Читать книгу The Awakening Of Miss Henley - Julia Justiss - Страница 13

As it happened, after returning from the park, Emma did not gird her loins and confront her mama.

Instead, she found herself having to soothe Marie, who sobbed as she helped Emma change from her habit into an afternoon gown and then fell before her, apologising for having kept Mr Nullford’s presence a secret and begging Emma’s forgiveness for the deception. In between hiccups, she explained that she only wanted her dear, sweet mistress to find a kind man who would take care of her and give her a happy life, like Lady Henley was always saying Emma needed.

Not until Emma had reassured the maid over and over that she was not angry and would never turn Marie off without a character, that she understood Marie just wanted the best for her, was the girl finally able to dry her tears.

By the time the maid bobbed a final curtsy and headed back to the servants’ quarters, Emma had had enough of sobbing and confrontation. Although it was likely her mama would be sobbing, too, when she confronted Emma, rather than apologise for her part in the deception, she was more likely to heap recrimination on Emma’s head for having turned down a perfectly unexceptional suitor.

And then lament, with another bout of tears, what was to become of her poor, plain, maiden daughter if she kept throwing away every chance to become respectably settled when, at her age, Emma could not hope to receive many more offers—perhaps not any!

It would not be the first time Emma had endured such a scene, though she devoutly hoped it would be the last. But after suffering Marie’s outburst, it made her head hurt just to think about meeting her mother, who seemed as oblivious as the maid to what Emma really wanted.

Which sealed it. She would grab a footman to escort her and slip away to Hatchards before her mama found out she’d returned home. There, she could dash off quick notes asking her two best friends from school to meet her at Gunter’s for some ices, after which, although it wasn’t the day for their normal weekly meeting, they might call on Lady Lyndlington.

Being able to write a few strongly worded appeals to various Members of Parliament decrying the continuing miseries of child labour should be just the thing to put today’s events in perspective and calm her for the coming showdown with her mother.

A little more than an hour later, Emma arrived at Berkeley Square and took a table inside Gunter’s, where she awaited the arrival of the two people dearest to her in the world: Olivia Overton and Sara Standish.

Olivia was first to arrive. Smiling as she waved over to her table the tall, angular girl who had a long, plain face and dull brown hair just as she did, Emma felt again the surge of gladness that Olivia had taken the lead and turned three shy outsiders at Mrs Axminster’s Academy for Young Ladies into the dearest of friends.

Inviting them to share her table for dinner one night, Olivia had observed that Emma and Sara also seemed to enjoy books and seemed as uninterested as she was in the conversations about Seasons and husband-hunting that occupied most of their classmates. She then suggested that the three of them would have a better chance of surviving the miseries of school if they banded together.

They soon become inseparable. After discovering the feminist writings of Mary Wollstonecraft and the calls for democracy and social reform of Thomas Paine, they’d decided that, for them, the future would involve working for noble causes, rather than competing for suitors or devoting themselves to securing—and measuring their worth by—the brilliance of the marriage proposals they received.

She and Olivia had just exchanged hugs and greetings when Sara Standish walked in, her plump face wreathed in a smile that magnified the sweetness of her expression. Petite, blonde and curvaceous, she provided a sharp contrast to her friends’ tall angularity.

As Emma settled in beside them at the table, the doubt and turmoil in her heart eased. With her friends to stand by her, she knew she could face anything.

‘I’m so glad you could come on such short notice,’ Emma told them after they’d given the waiter their order. ‘I was afraid you might both be occupied with calls this afternoon.’

‘Your note did take me away from perusal of a quite fascinating book,’ Olivia said.

‘I bargained with my aunt that, if I agreed to attend without protest whatever society events she chooses, I would only have to make calls with her twice a week,’ Sara said. ‘Luckily, today was not one of the designated calling afternoons. But what has transpired that you needed to summon us so precipitously?’

