Читать книгу Her Assigned Husband - Ambrose Pratt - Страница 6

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IT was, no doubt, in consequence of the Colonial Secretary's potent interest in her affairs that Mrs. Sherwin was launched under the fairest auspices upon the quaint little social cosmos of Sydney.

On the arrival in Port Jackson of the good ship Vansittart, Mrs. Sherwin found herself an object of extraordinary attention and solicitude. An aide-de-camp, accompanied by two equerries, forestalled her debarkation in a boat propelled by the oars of sixteen convicts, with a pressing invitation from the Governor and his lady to make Government House the hostel of her entire party; and, when she stepped ashore, it was to run the gauntlet of a thousand eyes, of women desperately eager to note and imitate the latest English fashions, and of men, scarcely less anxious to scan the features of an inexplicable phenomenon—a woman young, beautiful, and fabulously rich, who had turned her back upon the great world in order to cultivate a patch of the Antipodean desert. One may be sure that Mrs. Sherwin spared no pains to decorate her person fittingly on that eventful morning. The vexed countenance of her English tire-maid, Julia Dixon, was proof enough if proof were wanting. But the truth is, Mrs. Sherwin's form and face provided ample witness. "Ravishing, 'pon honor!" exclaimed Sir Harry as she set her foot upon the quarter-deck. That gentleman had already made friends with the aide, whom he ceremoniously presented. "Major Eustace Wilkes, my dear cousin; I knew his elder brother in the 14th Lancers. Many a bottle have we cracked together."

Mrs. Sherwin gave the major a graceful courtesy and an alluring smile. She read his despatches quickly, and indifferently assented to the invitation they conveyed. But she praised with ardor the loveliness of the harbor, the brightness of the sky and the courtesy of her reception, and all the while her eyes besought the aide-de-camp to take the spirit of her universal praises to himself. Major Wilkes was her lover on the quarter-deck; but before they reached the shore he was her slave. There were many similar good resolutions passed before the day was done, though one may doubt if any one was kept. Mrs. Sherwin was presented to a round dozen leading private citizens upon the landing stage, and to as many officers, who obviously held their civilian brothers in contempt. By some magic, which nobody could trace or analyse, she contrived to make each man she met believe he had absorbed her interest, and each woman that her dressmaker had little, if anything, to learn from London.

In the rarer atmosphere of Government House she was not a whit less successful. Five minutes' conversation with his Excellency pleasantly convinced the Governor of a better standing with the English Minister, his chief, than he had even dared to fancy; and her Excellency's affectionate esteem was acquired in perpetuity by a few subtle flatteries, supplemented with some rolls of brocaded silk and the promise of her tire-maid's services to convert them into ultra-fashionable frocks. In a word, Mrs. Sherwin was irresistible. She fascinated every mind, she captivated every heart. Her first week was spent in a round of routs and dinner parties, and, even before it was over, she had quenched every natural misgiving as to the nature of her relations with Sir Harry Blessington.

Very manifestly, her cousin worshipped her; but it was equally patent, even to the most suspicious eye, that Mrs. Sherwin used him merely as a servant and a shield. With other men, she flirted openly, but with him she did not flirt. She was always the great lady, and he must keep his distance. Soon the unlucky baronet came to be veritably pitied; he was ever so painfully anxious to placate her, yet she treated him with coolness, and seldom addressed him save to utter a command.

The more aspiring of her colonial critics, however, came presently to confess doubts if Mrs. Sherwin might possess a heart at all. True enough, she was rarely unresponsive to their coram populo advances, and it was a comparatively easy matter to entrap her into a tete-a-tete. But, observe this miracle—the lady, just now an audacious siren in the crowd, had no sooner acquired an opportunity for unsupervised audacity than she would confound her swain with such an address as this: "How nice that we are now alone. Do you know, Captain So-and-so, I have been deliberately intriguing for this chance to consult you. I am most seriously interested in making a success of my experiment in industry, and I can see it is quite necessary I should not start with mistaken notions. Now, I am aware, that you are the great authority here on (say, hop-growing), so I propose to put myself at your feet, a very diligent and grateful pupil if you will but condescend to be my teacher."

"The devil of it was," as one gallant soldier subsequently informed his comrades at the mess, "the woman is absolutely serious. She put me through a catechism so earnest and intelligent that, damme, sirs, before I knew what I was doing I was acting the professor; aye, and not unwillingly."

Beyond doubt, Mrs. Sherwin's popularity must have suffered a speedy eclipse had she singled out any individual for warmer favors. But she subjected all her admirers to the same process. In company she challenged them with glances tinged with provocation; but in privy conversation she became a mind—and nothing but a mind—burning with an imperious desire to be instructed. Now it was about some phase of convict discipline; now about the proper soil for certain crops; now again about the climate or the rainfall. Every brain that she encountered was explored, and her passion to be educated seemed insatiable. Gradually, most of her admirers ceased to pursue her with amorous intent, convinced of the insincerity of her engaging "company" manners and fatigued with the task of answering her questions. Those voted her a serious woman, a schemer, a blue stocking, or a tease. But as she lost caste among the frivolous, she as steadily increased the circle of her sober friends; and three months had not elapsed before many of the older officers and the more solid civilians began to treat her with deep and genuine respect. Her stay at Government House extended over nearly four months, and it would not have terminated then had their Excellencies' wishes only been consulted. Mrs. Sherwin, however, felt the time had come to get to hand-grips with her great experiment, and the architect having reported that the building and equipment of her country homestead wanted nothing of completion, she took leave one fine day of her hosts and set forth at the head of an imposing retinue into the bush.

Two days after her departure there arrived a mail packet from England carrying, inter alia, a letter to the wife of Major Marshall (a flagrant gossip) from a bosom friend in London. Within half a dozen hours the ladies of Sydney were better acquainted with a certain part of the contents of the document than they might have been had Mrs. Marshall employed the town crier to be her publisher.

Sydney positively effervesced. "Mrs. Sherwin is no great lady, neither is she a widow. She is an imposter, an adventurer. She is the wife of a convict. Her husband was a notorious transported thief or murderer, who is now, they say working in a chain gang in Van Diemen's Land. Mrs. Sherwin migrated to Sydney because England cast her out." The noise of these explosive exclamations soon penetrated to headquarters, and, thereupon another sensation was provided to society. The Governor sternly rebuked Major Marshall for permitting his wife to circulate the scandal. He described Mrs. Sherwin as a noble but unfortunate woman, and he fearlessly proclaimed himself her champion.

His Excellency's first subsequent report to the Secretary of State, now on record in the archives of the Colonial Office, makes the following interesting reference to Mrs. Sherwin:

"I can perceive no reason to apprehend an unprofitable outcome of the cross-breeding experiment now in progress at the Camberwell sheep-walk—to which your Lordship rightly attaches great importance—because the director of operations is a female. Mrs. Sherwin is a woman of masculine character, and is exceptionally shrewd and capable. Her merino sheep have greatly improved and increased since they landed here in April of last year . . . Mrs. Sherwin is planting immediately 40 acres with hops for malt, 60 acres with grain, and 10 acres with assorted fruit trees and Malaga vines. I am hopeful that her example will stimulate a like enterprise among our free settlers......"