‘It would have been civil to thank the man.’
‘Thank him? For what?’
‘He did his best for you.’
‘Well, his best wasn’t good enough.’
‘Why do you sound so bitter?’ Harding eyed her curiously. ‘What harm do you imagine he did you?’
‘I don’t wish to discuss the doctor or his administrations or his lack of them. The same applies to that old harridan who calls herself a midwife. In fact, I don’t want to discuss the birth or anything to do with it.’
‘Most women talk about nothing else. They enjoy gossiping and exchanging stories about their childbed experiences.’
She raised a brow.
‘Really? What empty, boring lives they must lead.’
A cloud darkened his eyes and he looked anxious.
‘I hope you are going to be all right to Lottie.’
His anxiety made him seem vulnerable and his vulnerability pulled at her heart. She touched his hand, the contact of each finger with his skin almost painful in its pleasure.
‘You love her, don’t you?’
He nodded.
‘Then I love her too.’
But she knew as she said the words that they meant nothing.
13
‘NOW that Flemintina is the child’s nurse,’ Regina told the servants, ‘and Jenny’s working in the fields, and Old Abe’s too old to work properly, I’ll need more house slaves. Callie Mae, can you think of anyone who would be worth seeing? I don’t want to waste my time interviewing everyone from the quarters.’
The Negroes were gathered before her in the drawing-room, Callie Mae, Flemintina, Minda, Sal, Big Kate, Melie Anne, Joseph and Westminster.
‘How many were you thinkin’ of, Miss Regina?’ Callie Mae inquired. ‘And wenches or bucks?’
‘I think I’d better have another man for the house and a man to do odd jobs inside and out like fixing things and cutting grass. And one woman. Flemintina can still do other work apart from seeing to Lottie—the bedrooms, for instance. I don’t like too many people about the place.’
‘There’s Lizzie,’ Callie Mae ventured. ‘She’s young and quiet-spoken. Keeps herself clean and tidy too.’
‘Tell her to come and see me this morning.’
‘Yes, Miss Regina.’
Westminster spoke up. ‘Bill’s good and strong. So’s Mowden.’
‘Where are they just now? In the fields?’
‘Yes, Miss Regina, ma’am.’
‘I’ll have a word with Mr Harding and see what he thinks first. That’s all just now. Except for one thing. I don’t want all of you petting and handling and wasting so much time with Lottie and that includes you, Flemintina. I want her properly looked after but not spoiled. Is that clear?’
There was a general murmur of:
‘Yes, Miss Regina, ma’am.’
But they all lowered their eyes and Regina had the irritating feeling that they had no intention of obeying this particular order. The worst of it was, Harding encouraged the general atmosphere of adoration where Lottie was concerned. He didn’t say much, he even tried to look unconcerned, but it was obvious that he enjoyed the eager chatter of the house slaves when they had some new story to relate about what Lottie had done or not done, how she’d looked, how she’d sounded, how she’d slept or not slept. She had actually heard his abrupt bursts of laughter mingled with Flemintina’s high-pitched shrieks of hilarity in Lottie’s room. He was besotted with the child. It was ridiculous. She wasn’t even pretty with her fat face and tufty hair. Now when he came in for tea, Lottie had to be brought down to the drawing-room to sit on his knee and share a biscuit and be fed milk from a special cup.
At first she hadn’t minded the sight of his big hands awkwardly holding the infant. She had even laughed at his awkwardness and taken the child, proud at being able to show him how competent she was at handling it, or how she could make it stop screaming by bringing up its wind. At first, of course, Lottie had slept most of each day and neither of them had much contact with her. But as weeks and then months passed, the little girl began to develop a personality and was wide awake for longer and longer periods and all the time demanding someone’s attention. She was a plump, sturdy child with hair the same dark colour as Harding’s. She had his dark eyes too but hers were large and soft and round.
At six months her fat legs were bending and bouncing on Harding’s knee and determinedly clambering all over him. Her chubby hands were grabbing at him in delight, pulling at his mouth, his nose, his hair.
