Eliza’s Daughter (26 page)

Using money Mr Croft sent, I was able to have her transported by litter as far as Amarante, where we now are. We hope to go on to Vila Real, where there is said to be a doctor. But she was so enfeebled by the first part of the journey that I again feared for her life. A priest in this town tells me that in his opinion the extremity of terror and pain suffered by Thérèse has locked her into a kind of catalepsy from which only profound surprise or joy can release her. I believe that he is right. So far, no expedient that I can contrive has proved of any use.

Now, my dear Eliza, I know this is asking a great deal; perhaps asking something that may not be in your power to grant. For all I know, you may now be a married woman, or engaged in some pursuit that will not permit you to strike camp at short notice, pick up your skirts and sail for Portugal. But oh! if you
could
come, I think, I truly believe, that your arrival might be the only event that would have the power to deliver my child from her dreadful prison. And I do beg you, if it is within your power, to make this effort, to come.

How can I be certain that you will even receive this letter? Or that it will not take so long finding you that my daughter's bondage may have been unlocked by death? I cannot be certain, of course. But I do have such a great faith in your attachment to Thérèse that I believe, if it is at all possible for you to do so, you will come, and that if you come you may be able to help her.

We move next to Vila Real. Should we for some reason leave that place, make your inquiries of the nuns in Oporto; the various convents are in communication and will know where foreigners are lodged. If you ask for ‘the Englishwoman and her afflicted daughter Teresa' anybody will be sure to tell you.

Ever your friend,
Hariot Vexford.

I read this letter sitting in the Duke's rose garden, on a sultry afternoon in July. The drowsy scent of full-blown roses, catnip and hot flagstones enveloped me like a quilt, and a sleepy whirring came from the grasshoppers in the meadow beyond.

We have been at war, I thought, this country has been at war with the French ever since I was a child, but what do I myself know about war? Battles are fought, Trafalgar, Vitoria, Salamanca, ships are sunk, sailors drowned, soldiers cut down by cannon fire – all to protect this island; but how am I, Eliza Williams, affected by such happenings? I hear about them as if they were in a play by Shakespeare or Sophocles. But these people, my friends, Lady Hariot, Triz – they have met war face to face. And I went on to think about Colonel Brandon and Marianne; I had at times been critical of them in my mind, for paying me so little heed as they moved about India, or travelled from India to Portugal; but how could I know what cares they might have had, what dangers faced them?

As soon as I had read the letter I longed to show it to the Duke; but he was in London, attending the great fete in Carlton House (in the special pavilion designed by Mr Nash) given in honour of Sir Arthur Wellesley, who had been created Duke of Wellington.

The Duke returned to Zoyland the following day, tired and, for him, out of humour.

‘London is nothing but a bedlam,' he peevishly said. ‘They have covered Hyde Park with oriental temples, pagodas, bridges and towers. There is no milk to be had, the cows are all banished from the parks; and it is impossible even to get clothes washed, all the laundry-women are devoting themselves to princes and foreign visitors.'

‘Oh, sir! Pray – pray – read this letter!'

He read, frowning, his lips pursed in a silent whistle, eyes eclipsed under the bushy canopies of eyebrow.

Having reached the end he at first made no comment, but puffed his cheeks out in a long sigh. Then he went through it again, slowly and carefully.

‘You realize that by this time the poor thing may be no more?' he said at last, turning the sheet around to study the date.

‘Yes . . . '

‘But I suppose you are none the less bent on running off to the rescue. Hey? The clement heart of Miss never yet permitted such an appeal to go unanswered. As I am well aware! Mendicants, cadgers, barkers, touters – every guttersnipe and gypsy in the country comes cap in hand to you for alms.'

‘Well,' I said, ‘I know what it is to be alone and friendless – '

‘Humph! And I suppose the chance of seeing Mrs Marianne constitutes no added inducement?'

‘I beg your pardon, sir?'

