by Karleen Koen
Roger. The Duchess laid down the gloves. She gestured for Barbara to lean forward and held her face in her hands, kissing each cheek and staring into the girl's eyes before she released her.
"Your grandmother is tired," Annie grumbled from her chair nearby.
"Go away, Annie," said the Duchess. "I must speak privately with Barbara." They waited until Annie closed the door behind her. Then Barbara turned, eyes shining with such expectation in them that the Duchess was taken aback.
"What if I told you, Barbara, that I thought it best to leave everything as it is…" Before she could finish her sentence, Barbara went down on her knees before her.
"No, Grandmama! I love him so. I will die without him!"
"You do not know him, child!" she said, taking Barbara's hands in hers. Great tears were welling up in the corners of Barbara's eyes. She shook her head stubbornly.
"Let him go to France," the Duchess urged. "You come back to Tamworth with me. I will arrange for an exchange of letters between you. That will give you time to know if—"
"If he goes away, I will lose him, Grandmama! I know that in my deepest heart. And if I lose him, I think I will die."
She was silent. This girl before her was someone she did not know anymore. Once, she had known every corner of her heart. Or had she? It frightened her to see the depth, the sincerity of Barbara's emotion. There was obviously only one solution Barbara wanted. Last night, it had seemed easy. Tonight, Abigail's objections raised doubts. A woman belonged to her husband, body, soul, property, once they married. If he was a drunkard, a sadistic madman, a lecher, a brute, a wife bore her lot as best she could. Caring parents tried to choose a sane, sensible man who would be good to their daughters in the long term. Many, however, simply sold their girls to the highest bidder, the one with the fanciest title and the most money. It was a contest the parents waged, seeing who could make the best bargain for their time and money. Staring at Barbara's tearstained face, the Duchess was reminded unpleasantly of the young Diana, so many years ago, pleading for her Kit.
"Please, Grandmama! Please, I know you can fix—"
"Bah! Go away, Bab. You have made me tired with all your tears."
Tired and frightened. She had come here to do the best for her girl, but now she was not sure what was the best. Obviously only seeing Roger himself could decide her. She was tired, and her legs, those traitors, those constant reminders of her age and frailty, were beginning to ache. She had been too active today, hopping about as if she were a young girl. She would pay for it tonight and tomorrow. She would have to remain in bed nearly all day. But that was good, she needed the respite.
* * *
All across the city of London and Westminster, church bells began to ring out the news of the approaching new year of Our Lord, 1716. The bells would ring tonight at midnight, and tomorrow, to celebrate New Year's Day. Everyone who could afford it would be wearing new clothes as they attended the king's reception or visited friends and relatives to play cards and deliver New Year's gifts. When the hour of midnight struck, doors throughout the city would swing open as people unbarred them to let out the old and bring in the new. Everyone would watch for signs of the new year's luck: the first person to enter a house on the new year was a sign, good luck if it was a dark-haired man, bad luck if it was a woman. Bibles would be dragged from their boxes as family members dipped, an old-fashioned custom of randomly picking a verse from the Bible to indicate the year's luck.
Roger and his friends were gathered about a huge silver wassail bowl. In it was the traditional "lamb's wool" ale: nutmeg, sugar, toast, and roasted apples. A garland of rosemary and bay and blue and gold ribbons was twisted around its base. Walpole and Carlyle, White and Montrose, Townshend and his wife, Catherine Walpole, the Duke and Duchess of Montagu, and Carr Hervey lifted up cups of the steaming ale and cried, "Wass hael," ancient Saxon for "To your health." The meaning was forgotten, but the gesture was part of heritage. Everyone was already a little drunk, and by midnight they would be drunker still. Catherine Walpole tried to catch Roger's eye, but he was talking to her husband. She turned to Carr Hervey, who was smiling at her, and lifted her cup. Silently, they toasted a new year to each other. No one mentioned Roger's failed plans. He seemed not to care at all. Bentwoodes might never have existed. All his talk was of France.
