by Sarah Burton
I ran downstairs to make sure everything had been made ready in the dining room, and found myself humming as I flitted about, but hearing a carriage draw up at the door ran back to the stairs in case it was the ladies as I did not want to face strangers without Evelyn at my side. On my way up the staircase I passed Roger sauntering down, and I don’t know how it was – high spirits, I suppose, or possibly the sack as I was not used to strong waters – but before I knew what I had done I had smacked him on the bottom as he passed, saying “Two can play at that game, cousin!”
He stopped and looked utterly astonished and somewhat shocked, but I carried on up the stairs, and went back to Aunt Madge’s chamber, where, to my consternation, I found Roger.
“And here is my other pretty cousin,” he declared, bowing to me. “You have both brought the country freshness with you.”
“I think,” I whimpered, curtseying, “I just met Frederick.”
“Good,” said Aunt Madge. “Let’s go down.” She took Roger’s proffered arm and led off, Evelyn and I following.
“What’s the matter?” asked Evelyn. “You are all red.”
“Nothing,” said I, feeling hot and ashamed beyond measure.
8
I immediately recognised Miss Sylvia and Miss Melissa as two of the gay ladies I had seen at the playhouse, Miss Sylvia being, I felt certain, the one to whom Roger had thrown the kissed orange. They were not painted (or perhaps only a little) as they had been when I saw them before, but both still wore patches on their faces. Sylvia’s was round like a real beauty spot, but Melissa had two – one shaped like a crescent moon and another shaped like a star – which I thought extremely à la mode. (Oh, indeed I had a smattering of London French by this time.)
“These must be your poor cousins,” Sylvia said, advancing towards Evelyn and myself as we curtseyed.
(“Your poor cousins,” Evelyn later repeated to me, as we undressed for bed.
“Perhaps she meant because our parents are dead,” I suggested.
“Perhaps,” said Evelyn, but neither of us was convinced.)
She looked us up and down before observing, “What original gowns. Is this the fashion in the country now?” Without waiting for an answer she and Miss Melissa swept past us and embraced our aunt without seeming to touch her which I thought most elegant and resolved to practise later.
Both young ladies were very finely dressed and I observed that their gowns were vastly low at the front, but whereas their breasts had been almost bare at the theatre, now their charms were covered by transparent kerchiefs. As I tried not to stare at this, having not had such a near view before, Aunt Madge was evidently struck by the same thought as she said, “My dears, aren’t you afraid you will catch a chill?”
“I’d sooner catch a husband!” said Melissa and they both laughed in a sort of twittering way which from my aunt’s expression I guessed to be somewhat irritating to her. I began to suspect that my aunt may not, after all, have been the epitome of urbanity, for it was obvious that she did not share their cutting wit. This came as something of a shock, as often sudden revelations of one’s betters’ flaws – especially one’s betters who are especially dear to one – constitute not only a surprise but tend to prompt a new valuation of their character. In short, I began to cease to view my aunt as an inviolable authority on the ways of the world. Melissa and Sylvia continued to laugh like this all the evening, flicking their fans before their faces in a way which, to tell truth, I found rather irritating too, but I repressed this sensation as, though their laugh seemed an affectation – as it were, to have no true happiness in it – this was evidently fashionable and therefore civilised. However I did not venture to copy them: I knew I yet lacked the refinement to carry it off.
Frederick and Roger saluted the young ladies, who, like everyone on first seeing the twins together, marvelled at their almost identical appearance. They really were as like as two peas in a pod, as the saying goes. Both twins were uncommonly handsome, but Frederick was slightly smaller in stature, and was the younger by only two minutes. Roger was fond of saying that those two critical minutes had made his fortune, otherwise Frederick should have been the heir and he the spare. Frederick always looked slightly pained on these occasions and indeed it seemed to me most unfair that twins should not inherit equally. Aunt Madge had often told us that when she was with child she had no idea she was carrying two babies, and Frederick’s arrival had been an utter surprise to both her and the midwife.