‘This post-scriptum – '

I had not noticed the post-scriptum, tucked in one corner. It said, ‘I understand that Mrs Marianne Brandon, the widow, I suppose, of your guardian is staying at present with the nuns of the Santa Clara Convent in Oporto.'

‘Good heavens!' I stared at the Duke. ‘Then, that must mean – I suppose – that Colonel Brandon has met his end.'

‘Died in some battle, doubtless, poor fellow.'

‘No wonder he never returned to Delaford.'

‘'Tis to be hoped that Mrs Marianne has informed the lawyers,' the Duke said drily. ‘But now, my dear – if, as I surmise, you are eager to be off to Portugal on this wild-goose mission, I have but one stipulation.'

‘Of course, my dear sir,' I replied, somewhat inattentively, for my mind was astir with speculation about Marianne Brandon. Did she intend to remain in Oporto, or would she come back to England? Had Willoughby – had my father – ever succeeded in his aim of seeking her out? Might they – if Colonel Brandon was no more – might they be reunited?

The Duke went on. ‘My stipulation, child, is this. I shall accompany you to Portugal myself. My ship, the
Miranda,
sails from Bristol in ten days' time with a cargo of cod and dry-goods – most fortunately as it turns out – so you are assured of a satisfactory passage. And we can reside at the Factory House in Porto, while you make your inquiries. My steward, Bliven, shall accompany us; he can make all the needful arrangements. And Enrique Morton, my agent out there, can put inquiries in train for you.'

‘But, sir – '

I must confess that I was somewhat aghast at the Duke's plan. The prospect of travelling thus, with all the consequence and consideration that his presence was bound to entail, did not at all enliven my spirits; to speak the truth, I had hoped to be off on my own, in solitude and freedom.

‘I had been planning to send Bliven over,' the Duke went on comfortably, ‘in order to find out how the
quinta
was recovering from the effects of the French ravages. But he has always proffered some reason why such a trip would not be convenient. Now I shall go myself, and that will be much better. I shall enjoy a stroll down the Rua Nova des Inglezes. Porto is a pleasing town.'

I did not voice any of my many objections. And, later, I was glad that I had not. For Dr Swinton issued a most vehement veto against his noble patient undertaking any such excursion.

‘Your Grace has been looking fatigued, and of late I have noticed you stumble several times. It would be highly injudicious – unthinkable – out of the question.'

‘But a sea voyage might be the thing to set me back on my feet,' objected the Duke.

‘
Not
across the Bay of Biscay in August, my dear sir! When gales may be expected daily! It would be folly – arrant, irredeemable folly!'

The Duke would have argued further but, that very day as it chanced, he stumbled again, on the terrace steps, and might have fallen and injured himself severely had not Lamb, his devoted valet, leapt forward and caught him just in time.

‘Oh, bless me! I am growing to be a clumsy, infirm old dotard,' the poor Duke lamented. ‘None of my friends will wish to come near me, soon.'

Seeing that he was really cast down, I teased him gently.

‘Indeed they will not, sir! Since you are so bad-tempered and irritable, and entertain them so stingily, and so completely fail to see the point of any joke they may tell you.'

‘Minx!' He pulled my ear. ‘Well: I see how it is. You must go on your errand of mercy without me. But I do implore you most urgently not to dilly-dally any longer than you need over there, but, once your mission is accomplished, hurry back to your poor old friend in Zoyland.'

‘Of course, sir. That's of course,' I said helplessly, my heart bleeding a little. How could I make any such promise? How could I tell what the case might be, when I found Lady Hariot and Triz? But it was no use to say those things.

‘In the meantime, before you set to your packing,' went on the Duke more cheerfully, ‘I want you to order a goose, or some capons, or a few quail, for I have Mr Nash coming down again tomorrow, and Sir John Middleton said that he would step over to meet him, now his lady is safely brought to bed.—Oh, and, by the by, Mr Nash's young helper will be accompanying him.'