In a few terse sentences, Emma told them about Nullford’s proposal, her refusal and the scene with her maid that had sent her scurrying from the house before it could be repeated, in more ominous tones, with her mama. Though she mentioned in passing her ride in the park, she omitted describing her encounter with Lord Theo.

Not that her friends would tease her about him, or press for more details of the meeting than she chose to relate. In truth, she was a bit embarrassed to find herself so attracted to a man who was exactly the sort of too-handsome, too-charming, too-faithless and too-purposeless gentleman she’s always scorned.

Even thinking about Lord Theo made Emma feel edgy and unsettled. So she would just stop thinking about him, she told herself.

‘You escaped before your mama could take you to task for refusing Mr Nullford?’ Olivia asked, pulling Emma from her thoughts.

‘Yes. I scuttled off to Hatchards, where I bought some paper and was kindly lent a pen and some space on their counter to write my notes.’

‘But given that the suitor was Nullford,’ Sara said, ‘are you so sure your mama will be disappointed?’

‘Since she put him up to it, yes. After the episode with my maid, I couldn’t bear the prospect of sitting still while she scolded me for my foolishness, then wondered for the millionth time why I fail to see the necessity of marrying so apparent to every other female, and then worked herself into a deep despondency, worrying over what will become of me. I hope later to use this incident to persuade her to finally accept that my vision for my future is quite different from hers and get her to agree to release me from the social obligations of the Season. But I’ve no hope of doing so before we go through the ritual of outrage, puzzlement and despair.’

‘At least you know she does care about you—even if she cannot understand you,’ Sara said.

Olivia reached over to press their friend’s hand. After her daughter’s birth, Sara’s mama had taken to her sofa, claiming her health prevented her taking any further part in society. There, she received calls from select gossipy friends and the various physicians and apothecaries summoned to treat her latest ailment, while delegating all responsibility for managing her daughter’s future to her sister, Sara’s aunt, Lady Patterson.

‘Yes, and I do appreciate that she’s sincerely concerned about me,’ Emma replied, ‘which is why I have so far tolerated yet another Season, when I would much prefer to be done with it and set up my own establishment. Oh, to be able to come and go when and where I please, without dragging along a maid or a footman!’

‘I know,’ Olivia said, sighing as well. ‘Though we are all more than one-and-twenty and could legally access the funds to establish the household together we planned at school, it’s turned out to be not nearly as easy as we envisaged. Merely mentioning the possibility of our hiring a house is enough to set Mama off in a swoon.’

‘Even we must recognise that our families will suffer a good deal of scorn and pity for producing daughters with such odd, unfeminine aims,’ Sara said. ‘I’m sure your mama genuinely believes that choosing not to marry and giving up your place in society would mean not just censure for her, but ruin and heartache for you, too.’

‘Another point on which Mama harps,’ Emma agreed. And one Mr Nullford had stressed. ‘Sadly, none of us can escape the burden of appreciating our families’ sensibilities, no matter how much their expectations conflict with our own wishes.’

‘I have no intention of “appreciating” my family’s sensibilities to the point of marrying, just to spare them distress,’ Olivia replied acidly. ‘Bound to a husband for whom I feel at best a tepid respect? Ending up a wife either neglected in favour of prettier, mindless females like the ones we knew at school, or scorned for having the temerity to display my intelligence and work towards political goals? Never!’

‘I’m not suggesting we give in to society’s pressure and marry,’ Emma replied. ‘Only that withdrawing from society to live and work together, as we envisaged at Mrs Axminster’s, will have to be deferred a while longer.’

‘How much longer?’ Olivia asked, frustration in her tone. ‘Until all family members likely to be embarrassed by us have passed on?’

‘Certainly not that long!’ Emma said, giving her friend a rueful smile. ‘I remain hopeful that I may escape by the end of the Season, perhaps even before. Especially after the contretemps over Mr Nullford, which Mama is sure to bewail as perhaps my last chance to wed.’

Inwardly wincing again, she refrained from disclosing Mr Nullford’s hurtful remark about her desirability.

