga
in he sipped deep of the brandy.

  "Go easy," Bobby cautioned gently.

  There was a nagging to the voice which Humphrey enjoyed. How good it was that someone cared. "Oh, Bobby, sometimes I see absolutely no point to this earthly existence."

  "The bitch again, is it?" Bobby asked curtly, his fingers tapping lightly on the folded piece of paper. "What would you do, Humphrey," he asked with suspect lightness, "if you were to learn of her whereabouts?"

  "What would I do?" he repeated. "An academic question, dear Bobby," he said. "The lady is quite gone from my life."

  "But not from your mind."

  He shook his head. "No," he said, staring with glazed eyes at the small white square of paper. "She will haunt me all my life," he concluded simply.

  Abruptly Bobby laughed. "You asked about the new guest, Humphrey, and did not give me a chance to reply. Do you still want to hear about him?

  "The new guest," Bobby entoned. "From London, he is," he began, "a solicitor, or so he says, here on business."

  "Solicitors are always involved in business," Humphrey said. "They never rest. It's what makes them so—"

  "But fascinating business, this," Bobby interrupted.

  Humphrey looked up. "What exactly is the nature of your fascination with the man?" he asked.

  "Oh, he's not my fascination, Humphrey"—Bobby smiled—"and his name is Morley Johnson." Again he lifted the piece of paper. "But he might be an object of some fascination ... to you. Mr. Johnson is here on business for his client. According to Mr. Johnson, his client desires a complete report on the present state of . . . Hadley Park. Mr. Johnson's client is curious about her childhood

  home. She wishes to know about its physical condition and the disposition of several favored childhood servants, and she also wishes to know. . ."

  At some point Humphrey had ceased hearing words. "I . . . don't . . . understand," he faltered.

  At that, Bobby laughed. "Of course you understand, Humphrey. My God, man, wake up! I've just provided you with a road map to the demon-bitch who has damn near sucked your blood dry. And there's more."

  He lifted the paper and read, his words precise, incredible. "His client, or so Mr. Johnson says, is Lady Eden. Lady Harriet Eden." Slowly he shook his head. "Sweet Lord, how often I've heard that name, Harriet, before. And Eden. I've heard that as well. Have you heard of them, Humphrey?"

  But Humphrey wasn't faring so well. There still was a blanket of disbelief covering everything. A device—thafs what it was—of Bobby's, to lift his spirits. "It's an . . . error," he stammered, "clearly an—"

  "Good God," Bobby shouted. "Are you deaf? Shall I take you by the hand and escort you up to the man himself? There is no error. His client is Lady Harriet Eden. Yes, her maiden name was Powels. Yes, she is alive and well and residing at Eden Castle on the North Devon coast. Yes, she's married to Lord James Eden, fourteenth Baron and sixth Earl of Eden Point. Yes, the man had a brother, dead now, named Edward Eden."

  The cries of yes became a refrain in Humphrey's ear. A feeling such as he had never known before rose up within him. He sat on the very edge of his chair, his mouth half-open. There still was an inclination not to believe.

  Bobby leaned close, no longer shouting. "I'm only grateful that I could deliver this information to you, Humphrey, I who know better than anyone the depths of your agony. Now perhaps you can exorcise her once and for all, and be truly mine."

  It wasn't that Humphrey didn't hear the expression of affection. It was simply that his mind was still spinning on other matters. How could such important news bring so many unanswered questions? Lady Harriet Eden? Edward Eden? What was that connection? And why had fate sent Mr. Morley Johnson on this night when Humphrey had been almost doubled over with memories of the past?

  "By God!" he exclaimed at last, full-voiced, certain possibilities be-

  ginning to occur to him. But he needed more information, needed to interview the man himself.

  On that note of resolve, he pushed away from the table, stumbling once in his eagerness, hearing Bobby call after him, but refusing to stop, moving steadily across the empty dining room, his eyes fixed on the doorway and the entrance hall, and beyond that the staircase and the second-floor guest chamber where, with luck, Mr. Morley Johnson could tell him precisely what he wanted to know, a glorious stroke of good fortune, the first time in his long and bitter life when fate had said to him, "Now, Humphrey Hills! You call the tuner

  Eden Castle, April 1852

  Although he was forced to operate within the boundaries of limited experience, John Murrey Eden knew, with a certainty that defied reason, that he would never again, under any circumstances, be as happy as he was now.

