Gentlemen and Players

by Frances Vernon

  Susan looked away. Sophia and Edwin had heard more from Sarah and knew more of her than she did. She watched Sarah, who had drifted over to the window and was standing there, pushing one little smooth hand through her hair and the other against the glass. She was commenting on the square garden and the remains of the twilight.

  ‘But this is dull for you and we’re going to have company, are we not?’ she said suddenly. Susan thought of words to describe Sarah’s remark: artless, arrogant, childish, sly, charming, stupid, clever.

  ‘Indeed, Sarah,’ said Sophia. ‘Now sit and be good.’

  Sarah laughed. ‘I am sorry, but I never prattled nonsense in my life before.’ She was charming, preparing herself for the arrival of others.

  ‘About your ambition to be a fallen women, my dear Sarah,’ said Edwin, and she looked up, wide-eyed; ‘there is a young man coming tonight with whom you may as well start. He’s my grandest connection, you know, a distant connection on the distaff side, to be sure, but still. One day he will be a baronet. He won’t be able for some time to keep you in the luxury you require, I must warn you: I believe he tries to live on three hundred a year, and he’s a great one for expensive youthful revelry of all kinds.’

  ‘And may we ask the name of this eminent young gentleman?’ said Susan.

  ‘Gabriel Morrison. Lumbering young cub, but I grant you he has a pretty face,’ he said in a middle-aged way, and then smiled at Sophia.

  ‘You’re jealous of his charm,’ said Sophia. ‘You shouldn’t let him sponge on you.’

  ‘My late husband used to sponge,’ said Sarah, and she added nothing. The guests began to arrive five minutes later.

  There were two couples and a widower besides Gabriel Morrison. Susan sat next to the widower at dinner. He discovered that she was the wife of a country parson, and told her that he was an atheist. He was elderly, plain, and enthusiastic, and Susan pretended to be as High Church as her husband. Edwin, who was talking shop with Sir Matthew Campbell, a Harley Street physician, thought that Susan was teasing, almost flirting. Susan rather wanted to continue with Mrs Mowbray, a big blonde woman who had been to Newnham and wrote novelettes, a conversation which she had begun before dinner, but she was too far away.

  The widower gave her up and on her other side Mr Mowbray was talking to Lady Campbell. Susan spent some time looking alternately at her plate and at Sarah, who was sitting opposite her, talking to Gabriel Morrison on her right.

  Gabriel Morrison was not wickedly handsome. He had a sweet boy’s face and a powerful man’s body. He was well over six foot and he had towered over Susan when they had briefly asked a few questions of each other in the drawing room. He was very young, no more than twenty-two or -three, and he had made her think of the day when her Alfred would bend his head down to talk to her. He had soft dark hair, not worn deliberately long, but which had not been cut for some time. His clear eyes were grey, and he seemed to hold them either very wide open or half closed. He had a heart-shaped face and a pink-and-white complexion, his nose was straight and short and his mouth was small, mobile and delicately coloured; it reminded Susan of her own and of Sophia’s.

  ‘You must call me Sarah, Mr Morrison,’ said Sarah, and Susan looked up. ‘It’s not, you see, that I wish to encourage great, early familiarity – but I cannot bear to be called Templecombe, and I am not divorced, and so I cannot really be Miss Pagett. Do you see?’ They had been talking for some time but until now Sarah had said very little except to encourage.

  ‘Oh, yes. You’ll have to call me Gabriel, then, which I shan’t like at all.’ He had a mischievous smile.

  Sarah drew back and murmured, one hand poised over her mouth, ‘Oh why not, Mr Morrison?’

  ‘It’s a horrible name, isn’t it?’

  ‘No.’ She paused and smiled. ‘Have you no others to use?’

  ‘Two. But they’re worse.’

  ‘Please tell me in confidence, Mr Morrison.’

  ‘Beresford Lancelot,’ he said in her ear.

  ‘Oh, dear. Gabriel after the archangel?’

  ‘Lord, no. My mamma was literary and artistic, don’t you know. I was named for her dear friend Dante Gabriel Rossetti – actually she only met him once – and Sir Lancelot.’