‘Nullford!’ Olivia said scornfully, shaking her head. ‘Only a female who believes any husband is better than none could seriously consider wedding that blockhead. And for someone as intelligent and perceptive as you to marry such a man…it would be a travesty!’

‘Certainly a waste of intellect,’ Sara agreed.

‘Thank you, kind friends. Unfortunately, Mama is just the sort of female who would think Nullford better than no one. Enough about that dispiriting offer! Though I did need to vent my ire over that event, my other purpose in bringing you here was to suggest that we call upon Lady Lyndlington. Perhaps she will have some letter writing for us, to help redeem what has so far been a most trying day.’

Except for the interval with Lord Theo. That exchange had been as stimulating as it was disturbing.

Truly, she ought to try harder to avoid the man, though he had a disconcerting habit of occasionally turning up at the social engagements to which her mama insisted on dragging her. She should avoid him especially since some foolish feminine part of her seemed to respond intensely whenever he was near. The man represented a clear danger to her good sense—and self-control.

And now she was thinking of him again, after telling herself she wouldn’t.

Shaking her head with irritation, Emma said, ‘Shall we finish our tea and call on Lady Lyndlington?’

‘Yes, let’s,’ Olivia said. ‘All this talk of marriage makes me want to write angry letters, too.’

‘Indeed!’ Sara agreed with a smile. ‘Let’s hear it for a limit to child labour, votes for all—and a wider role in society for women!’

Though Emma and her schoolmates were fortunate enough to find Lady Lyndlington at home, they did not end up writing letters. The head of the Ladies’ Committee, the butler informed them, was already entertaining a guest—Mrs Christopher Lattimar, wife to the brother of Emma’s good friend Temperance.

Since that lady also happened to be the former Ellie Parmenter, who before her marriage had for years been the mistress of an older peer and was thus, despite her gentle birth, not accepted in society, the three had heard about, but never met, her.

‘Would you ladies like to join them, or would you prefer to call again later?’ the butler asked.

The ton might shun his wife, but Christopher Lattimar’s close circle of political friends and associates in Parliament had quietly welcomed her. Lady Maggie, wife of his good friend Giles Hadley, Viscount Lyndlington, had become something of a champion for her and one of the leading supporters of her school for girls.

It took only a moment for the three to exchange glances and a mutual nod. ‘We would be pleased to join them,’ Emma replied.

‘Ladies, so kind of you to stop by,’ Lady Maggie said, she and her guest rising as the butler ushered them in. ‘May I present you to my good friend, Mrs Christopher Lattimar.’

‘Only if they feel…comfortable meeting me,’ Mrs Lattimar said to Lady Lyndlington before turning to Emma and her friends. ‘I shouldn’t wish to cause you—or your families—any distress.’

Even if Emma had not already known the circumstances beyond her control that had thrust this lovely, dark-haired woman into a position of shame, the fact that she had Lady Lyndlington’s support would have influenced Emma towards her. Anyone who’d earned the respect and affection of Lady Maggie, daughter of an earl and wife of one of Parliament’s leading reform politicians, would have to be intelligent and interesting.

In addition to which, her friend Temperance also held her brother’s disgraced wife in high esteem.

‘On the contrary! We would be honoured,’ Olivia said, expressing the friends’ feelings exactly.

‘Excellent!’ Lady Lyndlington said. ‘Mrs Lattimar, may I present Miss Emma Henley, Miss Sara Standish and Miss Olivia Overton, all three hard workers—and enthusiastic letter writers—for my Committee. Ladies, my dear friend, Mrs Ellie Lattimar.’

‘I’m so pleased to meet you,’ Emma said as the ladies exchanged curtsies. ‘I’ve heard so much about you from Temperance. She admires you tremendously.’

‘As do we all,’ Lady Lyndlington said, pressing Mrs Lattimar’s hand.

‘You are sure we are not intruding?’ Sara asked. ‘We don’t mean to interrupt.’

