Authors: Maria McCann
Smiling, Sophia smooths back the folds – so fresh and immaculate as to be a pleasure in themselves – to reveal a gleaming new binding. Her gift is the plays of William Shakespeare, edited by Samuel Johnson.
‘O, my dear ― !’
‘Aunt Buller seemed to think you didn’t have it. There are more volumes, of course ―’
‘Seven,’ puts in Mr Letcher dryly.
‘― which my dear husband had to carry. We’ve left them with the maid. You
don’t
have it, do you Sophy?’
‘No, my dear.’ Sophia hugs the book to her bosom. ‘I can’t think of a better present, Hetty, nor can I thank you enough,’ and she rises to kiss Hetty on both cheeks, noticing in the process that Hetty’s eyes are moist at the success of her gift.
‘Now let us do justice to that seedcake,’ says Mr Letcher, rubbing his hands together in high satisfaction.
Cutting up the cake, engaged in family gossip with Hetty and civilly addressed by Hetty’s husband, Sophia can imagine herself engaged upon the married life of her innocent expectations, the life she believed herself to be choosing when she gave her hand to Mr Zedland. It is a poignant sensation, such as a beggar might experience on being handed a plate of turtle soup: surely he would swallow the precious treat in drops, lick the bowl and spoon and do everything in his power to lengthen out the pleasure. So does Sophia endeavour to extract every last scent and savour from her impromptu tea-party.
After a while, Hetty asks: ‘Is Mr Zedland away from home?’
Having perceived her repeated leadings-up to this question and her very natural curiosity, Sophia is ready with a smile.
‘He dines today in town.’
‘And tonight?’
‘It depends. He is often engaged with men of business until very late, so he prefers not to bring them here.’
‘Do you hear that, Letcher? How agreeable, not to have one’s men of business in one’s home. Will you stay for him, Sophy?’
‘No. I’ll join you.’
‘O, I hope he does come! Aunt has raised my curiosity to such a pitch, you can’t imagine. She says he’s the handsomest man in England.’
‘I haven’t yet seen all the men in England. He has certainly a prepossessing appearance.’
Hetty’s eyes narrow a shade. Sophia is possibly the only person in the world who could interpret the precise degree of unease conveyed by those narrowed eyes. ‘If he’s detained by urgent business, I must resign myself to missing him, I suppose. But not the house, Sophy. You shan’t get off that.’
‘If not inconvenient,’ puts in her husband.
‘Of course it isn’t inconvenient.’ Hetty rolls her eyes. ‘What can possibly be of more interest? Between ladies, that is. Gentlemen never understand.’
‘Slander, my dear. Every gentleman of sense appreciates domestic comfort. But we mustn’t impose on Mrs Zedland.’
‘No imposition, I assure you. Hetty is right – were I in
your
new home, I should fairly boil with impatience for the Grand Tour.’
‘There, you see, Letcher?’
‘But Hetty, you mustn’t expect to see anything of my choosing. Edmund digs in his heels and refuses to decorate. When we first arrived, he was adamant that we should soon decamp for Wixham. And yet we linger.’
‘Perhaps he’ll change his mind.’
‘Hum! Perhaps.’
Mr Letcher is sympathetic. ‘Husbands are crusty, disagreeable things. My spouse often complains of it. But never mind, Mrs Zedland. If the new spring patterns are charming, and I am told by ladies that they always are, your patience will be amply rewarded.’
‘Who’s slanderous now?’ exclaims Hetty. ‘I never called you crusty and disagreeable in my life.’
‘Did you not? Then it was perhaps some other spouse. I follow the Mussulman custom, you know, Mrs Zedland, and permit myself four.’
‘Gracious!’ Sophia helps him to more seedcake. ‘The laundry bills must be shocking.’
‘I knew you would appreciate Mr Letcher, Sophy. Mama, bless her, is frequently at a loss. But to your house. If Mr Zedland wishes to stay, all the better, surely? Time enough to rusticate after the Season.’
‘You underestimate us, Hetty.
We
contrive to rusticate in Town.’
‘Come, this isn’t so far out! Lord, to think of Buller, with those dirty roads around, yet you contrived to visit. When you and Mr Zedland come to our seraglio,’ she darts a mocking glance at her husband, ‘you shall see the grapevines.’
‘Really, a vineyard? How delightful that must be.’
‘They are famous throughout the district, but my Mussulman husband refuses to drink the wine.’
Mr Letcher roars with laughter. ‘Not one tolerable bottle in ten years! The gardener warned that it wouldn’t do but Mama insisted upon making the experiment.’