“’Twas the last time Fred ever surprised anyone!” Roger quipped whenever she told this story, and it was easy to see that Frederick was the quieter, more sensible of the two. At first I thought him of a rather retiring, even bashful temperament, but soon saw that he rarely had an opportunity to shine, as Roger blazed away like a firework, dazzling everyone, and putting Frederick in the shade by comparison. Just before we went into dinner, when the other guests were being welcomed, I tried to gain an opportunity to speak with Frederick, but then realised that saying that I had mistaken him for his brother would still not excuse the familiarity I had shown. I hoped he did not think I was a forward young thing and bitterly regretted my moment of madness.
However, I could not escape him at the table as Sylvia and Melissa monopolised Roger’s attentions, while Aunt Madge conversed with the senior gentlemen, leaving Evelyn and me to Frederick to entertain.
“How do you like the university, cousin?” Evelyn asked politely.
“Oh, very well,” said Frederick.
“It must be pleasant to be there together with your brother,” she added.
Frederick picked up a napkin and wiped his mouth before answering.
“To tell truth, we don’t see much of one another in Oxford.”
“But you share rooms, do you not?” I asked, as I had remembered Aunt Madge telling me this.
Frederick chuckled.
“We do, but I still don’t see him much.”
“But—” I began, but Evelyn gave me a warning look and I shut my mouth.
“Let’s say – how can I put it? – we keep different hours… and different company.”
Evelyn’s look suggested this had better make an end on the subject. I began to think Frederick rather a dry old stick and wished I were nearer my other cousin who seemed vastly more entertaining, as Sylvia and Melissa had been fairly twittering their heads off.
“So how did you find London?” Sylvia asked me and Evelyn, seeing to her obvious chagrin that Melissa had gained all Roger’s attention.
“We just got out of the coach and here it was!” I said. Evelyn gave me a somewhat alarmed look but everybody else laughed. Sylvia seemed a little put out, but then joined in the laughter, again without mirth.
“I see you are a wit, Miss,” she said icily.
“My niece is a very clever girl,” said Aunt Madge. “They both are.”
“I believe a clever woman will discover it a very difficult thing to find a husband who is not a fool,” announced Sylvia, in a manner that ensured she received everyone’s – in especial, Roger’s – full attention. “For myself, I think it safer to conceal my intelligence.”
“And, my dear girl, that you do most admirably!” interjected Roger and everyone laughed but Sylvia gave me a look as would kill, seeing I laughed hardest of all. From that moment on, I believe, she had me in her sights.
“In this depraved age,” old Dr Rookham opined, “most think a wife learned enough if she can distinguish her husband’s bed from another’s.”
“Dr Rookham!” exclaimed Aunt Madge. “Well! This is not the woman’s age, is all I can say. Lewdness seems to be the business now. Love was the business in my time.”
“To love!” Roger cried, holding his glass aloft.
“To love!” We all pledged our support, none so enthusiastically as Sylvia and Melissa, both of whom seemed to look on Roger as a shining god.
“Still, some things are better these days. When I was a maid, young ladies would never have gone to
the playhouse without an escort – or even to dinner at a strange house without a chaperone.”
“Those must have been terribly dull days,” said Melissa.
“Indeed, now they affect a masculinity most deplorable,” interjected Mr Fluke.“They swagger and swear, game and drink like roaring boys.”
“Come now, Mr Fluke,” soothed our aunt, “you do not mean to insult the ladies present. There are some freedoms that are welcome. Now you are all able to gad about almost with the confidence of widows.”
“I should love to be a widow!” exclaimed Evelyn so suddenly that the table fell silent. “I mean,” she qualified, “of all women’s states, that is the most enviable.”
Still no one said anything, nor knew what to say.
“Their actions are less subject to… opprobrium,” she explained.
I remember I wasn’t sure what opprobrium meant but knew I had to run to my sister’s assistance.
“I think Evelyn means,” I ventured to suggest, “that of all women, widows are most free.”
