Daughters of England Read online

  “Yes,” I said. “I know.”

  “You have given this deep consideration, I hope?” he went on.

  “I have indeed.”

  “Very well. Let us now pray together.”

  We both knelt and he asked God to watch over me, to guide me in my marriage, and he went on in this vein for some minutes.

  Then he rose and said: “I will call them in now, and then we will proceed.”

  I stood beside Jack at the altar and we went through the marriage service.

  When it was over Jack kissed me tenderly. And Charles insisted that we leave the chapel so that our health could be drunk.

  I said goodbye to the priest and gave him my thanks, which he received very graciously, before telling me that God would guide me through my new life. He then said goodbye to me.

  In another room we partook of the wine which Charles Torrens insisted was appropriate on such occasions. Jack thanked him for allowing his house and servants to be used for our benefit and the two witnesses for coming to help us.

  “It was nothing,” said Charles Torrens, “only what one must do for one’s friends if it is in one’s power. Martin has very little to do when the family is not in residence. He was glad to be occupied and there is nothing he likes more than officiating at a wedding.”

  Then we drove back to London to Jack’s lodgings. How different it was on this occasion!

  Jack was laughing.

  “The deed is done,” he cried. “Oh, Sarah, my love. There is not a happier man in the whole of this city.”

  “Nor woman,” I said.

  He took my cloak as he had before. He threw it on to the bed. The new life had begun.

  Life was wonderful. We were together all the time. I was deliriously happy. He was all that I had believed him to be. He might have been impatient with me, for I was very ignorant, indeed completely unworldly; but he initiated me into the pleasures of loving in the gentlest and most tender way.

  Indeed, my innocence delighted him.

  We were in his lodgings for a week. His servants below were very unobtrusive. They would come at a certain time to ask our wishes and apart from that we saw little of them.

  We only made one excursion into the streets during that week. And that was to visit the coffee house—not in Covent Garden, for Jack had a fancy to go to Tom’s in Change Alley. If we went to Will’s, it would be too close to the theater and we should see some of my old acquaintances. He wanted no intruders, he said. He wanted us to be entirely alone.

  For a week we lived in this state of bliss and then he said he was going to take me away. He had told me he had a little place not far from Oxford Town. He would take me there. There we should not be disturbed by acquaintances and could continue this blissful existence. London was a dreary place just now, but soon they would be making it habitable again. Jack had heard that the King and the Duke were most interested in the matter. They had called in that fine architect Christopher Wren and were putting their heads together. Later we would come back and enjoy a fine city with wide streets, with most of those plague-infested houses gone forever.

  So, to the country we went.

  It was a wonderful life, living in a pleasant country house, not exactly large nor yet small. There were a few servants—as unobtrusive as those in his London lodgings—and we settled down to the idyllic life.

  We rode into the countryside, and went and ate in inns. We lay in the meadows and it was all rather like a dream.

  It could not go on like this. We would have a home soon. That was what I wanted. I knew so little about him. When I questioned him he would answer briefly and quickly change the subject.

  “Sometimes I think you are a man of mystery,” I said.

  “Men of mystery are very attractive, I have heard.”

  “That may be, but a wife should know something of her husband.”

  “My Lord Rochester would tell you that the less a wife knows of her husband—or he of her—the happier they are likely to be.”

  “These clever comments do not apply to ordinary people.”

  “But we are not ordinary, my darling.”

  “I want to be. I do not want to be smart like my Lord Rochester. Is he a friend of yours?”

  “An acquaintance.”

  “He is very cynical, I gather from his verses.”

  “He is extremely clever. That is why the King suffers the young rogue. The King will forgive a man a great deal if he has wit.”

  It was always like that. Whenever I wanted to talk about him, I would find the subject changed to something else. Only occasionally, when I awoke in the night, I would think how little I knew of my husband and ask myself why it should be so. He knew of my home on the Willerton estate, that I had come to London with Kitty and what had happened to me ever since…but with the coming of the day, there he was, laughing, merrily thinking of some new ways of making me happy.

  The days passed quickly. We had been at the house in the country for nearly three weeks when I noticed that he had become a little preoccupied. And then, one afternoon, when we had ridden off and had tethered our horses near a stream and had gone to its edge to sit awhile, he put his arm round me and said: “Sweetheart, I have to go away for a little while.”

  “Go away?” I echoed.

  “It is a matter of business.”

  “Business. I did not know…”

  “That I had business? My dearest, why should I burden you? It’s a matter of my estate.”

  “What estate? Your estate?”

  “My place in the country.”

  It was the first I had heard of it.

  “I did not know…”

  “Most of us have such places. They are managed by…”

  “People like my father.”

  “A good manager takes over most things, but there are times when one’s presence is needed.”

  I knew of such things. Had it not been so at Willerton House?

  “When shall we leave? I long to see the estate.”

  He was silent for a while, and then he said: “It will be easier for me to go alone.”

  I was amazed. I said nothing. He drew me closer to him.

