Rebel Heiress

Jane Aiken
Hodge

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

A Note on the Author

Also by Jane Aiken

The black winter that began 1812 was the worst Henrietta Marchmont could remember. The snow began early, and lay long. The Charles River froze over and presented a lively spectacle as young men skated out from Boston to attend lectures at Harvard College in Cambridge. But for Henrietta it was a season of unrelieved gloom. Illness did not improve her Aunt Abigail's temper, and she was alone as nurse, companion and scapegoat. And then there was the news: War with England seemed increasingly certain and, if it came, would put an end once and for all to Henrietta's long dream of reunion with her English father. How often she had imagined the meeting, having recourse to dreams of it, as to a drug, when Aunt Abigail was more than usually bad tempered.

Spring came at last, unwillingly. Skunk cabbage showed green on the Common, sludge lay in the gutters, a raw wind blew off the harbour, and Aunt Abigail's strength dwindled as the days lengthened. Now, the long, angry fight with death was over and Aunt Abigail would scold no more.

As the funeral procession reached the little graveyard on the hillside, Henrietta pulled her pelisse more closely around her. It had begun to snow again and the faces of the few mourners were pinched with cold. Mr. Anderson, the young minister, looked enormous with an overcoat under his surplice. Bowing her head over her aunt's open grave, Henrietta watched the first flakes settling idly on raw earth. Above, the New England sky was bleak and grey as the hard soil. Her feet were ice-cold in their shabby boots and from time to time a slow trembling shook her whole body. Was it cold? Or perhaps, though she would hardly admit it, even to herself, excitement? Poor Aunt Abigail. Closing her eyes as Mr. Anderson began to pray, Henrietta thought how sad it would be to die so unlamented. She had tried, ever since she could remember, to love her aunt. Now, by her grave, she admitted defeat. The little group of polite mourners were muttering the Lord's Prayer, but Henrietta's prayer was different.

‘Oh, God,' she breathed, ‘forgive her for what she did to me, and help me to forgive her, help me to escape.'

Clenching her hands more tightly inside their darned gloves, she allowed herself just for a moment, as the prayer ended, to lift her eyes and glance down towards the harbour. Yes, the
Faithful
was still there, but from the bustle on the docks near her it was clear that the business of loading was proceeding apace. There was no time to be lost.

The short service was soon over. Earth began to fall hollowly on to the coffin that was narrow and dark and frugal like Aunt Abigail herself. Mr. Anderson shut his prayer book, came round the grave to Henrietta and took her arm.

‘Come,' he said, ‘my dear Miss Marchmont. You must not be lingering here in the cold.'

She let him guide her away to the gates of the graveyard, grateful for the convention that demanded nothing from her but docility. On her other side, Miss Jenkin, her aunt's only friend and relentless competitor in good works, had begun to talk again, taking credit for her devotion to her sick friend, her organisation of the funeral, and of the austere collation that awaited them now in Aunt Abigail's cheerless little house on the wrong side of Beacon Hill. There was no need for Henrietta to listen to her. Miss Cabot, on her other side, was providing the necessary chorus of approving monosyllables.

Mr. Anderson's grip on Henrietta's arm tightened. ‘I must speak to you. Are you very cold? Could we perhaps take a turn on the Common before we go in?'

‘Why, yes.' Henrietta had known that this explanation between them was bound to come, and at least it would postpone the dreary ritual of the funeral feast. ‘I have no doubt that Miss Jenkin will do the honours to a nicety. And indeed,' she reminded herself rather than him, ‘I have much to thank her for.'

She listened passively while he made their excuses to the other mourners, only rousing a little to think with a flash of her usual spirit what an advantage it was to be the minister. What other young man would have been able to detach her with such public calm from her chaperone: Yet there was Miss Jenkin smiling her approbation and then turning, as he led her away, to mutter something to Miss Cabot, who nodded with such emphasis that her black Sunday bonnet shook on her grey curls.

They were out of earshot now. Mr. Anderson turned to face her. ‘Miss Marchmont, I do not know how to begin.' It was true enough; he stammered to a halt, his pulpit eloquence failing him utterly.

She managed a smile for him. ‘Indeed, Mr. Anderson, you must not mind it so much. Aunt Abigail had every right to do what she would with her own. Her house will make an admirable minister's residence. And believe me, I beg of you, when I tell you that I do not want it.'

His face glowed still redder. ‘It is like yourself to say so, Miss Marchmont, and I appreciate it, believe me, I do. But it is an iniquitous thing none the less; I would not have thought it of Miss Abigail. And yet I cannot refuse the bequest since it is made not to me myself, but to me in my capacity as minister. How can I reconcile it with my conscience to deprive my successors of so suitable a residence? But to have left you penniless and without even a roof over your head! When I think of all the donations I have accepted from Miss Abigail for her favourite charities — why, my blood boils. I thought her a good woman.' He paused, at a loss for words.

‘Yes,' said Henrietta, ‘I believe most people did.'

‘But not you, Miss Marchmont, I know it. How many times I have blamed you in my heart for not being more loving to your aunt. I begin to understand it now. Tell me, what was there under that mask of virtue?'

