But the most diverting thing she taught me was how to walk across a rope without falling. She had discovered the secret of rope dancing from Maddison, my mamãe’s lusty maid, and she revealed that secret to me, having first obtained permission from mamãe, who declared that the tight rope must be no higher than ten inches and be strung across the lawn to prevent injury. At first, we obeyed mamãe’s rules. I learnt how to walk across the rope this way while playing my drum. Later, whenever mamãe quitted town to attend to her students at Bunberry school, Annie raised the rope three feet high, and I practised ‘roasting the pig’ by laying myself upon the rope, holding it with my hands and with my feet crossed, and ever so swiftly, turning round and round.
‘Cousin Annie, did you run away from your mamma?’
Annie nodded. ‘To be sure I did. Ever since I was a child, she never let me do what I pleased unless I begged for permission first. Enough, says I.’
‘I’ve run away two times, Annie.’ I recalled how I had hid in the Pemberley stables and later atop my avô’s turret.
‘Twice?’ Annie questioned me with raised brows. ‘Well, when you run away next time, just make sure your papa knows exactly where you went. Always leave a note on your pillow. That’s the first rule for running away. And when he comes to get you, tell him your demands.’
‘My demands?’
‘Tell him what you want and how you won’t return home unless you get it.’
One afternoon, mamãe and Annie presented me with a set of proper boy’s clothes to march in and play my drum. ‘Such foolery,’ exclaimed papai, because only boys were breeched at this age. Mamãe, who could be just as headstrong as any man, refused to give up her idea. She and Annie had sewn me a white cambric shirt trimmed with ruffles, and nankeen breeches that buttoned above the waist onto a short red jacket with two rows of brass buttons. To complete the ensemble, they had bought a striking red military-style cap with tassel from the milliner, white stockings from the hosier and black slippers with straps from the shoe-maker.
‘You daren’t cut her hair, or else…’ papai shook his finger at mamãe.
‘Or else what?’ mamãe teased him, a pair of scissors in her hand. ‘There, there, now, I promise you I shan’t cut off all her hair. I simply wish to give you a small lock as a remembrance of this special day.’
‘Her hair is so silky and soft.’ A tear formed in papai’s eye as he beheld the lock in his hand.
Mamãe snipped another small lock for Annie, who would be departing two days hence, because my cousin wished to return home to Rosings. Annie had exchanged letters with her two pied ponies, both of whom missed her deeply, at least that’s what I think she wanted me to believe, but we both knew that a lonely Lady Catherine had written her the letters, expressing her wish to see her daughter again before she, her ladyship, died someday, whenever that would be. ‘Adeus, cousin Annie!’ cried I. Upon her leave-taking in late July, I lost my first true friend, and the sorrow of it made me most melancholy. Papai worried about me moping round the house, and during breakfast one morning, he hinted at a grand surprise for me.
‘Oh, tell me, tell me,’ begged I.
Papai’s eyes twinkled. ‘We shall host a certain important personage.’
‘Papai, who is it?’
‘It’s Pico Robinson.’
Ai de mim! My heart sank to my toes upon hearing that my tormentor Pico Robinson would visit us in Scarborough and thereby ruin what remained of my summer.
Mamãe poured me another cup of chocolate. ‘Is it not great news?’
‘Não, não, não.’ I pushed the chocolate away.
‘My dear girl,’ papai set down his morning newspaper. ‘What are you about? You were great play-fellows with Pico and his brother during our stay in the old wood.’
‘I hate him hugeously. Please, papai, please make him go whoam.’
‘Manners, Sofia-Elisabete,’ he scolded me. ‘He is your cousin.’
‘He isna my cousin.’ I scowled at papai.
‘Tom Robinson is my half-brother,’ papai revealed to me. ‘How lucky you are, for did you not wish for half of a brother? Well, now, you have half of a boy cousin, who, being our near relation, is just as good in my mind.’
I gaped at papai in disbelief. ‘Gaaaaaahhh,’ shouted I, and I took to my heels. I bounded up the stairs to my bedchamber, where I beat a defiant To Arms – the drum roll for raising the alarm that the enemy was upon us. Papai berated me for my unsoldierly conduct, and for the first time ever, he said he would confiscate my drum as punishment. At first, I knew not what he meant. When he took away my drum, only then did I realise that my drum was being sent to gaol.