  Sarah looked a little ignorant. She was half-smiling. He leant towards her. ‘The wicked one in the “Morte d’Arthur”, you know.’

  ‘How silly of me to forget. And Beresford?’

  ‘A concession to convention, or the nearest thing to it. My mother’s maiden name.’

  ‘Well, no,’ said Sarah a moment later. ‘It can’t be nice to have very fanciful names. But the other way around – boring names, you know – must be quite as bad. My younger sister is Susan Rose.’

  ‘Oh, I was sure Mrs Sacheverell’s name was Sophia?’

  Sarah spoke softly. ‘No, the lady opposite is our Susan Rose.’

  Susan was looking. Mr Morrison looked discomfited and Sarah looked very concerned for his comfort, her gentle smile on her face.

  CHAPTER 16

  CHILDREN

  Susan had considered adopting Sarah’s daughters, Charlotte and Emily, who were now seven and five, but they were not happy little girls. They had come on a long visit in May, and it was now the end of July, and they were still fretful London children.

  Susan was checking the books in the shade of the dining room, and at her side there was a pile of newly cut out linen which she would later teach Charlotte to sew into a shift for herself. She thought that Charlotte and Emily should learn plain sewing, just as the little girls in the village did. Susan remembered the fine samplers she had stitched as a child instead of useful garments and thought of how little girls nowadays were seldom made to strain their eyes over delicate work. Charlotte had learned neither.

  It was too fine outside for the children to do anything but play in the garden. Susan listened to the loud ticking of the grandfather clock and the bumbling of the bees in the nasturtiums below the open window. She rather wanted to carry on reading Diana of the Crossways, but it was before luncheon and she had a great deal to do. The little girls, who did not have books to see to and calls to make, were not playing in the garden. Susan went up to the nursery and found them quarrelling listlessly over the dolls’ tea party they were giving while the nanny was busy scolding the nursery maid in the night nursery.

  ‘Outside with the pair of you,’ said Susan very cheerfully, putting an arm round each of them. ‘Just look at the sunshine. Don’t you want to go and tease the frogs in the lily pond?’ They had once spent a happy fifteen minutes doing that on such a day as this.

  ‘But we’ve been for our morning walk, Aunt Susan,’ said Charlotte.

  ‘I know, dear, but you can’t get enough fresh air at your age, you know. Run along now.’

  ‘Yes, Aunt Susan.’

  She made them take off their shoes and socks before going outside. As a child she had always wanted to go barefoot in the summer, but had never been allowed to. Charlotte said that the gravel hurt her feet and there were prickly weeds in the lawns, but Susan denied this. Because she had upset the child she gave them both permission to paddle in the shallow lily pond if they liked. She thought of the green slime oozing between their hot, scratched toes, and the hems of the comfortable blue dimity smocks she had made for them getting wet and flapping freely against their bare legs. Her own lisle stockings itched.

  After a while they did step gingerly into the pond and seemed to be enjoying it. Susan smiled. She had begun to think that she would have no more children of her own, for she had not conceived in the two years following Alfred’s birth, and she had pain and irregular bleeding from her womb, although the doctor and the midwife could not tell her why.

  She started to work at her accounts again, and was disturbed by the children’s shouting. She thought that she would leave them to fight it out, so long as they did not come to blows, and then remembered that Octavius was in his study, which faced the back garden. She went outside, pu
t an end to the quarrel and sent them to pick raspberries under the gardener’s supervision.

  She finished the books and began a letter to Sarah.

  ‘Lynmore Rectory, 20th July, 1888,’ she began carefully, and then wrote, ‘My dear Sarah.’ She did not know quite what she was going to write.

  ‘Dearest Sarah, you have not written so frequently as you used to, of late. I hope the reason is that you have many new friends, and are well occupied. Occupation is the thing: look what it’s done for Sophia. Unfortunately she has gone too far, as one would expect: it is permissible for Mrs Gladstone to employ “fallen women” in her own house but really not for the wives of ordinary mortals! And it is leading her to Women’s Rights which, fortunately I suppose, seems merely to amuse her husband. I do believe that as politicians meddle more and more with social questions women ought to have the vote, for such things verge on their own sphere; but their sphere is the home. (And I think it positively immodest for a woman to be attended by a male doctor, for there are certain things which it is impossible to confide to them – how could they understand?) Women are unsuited for the great majority of professions. Don’t, Sarah, let Sophia infect you with her excessive enthusiasm! Her notions about “free love”, which, thank God, she has the sense not to put into practice, are wicked nonsense. It’s not a question of convention; “free love” or being a “fallen woman” would make no woman happy, it’s only men who would take any real pleasure in such a state of affairs.