This was news to me, and not particularly agreeable news. But I smiled and curtseyed, and went off to give the necessary housekeeping instructions.

‘So!' said Pullett, as I changed my dress for dinner. ‘So! You're off to Portugal, it seems? And not a word to
me
about it! A fine thing, to keep your plans from them as is most closely concerned.'

‘I was going to tell you,' I said, twining feathers into my hair. ‘It seems that gossip runs in this house faster than heath-fires. I would have told you.'

‘Well, I'm coming with you.' She set her lips ferociously.

‘
Oh no!'

‘Oh, yes!'

‘But you dread going in a ship! And they all say the Bay of Biscay is the most terrible water in the world.'

‘Just the same, I'm a-coming. I'm not having you getting up to mischief alone in foreign parts. Dear knows what you'd be doing. And why you can't stay and marry that nice young Mr Hobart, I
can't
conceive.'

I accidentally dug a hairpin into my scalp and clenched my teeth. ‘Marriage with him is not in question. He hasn't asked me.'

‘He would, soon enough, if you hit him hard enough. And he has a
good
ring – a good, clear yellow. Then His Grace would leave him Zoyland, and we'd all be in clover.'

‘Will you kindly hold your hush, and hand me that hairbrush and go away.'

She went off with a flounce.

***

Hoby was much more subdued on this visit. The pretext for it was some summerhouse, or maze, or gazebo that the Duke wanted Mr Nash to design for him, and the three men were off, conferring about it and its possible site for a large part of the first day. And Sir John Middleton came over to dinner that evening, very full of his new baby.

‘Smiling little fellow, worth a dozen of his prune-faced elder brother, who is the spit-image of my first wife. Devilish bad luck, I call it, that a man's constricted by this cursed entail, and can't bequeath his property where he chooses. If I could help it, I'd not leave a groat to the progeny of that Friday-faced female, my first wife.'

The Duke sighed in agreement, and drank off a large goblet of claret.

‘Sir,
sir
!' besought Dr Swinton. ‘You
promised
me that you would be very abstemious with your liquor.'

‘Oh, deuce take it! Not allowed above a mouthful of wine – and Lizzie going off on a wild-goose chase to Portugal – and McPhee tells me that caterpillars have got into the succession houses so that we shan't have any apricots – '

I caught Hoby's eye fixed on me anxiously.

After the meal, when the elder men were still at their port, he came into the drawing room where he found me playing Cimarosa sonatas.

‘Why are you going to Portugal? And when?' he demanded without ceremony.

‘Do you remember Lady Hariot? And Triz?'

‘Of course I do.'

I told him about Lady Hariot's letter.

‘But this is folly,' he said. ‘Complete folly! Firstly, how will you ever find them? Secondly – if the letter took so long in reaching you, it is odds but the poor girl has died long since. How old is she?'

‘I suppose, sixteen or seventeen.'

‘She will have died, you may be certain, and your trip will have been for nothing. And you yourself may be in considerable danger out there – the country still upheaved from the effects of war and French occupation, swarming with lawless men – you don't speak the language – you have never been abroad before – why should you do this? Lady Hariot never did so much for
you
,
that I recall –'

‘She was as kind to me as a mother –'

‘And I've heard it said that Boney is not safely confined in Elba, that he might escape and the French would rise up again in support of him – Liza, you
must
think again. This is a most ill-considered caper.'

I said coldly, ‘The Duke himself raised no objections to my going. I must ask you, Mr Hobart, to confine your advice to those over whom you have some authority. Over me, you have none.'

And, as he still stood lowering at me, I rose up from the piano and walked towards the door.

‘Since you and the Duke have become such fast friends,' I added as I left the room, ‘you might come down and visit him while I am away.'

Parting from the Duke proved a severe, an unanticipated ordeal. It was little short of agony, indeed. He looked up at me from his chair like some sad old dog who cannot understand why he is not permitted to accompany his owner for a walk. His eyes, under the bushy brows, were brimming with tears. He could not speak.