  Though he was totally absorbed in his own happiness, he was not impervious to hers. Or for that matter, the happiness of the entire castle, save for that one gloomy besotted chamber in the west wing where his uncle dwelt and from which that now constantly inebriated man never emerged.

  But for the rest of them, it was a castle at last truly named, a rapturous place grown more rapturous with the coming of spring, all the casements thrown open, letting in the freshness of sea breeze and early-blooming lilacs, a gluttony of happiness filling all quarters.

  On this mild April evening, he stood behind her where she sat before her dressing table, her hairbrush in his hand, and carefully guided the bristles through her luxuriant hair. It had become a ritual which brought both of them immense pleasure.

  "It resembles the color of autumn," he murmured, stroking her hair, his hand cupped about her head.

  She laughed and lifted her face. "Do you think Mary's will take on the red tint?"

  He shook his head. "She's destined to be blond, like my side of the family, and it will become her."

  John smiled, remembering how that very afternoon Mary had kept pace with him and Richard as they'd scrambled down the steep cliff

  to the ocean, then back up again. How he adored her, adored them all, having found at last the family he'd never had.

  "Penny?"

  He looked up to her reflection in the glass.

  "For your thoughts," she added softly.

  He laid the brush aside and sat in the near chair, his long legs outstretched, spying caked mud on his boots from their afternoon outing. "You know my thoughts," he murmured.

  "I know," she said, "but I like to hear you speak them." When at first he did not reply, she prompted, "Are you happy, John?"

  He laughed and pressed his head back against the cushions of the chair. "My father always said that it was wrong of a man to expect too much happiness. It spoiled him for day-to-day existence."

  "Do you think he was right?"

  "He was always right." He crossed his arms over his chest and again stared at her. During the daylight hours, he felt complete satisfaction in her closeness, her affection, the touch of her hand, the manner in which she spoke his name, the thousand little intimacies which seemed to satisfy and blunt the need for the greater one.

  But on occasions, like now at night, when they were alone, he felt the hunger and wondered how long it would suffice merely to brush her hair and hear her speak his name lovingly.

  "John?"

  She was there again, leaning forward in her chair. "What is it?"

  He shook his head. "Nothing."

  "No," she disagreed, and left her chair and knelt before him. "You looked . . . desolate." She frowned.

  "I'm sorry," he said, his hand cupped about her face. Then playfully he lifted her chin. "Will you marry me?" He grinned. "Will you come away with me and be my wife?"

  At first she looked surprised. "Come away where?"

  "India."

  She laughed prettily. "Why India?"

  "Why not? It's a world away from England, a new horizon, a place where we could—"

  "And what about Richard and Mary?" She smiled, still playing the game.

  "We would take them with us."

  "And never return to Eden?"

 
"Oh, yes, we'll come home one day, as husband and wife."

  Now she looked longingly at him, the sense of play diminishing.

  Encouraged, he leaned closer and repeated himself. "Please come away with me and be my wife."

  "But I am married, sir," she replied. "England frowns on a woman with two husbands."

  "You have no husband," he countered. "I doubt seriously if you've ever had a husband."

  Gently she broke loose and settled back on her heels, still at his feet. He noticed one hand drawing the dressing gown more tightly about her.

  Without warning he slipped to his knees beside her on the floor, took her in his arms and kissed her, a bit crudely, but what matter? There were years separating them, to be sure, but he knew he would never love anyone else as he loved her.

  At the end of the kiss, he caught a glimpse of her face and thought he saw despair there. Now he watched as she pulled herself to her feet and walked away, no words spoken.

  Had he offended her? They'd kissed many times, even during the day with the children scampering ahead, and always at night she bade him farewell with a kiss.

  "Harriet?"

  But she merely hushed him with a raised hand and continued to walk away, to her bedstand now. When at last she looked back at him, there was an expression on her face that he'd never seen before, the kind of splintered peace that comes with hard-fought resolution.

  Slowly she approached him, a small volume in her hand. "Do you know it?" she asked.

  "The Book of Common Prayer. I have one of my own."

  "Turn to page seventeen," she commanded.

  Torn between her stance before him and her perplexing command, he did as he was told, and at last found it, page seventeen, the Ceremony of Marriage.

  Again he looked up, then slowly rose, his eyes never leaving her face. "I. . . don't understand," he said.

  Again she retreated, as though determined to keep a safe distance between them. "Have you ever made love to a woman before, John?" she asked.

  Still grasping the prayer book, he looked down, embarrassed by the truth he knew he must speak. "No."