‘Not at all,’ Lady Lyndlington assured her. ‘In fact, given the enthusiasm you have all displayed for our committee’s aims, I’ve been hoping to persuade you to work for another of our projects. As you may remember, Mrs Lattimar runs a school that provides education and training to indigent girls. It’s an endeavour I think you might also like to support.’

‘You rescue girls from the streets or from houses of ill repute, do you not, Mrs Lattimar?’ asked Olivia.

Though Lady Maggie’s eyes widened and Emma felt a pang of dismay at Olivia’s customary bluntness, Mrs Lattimar merely smiled. ‘Not to dress it up in fine linen, yes. Now, if we are to be friends who speak the truth plainly, shall we dispense with formality, as Lady Maggie tells me she prefers among members of her Committee? Please, call me “Ellie”.’

‘We’d be delighted to—Ellie,’ Emma replied. ‘How do you find the girls?’

‘Some find me, having heard murmurs about the school on the streets. I also maintain contacts with various houses, whose proprietresses I knew in my former…position. Sometimes, the girls I take in are daughters of working girls who don’t want to follow that life. More often, they are orphans with nowhere to go but the streets.’

‘There are few enough choices for girls, even honest ones who wish to go into service,’ Olivia said. ‘I imagine it’s almost impossible to escape a life on the streets—and eventual prostitution—when you have no resources at all.’

‘Very difficult,’ Ellie agreed.

‘What sort of training do you provide?’ Sara asked.

‘All the girls are taught basic reading, writing and simple maths. The rest of their day is devoted to mastering practical skills that will lead to future employment—needlework, cleaning tasks, cooking. Our goal is enable them to become honest, hard-working members of society, protected by their skills and experience from the threat of ending up back on the streets—or in the brothels.’

‘What inspiring work! How can we help?’ Emma asked.

‘Monetary contributions are always welcome. But if you wished to become personally involved, I would be happy to have you visit the school itself. Having genteel ladies describe to the students the duties domestic servants perform in an aristocratic household, stressing the skills that would impress a housekeeper interviewing them for a position, or make them valuable to their mistress after they are hired, would be very helpful.’

The three friends exchanged another look and a mutual nod. ‘We can certainly pledge to do that,’ Emma said. ‘Perhaps during our visits, we can find other ways to be useful.’

‘I would very much appreciate it,’ Ellie said. ‘But now, I must return to the school.’

‘I’m afraid I am due elsewhere soon as well,’ Lady Maggie said as the ladies all rose. ‘No time for letter writing today! But I will see you Tuesday morning, as usual?’

‘Of course,’ Olivia said. ‘We look forward to it.’

After bidding the others goodbye, the friends descended the front steps to await the hackney a footman had summoned.

‘What obstacles Ellie Lattimar has overcome,’ Olivia said.

‘Temperance told me her father virtually sold her to an older lord to pay off his debts,’ Emma confided.

‘Much as I sometimes feel…unappreciated, at least Mama cared enough to delegate my aunt to look after me,’ Sara said.

‘Imagine, being cast out at sixteen all alone, with nothing to protect you or secure your future but your own wits and determination,’ Olivia said, shaking her head in awe.

Emma seized both her friends’ hands and pressed them. ‘Thank heavens, whatever happens, we will always have each other, no matter how scandalously unconventional we become.’

The hackney arrived and they set off, planning where they would meet at the various upcoming social engagements as they dropped off first Sara in Upper Brook Street and then Olivia at Hanover Square.

After seeing her last friend to her door, Emma descended the stairs back to the street. No reason now to delay returning home—and facing the inevitable, and inevitably unpleasant, encounter with her mother.

Halting in mid-step, Emma surveyed the position of the sun. It was still mid-afternoon, she calculated. Her mother would only now be rising from her bed to drink her morning chocolate—and learn of her exasperating daughter’s latest folly. She probably had another hour or so before she would add tardiness to the tally of faults her mother would bring against her.

Deciding on the moment, she waved away the hackney and set off walking.