‘Lottie!’ Regina would chastise. ‘Bad girl! Sit down at once and take your milk.’
‘Oh, leave her alone,’ Harding always replied. ‘It’s good exercise for her.’
Tea time was no longer peaceful. It was no longer an opportunity to have Harding to herself. No longer was there any chance to talk to him. She brushed her hair until it gleamed, dressed in beautiful gowns, wore Mistress Kitty’s jewellery, but she might as well have been invisible. Harding had no eyes, no time, no interest, no attention for anyone but his daughter. Lottie now dominated their relationship, if they had any relationship at all. When they had been married they had continued as they had done before and slept in their own rooms except on the nights when Harding came to make love to her. If it could be called making love, she often thought bitterly. He had never told her that he loved her. Certainly she had not minded the arrangement at first. Before Lottie had come on the scene, it had worked very well. She liked to have a time and an area of privacy in her life. Privacy was something she had always jealously guarded, had hugged to herself with the same secret, miserly pleasure as with the looted gold coins she had brought all the way from the Highlands after the battle of Culloden.
But now she lay alone in her bed each morning stiff and strained and resentful, listening for any sounds coming from Harding’s room. She was aware that he often had the child brought to him early so that he could have a few minutes with her before going downstairs and starting his daily routine. The sounds of his deep voice, warm and soft with an affection that he’d never shown to her, filled her with anger. It was so unfair. She was his wife. She should come first in everything. Did he think she was nothing but a chattel, something with no feelings, a machine to attend to his house, his physical comforts, his sexual needs? She was a good wife. From the moment she rose in the morning until she lay down in bed every night, she worked conscientiously to be a good wife and run his house properly and efficiently. It was her life’s work, her whole purpose in life to make sure that he had everything he wanted. He had wanted a child and even in that she had succeeded. She had given him a child. It wasn’t her fault that the child had not been a son. But now, seeing how he behaved with Lottie, she was afraid to think of how he would be if he did have a son.
Mornings became a torment to her and she started every day with tension that more often than not developed into a headache. How dare he ignore her and lavish so much love and attention on a fat, ugly, infant who wasn’t what he or the servants claimed at all? There was nothing particularly clever about anything the child did. She tried to tell him, to make him see sense and stop making such a fool of himself, not to mention completely ruining the child. Once his precious prodigy began to walk and talk and be aware of the power she held over her poor doting fool of a Papa, she would lead him a merry dance. He was fast making the child into a spoiled, selfish, repulsive little monster who dominated the whole house and everyone in it. She told him so.
‘I might have known,’ he sneered, ‘that you would be incapable of any normal feelings, even for your own child. It’s a good thing the child has me. I shudder to think what a barren, loveless life she might have had with no one but you.’
‘What about the barren, loveless life I’ve had?’ she wanted to cry out to him, but the hatred in his eyes made her afraid of any further attempts to reach out to him. Eventually, however, she did broach the subject of permanently sharing a room. For long agonising hours and days beforehand she had t
hought about the decision and the best manner to convey it to Harding. She had meant to be very diplomatic and choose the right moment and be at her most attractive and appealing. She had meant to catch Harding at his most intimate and vulnerable time. She had planned to make the offer to him after they had made love and were close to one another. She’d wanted to whisper that he could be with her like this every night, she’d longed to confess to him that her need to feel continuously close to him, to be part of him, outweighed even her basic compulsion to withdraw into herself.
But somehow she hadn’t been able to wait for the best time, and instead had blurted it out one night as they were parting at the top of the stairs to go to their respective rooms.
‘It isn’t right that we should be sleeping in separate rooms. We are man and wife. You may move in with me if you wish.’
His lips pulled back in an ugly sneer.
‘You are a bit late in deciding what is right and what is wrong, mistress. And don’t imagine that I don’t know how your twisted mind reached this decision. You are jealous of your own child.’
He’d walked away to his own room without even a polite goodnight to her.