‘And now blames
him
for it. The gardener, I mean. But he’s trained some of them up a loggia and they give the prettiest shade imaginable. Come in summer, Sophy, and we can dine beneath them.’
‘I should love to. Do the grapes make good eating?’
‘Sour, alas. But ornamental. We must not expect too much of beauty.’
Her eyes, meeting Sophia’s, seem to hold them an instant. Not until Hetty has looked away, and is demurely nibbling at her slice of cake, is Sophia even aware of it.
The refreshments disposed of, Sophia and her cousin are ready for their tour of the house. Upon Mr Letcher’s rising to accompany them, Hetty suggests he stay and rest. ‘We’ve a campaign to plan, my love, right down to pelmets and fringes. Best stay out of the firing line.’
‘If Mrs Zedland will not think me impolite,’ he says, hovering.
Sophia assures him she will think nothing of the sort. Indeed, her thoughts are entirely engaged by one question: what Hetty will make of what she is about to see. So Mr Letcher remains, digesting seedcake, while the ladies mount the stairs.
The first room opened is Sophia’s own chamber. The mattress, sponged and scrubbed but not replaced, retains a faint odour but at this time of year it is weighted down by coverlets and quilts; the bed is tightly made and the room pitilessly aired. If Hetty is aware of any taint in the atmosphere, she is far too well bred to reveal it.
‘Don’t fear to insult my taste,’ Sophia prompts. ‘I chose none of this.’
‘Well. It’s a
little
drab.’ Hetty, linking arms, gives an affectionate squeeze. ‘And those boards need varnish. But only think, my dear, once you get started – how glorious to sweep it all away at once! I’ve often thought that in decorating, the first time must be the best. After that, you know, one patches and pinches and has nobody else to blame.’
Sophia, persuaded that genteel economy will form no part of her cousin’s married life, feels Hetty’s kindness. She is about to consult her on the relative desirability of green and yellow bed-hangings when Hetty’s arm stiffens in hers: it is the involuntary frisson that accompanies a hastily restrained impulse. Sophia has been anticipating this moment. She composes herself and waits.
For a short while Hetty also remains silent. When she does speak, it is with an assumed lightness.
‘If only my husband were as tidy as Mr Zedland. Letcher’s like a romping pup, things flung everywhere. It creates so much work for the servants.’
Sophia’s eyes turn with Hetty’s towards the bolster with its tell-tale single indentation and then back towards her cousin’s face, which just now resembles that of the maid in Bath, the one who said, ‘Oh,
Madam . . .
!’ before spilling out the business of the bubbled heir. On this occasion, however, Sophia is better prepared.
‘You guess rightly, Hetty. We occupy separate beds.’
‘But Sophy ―’
‘His physician insisted. Mr Zedland is a very light sleeper.’
The room which ‘does’ Edmund for a bedchamber is at the other end of the corridor. Hetty surveys the new bed with its fresh hangings, the wardrobe, the gilded mirror, the writing table and lamp. She looks down at the pink carpet, patterned with songbirds, on which the ladies are standing.
‘I’m surprised he didn’t have the room painted and papered,’ she says at last. ‘Before the furniture was put in.’
‘It can be moved elsewhere when we paint.’
‘There are some good pieces.’
‘A little
passé
, don’t you think? Edmund barely notices, but for myself, I want the latest things.’ She listens to her own lies as they tumble out. All her life she has feared and despised mendacity, has scorned to practise it, and yet, put to the test, she is as slick and proficient as Edmund himself. Drawing Hetty away from the comfort of Edmund’s chamber she adds, ‘The place was sadly neglected, you know. Old Mr Zedland let it furnished.’
The study is a relief to her. This sterile cell represents nothing a wife might covet, save the right to close the door on household nuisances. She wonders how close Hetty has come to guessing the truth, namely that Edmund’s bedroom furniture was pillaged from the marital chamber. Taking her cousin’s hand in hers, she bestows on it an encouraging little pat. ‘You mustn’t worry because our arrangements aren’t yours, my love. They suit me well enough.’
‘Do they, Sophy?’ Hetty perches on the edge of the desk. Inside the top drawer, concealed by a mere quarter-inch of mahogany, lies evidence of spectacular debaucheries –
a pair of sisters
– that Hetty’s guesses, no matter how sympathetic, can never come near. Without warning, Sophia is flooded with perverse satisfaction. Hetty has made the good marriage, the marriage of hearts, minds and purses. In the eyes of society, she holds all the aces. But has she ever felt for Josiah Letcher what Sophia felt for Edmund Zedland? How extraordinary, to know one’s husband no better than a highwayman, to fear him, even, as a dealer of disease and death, and yet to recall an intimate, headlong exhilaration – could the worthy Josiah Letcher inspire such violence of loving? Never. Never.
