Consequences

by Nancy Carson

  They say that nothing lasts forever, and it seems that that horrid phase of my life is soon to be over. I consider myself extremely fortunate to have been asked by Clarence to be his wife (how many fallen women get such a second chance?), and I do know how very much he needs me. In my situation I also need him, his love, his support and his companionship. My children, too, will benefit greatly by having a father figure to look up to. We shall be living at his house, The Larches, from the moment of the wedding. Rest assured that Clarence is entirely happy to accept Christina as his own, and I know he will love and cherish her, as much as he will Benjie. It is unlikely therefore that you and I will see much of each other in the future, except on social occasions, although I sincerely hope that dear Marigold and I will keep in close contact.

  Algie, after all that we have meant to each other, I hope you can understand and accept my decision to consent to be Clarence’s wife, and that you wish me well. If you find it hard to accept at first, as I suspect you might, then I hope you can at least understand. Whatever your reaction or opinion, please remember that my regard for you will never change.

  Your friend always,

  Aurelia.

  He could scarcely believe what he had read, so he read it again, mouth agape and feeling hot and agitated. In the strange and unusual silence of the house he could hear his heart pounding. He asked himself, could Aurelia really, honestly, have the utter stupidity to rush into another marriage? The first mad dash for the altar should have taught her the folly of marrying impetuously, and why should this time be any different? He could understand her feminine need for security, and he presumed that Clarence’s wealth had beguiled her, with its implied promise of pampering. But she had not thought this thing through. She could not have thought it through. He recalled his own mother remarrying in haste after the death of his father, and what a shameful calamity that turned out to be. Somehow, he had to stop this charade.

  Clutching the letter, he ran upstairs, taking the steps two at a time. He found Marigold sitting on their bed darning his worn socks by the light of an oil lamp. She looked up at him, the single flame reflected in her apprehensive eyes, and she decided to say nothing until spoken to, for she could see he was wildly agitated.

  ‘Marigold, I’m going to see Aurelia,’ he said, and his voice trembled with anger.

  ‘Do you have to?’ she answered.

  ‘Having just read this, yes, I have to.’ He waved the letter at her.

  ‘Tonight?’

  ‘Tonight.’

  She sighed heavily and put down her darning. ‘Oh, Algie…I suppose it’s about her wedding to Clarence?’

  He regarded her with disparagement at the realisation that she was already aware of the wedding to Clarence. ‘You knew about this?’ He waved the letter at her again.

  She nodded. ‘She told me on Thursday.’

  ‘Yet you never said a word to me?’

  ‘What was the point?’ she declared. ‘I didn’t want you flying off the handle at me for something that’s not my doing, and I knew you would. Like you are now. It wasn’t my doing she decided to get married to the man you dislike most in all the world, nor was it my place to tell you about it, knowing how close you two have been.’

  ‘Well, it can’t go on.’

  ‘You can’t stop it, Algie,’ Marigold protested earnestly. ‘You have no right to interfere. You don’t own her.’

  ‘I’m the father of her daughter, if you remember. I refuse to allow Clarence Froggatt to assume fatherhood over a daughter of mine.’

  ‘And what if Clarence is there with her? He’s ever likely to be.’

  ‘So much the better.’

  ‘Well, if he is, you’ll make a proper fool of yourself, Algie. Just leave it be. Let her get on with what’s best for her.’

  ‘Getting married to him is not best for her. I’m going to stop it or die in the attempt.’

  ‘If you just stop and think about it for a minute,’ Marigold said agitatedly, ‘instead of taking umbrage and going into a huff, you’ll realise it’s to everybody’s benefit. She’ll be a burden off your shoulders, and she might have the chance of finding some happiness and contentment. Let’s face it, she could do with something good happening in her life.’

  He failed to answer, but stuffed the letter in his pocket and ran downstairs.

  She heard him scuffling about as he put on his shoes, his cap, his coat. The front door banged behind him. She parted the curtains and in the darkness could just about discern him ride off on his bike, pedalling vigorously.

  Oh, Algie, she said to herself, why can’t you just leave her be?