Her normal feelings of insecurity and apprehension intensified. If he did not love her, could he not fall in love with someone else? But what could he do that would jeopardise her position at Forest Hall? She was his legal wife. He could not abandon her now. Or could he? Anxiously she leafed through the books on the drawing-room shelves in search of any legal information that might soothe and comfort her.
At other times, she squashed her anxieties, withered them, froze them and went about the business of running Forest Hall as coolly and efficiently as if nothing could possibly ruffle her. She sat opposite Harding every afternoon daintily sipping tea, a dignified outcast clinging surreptitiously to the borders of his attention with an occasional polite remark or query.
She kept telling herself that he could not do without her. For surely he loved her in his own way? In bed, what he lacked in tenderness was more than compensated for in passion. He was a passionate man and she amply fulfilled his passionate needs. Why should he want another woman? But of course, there was no other woman. The only other female in Harding’s life was Lottie. At eight months, she delighted him with her ridiculous jerky, half-sideways, bottom-jerking crawl. By then, of course, she could stretch up her arms when she wanted to be lifted. At a year she was enchanting him by squealing:
‘Papa! Papa!’
And of course, just as she had predicted, the child was absolutely spoiled. If she did not get all her own way, her plump face screwed up and reddened almost to purple as she yelled in outraged protest. She refused to be put down to sleep until far too late at night. Indeed she kept the same hours as Harding, only occasionally dozing off to sleep during the day when he was not there. She was fussy about her food, rejecting something she did not like, or when she had a whim not to eat at all, by upsetting and spilling the food on to the table or floor.
On one occasion when this happened, rage overcame Regina. It wasn’t only because she had just had the slaves thoroughly clean and polish the dining-room floor and the dining-room furniture. It wasn’t only because of Harding’s loving tolerance of the child’s misdemeanours, although it did occur to her, and with much bitterness, that he had no such tolerance for any of his wife’s faults. What really made her lash out and strike Lottie was the realisation that the child was in danger of becoming a little monster. Harding would obviously adore Lottie no matter what the child did or what she was like, but no one else would.
The astonishment with which Lottie received the stinging slap on her face registered in her saucer eyes and her moment of stunned silence. Then she let out a scream, followed by another and another during which she went rigid and Flemintina came running in panic and Harding went as white as the tablecloth.
‘It’s just temper.’ Regina attempted to make herself heard above the din. ‘There’s nothing wrong with her. Be quiet at once, Lottie. At once! Do you hear?’
After Flemintina had managed to pacify her and carry her from the room, Harding said,
‘Don’t you ever dare lay a finger on that child again.’
‘It was for her own good. Can’t you see what you’re doing to her?’
‘I’m warning you, mistress.’
There was such venom and fury in his eyes that it was as much as she could do to prevent herself bursting into tears.
‘I just don’t understand you,’ she managed, her voice bewildered and incredulous. ‘You were so insistent before. All you wanted was a son. You wanted a son to carry on your name, you said. I’ll never forget how disappointed I was for your sake when I discovered it was a daughter. Yet you’ve been absolutely stupid over the girl right from the start.’
‘I still want a son,’ Harding said. ‘That does not mean I need be cruel to my daughter.’
‘But you are cruel to her.’
‘I am being cruel to her? I, I am being cruel? What are you raving about now?’
‘I keep telling you. You’re ruining the child. You’re allowing her to have all her own way and to behave in whatever manner she fancies.’
‘She’s only a year old, a mere baby. What does she understand about behaviour?’
‘She understands very well and she’s got to be taught to behave properly.’
‘By beating her, no doubt?’
‘If necessary,’ Regina said coldly.
‘No, mistress, I would rather beat you and teach you a lesson than allow you to touch my daughter again. Do I make myself plain?’
Regina’s mouth twisted.
‘Oh, yes. Perfectly. You care about no one except her. She can do whatever she pleases and be whatever she pleases. All I can say, sir, is God help me if you do have a son.’