‘I will come back to you as soon as I possibly can, sir, I promise. Truly,
truly
.'
The words came from me, though I had not intended saying any such thing. But his look smote me to the heart. Why, I wondered, why are human beings obliged continually to give one another so much pain?

And quitting Zoyland was very bad. The domestics were downcast to see me go, and many besought me not to make any prolonged sojourn in Portugal, but to hurry back without too much delay. ‘Indeed, we and His Grace can't spare ye, Missie,' said old Tark.

Pullett had sunk into a gloom for days beforehand. Her glances of farewell, as we drove away, at every bush, every tree, every turn of the road, each seemed intended to convey a reproach. To make matters worse, the sea voyage, on the ship
Miranda
,
was wretched from start to finish. The only thing for which I was thankful was that the Duke himself had not carried out his intention of accompanying me.

We were over a fortnight at sea, with contrary gales, and the waves in the Bay of Biscay so raging and mountainous that even the sailors were sick, and poor Pullett more dead than alive, weak as a ghost, unable for six days to take any nourishment apart from cold water, since her stomach was in such a condition of irritation that it rejected even a crumb of bread.

Thus befell a most distressing occurrence. One evening Pullett left our cabin (a tiny, cramped compartment, not much larger than a dog kennel) complaining that the air stifled her, she could not breathe; and crept out on deck.

I, unlike everybody else on the ship, had not been taken sick, but was utterly exhausted from unceasing care of Pullett for the last six days. I wearily inserted myself into my hammock – a process akin to mounting a fretful horse – with the intention of resting for ten minutes and then going to see after Pullett. Instead, I fell into a profound slumber which lasted until daybreak. To my horror, when I next awoke, Pullett had not returned to the cabin and, when I scrambled out on deck, nobody could tell me where she was; or had even laid eyes on her. The storm was still raging, and it became dismally plain that the unfortunate woman must, in her weakness and disability, have been swept overboard during the hours of dark. She could not swim, I knew; there seemed not the slightest possibility of her having survived.

If
only
I had accompanied her on deck, I thought, again and again, this dreadfully sudden end could have been averted, and she would probably have continued to live for many more years. I had no idea of Pullett's age; she might have been in her late fifties, but, wiry and healthy, she often boasted that she had never felt a day's illness in her life. She had no family, no friends but Rachel and Thomas.—Her untimely death lay, a heavy weight on my conscience, for a great while thereafter; the heavier because, in the past, I had often found her self-appointed authority over me decidedly irksome and uncalled-for, annoying rather than amusing or touching. But now, more than I could have believed possible, I missed her tart, admonishing, censorious guardianship.

And oh, how I missed the Duke's fond, easy, uncritical company!

At last the ship changed her course eastwards and we made our way up the river Douro (dodging the dangerous sand-bar at its mouth) and came to Oporto, which, as the Duke had told me, is a fine, precipitous old town, with steep streets, roofs and spires rising up in layers, very grandly, on either side of the river. In many ways it is not unlike Bristol; or so I thought. We tied up near the
armazem,
or warehouse, from which the Duke's wine was shipped to England, and at last I was able to step ashore into a new world.

I ought to have felt as free as a bird. And, indeed, I was deeply interested in all around me. I liked to observe the short, compact, but graceful women, mostly pale-faced and black-eyed, with close-fitting bodices over white linen shirts, serge petticoats, muslin kerchiefs under heavy black hats, ornaments of gold and floss silk, black lace shawls and parasols to shield them from the sun. The men wore broad-brimmed hats, short jackets, and tight-fitting trousers to the calf. Both men and women mostly had wooden-soled slippers. And some peasants wore cloaks made of rushes. The air jangled with the sound of bells – goat bells, church bells, mule bells; and was rich with the smells of fish and dung. The streets were amazingly filthy. Pullett would have been scandalized.