"I might be gone for years," Roger told his friends. "I might explore the whole world."
"That is the lamb's wool talking," said Walpole.
"That is a disappointment," said Carlyle, but no one was listening to him.
* * *
Barbara sat on her bed. The bells were ringing. Her Bible, especially made for her at her confirmation, lay open on the bed. It was covered with soft, scrolled, embossed leather, and the arms of Tamworth and Alderley were engraved on the front and back covers, and in gold on the front pages. Mary, Charlotte, and Anne, all wide–eyed, sat on her bed. She had promised them, in her happiness of the afternoon, that tonight at midnight, they would dip. Now she felt like doing nothing except lying on her bed. There was such a weight on her heart that it hurt each time it beat. If she lived through this, she would never, never love again. It was too painful. If she lived through this, it did not matter whom they married her to; it would be years and years before she recovered.
"Bab, it is Mary's turn," Charlotte said.
Barbara handed the Bible to Mary, who shut her eyes tightly, fumbled with the pages, and finally jabbed her finger down.
"'Blessed are the meek,"' Barbara read for her, "'for they shall inherit the earth."'
Mary looked disappointed. Anne's verse had had the word "whore" in it, which had shocked and titillated everyone. Charlotte's had mentioned "fire and snakes," which they found fascinating.
"You now, Bab. You," said Charlotte.
Barbara closed her eyes and fumbled with the pages and jabbed her finger down.
"'Vanity of vanities, saith the preacher; all is vanity."'
She could barely finish reading out the words. Her throat closed. She could not help it. She did not want to disappoint them in their New Year's fun, but she lay back on the bed and put her arm over her eyes. The three other girls looked at one another. Roger, Mary mouthed silently. The other two nodded. The three of them were half in love with Roger themselves, simply because their Barbara was. Anne crawled over and pulled Barbara's head into her lap.
"I love you, Bab," she said softly. She wiped the tears from Barbara's cheeks.
Mary and Charlotte each took a hand and patted it. Barbara felt the tears trickling down the comers of her eyes into Anne's lap. How could anything hurt the way this did? Just a few months ago, she had watched Jane cry and not understood it. She had been a child then. And now she was not. Oh, Roger, she thought. It is going to take me so long not to love you anymore.
* * *
The Duchess lay in her bed, Dulcinea, as usual, curled beside her. Every now and then she could hear laughter and shrieks. Abigail's party guests must be into their third bowl of lamb's wool. The New Year, 1716. Memories filled her the way the lamb's wool filled Abigail's guests. Over five years now that Richard was gone. Barbara had been a little girl.
Now she was a woman. With a woman's heart and a woman's needs. Children, a home—if she were fortunate, a husband she could love. But that happened to so few people. She and Richard had been special. Dear sweet Jesus, how special. Lying here tonight in this bed, she could see the young Richard in her mind's eye the first time she had ever seen him.
What had she been doing? She was at court, yes, and she was in a walled courtyard. It must have been spring. Blue sky, and birds singing and green trees were there in her memory. She was eighteen. Unmarried. Comforting a child. Yes, that was it. Some boys had been picking on a younger boy, and she had seen it, and with a sudden fierce surge of temper (she had been a fierce girl—prickly, bad-tempered, angry—because her mirror had showed a plain woman when her heart longed to be beautiful, as her mother had been) she had chased awa
y the boys, and was kneeling down, comforting the child, almost crying herself, so in sympathy did she feel, and she sensed someone was staring at her. She looked up, her head jerking, to see a young man looking down at her from one of the buildings around the courtyard. He was smiling, and his smile was beautiful, kind…tender. She had leapt up and walked away, taking a confused impression of a handsome mouth, a wide nose, full cheeks, a man any woman would look twice at.