  Then a terrible possibility suddenly struck her, a possibility that immediately started taking on a life of its own. So fiercely did it strike her that she was fearful of it actually coming to pass. The probability loomed vivid in her thoughts, and she wondered why she had never considered it before. For Marigold was under no illusions about what Algie and Aurelia had meant to each other in the past. On the strength of that, would he sacrifice his own family – give them up – for the sake of preventing this marriage to Clarence? It was an agonising prospect, and the more she pondered it, alone in their bedroom, away from Clara and the children, the more likely such an outcome seemed possible.

  She looked at her darning, the various socks lying on the bed awaiting attention, the darning mushroom, the skeins of wool, the needle. Why should she continue to darn his socks if such was his plan? Let Aurelia darn them. Why should she continue to do anything for him if he was about to favour Aurelia? Did Christina mean more to him than Rose and Frances? These, and questions like it, began to assume a relevance that tortured her.

  Then she heard Rose’s tiny infant voice, and Clara answering her. They were coming upstairs. It was past Rose’s bedtime. They stood in the doorway of the bedroom.

  ‘Time for bed, Mommy.’ Clara said on behalf of the child, unaware of Marigold’s distress.

  Marigold stood up, smoothed down her skirt. ‘I’ll do it, Grandma,’ she said wearily. She picked up Rose and gave her hug.

  ‘We’ve had a wash in the sink already, so we’re all nice and clean.’

  Marigold forced a smile. ‘Thank you, Clara. Come on then, Topsy. Let’s get you to bed.’

  ‘Has our Algie gone out?’ Clara asked. ‘I thought I heard the front door bang.’

  ‘Yes, he’s gone out, Clara. I don’t suppose he’ll be back till late.’

  * * *

  Just before half past nine, Algie arrived at Talbot Street, panting from his vigorous ride, his breath turning to clouds of steam. The sky was clear and there would be a hard frost, but the cold had failed to temper his determination to change Aurelia’s mind. Outside her house there was no sign of a horse and gig, so it was reasonable to assume Clarence was not there. He rode up the entry, dismounted and leaned his bicycle against the wall under the lit scullery window, and rapped hard on the door.

  ‘Who is it?’ a small voice uttered from inside.

  ‘Me, Algie.’

  She opened the door and looked at him anxiously. She was wearing a nightgown and slippers.

  ‘Algie…I was just going to bed.’

  ‘He’s not here, I take it?’

  ‘Who’s not here?’

  ‘You know who,’ he said impatiently.

  ‘If you mean Clarence, no, he’s not here.’

  ‘Good.’ He barged past her, took off his cap, his gloves, his coat. ‘Don’t tell me you’re surprised to see me.’

  ‘I’m certainly surprised to see you at this time of night.’

  A fire was burning cheerily in the grate, and an oil lamp glimmered on the coal box beside the fender. The room was clean and tidy except for a wicker washing basket filled with clothes that stood on the table, ready for an early start in the brewhouse tomorrow. Gathered neatly in a box on a chair was a collection of Benjie’s toys, a rag doll that was Christina’s lay inanimate on the sideboard.

  ‘Now what’s all this about you
marrying him?’ He was trying hard not to show his angst and contempt, but his stern facial expression and tone gave him away too readily.

  ‘You got my letter,’ she replied simply, outwardly unruffled, but inwardly apprehensive.

  ‘I got your letter, and to say I’m flabbergasted is to put it mildly. I’m disappointed in you, Aurelia. You can’t seriously be thinking of marrying Clarence bloody Froggatt?’

  ‘As a matter of fact, I am, Algie, and it’s all arranged. Didn’t my letter make it clear?’

  ‘Harriet’s not even cold in her grave,’ he said with scorn, ‘and for your part, you’ve decided to rush headlong into yet another catastrophe. Are you mad? Haven’t you learned anything?’

  ‘I’ve paid it a great deal of thought, Algie, and no, I don’t think I’m mad. It was the last thing I expected, but how could I refuse? It’s the best thing for all of us if you think about it rationally, because it solves all our problems, not just mine. To let you know about it in a letter was a coward’s way, I know,’ she admitted guiltily, ‘but I just didn’t have the courage to tell you to your face.’