Bliven, the Duke's manager, a rather surly man, who plainly regretted the necessity of putting himself out on my behalf, led me from the region of warehouses, mostly belonging to English port-wine shippers, to the English Factory House, a handsome granite building which had been abandoned and somewhat damaged during the French occupation, but was now restored to its former use.

Here Enrique Morton, the Duke's local agent, a black-haired man, half-Portuguese, was able to arrange for my accommodation overnight in a hostel, and for my transport up the Douro river next day, should I wish it, in a
barco rabelo,
the flat-bottomed boats which are employed for the transportation of wine casks from the numerous vineyards farther up the river. There were many of these to be seen, plying back and forth over the water. They have square sails and oar-shaped rudders worked by three men, and are capacious, being able to carry from twenty to eighty pipes of port at one time. The roads in this country are extremely bad (as I was soon to discover for myself) and almost all the wine transport is conducted by water.

Having, therefore, a day to spend in Oporto, I resolved to go directly to the Convent of Santa Clara and make inquiries there, in case by good fortune Lady Hariot and her daughter had succeeded in removing thither in the period since Lady Hariot's letter had been written.

Accordingly I purchased a black hat (so as not to stand out too conspicuously from other women in the streets) and inquired my way to the convent which, I discovered, lay not too far from the wharves and the English Factory Building. The Portuguese tongue was so very guttural as, at first, to be almost wholly incomprehensible to me but, by a mixture of French and Spanish acquired at school and from the Duke's tutors, I was able to make myself understood. I learned that there were two religious establishments, one for monks and one for nuns. To the latter I made my way and found it situated on top of a high hill-brow, with magnificent views overlooking the wide, curving Douro. Seeing the whole town thus laid out before me, I found it even harder to conceive how the intrepid Sir Arthur Wellesley had cast his troops over this swift-flowing stream under the guns of the French on the northern bank.

Had Colonel Brandon taken part in that engagement? I wondered.

Arrived at the convent, I stated my business to a portress at a little grille, and was sent to wait in a small parlour with whitewashed walls, sparsely furnished with a few oaken stools.

I had asked for an English-speaking sister, if possible, and was presently rewarded by a soft voice from behind yet another grille, which first administered a blessing on me in Portuguese and then added, ‘Spik Inglizh.'

I inquired if she was able to tell me the whereabouts of an English lady and her afflicted daughter.

She would ask, she said, and vanished again. After a longish interval she returned and informed me that when last heard of – but that was not recently – the lady and her daughter were lodged at the convent in Vila Real.

‘
A que distania?'

About twenty leagues, perhaps.

I thanked her wholeheartedly for this useful clue, and left an offering for the convent. (The Duke had been lavish with travelling money. ‘If go you must, it will ease my mind at least to know that you are comfortably provided for,' he said.)

As I retraced my steps past the portress's lodge, a tall Englishman was making inquiries there. Voice, build and costume were all decided indications of the Anglo-Saxon race.

‘Are you certain that you have no information?' he was saying. ‘Ask once more.'

‘Very well, I will inquire again, Senhor.'

The stranger wore a long, caped travelling cloak and a black hat pulled down low. I had but a glimpse of a portion of his face. His glance passed over me incuriously for I wore black like any Portuguese female and furthermore had my hat pulled down to screen my countenance; and he for his part was wholly intent on his business. I had an instantaneous impression of deep-set dark eyes, grizzled locks, and a visage harshly scored by marks of illness, grief or dissipation. Bad temper, too. He tapped his cane impatiently on the stone floor of the lodge as if he were a person unaccustomed to be kept waiting in draughty ante-rooms. Yet his clothes had been shabby, I thought as I walked off down the hill, and his shoes dusty.

The Duke had warned me about the discomfort of Portuguese lodgings, and his gloomy predictions were amply fulfilled. As I tossed, flea-bitten, on a hard bed that night, and listened to the rain lashing against the ill-fitting casement, my brief glimpse of the stranger's face returned to me several times.