‘There was wickedness, Mr. Anderson, pure wickedness. I have long felt it, and now, at last, I know. The knowledge has made me happier. I used to feel so wicked myself because I could not love her when she had been so good to me. As I thought.'

‘Well' — he made an obvious effort to be fair to the dead woman — ‘the fact does remain that she brought you up when you were left alone in the world.' She made a move to interrupt him. ‘No, let me speak, Miss Marchmont. There is something I have to say to you. You are alone again now, without a home, without means, and without, I fear, much hope of earning your bread. To go out as a governess or companion is what I know your proud spirit would reject, nor are there many families who can afford such a luxury these days. No, Miss Marchmont, you must hear me out and believe me when I tell you that I have long pondered this step. It may seem rash to you for a man so young as I am, with the world all before him, but I
have long believed it my duty as a minister to find myself a suitable helpmeet. And who could be more so than you, my dear young lady, brought up as you have been by your aunt, in the very odour of good works?' He paused here for a moment, embarrassed as he remembered the new and unlovely light that had recently been shed on her aunt, but then went on undaunted. ‘Miss Marchmont, I am not a romantic man, but I have known you now these five years or more. I have watched you grow from a somewhat headstrong girl — you will pardon my frankness, I know — into a young woman I am proud to be able to call my friend. I have seen your attendance at your Sunday school class; so faithful, so patient even with the most ungrateful and disobedient of your charges. I have watched your devoted care of your poor aunt in her last illness — a care that was all the more praiseworthy because, as you have confessed, you found it impossible to love her as a niece should. Miss Marchmont, taking all this into account, I feel sure, young and inexperienced though you are, that I am doing the right thing in asking you to be my wife. Imagine the life of service we will lead together! I have always felt that a minister, more perhaps than any other man, with the many calls there are on his time and patience, needs the support and consolation of a devoted helpmeet, the comfort of the domestic hearth. All this, I am sure, despite your youth and some slight tendencies I have observed in you to frivolity, some hearkening after the things of the world, all this will make you, I am convinced of it, a wife I shall be proud to introduce to my faithful and, I think I may say, devoted congregation. Miss Marchmont, I am asking you to marry me. Will you be mine?'

Henrietta had listened to this remarkable speech with some astonishment. Now she turned to face him, releasing her arm from his. Their brisk walk and the cold wind had whipped up the colour in her cheeks; one dark curl had escaped from her mourning veil and blew against her face. Her blue eyes sparkled and for a moment his hopes soared, then plummeted as she spoke.

‘You have not said you love me, Mr. Anderson.'

‘My dear Miss Marchmont' — he was pained and showed it — ‘I had thought better of you. I have often urged your aunt to forbid your reading those trashy novels. I blame Miss Edgeworth and Mrs. Radcliffe for this. If by “love” you mean that I would throw my bonnet over the moon, abandon all for your
sake, then I must honestly confess that I do not love you. But as a sister in God, I may say that I love you most dearly and promise to care for you more tenderly than any hero of romance. Perhaps I have erred in speaking to you so soon. It is, I know, hardly fitting that we should be talking of love and marriage almost at the graveside, but I wanted you to know that, alone and penniless though you are, you yet have a friend who will care for you. Do not think you must answer me now. Treasure up what I have said in your heart, and remember, I beg, how truly I admire and respect you, how eagerly I look forward to your presence at my side. But come, our friends will be wondering what is become of us, and gossip is, as you know, what I in my position must of all things avoid.' He took her arm again and gently urged her up the slope to the far side of the Common.

‘But I must answer you, Mr. Anderson, as much for my own sake as for yours. I fear you have been much mistaken in me, and when you know me better, will be grateful to me for this frankness. Do you truly believe that I want nothing else in life but to devote myself to good works? Why, I have had enough of Sunday school, of flannel and sewing bees to last me several lifetimes. I am about to begin to live, Mr. Anderson. But forgive me' — she softened at his hurt look — ‘I am an ungrateful wretch. I have not told you how deeply honoured I am by your flattering offer, how grateful I am for it, how kindly I take it — but, indeed, I cannot accept it.'

He was walking faster now. ‘I am grieved, Miss Marchmont, grieved and surprised. Has yours too been nothing but a mask of virtue? But I will not believe it; you are disturbed, not yourself; you will think more of this. Besides, how else will you live? What will you do? Have you seriously considered the position in which — I am sorry to have to say it — you find yourself?'

‘What else do you think I have been doing since Aunt Abigail died and I found how I was placed? I have it all planned, only I need help. I had intended to ask it of you, for indeed, Mr. Anderson, I have always looked on you as my friend. But how can I ask you to help me now?'

‘Help you? Of course I will. If you are truly convinced that you have no vocation for a clergyman's wife, why then (was there a shade of relief in his voice?) we will say no more about it and you must tell me how else I can help you.'

‘Oh, if you only would! Mr. Anderson, will you persuade the captain of the
Faithful
to take me as a passenger when he sails for England? I know he does not usually take passengers, but if you were to make the request, perhaps he would accept me.'