  ‘Woman’s sphere is the home, I said. A fine old truism, but mine is the parish! I am really curate to Octavius as well as his wife, although naturally I do nothing sacerdotal. Visiting, organizing, administering, I am always run off my feet. I know myself to be truly useful. There are many women like myself whose unpaid work makes the world go round. I think that really we have a better chance of reaching Heaven than the men! But there, that’s irreverent, is it not?’ She knew that Sarah would not understand, but she still did not know what to write to her.

  ‘You mentioned in your last letter that Mr Morrison called on you at Bryanston Square. It was a nice surprise, I dare say. He is an agreeable young man and very handsome in his way, although I myself never did fancy a man who has quite such a high opinion of himself as I suspect young Mr Morrison has. All men are as conceited as little boys but some men are actually more so! I ought not to tell you so, but he told Sophia that you reminded him of the Mona Lisa and thought you were a most intriguing, clever little woman. He is perhaps a trifle rash and unsubtle? It is true of course, but Sarah pray be careful. He may try to seduce you, for you are an unprotected woman, a “fallen” woman already, Sarah, if that gives you any pleasure, not in the usual sense, but because you have deserted your husband and your children and become, in society’s eyes, very odd. You are no longer known, are you? If you submit to Mr Morrison you will never forgive yourself and naturally you don’t need to be told that he will not respect you. But it is most important that you should respect yourself: if women had the animal passions of men it would all be fairly simple, but the truth is that they do not, and therefore they must withold themselves, in order to preserve their influence with men. Do you understand me? I know your jokes about how you mean to become a courtesan, and of course we all tease you about it, but I fear that young Mr Morrison might not understand your teasing.’

  Susan did not tease Sarah about her ambitions. She had written several letters to her sister, all very similar, as similar as Sarah’s letters. All this she knew very well. She re-read the letter and sighed. Nothing in it indicated that Sarah shocked her. Edwin Sacheverell had assured her that nothing would be more likely to make Sarah take action, and she believed him. He had assured her as a doctor that Sarah was not at all mad, only childlike: overexcited, mentally deficient, and yet very shrewd.

  Susan got up and walked out into the garden to pace. She decided to write to Edwin and tell him that it was indulgence which had made Sarah childish. She was going to tell him that she would no longer indulge her sister.

  Shrieks came from the kitchen garden and Susan ran. It was Emily, who had been stung by a wasp. Charlotte was taunting her. Susan slapped Charlotte instinctively and sent her inside. She put her arm round the injured little girl and hustled her into the stillroom where she bathed the sting with vinegar. Emily was crying, not with pain and shock and anger, thought Susan, but with childish grief. Charlotte shouted from the stairs as Susan tried to nurse her younger sister: ‘I hate it here and I want to go home!’ She had never said it before and now she had shouted it so that Octavius, who had not wanted the children to come, must have heard. For some moments Susan did nothing to either of them and then she took Emily by the hand, gathered up Charlotte on the staircase, led them back to the nursery and left them there.

  She went back to her letter. ‘I have re-read this,’ she scribbled as soon as she sat down, ‘and I see that I have said that you “deserted your children”. I thought it was too strong a way of putting it but I’m afraid that after a moment’s consideration I no longer think so. You have deserted your children, Sarah, which you had no right to do, however much you hated your husband. I’ve written lies about how well your little girls are picking up: they’re not. They are very unhappy, fretful and disturbed and although they’re obedient after a fashion they’re a pair of nasty whining little chits, through no fault of their own. They have spent all their lives shut up in a nursery at the top of that house of yours (I’m sorry – your husband’s) and have never had any affection from anyone. How could they be nice, Jolly, loving children under such circumstances? I’ve done everything I can for them but to no avail, the rot set in years ago and no amount of good bringing-up will ever correct it. You are a selfish woman, Sarah Templecombe, and you’ve ruined your children. You won’t take any of this in, will you? It’s water off a duck’s back as always, there’s no more doing anything with you than there is with Charlotte and Emily. I shan’t retract a word of this, it’s high time I spoke my mind.

