Indiscretion (33 page)

The summer-house, very new, was meant to look very old. It was a Gothick summer-house. ‘Ah, yes,’ Stephen muttered, ‘where the knights of old would unbutton their hauberks and sit down to a nice dish of tea.’

‘Ignore him, Richard, he’s being an absolute bear today,’ Isabella said, giving her brother a mock slap.

‘I plead innocence,’ Mr Leabrook said smiling, ‘as far as the design goes: my improver would insist on it. Echoes the character of the landscape, or something. He made it sound very fine.’

‘I think it’s delightful,’ Isabella said; and turning to Caroline, ‘Just think, Caro, when it
is
summer, what pleasant afternoons we can laze away here
—’

‘My dear, surely you are disposing of Miss Fortune’s time quite unwarrantably,’ Mr Leabrook said: the smile still in place, but with no light behind it.

‘Oho, that is because you fear we shall gossip about you,’ Isabella said laughingly, ‘and to be sure, my dear Richard, we shall: I shall tell Caroline all about your shocking vices that you hid till after your marriage, and we shall sigh and shake our heads over you.’

There was a suffocating constraint: Isabella looked perplexed again; and when a scream rang out, Caroline thought for a moment that she had done it herself, for there was certainly one building up inside her. But it was Lady Milner
—
a large spider had run over her foot. ‘Look, madam, there’s really no harm in them,’ Mr Carraway said, gently picking it up in cupped hands. ‘They are actually rather pretty creatures
—’

‘I do not find them so, sir, and I do not wish to look,’ Lady Milner said, in her most repressive tone. ‘Do you think we might return to the house now, Mr Leabrook? I grow a little chilled.’

They went back to eat, drink, and not be merry; and after the meal Caroline found herself appropriated by Mrs Leabrook, who took her to view her dovecotes and poultry-houses, for she had heard how interested Miss Fortune was in all matters of husbandry. As Caroline could only with difficulty and effort tell a sheep from a haystack, it was hard to see where Mrs Leabrook could have heard any such thing; not that
hearing
was the lady’s style. Caroline might as well have said what she was thinking
—
‘Your hen-houses, ma’am, are the most supremely dull thing I have ever been shown in my life’
—
for all the attention Mrs Leabrook paid to her comments. Poking for eggs, stroking wattles, she talked mercilessly. It was like someone reading out loud from an endless bad book. A series of swift transitions took her from the diseases of fowls to pride in her children.

‘I can say, as so few can say in these times, that they have never brought me a grey hair. Richard’s first concern, on his becoming engaged to Miss Milner, was for my comfort and security
—
new carpets and fireplaces to be ordered at once for the Dower House
—
though I said to him, “My dear, you know I don’t feel the cold,” which is true, I’m peculiarly hardy in that way, as was my mother, it’s in the blood I dare say and, ah —’
gasping in air
‘—
that has always been his way, the thoughtfulness and regard, and one sees it too in Georgiana
—
that’s his sister, you won’t have met her, she’s away at school in Brighton
—
the tenderest-hearted creature, and I’m glad to say none of that hard smartness one sees in girls these days, indeed when she was to go away to school I was anxious that she should not come back with a set of nasty affectations, the more so as one hears there is a rakish tone to Brighton, not that I have been there myself, because I adore the country and never like to leave it, but Richard was quite as concerned as I, for he has the most scrupulous regard for his sister’s delicacy, and he personally made sure that the establishment was of the strictest principles with respect to the morals of the pupils
—
made thorough enquiries into the character of such males as are permitted to cross the threshold
—
drawing-masters and the like
—
in short not even a father could have done more
...’

Having to listen to encomiums on Richard Leabrook’s chivalrous attitude to the fair sex was, perhaps, a little too much after a morning that had left Caroline feeling like an overwound clock. Certainly something caused her, when she escaped from pullets and pouters and returned to the drawing room, to lose her temper in the most uncharacteristic and unfortunate fashion.

There, Matthew was holding forth about Brighton — something about its being a mere fishing-village fifty years ago, and now it was a handsomer town than Bath, or he thought so at any rate, and
—
‘Is it not? Miss Fortune, you know Brighton well, would you not agree? We are talking about Brighton, you know, and
—’

‘Brighton is a place I never think of without sorrow and vexation, Mr Downey,’ Caroline burst out uncontrollably, ‘and I wish you would be good enough to bore us with some other subject.’