‘It i’n’t fair.’ I ran the length of the passage after papai. ‘It’s my drum! It’s my drum!’ I sought the comfort of mamãe’s arms where I complained of my mistreatment, but she instructed me on something called etiquette. She said that a true Christian politeness comes from a pure heart – one that is good and kind.
‘If you wish to be a proper lady, you must exercise the goodness of your heart every day and extend the gentle courtesies of life to everyone, including Pico,’ advised she.
I turned away in a pout.
‘Listen to me, child. Pico is our guest. A good hostess must always see to the comfort and happiness of her guests, and she must never insult them or be rude to them,’ continued she.
‘He calls me nincompoop.’
‘Rudeness must not be met with rudeness,’ returned she.
But I refused to subscribe to her maxims.
Ere long my half of a cousin Pico, he being a whole five years older than me, strutted into our drawing room all dressed in the style with his fancy high-waist blue breeches and blue jacket – these things having been paid for by my avô. He bowed genteel-like, presenting mamãe with a nosegay. She complimented him on what a handsome boy he was.
‘How are ter?’ He grinned at me, his eyes gleaming with mischief, his plans set into motion on how best to torture me with spiders – I was sure of it.
I sneered at him, which only made him laugh, and when I deigned to give my half of a cousin a quick curtsey, he laughed at me again. Papai boasted of the wonders of Scarborough, and he remarked how glad I was for Pico’s visit. ‘Sofia-Elisabete has many an exciting adventure planned for the two of you,’ added he. Impossible, I told myself. I shot a confused glance at papai, wondering why he was allowed to lie, but I was not.
Later, after we had supped, mamãe did the unthinkable and asked Pico to entertain us with a story. I suppose she had no choice when she aimed to be a good hostess to our guest. We sat near Pico, who struck a silly pose leaning on the side of the chimney-piece, as he recited his favourite story, one that had been written an age ago by Francis Godwin, Bishop of Llandaff, about Domingo Gonsales’s strange voyage to the world in the moon. Listening to Pico’s boyish version of the tale, I realised he was a brilliant story-teller, and I begrudged him nought, for did I not pride myself on being a diverting and charming story-teller whenever I chose to be?
Pico recounted how the young Spanish nobleman, Domingo Gonsales, defied his parents and ran away from home to go warring, much to their unhappiness. ‘He fought the Prince o’ Orange an’ his troops. “Gie me yer munny,” demanded Gonsales, but the prince’s trooper replied, “I’ll gie thee nowt.” So Gonsales dispatch’d him good wi’ his pistol – the man’s blood flowin’ like a riv’let – an’ Gonsales plunder’d the man’s munny an’ other stuff worth two hundred ducats.’
‘Papai, why did he patch the trooper’s clothes?’
‘I shall tell you later,’ whispered papai, but I knew this meant he would never tell me.
Pico described how Domingo Gonsales returned to Seville and got into a heap of trouble. ‘Gonsales fought a duel wi’ pistols an’ he killed the man – booffft! – so escape to Lisbon he did. Munny he needed now, so he left his wife an’ brats to go a-tradin’ for diamonds, em’ralds an’ pearls in the East Indies, but on the way whoam he took ill.’
‘Mamãe, what’s an emerald?’
‘’Tis a green gemstone,’ mamãe showed me her sparkling green wedding-ring.
Pico continued on, telling us how Domingo Gonsales did some rusticating for a year to improve his health and how he puzzled his wits together to become the first flying man. ‘Gonsales lived on the Isle of St. Helens, wheer he found huge flocks of wild gansas wi’ claws like an eagle. He harness’d twenty-five gansas to carry him inside an engine he had made.’
‘Papai, what’s an engine?’
‘It’s a machine, a device,’ papai told me. ‘His might have resembled a wooden chair – something for him to sit on.’
Pico described how Domingo Gonsales set sail for Spain, when an English fleet attacked his ship. Afore his ship crashed on the rocks an’ smashed everyone to a million bloody bits, Gonsales, who had harness’d his gansas to the engine, escap’d by flyin’ to Cape Verde. “Lo there!” cried he. Stinkin’ savages wi’ long staves charg’d towards ’em, an’ so the gansas took flight again, this time to the top of a pike, fifteen miles high, above the clouds, the gansas a-puffin’ an’ a-blowin’ an’ ready to burst from a’ the hard work.’