Still no one said anything.
“Free is perhaps the wrong word, my dear,” Aunt Madge said, frowning. “It suggests… inappropriate liberties… a lack of modesty.”
“Independent, then,” Evelyn hastily supplied. “As a daughter, a woman must do as her father sees fit; as a wife she must do as her husband wishes; only as a widow is she mistress of her own destiny.”
There was still an uncomfortable silence.
“Indeed, looked at in that light,” Roger sighed, looking extremely serious, “it seems a shame that in order to be a widow, one must first be a wife!” Only then did we realise he was jesting and everyone burst out laughing. “To widows!” he proposed, and we all drank to widows.
“Ods bodikins!” exclaimed Dr Rookham. “Our English women have the most liberty in the world! A countess may marry her footman; married ladies may ramble, game and be lewd; a more incontinent generation of women has never been known.”
“Indeed, our women are the happy women, sir,” said Roger, raising his glass again to the ladies, though I noticed Frederick refrained from following him. What a sobersides Frederick seemed to me! And to think I had… I blushed to think of the incident on the stairs.
9
Later, when we had risen from table and had fallen into groups in Aunt Madge’s withdrawing room, Melissa, who had been talking with my sister, moved to talk to me and I saw Evelyn raise her eyebrows at me as though in warning to watch what I said.
“Don’t you think Sylvia is a great beauty?” Melissa said.
“She is very pretty,” I replied, quickly adding, “but so are you,” which, I am sorry to say, was an untruth.
“Ah, but I lack Sylvia’s je ne sais quoi. She has a host of admirers, I assure you. But I believe your cousin has a special place in her heart.” And she looked at me most meaningfully. I knew not what to say.
“She seemed to have many admirers at the playhouse,” I said.
“Oh, you have been to the playhouse!” Melissa exclaimed, as though she had hitherto assumed I chewed cud in a field all day long. “Pray, what did you see?”
“Thomaso,” said I.
“And what do you think of the actresses? They are bold trollops, or I’m no judge.”
“I thought Mistress Gwyn very pretty,” I ventured, “and a very good actress.”
“All women are actresses, don’t you know! At least, all ladies of quality,” said Melissa. “Consider Sylvia.” We looked across at Sylvia and Roger – Sylvia was affecting to be insulted at something Roger had said, but snickered all the while behind her fan.
Then Sylvia came over and, deliberately cutting me, drew Melissa aside to speak with her. Frederick began talking to me but I was distracted by Sylvia who, seeming to feel a pimple on her chin, reached across to Melissa’s face, pulled the patch off her cheek, put it in her mouth and sucked it a moment to moisten it and then stuck it on her own chin. Unfortunately, Sylvia did not fail to notice the expression of disgust which my uncivilised face must have shown. Not for the first time, I cursed myself for my lack of refinement.
“Don’t mind Sylvia,” said Frederick. “She makes it her business to wound.”
“I don’t mind,” I said. Perhaps emboldened by one humiliation, I took my opportunity to deal with another. “And cousin,” I said, “I’m sorry about… on the stair… it was a foolish game I was playing – with your brother.”
Frederick seemed to look at me a little sadly, and then said gently, “Take care with whom you play games, cousin.” Then, having considered me a little longer, he seemed to brighten, and said “I suppose you are merely a child, H, and no harm done.” Then he changed the subject, to my relief, as I felt very cast down to be called a child. “I see the party is disbanding. We must say our good-byes.”
Roger and Frederick saw the young ladies home in the coach and Evelyn and I talked a while with our aunt. She always felt the cold most extremely. (She said this was why she could never be happy in the country, as English country houses, she said, seemed purposely designed to admit as much cold air, and their fireplaces to emit as little heat, as possible.) As a consequence, she had a habit, when there was no company, just we girls, of sitting in a chair by the fire with her feet on the mantelpiece, allowing the warmth to penetrate her usually heavily skirted nether regions. Either this, or she would stand with her back to the fire, with her skirts hitched up behind, her countenance betraying a state of the uttermost bliss.