  “I can get up there quickly, settle things and then come back.” He hurried on, as though fearful that I might ask questions. “I have to go back to London first. We’ll leave tomorrow. You will stay in the lodgings while I’m gone. It will not take more than a week or so to settle the matter.”

  I felt a terrible alarm. He was going to his home…his estate…and he was not taking me with him. There seemed no reason why he should not. Was I not his wife? I wanted to know his family. It was my family now. I had the sudden feeling that I was being shut out.

  “Why cannot I come with you?” I insisted. “I want to see the estate. I want to meet your family. You have not told me anything about them. What family have you?”

  “Oh…only brothers.”

  “What do they say about our marriage?”

  He shrugged his shoulders. “They are concerned mostly with their own affairs. Look here, Sarah. I shall only be away a short time, then I shall be back and we will talk over everything. We’ll make plans. I did not want to think of anything else during this wonderful time except that we are together. Do you understand?”

  “Oh yes, but…”

  “Let’s forget all this. We must be happy together. Now, no more of my parting. I shall be back before you know I have gone. I tell you what I intend to do. Early tomorrow morning, we will start for London. I’ll take you to my lodgings. You will be well looked after there. You think of what we shall do. I shall expect well-laid plans by the time I return. It’s going to be wonderful, darling. Don’t look sad. Everything is in order, I tell you. Think about it. Where shall we live? You love the old city, do you not? Life is going to be better than you have ever dreamed of, I promise you.”

  “I wish you did not have to go.”

  “So do I. But these things happen, you know. Being away from you wil
l be torture, but think what it will be like when we are together again.”

  “But…”

  He put his finger on my lips in a playful gesture. “Do not let us talk of miserable parting. I forbid you to talk of it. There! Husbandly authority. You promised to obey me, you know. I insist. We are not going to spoil this night by thinking of tomorrow.”

  A week had passed. I felt desperately lonely without him. The days seemed unendurable. I saw little of the servants who were in their quarters below. One of them came up as before in the morning to take my orders. Often I compared them with Martha and Rose and I thought how I should like to see them.

  I was so delighted when the week came to its end and I was expecting Jack to return at any moment. I thought it would be like him to want to surprise me and I expected to hear his voice calling me.

  Instead there was a letter from him.

  My dearest,

  This is a sad, sad disappointment for me. I cannot return to you for another week. I miss you so much. But never mind, we’ll make up for it when we do meet. I cannot wait for that.

  God bless you, my darling.

  Your ever loving,

  Jack

  My disappointment was intense. I felt wretched and uneasy.

  I had not gone far from the house as yet, but now I decided that I would go to Drury Lane. I would go and see Martha and Rose. I should enjoy telling them about my wonderful marriage and how happy I was and how my husband had had to leave for a little while on important and urgent business. When he came back we were going to find a house in London. He had a place in the country but he had insisted that we should also have a residence in London.

  I felt a great emotion when I saw the house. I remembered so vividly the day when Kitty had brought me there.

  Martha and Rose cried out with delight at the sight of me.

  I flung myself into their arms.

  “Ooh!” said Rose. “You’re a ladyship now, aren’t you, my lady?”

  Martha said: “You didn’t bring his lordship, then?”

  I told them he had had to go away on business.

  “We have been in the country and just returned,” I said. “As I am staying not far away in his London lodgings, I thought I would come and see you.”

  They were excited.

  “And you a real lady,” said Martha. “It’s more than I can take in. Our little Sarah. Wouldn’t Mistress Carslake have been proud?”

  I felt the tears in my eyes then.

  I sat in the parlor with them. Martha brought out her homemade wine.

  They wanted to hear so much—where had the wedding taken place?

  “I’ll swear it was a great affair,” said Martha.

  “No, Martha. We did not want to wait for that. It was in a chapel in the house of one of my husband’s friends. It was very simple.”

  “And then he took you to his grand home, I reckon.”

  “No. We wanted to be alone.”

  “Ah yes,” said Martha, smiling knowledgeably. “I’ll swear Mistress Maggie will be as proud as a peacock at your rise in society, that I do. You becoming a little ladyship and all that. That is something I never thought to see. Oh, and I’d forgot. In all this excitement, it slipped out of my mind. It’s the letter. Go and get it, Rose.”

  “A letter?” I said.

  “It came by the same one as brought it here before. He was traveling down on the coach and he’d promised Mistress Maggie to bring it. It’s for you, he told us, so we kept it and we’ve been wondering how we were going to get it to you. It only came two or three days ago.”

  Rose went off and came back with the letter. I seized it eagerly. It was in Maggie’s writing and it had my name on it.

  I opened it and they all looked at me in anticipation as I read it.

  Dear Sarah,

  I shall be coming home in a week or so. My sister died. It was the best thing. She would never have been well again. There are several matters that have to be dealt with here, and I shall just stay to clear them up. My poor nephew has no idea how to manage. But I shall be starting back, I reckon, in say a couple of weeks from writing this. I am not looking forward to the journey, but I am to being home with you all.

