by Bianca Bloom
In fact, I hated gambling as well, and I did not want to admit to the vicar that I was seeking a husband with that particular vice, though I did want to reassure him that there was a reason the marriage was hasty.
The vicar was, indeed, the picture of discretion, and I could not imagine him going over to the blacksmith to tell him that Lady Bell was about to marry a man who lost everything at cards. On the other hand, to bring up a given subject in the village was to give it life. And I very much wished for the transactional nature of my marriage to remain dead. Enough tongues would be wagging about how the merry widow on the hill was willing to marry any Lord Bell who happened to come along. At least half of the people who heard of my situation would joke, mostly out of jealousy, that if my new husband were to die and be replaced with a young lad of sixteen, I would be the young lad’s wife before the evening was out.
The gossip could be cruel, but forewarned is forearmed, and I knew how to guard against it.
“We would like to marry right away,” I said again.
The gentlemen looked at each other, but neither said a word to contradict my edict.
“Thank you for your time, Lord Bell,” said the vicar, “And I assure you that I wish you the very best for your future in the village. I take it you will accept Lady Bell’s decision when it comes to the time and date of the wedding?”
He nodded. “Yes, I will. Good day, Mr. Manley.”
And with that, he left, and my old friend took me in hand.
“Marion,” he said, “You must allow me to speak to you in the plainest possible words. You were born in this village, and whatever you may say about it, the village will care for you.”
Looking down at the very fine pair of boots that I was wearing, I smiled a bit. “The village resents and despises me, Vicar. You do not need to clothe it in the fellow-feeling that you wish our village held.”
He frowned, shaking his head. “I cannot deny that many villagers resent their employers. This is, perhaps, an excusable feeling, one that I imagine you experienced yourself when you were working.”
At this, I did flush. There were days that I had walked back from the inn so angry that I would have gladly made an effigy of workers and drinkers alike. Sometimes, my wrath was directed at Mrs. Climpson, though I was now well aware that she was demanding but not unkind.
“Well, and if they dislike me because I am their employer. What then?”
He picked at the cake that his housekeeper had set before us, apparently too distressed even to eat. This was a rarity indeed for Dr. Manley, and I felt unsettled at his sadness.
“If you lose money,” he told me, “You will be taken care of in this village. Everyone will see to it that you and your daughters come through this time.”
I frowned. “My daughters cannot understand that the estate does not belong to me. And to tell the truth, I cannot understand it either. To be barren, and to lose Gilbert so young! One I would understand, but both are incomprehensible.”
“Incomprehensible, perhaps,” the vicar said, “But they may yet prove useful circumstances in some way.”
I glared at him, for this was a theological point on which I knew we would always disagree. “Or they may prove useless.”
He nodded. “That is very true. But are you so afraid of the circumstances of a disinherited widow that you would seek to nullify them? By taking a course that at first blush appears simple, but will ultimately be a hard one?”
I almost rose from my seat. “You do not know that my marriage to Hamilton Bell will be a hard course. He is not stupid, and he is pleased enough with the arrangement.”
“Will he be pleased for some years, then?” asked the vicar. “So long as ye both shall live?”
At this, I had to look away. Indeed, I had very specifically arranged things so that we would be parted by riches and annulment, not death. And I was sure that the handsome Lord Bell, if he somehow overcame his hatred of women, knew very well that he could divorce me and throw me over.
Though I hoped that by that time I would have acquired a good deal more property.
“Vicar,” I said to him, gathering my skirts in preparation for departure, “Do you mean to say that you will not perform the ceremony?”
At this, he gave half a smile. “Marion Bell, I have never managed to talk you out of a single scheme.”
This finally made me laugh. “I’m not sure that’s true. You did manage to talk me into closing the pub each Christmas, which is still not one of my favorite schemes. I honor it every year, even so.”
He gave a great sigh. “If the two of you are two be married, I would rather that take place here than in some strange church. But promise me you will think on it carefully. You know the risks.”
This seemed a bit of a hurtful barb, but when I saw the vicar munching sadly on his cake, I realized that he did not mean it to be so. “Yes, that’s true enough. I do know the risks. Experience has been a hard teacher.”
21
And so it was with a light heart that, the next day, I walked down the aisle. My daughters were with me, and Esther, with old Toby as the other witness. The whole village would have been clamoring to get in the doors had they known, but I knew I could trust to the vicar’s discretion.
When we said our vows, Flora sighed, a smile on her face, and Frances sobbed loudly. Only Grace looked worried, her little face pinched and fretful.
She was certainly the wisest of my daughters. Or rather, our daughters – I worried anew as I looked at Lord Bell, solemn but becoming in a borrowed suit, hoping that he would not be a wicked stepfather to my daughters.
After we left the church by the back entrance, I entrusted my daughters to Esther’s care and started off with my new husband on the journey to Glasgow. We had chosen to get married just after dawn, as the long trip would last well into the night.
It was to be its own test of our young marriage.