I turned to papai. ‘Are clouds soft and furry?’
‘Perhaps one day I shall take you to see a cloud, my dear child.’ Papai winked at me. ‘Go on, Pico.’
‘Well, after a bit o’ rest for the gansas, summat odd happened. “O my stars,” shouted Gonsales. The gansas struck bolt upright, an’ they drifted higher an’ higher, floatin’ in the air. Gonsales believ’d that wi’out his true Spanish might, he would ha’ died o’ fear.’
‘But where did they float to? Oh, tell me, tell me,’ pleaded I.
Pico revealed that Domingo Gonsales and his gansas floated in the air for what seemed an eternity – but was just eleven days – surrounded by a sky lit up with bright stars. On the twelfth day, they descended on the world in the moon. ‘He came ’pon the Lunars – moon men, moon women an’ moon children – who spoke in tunes. Fal de ral de ra. Some o’ the moon men stood ten feet tall, an’ some o’ the ancient-lookin’ ones were one thousand years old an’ they stank o’ rotten cheese.’
Pico told us of a perfect world, a paradise, where the Lunars knew not pain, hunger, murder or thievery. ‘Thieves? Pfft.’ They needed not lawyers, as there was no contention amongst them. ‘Lawyers? Pfft.’ They needed not doctors that much, as the air was pure and temperate; for, it never rained, and never did a wind blow on the moon. ‘Doctors? Pfft. The Lunars, being good Christian folk, lived wi’ love, peace an’ friendship. If a moon child grew up wick’d, they’d trade him for a child in America, which is wheer they got the tobacco for the moon men to smoke.’
And so Pico concluded the story of Domingo Gonsales, who journeyed back to earth, it taking him a whole nine days to do so. ‘He landed in China, near the city o’ Pequin, wheer a devilish set o’ men arrested him for being a magician. But he learnt to speak summat called Mandarin wi’ the hopes he could return to Spain.’ Pico bowed to our applause, declaring his intent to see the world and have mighty adventures just like his hero Domingo Gonsales did.
That night, after we children had gone to bed, I dreamt of a voyage on the high seas, and when our vessel hit a gale, Pico and I climbed atop a gigantic gansa to fly to the world in the moon. ‘Viva!’ That is how I greeted the moon children who gathered round us, dressed in their moon-coloured clothes. ‘Pray let us exchange Pico for a well-behaved moon child?’ I suggested to them. And so we did. A pretty moon boy climbed atop the gansa with me, and we descended to earth where we landed in the countryside near Seville, for my aim had been off. There, I found a pot of chocolate ducats half buried in a field, and I bought us pão espanhol and butter that had been made in Alcalá. We lodged that evening on an old palheiro – a haystack with a wood pole in the centre – and when the sky darkened and the bright moon appeared, we could make out Pico-in-the-Moon. My cousin would live there for ever, or at least for one thousand years, unless the Lunars exchanged him for a child in America given his wicked humour and bad manners.
The next morning at breakfast mamãe continued her attentions to Pico, and she surprised him with his favourite hasty pudding all nicely dished up with a hole in the middle containing the melted butter and treacle. We never ate pudding for breakfast, and so it bewildered me why all of a sudden my parents thought it the tastiest thing in the world.
‘O tasty hasty! O hasty tasty!’ Papai winked at us. ‘Observe my technique. I shall spoon some pudding from the brim of the plate, after which I shall plunder the sauce hole – mind you, without demolishing it – and as quick as can be, I shall devour the spoonful of hot pudding. Mmm…what triumph.’
‘Papai, I bet a ha’penny that I shan’t ruin my sauce hole.’
‘Done! I’ll take your bet.’
I grasped my spoon, and I set about to fortify my sauce hole with extra pudding.
Pico scrutinised the walls of my pudding fortress. ‘Yer need a drawbridge for yer castle.’
‘A drawbridge?’
‘A bridge for the troopers an’ their hosses to cross to get into the castle.’ With his spoon, Pico smashed a part of the wall surrounding my butter and treacle, and the buttery brown liquid spilled forth, like a muddy moat oozing in my dish of pudding.
I gasped at his treachery. ‘Why, you…you dunderhead.’
‘Manners, Sofia-Elisabete,’ papai reprimanded me. ‘Apologise at once to your cousin.’