The more she thought along these lines, the more worried she became. She began to hope they didn’t have a son after all. Apart from perhaps giving Harding another ally against her, a son would have more claim to Forest Hall than she would, would he not? She felt sick with anxiety. She cared for the place even more passionately than she cared for Harding. It was her home. She belonged here. It was part of her. Often she wandered about the house caressing the walls and the furniture with gentle, adoring hands. Everything about it she knew and loved. The way the chandelier in the hall tinkled airily and did a little dance in the draught; the mirror polish on the floor and banisters; the luxurious draping of the four-poster beds; the blazing log fires in every room glimmering against silk brocade curtains; the elegant dining-room with its long mahogany table and panelled walls and sideboard laden with silver; rows and rows of books making an Aladdin’s cave of the drawing-room. Here she could escape alone into a hundred other worlds, worlds in which she could adventure, love and be loved, weep and laugh, lose herself and yet be safe. Often in the afternoon, after tea had been cleared away and Harding had left, or in the evening if he was occupied with Lottie, she would sit in the corner with a candle and a book, and shrink into the other world for comfort.
She loved the never-used ballroom, too, with its rows of silver-grey tall-backed chairs and its harpsichord and music stands and magnificent chandeliers.
It occurred to her, looking at the ballroom, that one day when Lottie was older, the child would need to learn how to dance and perhaps perform on the harpsichord. No doubt she would need to be given balls so that she could be introduced to and meet all sorts of people, especially beaux. That was the custom, was it not?
For the first time in many months, she felt a surge of happiness. Lottie would not be here monopolising Harding’s attention for ever. That was a fact that had not occurred to Harding. For many things and for many occasions, a young girl needed a mother much more than she needed a father. By capitalising on this fact, she could surely win Harding round and make him more aware of her again, grateful to her, even admiring.
Cautiously, casually, she broached the subject to him.
‘It is as well we
have a ballroom.’
Harding raised a brow.
‘Is it?’
She sighed. ‘I thought such things had never occurred to you.’
‘What things?’
She was sitting opposite him in the drawing-room, neatly stitching on her embroidery frame. She took her time in answering.
‘You believe you are the only one who has Lottie’s welfare at heart. You think you can do everything for her and know everything that has to be done. But of course you do not.’
‘I have no idea what you are talking about but I suspect it is something devious.’
She shrugged.
‘Oh, very well.’
After a minute or two of silence, he burst out,
‘Well? Explain yourself, woman!’
‘Your daughter is growing fast, sir. Are you going to allow her to throw her food around and screech like an animal forever? Are you going to have her working with you on the plantation dressed in boy’s clothes? She will learn some choice language there from the overseer and the like, I have no doubt. Are you going to keep her by your side in your office and teach her how to scrape a quill across a ledger? Have these to be her accomplishments? Is that all you can offer her? May I give you a warning, sir? She will not thank you for launching her into womanhood and fashionable society with so poor a preparation.’
She saw by his face that he had taken her point. He would suffer anything for his precious Lottie, even his wife. Bitterness rose like bile inside her but she lowered her eyes and swallowed it down.
‘I wish to make her some pretty dresses but I need material. When can we go to Williamsburg to do some shopping? Or would it be more convenient to go to the store? Have you business to do there?’
He looked subdued, thoughtful. At last he said,
‘Yes, it is time I went and settled my account there. You can come and purchase whatever you need from the store and also make a list of anything you want sent over from Glasgow.’
‘I’ll need linen and thread lace for underwear, and silks and taffetas for dresses and lots of pretty ribbons. When she gets older, of course, she must learn to sew for herself. I will teach her. She should also learn the social graces. I can teach her those too. But when it comes time for her to learn to perform on a musical instrument, I will have to engage a tutor. I could begin taking lessons myself just now, of course, so that I might be of help to her. Then there’s dancing. That’s what I meant when I said it was as well we have a ballroom. Eventually she’ll want to meet people. She’ll want us to give her balls, also to attend concerts and other gatherings.’ She sighed. ‘As you know, I have no time for such things and I’m happier without social intercourse, but for Lottie’s sake I will entertain, because it is the proper thing to do. Of course, I realise she’s only a baby yet.’
The Tobacco Lords Trilogy Page 77