At first he said nothing, and it was easy enough for me to say nothing. He only looked out the window of the carriage I had hired, marveling at the scenery.
And when I saw the Isle of Skye with a visitor’s eyes, I was able to marvel a little bit myself, already looking forward to our return from Glasgow. Never was I prouder of my native isle than on my return trips from the ugliness of the city, when I was able to leave the stinking pavements and cramped corridors for the beauty of the peaks and the bay.
“The island has changed,” he said finally, as I twisted my new ring on my finger. When I was married to Sean, I had worn a cheap ring. With Gilbert, an expensive one. And now, with Hamilton Bell, I had not gotten a chance to procure anything else. So I was reusing the old one, which I had worn for a time after Gilbert’s death. My finger was still pale in a perfect outline of where the ring had rested, and slipping it back on did not feel entirely odd. I was just going back to a past life, that was all. It seemed that my ring finger was destined to be seldom free, and even the thought that my dear Adam might someday slip a ring on it did not cheer me.
“Yes,” I said, “I suppose Skye has changed for you. When was the last time you visited?”
He sighed, shifting in his seat. “About twenty years ago. After my parents passed, I was sent to my mother’s family in London. They could have afforded to send me here, but did not like to.”
This did get my blood boiling, reminding me that even though I might complain to the vicar that I was despised, Skye would always be my one true home. “What, they did not like the Isle of Skye? They must be uncommonly choosy.”
He smiled. “They did not like anything outside of England. I am not sure that I would call them choosey. Just very English.”
“I would count that the same. To be English is to be choosey.”
This got the smallest hint of smiles from him. “Perhaps it is so.”
Once again, I was struck by how little I knew of the man sitting next to me, my legally wedded husband. “And did you always live in London after that? How is it that the solicitors were never a
ble to find you, then?”
His accent was one I had never been able to work out. It was all sorts of accents blended, but still not the same speech that I would have heard from a sailor, or from one who had spent ages in India like Gilbert.
He cleared his throat. “No, I wished to travel. Since I had no need to make my fortune, I endeavored to spend it, I suppose.”
I frowned. “You had no need to make your fortune! But have you anything left?”
Nearly straight away, my mind was flying. If Hamilton Bell had some fortune he had not spoken of, that would change our whole situation dramatically. Perhaps he needed to pay this debt, but did not want to dip into his fortune to do so? That would seem rather drastic, though, if it were a big enough fortune to cover the death duties.
He was staring out the window again. “No. It is entirely spent.”
That must have put him in a sour mood, because he spoke hardly another two words to me during the entire journey, except to accept food when I offered.
Well, whatever else would happen to my new husband, he was not likely to starve.
I usually stayed with a distant cousin of my father’s on trips to Glasgow, but in this particular instance I had decided that we might as well stay in more expensive accommodations. For a wedding night, it would be expected.
The Queen’s Hotel seemed to fit the bill, and I hoped that my husband would appreciate it. It had cost me – or rather us – a pretty penny. And as we approached it, I was once again impressed with the richness and the scale of the building. With all of its grand rooms, each occupied by a stranger to me, I was reminded that my life was uncommonly provincial. While my marriage might be the most pressing item on the tongues of all of the fishwives of Skye, it was not going to be talked about here. In the city, one had a little bit more room to catch one’s breath. It gave me some measure of relief, but it was also lonely. I wished that I might have gone against tradition and brought my daughters on this particular voyage – I had only my new husband, and he was not the first person I would have chosen for company.
In fact, the closer we drew to the moment when newlyweds would normally have gone into some sort of clinch, the farther we drew from each other. The stout lady who received us at the hotel did not seem at all bothered that the two of us stood well apart, and had us escorted to our rooms straightaway. The porter brought up our things and then left us in our respective rooms, so I resolved to go to the connecting door and speak to my new husband before he had a chance to undress.
In fact, he had already taken off his jacket, but I tried to pay this very little mind. My imagination, however, could not ignore the fact that he was in his shirtsleeves, and tonight was our wedding night.
I cleared my throat. “Our appointment is tomorrow at ten. I will have some breakfast brought up for us. We can walk from here, it is but three streets over. We should start at nine thirty or so.”
He nodded, then paused. “Do you worry about your daughters, being so far away?”
It seemed an odd question. Searching his face for any hint of a threat, I concluded that none existed. In fact, Lord Bell himself looked a little bit worried.
“No, not when I’ve left then with Esther. If anything, she’ll be a better mother than I am.”
It was strange that he had anticipated my thoughts. Though I did not worry for my daughters, I did miss them greatly. Even though they were well past the age when they needed me to kiss them goodnight, I did like to look in on them, just to reassure myself that God was in Heaven and all was right with the world.
“I’m sure that Esther is not a better mother,” he said, with such warmth that I had to smile. “She’s not their mother.”
“She’ll be more attentive than I am, anyway,” I explained. “The girls like her because she brooks none of their nonsense, yet still loves and teases them. Do you have children?”