‘Não.’
Mamãe cleared her voice. ‘Sofia-Elisabete, must I remind you what a good hostess is?’
A dark cloud hovered over me, but my countenance soon brightened. ‘I apologise, cousin Pico, for calling you a dunderhead. I ought not to call you a dunderhead. A dunderhead…’
Papai groaned at my insolence. ‘Yes, yes – but I still win the bet. Where is my ha’penny?’
I, Sofia-Elisabete, being no stranger to losing bets with my papai, removed a ha’penny from my pinafore pocket. Papai snatched the coin from me, and he tossed up the coin ere he placed it inside his waist-coat pocket.
To my astonishment, Pico expressed his wish to play at being drum-major, he having heard from MacTavish that I was a true musitioner. ‘An excellent idea, indeed. The two of you shall become good play-fellows,’ mamãe rejoiced at our truce, and she urged papai to give me back my drum. Eager to show my parents that I could be a good hostess, if I turned my mind to it, I dressed in my stylish nankeen breeches and red jacket to impress my guest. But Pico laughed at me and my boy’s clothes. ‘Yer a rum ’un,’ declared he.
Pico commanded me to beat my drum and to march behind him. So obey him I did. On a sudden, papai stalked into the garden to confiscate my drum, this time as punishment for drumming out Pico from the army with the Rogue’s March. ‘It’s my drum! It’s my drum!’ cried I, as I ran round and round the garden. Enough, I told myself. I refused this time to give up my cherished drum. ‘Manso! Be still!’ papai caught me by the arm. The two of us struggled over the drum, he winning the battle in the end, given his might.
I stamped about and I sulked, I stamped about and I sulked, making sure everyone knew when I was sulking. That’s the trick, you know, to get one’s way by being a highly visible sulker and not hiding oneself in one’s room or behind a curtain in the drawing room. Papai, who soon tired of this stamping about and sulking, ordered me to walk out with Maddison and Pico, for they were going to the harbour in the South Bay to buy turbot and soles at the cobles that arrived on the sands each day.
In my childish mood, I shuffled down the street behind my two companions. Once we reached the sands Maddison set about to inspect the fresh fish for our dinner, while we children took turns peering through a spyglass to count the number of sails in the harbour. When it came my turn again, I started at the sight of someone who resembled Sister Lisbet. I had not visited with my guardian angel in a long time. Had she forgotten me?
‘What did ter see?’
I boggled f
or a second. ‘I believe ’twas a dolphin.’
‘Liar.’ Pico snatched the spyglass from me. ‘Gad zookers! It’s Domingo Gonsales.’
There, on the pier, stood a Spaniard, mysterious and magnificent in a wide-brimmed hat pulled down to mask his face. He wore an embroidered jacket, breeches, black buckled shoes and a brown capa that he flourished like a torero in the bull ring ere he flung it over his left shoulder. Beside him, reaching for his arm, was a handsome señora dressed in a black velvet jacket and white silk skirt fringed with lace, her hair adorned with a high comb and a red flower, her white lace veil billowing in the wind. Who was this elegant lady? Why she had come to Scarborough, a most unlikely place for a Spanish noblewoman, especially one who looked like an angel on earth?
Pico and I raced each other to get to the pier first to meet his hero Domingo Gonsales. The two foreigners expressed their amusement at seeing me, a half-boy dressed in boy’s clothes, approach them without an introduction. Pico performed a gallant bow, as did I. We stood there shyly with our caps in our hands, when, suddenly, Pico blurted out, ‘How are ter?’
‘Buenas tardes,’ the Spanish lady dipped her chin. ‘I am Doña Marisa, and this is my cortejo – my escort – Señor Gonzalez.’
I goggled my eyes at the man. ‘Are you really Domingo Gonsales who flew to the moon?’
Señor Gonzalez lifted the brim of his hat to wink at me. ‘No, but seeing how I am Sábado Gonzalez, I must surely be his primo, his cousin. What are your names?’
‘I’m Pico, an’ this is my cousin, Soofia-Eee.’
‘Pico?’ Señor Gonzalez stared at Pico’s nose and then he laughed for whatever reason. He turned to peer at me. ‘Are you a boy, un niño, or a girl, una niña?’
I, Sofia-Elisabete, Love Child of Colonel Fitzwilliam Page 6