A double regret
—
for the rudeness, and for the dangerous hint of revelation
—
occupied Caroline during the suspended silence that followed. It was Matthew himself who broke it with a gust of high, thin laughter.

‘Oh! you are joking — of course you are — it is only her way of joking, you know. I remember it from Brighton. It is a sort of joking I have never quite understood myself
—
you seemed to get on better with it, Leabrook, as I recall — but there, I dare say it is my fault, I am rather serious by nature. Not that I dislike a joke by any means. I do believe I have rather a sly sense of humour — I remember making my father laugh uncommonly once with a remark about opera-singers
...’

Matthew’s invincible egotism came to her rescue: an undeserved rescue, she felt remorsefully, for there were worse sins than being a bore — but it had been that sort of day, and she could have yelled with thankfulness when Stephen, who had long been broodmgly silent, said with his abrupt decisiveness that they should be going, and had the carriage bespoke before anyone could protest.

Not that anyone seemed likely to do so: even Mr Leabrook was half-hearted in his pleas that they would stay a little longer. Caroline had no doubt that he was glad to see
her
leave; and the bow, the look, the chill emanation she got from him in the drive at parting suggested that he wished she were going somewhere a good deal further off, and hotter, than Wythorpe Rectory.

Oh, Carol You too?’ Fanny said. ‘But I have already had the lecture from
him —
old Jack Tar within — and you may be sure I took it
very
amiss.’

It had not been easy to contrive this meeting alone with Fanny: Caroline had been forced to the expedient of calling at the Manor, waiting for Fanny to take her dogs to exercise, and then jumping up to go with her — which Isabella, settled in for a confidential chat, plainly found most odd. Now, with Fanny firing up as soon as she had tentatively mentioned the subject of Mr Carraway, Caroline inwardly cursed Lady Milner for this commission she had laid upon her. Also she outwardly cursed Fanny’s spaniel, which had scrabbled its muddy forepaws on her best sprig muslin.

‘Leo, go down. Well, I wonder who will address me on the subject next,’ Fanny said, with asperity. ‘I declare I shall have to start making an appointments book.’

‘My dear Fanny, I don’t intend a lecture. I care for your welfare, and I know that Lady Milner
—’

‘Oh, Caro, I don’t mean anything against
you,
and I know perfectly well what has happened: Augusta has put you up to it, hasn’t she? She cornered you yesterday, and browbeat you into a promise, and so here you are.’ Fanny squeezed her arm. ‘I wouldn’t even mind if you did give me the lecture, because I’d know you wouldn’t mean a word of it and were only trying to oblige my Pharisee of a stepmother. Now with
him
it’s a different matter. He came hemming and hawing to me last night after dinner and just when I wondered whether I was under sentence of court-martial or something he began to talk about Mr Carraway — about Charles. At least so one gathered through all the coughing and circumlocuting
—
is that a word? Heavy hints about the danger of too great an intimacy after too short an acquaintance and so on. “Captain Brunton,” said I, “I am in full agreement: I have not known you very long, and you really have very little connection with me or my family, and so it is quite inappropriate for you to address me on these intimate terms, on a matter that is really none of your business.” I turned that rather neatly, did I not?’

‘What did he say to that?’ Caroline said, part amused, but inclining also to feel sorry for the Captain, facing the utter ruthlessness of youth: cannon-shot was nothing to it.

‘Oh, he harrumphed and havered, and at last he grumbled that I should think about what he said, not merely for my stepmother’s sake but for my own. Now, tell me, were
your
instructions pretty much the same?’

‘I am, I know, all too easily persuaded, but the last time I took
instructions
was when I was at school,’ Caroline said, as temperately as she could.

‘I have offended you,’ cried Fanny, almost with excitement, ‘and you tell me so, instead of going all stiff and brooding! That is what I like about you, Caro. Oh, I don’t mind what you say to me. I will even admit that one
must
be careful in these matters, yes, and that there are many silly young girls who have come to grief through not being so. Leo, don’t roll in that. But the fact is I am not silly. My head is not easily turned.’

‘I suppose we none of us like to think we are silly. But all must acknowledge that they are capable of silliness, from time to time: Lord knows, I am.’