He shook his head slowly. “I have never been married. I once thought – but no, I do not have children.”
This got a smile out of me. “Well, then. Once they’re a little bit older, it’s easy to worry less about them. At least sometimes – I don’t worry much about the twins, but I do worry for Grace. And I suppose that I know that Flora will get herself into some sort of mess soon if I don’t get her married off.”
He cleared his throat. “Well, perhaps that can be one endeavor of ours. What did you end up telling her about balls?”
I frowned, rubbing at my eyes. It was quite late, after all – Lord Bell had chosen an odd moment for a little conference.
“Tell Flora what about balls?”
He stared at me. “You said that when she found out about our marriage, her primary concern was whether she would soon get to go to more balls.”
This made me smile again. “Oh, Flora. I told her that she might, and that it would depend on your own interests. I am still busy with the estate, but I will have to run about the countryside to balls if I ever want to see my daughters leave the house.”
Lord Bell’s broad shoulders traveled upward, then down, in a mesmerizing movement. “There are other ways to leave home than through marriage.”
“Not for a young lady from a good family,” I snapped, though I had often harped on the same point when I felt tired or piqued.
Lord Bell was no longer smiling, but his voice was still patient. “I imagine that you and my late cousin may have considered finding a governess for your girls. Governesses are independent young women. Modern women.”
“Well, no daughter of mine is going to leave home to be a governess,” I spat. “That’s a road to modern spinsterhood, to be certain.”
“Or a road to adventure and an independent income, for some,” he pointed out, opening his door. “Which I believe is something that you think of rather fondly.
Ignoring the connecting door, which was still open, I marched furiously over to my own bed and blew out my candle.
His heart had seemed to soften so much at the mention of children that I rather wondered whether he wanted children of his own. But if he had, wouldn’t he have held out for marriage with a woman who was willing to be a wife to him? We had both been clear that conjugal relations were to be pointedly excluded from our own union. At least, I thought we had been clear. I hoped that he wasn’t going to try to get some sort of exception made when he developed a hankering for a little son.
Well, there was no chance of my having more children, with him or with anyone. I intended to finish raising my daughters and then have some years of a childless home. Since there was no way to guarantee any future baby of mine a good father, and I was likely barren anyway, I might as well be done with the whole business. I had never understood the way that both my late husbands longed for sons, as I would have been just as happy with more daughters. As a girl, I had never wanted to be a mother, and yet when my twins were born I fell in love with them straightaway. Even though I was poor, and Sean was off half the time, I wanted to scrape together more money so that I could have more children. With Gilbert, though I did not share the desire for a son, I wanted to give Grace another sibling and to have another darling babe for myself.
But I had to accept that all that was ended. Lord Bell, or Hamilton, as I supposed I should call him, did not desire me. And Adam was not married to me. Even if he were, it would not change my barren body. Either way, it was not to be – I had my three darlings, and must learn to be content with that.
As I drifted off to sleep, I thought about the way that Lord Bell had recalled my girls. How he had demonstrated an interest in their well-being, even remembering that Flora loved balls so much as to make them her first concern.
I tried to picture Adam in the bed with me, his arms around me. But I realized that never, not once, had Adam asked anything about my daughters. The only questions he had related to himself, and how he might get in and out of my home undetected by any of my pesky children.
I was thinking of both men as I fell asleep.
22
It was the
strangest wedding night of my life.
With Sean, we had happily resumed the very activities that had forced our early marriage in the first place. Though I was little bit tired from carrying two tiny girls around in my expanding belly, we stayed up most of the night. I was thrilled by the sudden manner in which I was allowed to live with my lover. What would have been a great scandal the day before was suddenly made quite normal, desirable even, by the brief words that the vicar had spoken.
He was thrilled by the great amount of whiskey his friends had given him after the wedding. Of course, at the time, I had believed that he was thrilled only with me, and that he was drinking the whiskey out of some sense of obligation.
After all, I was very young, and knew next to nothing about men.
My wedding night with Gilbert had been a very different proposition. Even then, I was well aware that my sacred duty seemed to be to give the man a son. And I thought that my time with Sean would have left me well-qualified to do so.
Instead, the night turned into an Onanist fiasco. I had no sooner gotten out of my best new dress and reached my cautious hands out to my diffident new husband then he exploded with nerves, staining the outside of my shift and temporarily spoiling our chances. I tried to distract him, but before I could get us into the position that would be required for a child’s conception, he had lost control of himself again.
It was two days before I finally fulfilled my wifely duties, and I was only able to do it for a minute or so before the man spent. Still, I thought that it might be enough.
And then there was this night, when I had argued with my husband and banished him to the next room. I thought that would be the end of it. After all, we had a great deal of business to arrange in the morning.
23
I could not have been more mistaken.
For deep in the night, I was transported back to the beach that was just north of my great mansion on the hill. It was near the shack where I used to live, and I had once walked near it every day. But as soon as I could afford to live on the high ground, I began avoiding the place. After all, there was no reason for me to be there.