Having adopted her unusual seated position, she enjoyed a few moments of elevation before asking us our opinions of Miss Sylvia.
“She is very pretty,” I said, having discovered this was always an acceptable answer.
“Yes, but what say you to her character?” she asked.
It hadn’t occurred to me that Sylvia had a character at all. She seemed, as I observed all fashionable people did, to exist mainly on the exterior.
“I don’t think we know her well enough to tell,” said Evelyn sensibly as always.“But you have known her some time. What is your opinion, Aunt?”
Aunt Madge considered this.
“I fear she has a cold heart,” she eventually decided.
“She seems fond of Roger,” I ventured.
“I don’t say she has no capacity for affection,” my aunt explained. “I fear she may lack sympathy.”
Evelyn and I kept respectfully quiet at this.
“Aunt,” Evelyn eventually said in the tone I knew to presage something causing her some distress. “What I said at dinner about widows. I didn’t think, I mean… I fear I seemed flippant.”
“Don’t trouble yourself, Evelyn,” Aunt Madge said. “Your observation was quite correct. Widowhood has many consolations. I can keep the company and the hours I choose. I can mostly do as I please.” She stretched her arms and yawned. “And just now I should like to go to bed. Alone!” she added, in mock tragedy and then smiled at us. “You are good girls. I confess to the sin of pride, as I felt very proud of you both this evening.” She kissed us both and went up to bed, followed by Evelyn, while I remained to put out the lights.
I was tired but not ready to sleep so started clearing away the remaining dinner things as Aunt Madge had let the servants go to bed. I noticed that Sylvia had left her fan on the table and picked it up. It was very pretty, made of ivory or bone intricately worked, and green taffeta. I flicked it open experimentally. It had a smooth action and made a pleasing sound. I opened and closed it a number of times and then carried it to the looking glass above the fireplace and held it in front of my face. Then I had an idea and took a dab of soot from the chimney on my finger and improvised a beauty spot. Delighted with this effect, I practised a number of expressions: beguiling (fluttering my eye-lashes), disdain (chin up), amused (twittering); before I realised there was someone else in the room with me. In the glass I could see my cousin, though which one I could not tell. I turned round, holding the fan behind my back but could not tell whether it was too l
ate – his expression did not tell me whether he had just come in or whether he had been there for some time, watching me.
“Roger?” I experimented.
“Fred,” he said. “Roger’s… gone on with some friends.”
He came towards the fireplace and placed the guard in front of the embers, while I took the opportunity to slide the fan onto the table. Straightening himself, he considered me, then reached towards my face. For some reason I found myself trembling.
“Don’t be afraid, coz,” he said, cupping my chin and turning my face towards the light. He drew out his handkerchief and dabbed at my cheek. “You have got some soot, I think. There.”
“Thank you,” I heard myself squeak.
He stood back and looked at me again, with the same expression as when he had said I was a mere child.
“I should like to take you and your sister out tomorrow, if that would please you.”
“Oh, yes!” I said. “I mean to say, I’ll ask her.”
He seemed to want to say something more, and then to change his mind.
“Up to bed, H,” he said. “I’ll lock up.”
I said goodnight and just as I reached the door, he said, “Have you not forgot something?” My mind misgave me I had committed some fault. I wondered what it could be. Had I neglected to say thank you for something? Should I have curtseyed? Seeing I was nonplussed, to my horror, he picked the fan up from the table and offered it to me.
“Oh, it’s not mine,” I said and turned and ran all the way up to our room.
10
The next morning, from my aunt’s pursed lips whenever he was mentioned, I deduced that Roger had not yet come home. She agreed to join us for our little outing. We were to go over the river to the pleasure gardens at Vauxhall as the weather was so fine and then, in the afternoon, to see a play. I resolved to put behind me the humiliation of the night before and Frederick was very pleasant to us both and I soon felt at my ease again.