  ‘Neither did Marigold,’ he scoffed. ‘You’re two for a pair. Well, I’m here now, and we’re standing face-to-face. Tell me how my assessment of you and Clarence is wrong, and explain to me why I shouldn’t be upset.’

  ‘I can understand that you’re upset, Algie.’

  ‘But can you understand why? Because, on the one hand I have loved and cherished you. I have accepted my responsibilities and supported you and Christina to the best of my ability, and am happy to do so from here on. On the other hand, I despise Clarence Froggatt because he’s an underhand, supercilious arsehole who tried to ruin me. Surely you can understand why I think it’s such a sickening mismatch?’

  ‘But that’s only how you see Clarence,’ she said remaining calm, anxious to placate him. ‘I’m sure he meant you no harm – he simply made a business decision.’

  ‘That tells me you’re very naïve, Aurelia.’

  ‘But I’ve known him longer than I’ve known you, Algie, and I know he’s a kind, gentle soul. Certainly not what you have just called him, so unkindly. He’s the man I ought to have married in the first place.’

  ‘It’s a pity you didn’t.’

  She was standing with her back to the fire and the oil lamp. The yellow dancing light from both showed through her thin nightgown, throwing the contours of her legs and body into silhouette. At first he was too angry to be affected by either this sight, or the fact of her sharing this tiny room with him wearing only her nightdress and slippers. Now, though, he was becoming aware of it and of her proximity to him, and it was having its effect. The ardent intimacy of their past hovered latently.

  ‘How quickly your loyalties change.’

  ‘It isn’t like that, Algie. And for your information, Clarence respects the fact that you and I have had our moments.’

  ‘Moments?’ he mocked.

  ‘Oh, Algie, I didn’t mean to understate our affair,’ she said contritely. ‘That was not my intention.’

  ‘All right, but can you honestly say you love him, and that it’s not a marriage of convenience?’

  ‘The fact is, Algie,’ she said with composure, ‘Clarence lost Harriet, and blames himself. Now he needs a wife and a mother for his son. But my children will benefit as well from having a father figure around – I think I said as much in my letter.’ She sighed, and saw the reflected firelight flickering in his eyes. She had to make him understand. ‘Women are like birds, Algie. We need a comfortable nest to rear our young in, and be looked after, and Clarence is happy to provide that nest and look after us, despite all, despite you, despite Christina, despite my divorce.’

  ‘Some nest,’ he remarked sourly. ‘But you still haven’t answered my question.’

  She smiled to herself as she realised he was looking interestedly through her nightdress, regardless of his rancour. He was apparently being distracted by what he saw. So to avoid the potential for any inapt intimacy, which even now she could so willingly yield to, she motioned him to sit down. He sat at the table while she took a chair on the opposite side.

  ‘As far as Clarence and I are concerned, it’s a good and sensible arrangement. It’s what would have happened anyway years ago, if Benjamin had never intervened. I loved him then and I shall grow to love him again – equally. We shall merely resume where we left off before. It does not mean I think any the less of you, or ever will. Please try and understand that, Algie.’

  He sighed. Her logic was making sense, but he was not ready to go along with it yet. ‘After all we’ve been to each other, Aurelia, I cannot stand the thought of you and Clarence Froggatt…’

  ‘Shall I make some tea?’ she suggested, hoping to take the heat out of the argument. ‘There should be enough water in the kettle.’

  ‘Good idea.’

  She put the kettle to boil, and returned to her seat.

  ‘Answer me one thing,’ he said.

  ‘What?’

  ‘I’m still a bit puzzled. You’re about to marry Clarence bloody Froggatt, and I’m beginning to understand your reasoning – now. I don’t mean to insult you, so don’t take it the wrong way, but he knows you’ve had an affair with me, he knows you had Christina by me. He knows you’re divorced – because of me – and therefore a pariah in the eyes of respectable society. So why is he so keen to jeopardise his own social standing to make you his wife and carry all that baggage?’

  ‘He reckons it will all be seen as a nine-day wonder,’ she replied airily. ‘Anyway, he loves me. He says he’s always loved me.’