‘And what a dreary world, if it were not so! Imagine a world without folly and excess! It would be death! But I hardly need say this to you.
You
have never voluntarily worn the shackles of convention.You do not subscribe, I’m sure, to the belief that grown people with rational minds somehow do not know what is best for them.’

‘No, I don’t believe that,’ Caroline answered honestly. ‘But
...’

‘But me no buts,’ Fanny laughed, taking her arm, ‘for you know what I say is true.’

Caroline sighed. As so often with Fanny, one felt disarmingly helpless, as if bound with a multitude of tiny threads.

Well, Lady Milner, I tried, she thought, as she walked home; and was pursued all the way through the village by Lady Milner’s imagined stare expressing Lady Milner’s imagined thought:
You did not try very hard, Miss Fortune!
She was quite sick of it when she turned in at the Rectory gate, and found loosely tethered there a horse she did not recognize, a horse steaming as from a hard ride.

‘Mr Downey!’

Matthew it was who stood beneath the porch, the riding-crop raised in his hand to rap. Arrested, he swung round upon her staring, his face scarlet up to the stormy hairline, his nostrils as wide as the horse’s.

Intense, even for Matthew.

‘Mr Downey, this is an unexpected pleasure. Please, won’t you bring your horse round to the stable, where—’

‘It’s not my horse. It belongs to Leabrook,’ he said hollowly, still staring.

‘Oh. Yes, of course, it would be. Well, let me tell Jackie, and he—’

‘The horse will do very well where it is. I do not intend a long stay. What I do require —’ Matthew mopped his brow with his gloves ‘— is a private interview with you, Miss Fortune.’

‘With me? How odd — I cannot conceive what ...’ She waited, nervously smiling; but though she had no notion of what it could mean, she feared it was not good. Short of vaulting over the hedge and running away, however, she could see no help for it. Matthew looked dramatically determined.

Uncle John was in his study, steeped in the Early Fathers, and Aunt Selina was on a sick visit: it was simple enough to take Matthew into the winter parlour, close the door, and brace herself. Was it her rudeness yesterday? Perhaps he had thought of something tremendously rude to say in return. Perhaps he was going to challenge her to a duel. She had never heard of that happening to a lady
—
but suppose it did? Should one accept? And who chose weapons? The one receiving the challenge, surely. In that case she would choose something, like spoons, that could not do much damage. Her eyes strayed longingly to the sideboard.

‘Mr Downey, you must be thirsty
—
let me
—’

‘Miss Fortune, I must speak first, and ask you only to hear me. It is far from my habit to dictate the conversation in this way, but the circumstances
...’
Giving her a long, bleak look, he drew a paper from his pocket. ‘This,’ he intoned, as if she were unlikely ever to have heard of such a thing before, ‘is a letter.’

‘Ah? Oh
—
you have heard from your aunt at last?’

‘Oh, Miss Fortune, this
—
this parade of yours is pitiable,’ he groaned, shaking his head. ‘The letter is not from my aunt. You may as well hear its contents, though you must know very well its import. It is from my aunt’s lawyer in London. At Symond’s Inn. He is a Mr Coker. “Dear Sir”
—’

‘Mr Downey, please, I must ask you to desist. I do not want to hear a letter from your aunt’s lawyer
—
I do not see why on earth I should
—
these are surely private matters with which I have nothing to do.’

Matthew laughed shrilly. ‘Oh, excellent! Oh, you surpass yourself, Miss Fortune
—
this is your famous joking, I take it, and there was never a better
...’
He staggered about, laughing without mirth.

‘If you do not begin behaving like a man in his senses, Mr Downey, I shall be obliged to ring.’ Obliged to ring: how stagey I sound, she thought; but the whole scene had a feeling of unreality, as if the Rectory’s solid walls would wobble at any moment.

‘Very well.’ He straightened, glanced over the letter with glazed eyes. ‘I will play your charade, Miss Fortune, and tell you what this letter is about. Then you can see if it answers your hopes
—
your expectations. Mr Coker informs me
—
on Aunt Sophia’s behalf, as she does not choose to have any further communication with me directly
...’
He gathered himself, jaw convulsively working. ‘Informs me that I am finished. He does not use that word, to be sure. I know
too well that the law does not talk in such terms. Still, that is what has happened. I am forever excluded from Aunt Sophia’s favour. My allowance is stopped forthwith, and I am to consider all future prospects, of settlements, conveyance of property, inheritance
—
all my expectations, in a word
—
at an end. There you have the bones of it, Miss Fortune. Are you satisfied?’