And, amid confused wonderings at the Portuguese – how could they display such charming taste in adorning so many of their buildings with façades of blue-and-white pictorial tiles, while allowing rats to roam freely in their streets and so many villainous insects to bite their visitors? – I tried to decide of whom the strange Englishman had reminded me so forcibly.

– No, dear reader, it was not Mr Sam; though the flashing dark eyes bore a superficial resemblance to that lost hero; it was somebody very much more familiar, somebody that I had seen recently and frequently; who could it possibly be?

Weary of such useless conundrums I at last fell asleep, but not for long; church bells clanging far and wide woke me to a day of torrential rain. The Duke had warned me of this also.

‘Portugal is the doorstep to the Atlantic ocean,' he said. ‘Doubtless all those Atlantic gales have their part in the production of such noble wine as is shipped from the Douro; that, and the soil, and the climate, which is hot in summer, very cold in winter; indeed the vines of the Douro region have not their equal anywhere in the world. Or such is my opinion. It was a fortunate conjunction of talent and circumstance which brought the English there, a couple of centuries ago, to trade Newfoundland cod for wine.'

Myself not at all grateful for the weather, being no imbiber of port-wine, I rose, ate a breakfast of hard bread, tea and preserve (made, I think, from pumpkins), then Mr Morton came to escort me to the boat.

When I had told him that I wished to travel to Vila Real, he said that would be no problem, as the Duke's vineyards lay to the east of a village on the Douro called Peso da Régua, and the
barco
would take me as far as that place, from where I could arrange for mule transport through the mountains (the Trás-os-Montes) to my destination.

The Duke had kindly supplied me with all kinds of equipment for my journey, a mahogany box containing metal plates, a pot for boiling water, spoons, knives, packets of dry biscuits, raisins, a lead-lined box of tea and a waterproof cloak. Having observed the meagre space allotted me on the
barco rabelo,
I ungratefully consigned all these things (except the waterproof cloak) to the keeping of the porter at the Factory House, having little doubt in my mind that anybody who grew up in Byblow Bottom could make her way through the mountains of Portugal without such appurtenances.

Certainly it would have been hard to find a place for them on the
barco,
which was piled high with empty wine casks ready for the vintage, which, Morton told me, would start shortly in early September.

‘It varies from one vineyard to another; the Duke's place, Quinta dos Rosas, lies on a very warm, sheltered slope and is ahead of some of the others. You will wish to see the vintage, I daresay,' he added disapprovingly, and seemed relieved when I told him that depended on whether my search for Lady Hariot proved successful, in which case I would no doubt remain with her.

‘What happens at the vintage?'

‘We hire a number of Spanish itinerant workers,
gallegos,
a kind of gypsy, who migrate southwards at this season. They tread the grapes in the
lagares,
which are great stone tanks. It is punishing work, fit only for the strongest men; the first spell of treading lasts uninterruptedly for eighteen hours; so the men who come to do it are rough, dirty and wild.'

‘
Why
does the first shift last so long?'

This idle question from a female he thought proper not to answer, but declared, firmly, ‘It is a scene not suitable for ladies. They sing very obscene songs as they tread, also.'

I could see that he, like Bliven, thought it was very inconsiderate and tiresome of me to come, needing assistance, to the Douro valley at this season. Or, indeed, at all.

The passage up the river lasted for several days. We were favoured with a following west wind, but the current is a swift one, and oars were required as well as sails for the
barco
to make any progress. At night we received hospitality from
quintas
along the river. The weather continued dismal. I could tell that the scenery must be magnificent, but often it was almost invisible. High, green, terraced hillsides rose on either hand, glimpsed in a ghostly manner through veils of gliding mist and rain. Some were striped in vertical lines, some horizontally, according to the vine-grower's taste. The landscape was a most curious combination of wild grandeur and mathematical neatness, wholly unlike anything I had ever seen before.

Sadly, I wondered what Mr Sam would have made of it.