It was her first sight of him. And his first of her. Two years later, she would marry him. He was a fortune hunter, relatives warned. She was a fool. They laughed and whispered and talked behind her back. She was marrying beneath her, said others. Her father had been astounded. And angry. And finally agreeable. Her father, who trusted no one, had grown to love Richard as if he were his own son. Her father said that he would rebuild their fortune and power and she…what? She saw ambition and honesty combined, but the truth was she was already wild in love. Her girlfriends had been married for five and six years and were mothers of children. The truth was she longed to bed him. The first time he kissed her, his mouth on hers was fire and honey. She had known from that moment that she must be careful. She must not let him have too much power over her. But he had loved her. That was his power.
And what did her Barbara want? A man, just as she had wanted Richard. But by the time she married him, she had begun to know what he was: fine, honest, loyal. Barbara knew no such thing of Roger. Yet her heart longed for him. And perhaps the Duchess should trust that heart. Time would tell. She wished that Barbara were older, that Roger were younger, that Richard were here to talk to. But Richard would be old, old now. The man she had buried talked of his roses and his shrubs. He visited his sons' tombs daily, and he cried. How many times had Perryman had to go and find him and gently lead him home? That man could not have helped her. No one could. She would have to trust in herself, and in the Lord. There was nothing else left.
* * *
She had asked the key members to assemble in the library. It was the afternoon of New Year's Day. She had made her decision. Or at least part of it. The rest depended on Roger. Whose turn was next. She sat waiting for them, one hand stroking Dulcinea, who was content for the moment to lie in her lap. The library was a small room off the huge gallery that crossed the entire north front of the third floor of the house. Row upon row of small, leather–bound books marched in straight lines across the shelves. Richard had taken great pride in assembling his books. In one corner was a built–in set of drawers with a flap that let down, turning it into a writing desk. Now, hardly anyone used this room. Tony was not the reader and collector that his grandfather had been, and Abigail had other interests. The fire burning in the charcoal brazier that had been brought in to warm the room up could not disguise its musty smell. The Duchess sat near the built–in set of drawers. She had unfastened the flap and was running her hand over and over her own name, Alice, that Richard had carved into the desk flap with his penknife. A stupid, foolish, schoolboy thing for a man in his forties to do.
Someone coughed nervously. Dulcinea jumped from her lap and walked over to Sir Percy Wilcoxen, senior member of a firm that had served the Saylors for years. Sir Percy had a wart on the end of his nose and a dry, pinched face. Dulcinea wound herself around his legs. He coughed again. The Duchess motioned for him to sit down. He did so, and Dulcinea jumped into his lap. He patted her perfunctorily, then pushed her down, but she jumped back. Abigail, Tony, and Diana appeared, all looking heavy–eyed. Too much lamb's wool. The Duchess, however, felt well, fit. She had stayed in bed all day, opening her letters. Everyone wanted to see her: Louisa, Lizzie, Sarah Churchill, Lady Chesterfield, Mrs. Clayton. And there were presents: fans, rouge boxes, packages of pins, bouquets of flowers, perfume, ribbons. She had quite enjoyed herself.
The Duchess waited until bows and handshakes and greetings were finished. Everyone was seated, watching her. Sensing where all eyes would be focused, Dulcinea went to the Duchess.
"You have the document, Diana?" the Duchess asked. An air of expectancy filled the room.
Diana nodded. She made no move to give the paper, a piece of folded, yellowish parchment she was holding in her hand, to her mother. Abigail was watching the Duchess with a paralyzed fascination.
The Duchess held out her hand. Diana stared at that hand.
Then she leaned forward slowly and put the paper in it. It was clear to everyone in the room that she had no wish to do so. The Duchess handed the paper to Wilcoxen, who glanced at it, coughed, and then read it aloud.
"'I, Alice Margaret Constance Verney Saylor, Baroness Verney, Countess of Peshall, and Duchess of Tamworth, do hereby give the land called Bentwoodes to my granddaughter, Barbara Alice Constance Alderley, to be used as dower to her marriage. Signed this seventh day of November, 1715, in the presence of Annie Smith and James Perryman.'" He coughed again and stopped. The Duchess held out her hand, and after a moment, in which Abigail and Diana both held their respective breaths, he handed it to her. Dulcinea turned over on her back and batted at the paper.