  ‘Your affectionate sister, Susan Potter.

  ‘P.S. You delight childishly as Sophia used to in no longer moving in the first circles. You consider, don’t you, that you’ve abandoned fashionable follies? Might I remind you that it is very much the thing to neglect one’s children and leave them entirely in the hands of their nurses and governesses? But there, your children saw so little of you when they lived in the same house that I should think that if a maternal fit came over you, they’d flee. Make no mistake about it, my dear, they’re not pining for their mamma.’

  Susan sealed the letter immediately and went out to post it herself, although she could have sent someone. When she had posted it she walked a little way along the dusty road to Congleton, then turned back when she realised that it was past time for luncheon. She had not been late for a meal since she was a child, and she thought that she had never in her life written a really spiteful letter.

  ‘I’ve never known you be unpunctual, Susan,’ said Octavius. ‘I apologise for beginning without you but Molly assured me that something or other would be wrecked if they kept it cooking.’

  ‘The peas, I expect. Benedictus benedicat,’ muttered Susan as she sat down in front of her plate of smoked mackerel.

  ‘Dear, is something wrong?’

  ‘Oh, Octavius, may I tell you?’

  ‘Yes – yes, indeed, my dear. You can tell me what you like.’ He watched her with round eyes, holding his napkin tightly.

  ‘I’ve just written – and posted – the most terrible letter, Octavius. To Sarah. I – I accused her of neglecting her children and I said they didn’t love her. And I don’t even know for sure whether they do or not, they’re not exactly forthcoming.’

  ‘They make a good deal of noise nonetheless …’

  ‘Oh, for God’s sake, Octavius! Let me finish.’ He jumped.

  ‘You know how unbalanced she is, God knows what my remarks may do to her. Dr Sacheverell says she oughtn’t to be talked to seriously, let alone chided, u
ntil she’s settled down. I’m so worried, Octavius, she’s had over a year to settle down in and she’s queerer than ever, and I just know I’ll have made her worse.’

  ‘Susan, you know you’ve always said Dr Sacheverell is an old fraud who hasn’t a clue how to cope with Sarah,’ he muttered, patting her hand and eating.

  ‘I have not,’ said Susan. This was largely true. ‘I’ve been spiteful and hateful. And this morning I slapped Charlotte and she didn’t really deserve it.’ He gave her a flickering smile.

  ‘Now, Sukey – Sukey, you’ll manage excellently, you know you will. No real harm will be done. Don’t let’s worry about it.’

  ‘I shall worry about it,’ said Susan.

  A little later she asked him what he would like for dinner tomorrow night and they spent the rest of luncheon in more cheerful discussion.

  *

  On the day Susan’s letter arrived, Gabriel Morrison called on Sarah for the second time since he had first met her at the Sacheverells’. He lived quite near by, in rooms in Bayswater, on three hundred a year, without servants. His landlady cleaned his rooms, cooked dinner for him when he wanted to eat at home, and attended to his laundry. Sarah had never met a young man who lived in such a way, although Edwin told her that when he had first defied his father by not going into the Church, he had lived in a single room on ninety pounds a year. Gabriel had never met a woman who had separated from her husband and lived alone with a companion to whom she hardly ever spoke.

  He called on her on his way back from the Strand, where he had bought a new gun for the shooting season. Almost absent-mindedly he took it with him into the drawing room where Sarah, dressed in deep blue and deep cream with an embroidered band in her hair, was sitting on the sofa, smiling at him, poised with her feet to one side and her arm lolling over the back, able to be described as an older woman who had not quite lost her youthful charm.

  ‘For the Glorious Twelfth, Gabriel?’ she said after a moment, when he had apologised for bringing it and had laid it gently against the wall. ‘Think of the poor little birds.’