‘Why? I mean
—
yes, I mean why should this be a satisfaction to me, Mr Downey? But really I don’t understand any of it. Why would Mrs Catling do such a thing?’

‘Oh, you keep it up finely, Miss Fortune, I’ll say that for you
—
brilliantly done! Thus, you will make me rehearse my humiliation before you, as well as having caused it in the first place.’

‘Caused it?’ Caroline shook her head and went to the sideboard. ‘All I can think, Mr Downey, is that you have been given the run of Mr Leabrook’s wine-cellar; and all I can suggest is that you take another glass. Because often that is the one that brings you full circle back to sobriety, I find. As for this letter
—
well, is it not perhaps merely a threat? Mrs Catling always did like to keep you
—’
she nearly said dangling
‘—
in suspense.’

‘I hardly think Aunt Sophia would employ her solicitor to make an empty threat. Besides, I have a communication from my banker also. The allowance is indeed stopped, and she has ordered my advance on next month’s to be repaid. No, Miss Fortune, it is all real, I assure you: you are to be congratulated: if this was your ultimate aim, you may be easy, for it is all achieved.’ He ignored the glass of canary she offered him and paced and prowled. ‘Your malice towards me I can in a sense comprehend
—
for one need look no further than motives of interest
—
but to betray a sacred confidence
—
and worst of all to betray Perdita
—’

‘Perdita? Your
—
the lady in London? Now I am convinced that one or other of us is going mad. I know nothing of Perdita, Mr Downey, but what you chose to tell me.’

‘Precisely! And that is precisely what Aunt Sophia now knows!’ He brandished the letter aloft, his head back, as if he were reading it in bed. ‘Listen. “It has come to my client’s knowledge that a clandestine engagement of a most disreputable character has long subsisted between yourself and a Miss Perdita Lockwood, of Snow Hill, London. The wilful deceit practised upon my client, who supplied the above-mentioned funds on the express understanding that nothing of this kind would be entertained, is such as to render it impossible there should be any further communication, in correspondence or in person, between my client and yourself. The funds already advanced, my client is inclined to regard as money gained under false pretences
...”
There follow certain veiled threats that any approach from me to my aunt will be viewed as intrusion and molestation
—
oh, but you have the flavour now, I’m sure, Miss Fortune. Is it piquant enough for you? Do you relish it?’

Caroline sat down, moving through the slow mist of realization.

‘You think
—
Mr Downey, you think I told Mrs Catling about your secret engagement.’

‘I beg your pardon, it is not a
secret
any more. It was a
secret
that I entrusted to only one person, Miss Fortune: yourself.’

‘Mr Downey, you are mistaken,’ Caroline said, meeting his wild glare as calmly as she could.’I am sorry indeed for what has happened
—
it must be a prodigious shock to you; but this shock has made you jump to a wrong, an entirely wrong conclusion, sir. You must think in what other ways this information could have come to Mrs Catling’s ears
—’

‘There are none! Upon my soul, Miss Fortune, you have a curious notion of what a man means when he says he is entrusting you with an exclusive confidence
—
as if it were the trivial secret of a silly schoolgirl which she shares with a dozen of her playfellows! No one knows
—
or rather no one
knew
about Perdita but yourself. And to be sure, I do not
want
to believe you could have done this. It was because I liked you
—
trusted you
—
that I let the secret out in the first place. And yet I fear there are horribly good grounds for believing it, Miss Fortune
—
I have been putting two and two together, and they most assuredly make four! Indeed I do believe I must have something of the clairvoyant about me
—
for I was only remarking to you the other day, was I not, that it might be possible for you to be reinstated among my aunt’s acquaintance? And meanwhile you already had your little plan in hand, to reinstate yourself
much
more fully!’

‘Good God. If I have you right, sir, I hardly know which to marvel at most
—
your impudence or your absurdity. Mr Downey, I am most happily reconciled with a kind and loving family: I can want nothing more: and you actually suppose that I spend my time in making mischief between you and your aunt, in hopes that the old crocodile might leave me something after all?’