  ‘Even when he was married to Harriet?’

  She shrugged. ‘I can only go on what he says, Algie. He reckons there are degrees of love, and I believe there are. He loved Harriet, but he’s openly admitted that he did not love her to the same degree as he loved me.’

  He shook his head. ‘Even if that’s true, it still doesn’t make sense. I’m not trying to belittle you, Aurelia, but there must be hundreds of spotless girls, beautiful girls out there who’d be clamouring for his attention, given the chance. He must know that, so why choose you? Why you, in particular? You’ve given him nothing but grief in the past, and who’s to say you wouldn’t again. If I were him, I’d be asking myself whether I could really trust you, judging from your past history.’

  She looked at him pensively, her eyes clear but earnest in the yellow light of the lamp. ‘I can assure you, Algie, that he’ll be able to count on my fidelity. If I’d married him in the first place I would never have had to seek love elsewhere…I’ll let you into a secret…I realised very quickly – oh, in just a few weeks – what a dreadful mistake I’d made marrying Benjamin. One day I met Clarence – quite by chance – and we talked. I told him exactly how I felt, confessed that I had made a terrible mistake. I told him how sorry I was for what I’d done to him, how I wished we could turn the clock back, and I found myself crying. He took me in his arms there and then, and when I looked back up at him I saw that he was weeping too. That affected me. I’ve never forgotten it. I’ve never forgotten what I did to him, how much I must have hurt him, how much I wanted him back.’

  ‘Well, after all that’s happened – after all you’ve been through – I think you’re lucky to be betrothed to him yet again,’ he remarked sincerely.

  ‘I think so too,’ she responded, relieved that perhaps she was winning him over. ‘It’s what I said in the first place. And it’s a mark of Clarence’s feelings, his sincerity.’

  He smiled and reached for her hand across the table. ‘Yes, I suppose it is,’ he conceded. ‘All right, Aurelia…I wish you well,’ he said at last. ‘I know what you’ve been through, and me being a part of your life—’

  ‘You’ve been a big part of my life,’ she interrupted.

  ‘Being a part of your life has made me grow up, I was about to say. It’s matured me, strengthened me.’

  ‘So I have your blessing?’

  ‘Yes, you�
�ve talked me round.’ He sighed, and let go of her hand. ‘I didn’t think you would, but all right, you have my blessing. I won’t kick up a fuss any longer.’

  She smiled, all her love in her eyes. ‘So will you and Marigold be witnesses at my wedding?’

  ‘How does Clarence feel about that?’

  ‘He was the one to suggest it. He would dearly like you and him to be friends again. We talked about it, so I know it. He intends the four of us should have dinner at his house afterwards, if you can agree to some sort of accord. You will come, won’t you?’

  ‘All right…’ He nodded resignedly. ‘We’ll come. We’ll be there – for your sake, and I’ll be as sociable as I can be to Clarence.’

  ‘Thank you, Algie – from the bottom of my heart.’ Her eyes misted with tears at finally gaining his support. ‘Then he intends to throw a party on Christmas night for all our friends – you and Marigold included.’

  ‘All right,’ he agreed with a grin, and reached for her hand again. ‘So…after you’re married, shall I be able to see Christina from time to time? After all, she has two half-sisters at my house. And you know how close half-sisters can be…’

  * * *

  Chapter 38

  As he rode home gingerly on his bicycle in the frosty, moonlit night, Algie skidded once or twice, but managed to regain his equilibrium before actually coming a cropper. Lack of concentration was the cause, pondering Aurelia and the change in her fortunes. Despite his initial anger and resentment, he realised that her marriage to Clarence had actually set him free, not just financially, but emotionally too. He was finally able to let go of her, and that fact alone came as a huge relief, to his surprise. No longer would she be a burden on his conscience, no longer would she play a role of any significance in his life, no longer would she tempt him just by being available. It was liberation. His regard for her, his affection, his passion – the entire weight of all those feelings – all seemed to have been spirited away, lost in the crisp night air. The abiding legacy of Christina was still a concern however, and he was determined that he would always contribute financially to her upkeep, irrespective of Clarence’s wishes.