  Tell Martha and Rose I’ll be glad to see them, and you don’t have to have me tell you that it is the same with you. The truth is I am just longing to be home.

  Your loving Maggie

  When I told them she was coming home their pleasure was intense.

  “What a day!” said Martha. “A ladyship comes to see us and the mistress is coming home.”

  We decided that she might be in London by the end of the week, considering when the letter must have been written.

  They were too excited for talk of anything else, which relieved me, for I was finding some of the questions they had been asking rather difficult to answer, and now that I was no longer under the spell of Jack’s presence, I was beginning to realize that there was something unusual about our marriage.

  After that, I could not resist calling at the house each day to discover whether Maggie had come home.

  There might be another letter, I thought. And, as she did not know what had been happening during her absence, she would expect me to be at the house and so would write to me there.

  I marveled that I had not attempted to communicate with her. I had been so completely absorbed by Jack, and he had somehow insisted that I give no thought to anyone but himself, while implying that he preferred our marriage to remain a secret for a while.

  When I looked back, it seemed that I had acted very strangely. Indeed, from the moment I had gone to that house in Knights-bridge and there had followed that most unusual marriage ceremony, I felt that I had been living in a dream.

  I could never resist taking the way past the theater. Then I would think with some nostalgia of the excitement I had experienced—that feeling of mingling fear and triumph when I stepped on to the stage. There was nothing quite like it. Kitty had known exactly what I wanted. Dear Kitty. Now that I was alone I thought of her constantly, of her grand marriage and her inability to give up the theater. Her story was like mine in a way, for I was now realizing how much I missed my growing knowledge of the theater people and I wondered whether there would come a time in my life, as there had in Kitty’s, when I should have regrets.

  But I was deliriously happy with Jack. I wanted nothing more. It was only because he was not with me that my thoughts were following this line.

  I paused for a moment to look up at the theater, and as I did so I heard someone call my name. A young woman was coming out of the building, and I recognized her as Joan Field, an actress with whom I had played on one occasion.

  “Sarah!” she was saying. “If it isn’t Sarah Standish! How fare you? And what do you here? Where have you been? You just disappeared mysteriously.”

  I was on the point of telling her of my marriage when I remembered that Jack had been rather anxious that it should not be announced just yet. In that moment I wondered why, although previously it had seemed such a trivial matter that I had not given too much thought to it. I felt he probably had his reasons and I naturally wished to do what he wanted me to, so I did not tell her of our marriage. She would learn about it in due course.

  “I wanted a rest from the theater,” I said.

  “And now you are back?”

  “Well, not exactly. I was just passing.”

  Fortunately Joan was absorbed by her own good fortune and wanted to talk of that, so she was not very interested in my affairs.

  “I have the most wonderful part,” she said. “You know it was decided to change Measure for Measure. They altered it a bit, and they brought in some of the characters from the other plays. They wanted Benedick and Beatrice in it and, well, I’m Beatrice.”

  “A good part, I’ll swear,” I said.

  “Oh indeed, yes. Why, I think it is the best part, and I do believe the audience were of that mind. There’s been such a to-do. Well, bringing
Beatrice into Measure for Measure! You can imagine.”

  “I can indeed,” I said.

  “Let’s go along. I’m meeting someone at Will’s Coffee House. Have you been there?”

  “Yes,” I said.

  “These coffee houses, they are so fashionable now. We can talk there. Do come.”

  I hesitated only for a moment. The days were so long. It would be pleasant to pass an hour or so in Joan’s company.

  We sat in the coffee house, where we talked—at least she did. She was so excited, first by the new part and even more so by a new admirer.

  “He liked my Beatrice,” she said. “He was there every night I played. Then…well, you know how it happens. He was waiting after the play. He is very distinguished. Sir Harry Fresham, that’s his name…a very noble gentleman. He has breeding. Oh, you can always tell. He gave me a diamond brooch.”

  “Does he…want to marry you?”

  She looked at me in amazement. “Well…there’s been nothing said. He’s talked of giving me a nice little place near the theater.”

  “Oh, I see,” I said.

  “As a matter of fact,” she went on, “you may be meeting him. These coffee houses are good places to meet your friends.”

  She went on talking and I noticed how her eyes kept straying to the door. I said I thought I should go, but she prevailed on me to stay for a while. I had the notion that she was certain that her new friend would come into the coffee house sooner or later and she was eager for me to meet him so that I might admire and perhaps envy her.

  And so it happened.

  She was alert suddenly; a look of great delight spread across her features as a man came towards our table.

  “Oh, Harry,” she cried, as if in surprise. “I wondered whether…Oh, this is Sarah Standish.”

  He took off his hat and bowed and a deep shock ran through me. It was only the wig which might have deceived me for a moment. It was light brown, with luxuriant curls reaching to his shoulders. I saw the freckles across the bridge of his short pert nose and the long upper lip. It was a face I had seen before in the chapel in the house in Knightsbridge.

  I was stunned. I could only stare at him in amazement.

  “Sir Harry Fresham,” Joan was saying proudly.