Should Hetty hear these thoughts, she would take no offence. Sophia imagines her perplexed musings:
Darling Sophy is grown irrational. She must not be quarrelled with, but bled and carefully watched.
She is not such a fool as to claim a bad husband as a distinction:
rational
, Sophia is still. But she has discovered a depth in herself, a source upon which Hetty (kind, generous Hetty, living on the surface, in the sunlight) will never draw. Then again, Hetty might say, ‘To be thus attached to a bad fellow, my darling, is not strength, but weakness. You must get free of him. Ask your papa to negotiate a separation.’ But Hetty would have misunderstood. Her love for Edmund was indeed a weakness, a sickness: Sophia sees this plainly enough. But
what it takes to survive such sickness
– of
that
she is proud. In Hetty’s presence she feels herself unutterably the older woman, experienced beyond imagining: an ancient, wizened sibyl. And with this realisation comes the knowledge, irrevocable, that this is why she has not confided in Hetty, and will not, and cannot. Even to Mama she has complained only of Edmund’s dishonesty and the low company he keeps. Of the most intimate wounds he has inflicted, not a word.
So struck is Sophia by this view of affairs that the room fades from her consciousness. In another moment she becomes aware that Hetty has her by the elbow and is mouthing something, which proves to be, ‘Sophy? Are you well?’
Not until she has recovered herself, breathing as deeply as her stays permit, can she lead the now pensive Hetty to the guest rooms, macabre in dustsheets (the attics, where the servants sleep, being unworthy of attention), then the dining room, the offices and the square of garden at the back of the house. In the scullery (for Hetty wishes to see how it is laid out) they discover Titus, grey and listless, scraping at the burnt bottom of a pot. Mrs Launey and the maidservants, surprised in the kitchen, are caught in mid-bicker, dropping the bone of contention as they drop their curtseys, ready to pounce and worry it directly the mistress has gone.
‘I shall dine out today,’ says Sophia. ‘You may heat up the beef and serve it for supper.’
Mrs Launey looks bilious. I haven’t given her much notice, Sophia thinks, but surely she can manage that.
‘If you’re not wanting me, Madam, may I take a walk? For my constitution. I find I’m not quite myself.’
‘As long as the maids are fed,’ says Sophia.
When Mrs Launey has thanked her, the ladies withdraw to the breakfast room, which despite its sallow décor retains a faded charm. It is also out of hearing of both Mr Letcher and
les domestiques.
‘You don’t have the boy answer the door?’
‘Sometimes. He’s unsatisfactory.’ She really must deal with Titus, who will never learn to speak like a Christian and whose demeanour evidently disgusted Mrs Howell, for that lady never returned. Unlatching a shutter, she beckons Hetty to a window. ‘What do you think of the view from here? It isn’t St James, of course.’
Hetty steps forward and studies the throng of passers-by. ‘Do you know, when I’m in London I always feel I could be jostled off the pavement at any moment.’
‘Yes. Such a press of people and often so ill bred. Are we your first call since you arrived?’
‘Not quite. After our foul mutton we went to supper with Mr Letcher’s sister at Chelsea. I don’t think she cares for me much.’
‘No?’
‘I serve merely to make up a card table. What about you, Sophy? With whom do you visit?’
‘Oh, we live in a very retired way. My life revolves around Mr Zedland. You know how it is when a wife ―’
‘But my dear, you haven’t any children.’
Sophia laughs. ‘I should be sorry to be in the straw so soon!’
‘Quite.’ Hetty’s expression is one Sophia recognises from childhood: thus did she look just before pushing a naughty boy, found tormenting a swan, into Statue Lake. ‘Have you cast us in the roles of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, my dear? We weren’t sent as spies. We weren’t
sent
at all.’
‘Of course not, Hetty, I never ―’
‘Then why this reserve? You wound me, Sophy.’
‘Wound you?’
‘One doesn’t keep a dear friend at arm’s length.’
‘You aren’t a dear friend, Hetty, you’re my dearest friend – apart, that is, from Edmund. Some ladies become more reserved upon marriage.’ She can’t resist adding, ‘We may have our reasons, you know.’