"The land," the Duchess said clearly, "belongs to Barbara. Not to you, Diana, nor to you, Abigail, nor to you, Tony."
"G-Grandmama," stammered Tony, "I have no interest in—"
Abigail closed her eyes a moment, as if praying for patience. There was a soft knock on the door, and at the duchess's command, Barbara entered the room. She went at once to stand behind her grandmother. Now everyone's eyes were on her. Interest in the paper faded.
"Bab," the Duchess said in softer tones, "I have just been saying that this piece of paper"—she waved the piece of parchment—"deeds Bentwoodes to you. Is that not so, Wilcoxen?"
"Ah, yes. Yes, indeed." Wilcoxen stopped, clearly unable by nature and profession to commit himself further.
"Do you wish to sell this land…to, say, your aunt, Barbara?" the Duchess asked. Abigail bit her lip. Tony watched his mother with puzzled eyes.
"No," Barbara said. "I do not."
"Do you wish to give the land back to me? I am within my legal rights, am I not, Wilcoxen? I deeded the land to Barbara as a dower; it has not been used so."
Wilcoxen cleared his throat. All four women were staring at him. He had the look of a man set unexpectedly amid a group of lionesses—just as the ones that were at the Tower in the zoo, lean, spare, cruel beasts that could tear out a man's heart with one swift bite—lionesses staring at him with steady eyes, each one ready, willing, capable of devouring him. But of them all, the Duchess herself was the most formidable. He cleared his throat.
"Ah. Yes. Well, your grace, as to that—"
"As to that," interrupted Abigail, "Barbara is under age—"
"No," the Duchess snapped. "She is fifteen. The age of consent is twelve for a girl."
"For marriage only, Mother Saylor, is she a woman," Abigail said. "She can have no say as to where that land goes. Diana, as her guardian, must decide."
"Which of us is correct, Wilcoxen?"
"Ah, yes, well. Both of you have made salient points, your grace. There is precedence on both sides. Mistress Alderley being female…of course, that is…"
With one swift movement, the Duchess tore the paper in half, then into fourths, then into eighths. Abigail gasped. Wilcoxen coughed. Tony stared. Barbara put her hand to her mouth. Dulcinea batted wildly at the pieces drifting to the floor. Only Diana was cool and motionless, watching her mother without a single movement.
"I take back my gift," the Duchess said. "If you want it now, you will have to sue me for it."
"Never do that, Grandmama," Tony said quickly. Abigail bit her lip.
"What–what does that mean?" Barbara said in an unsteady voice.
"That Bentwoodes is no longer yours, my sweet, but mine, to do with as I see fit. You come home with me, Bab, and we will decide—"
Barbara ran from the room. Tony jumped up and ran after her. Abigail stood up. The Duchess pushed Dulcinea from her lap and reached for her cane.
"Stay here!" she
hissed to Abigail, who was already at the door.
She hobbled out into the gallery. At one end, far down, she could see Barbara leaning over, holding her stomach, as if she were retching. Tony was standing behind her. He was talking to her. The Duchess pursed her lips. She went back into the library, walking slowly, as if her legs were paining her. Abigail was whispering furiously to Wilcoxen. The two of them looked up as the Duchess entered.
"Go away," said the Duchess. "Now. Except you, Diana. You stay."
Wilcoxen bowed rapidly, right and left, without looking at any of the three women he was left with. He could not get out of the door fast enough.
Diana's hands opened and closed methodically against the arms of the chair upon which she was sitting. It was the only movement she had made since the Duchess had torn up the paper.
"Your theatrics were uncalled for, Mother," Abigail said, her full, fleshy face showing its stubborn jaw. "And I would appreciate it if you would treat me with a little more courtesy! I am not your tirewoman, to be snapped at like a dog. Now, I am going to my rooms. Not because you order it. But because I wish it! I have a headache!"
