Philippa Carr - The Adulteress

And went out. The remark had shaken me. What did Jessie mean by it? When I had turned to look at her her expression had been one of bland innocence. But the nudge … Well, nudging was a habit with her.

Was I oversensitive? I was a married woman. It was to be expected that I should have a child and if I did so after a visit, even though she had been careful enough to mention the time lapse, it was not so very significant.

I went out to find Jethro and I did. He was in his cottage.

“Ah.” he said. “I thought maybe you’d be calling on me sometime. Mistress Zipporah.”

“I had to talk to you. Jethro. Tell me. how is everything at the Court?”

“It’s all as it should be, it seems. His lordship is happy. Jessie gives herself airs and still behaves as though she’s the mistress of the house—which in a way she is. there being no mistress there … mistress of the staff, you might say—but she does take her rule on the other side of the screens, if you get my meaning.”

“I thought she was a little more respectful.”

“Oh yes, she is that. And she takes great care of his lordship.”

“I have seen that and I don’t think it is just for our benefit. She is really anxious to keep him alive.”

“She changed after you went, Mistress Zipporah. I don’t know what you did … but you did something.”

“I just pointed out that the easy life was hers only as long as Lord Eversleigh was alive to provide it.”

Jethro’s brown old face wrinkled up into a grin.

“Well, it did the trick and everyone seems happy.”

I wondered if Jessie was, for she had had grandiose schemes for getting her hands on Eversleigh.

I said: “And the afternoon visits to Amos Carew, do they still continue?”

“They do. Mistress Zipporah.”

“Jethro,” I said, “I shall have to go soon. Can you keep me informed?”

Jethro looked embarrassed and I realized I had been tactless. Of course, he couldn’t read or write.

I went on: “Perhaps you could send a messenger to me. … Is there anyone … ?”

He looked dubious and I went on: “It would only be in an emergency of course.”

“I’d do my best. Mistress Zipporah, but all is well now and has been since you came, before which is some time now.”

I had to leave it at that.

I came away thoughtfully from Jethro’s cottage and as I did not feel like returning to the house I started to walk in the opposite direction.

I was deep in thought. I was visualizing myself living here with Jean-Louis and meanwhile Dickon would be at Clavering. Life would be so different. I should have to get rid of Jessie quickly and I wondered what her reaction would be. I had not liked her remark about Lottie’s birth nor the suggestive and significant nudge which had accompanied it.

So deep in thought was I that I had not noticed that the sky had darkened; I heard a rumble of thunder in the distance and thought I should have to hurry back if I was to reach the house before the storm broke.

I was near one of the farms which was a quarter of a mile from Eversleigh when the rain started to come down in torrents. There were patches of blue sky on the horizon so I guessed that it was only a passing storm. I was not far from a barn and I sprinted across, opened the door and went in. It would only be for five minutes or so, I was sure.

It was dark in the barn after coming from the light and my eyes took a few seconds to adjust.

Then I saw that I was not alone.

They were lying in the hay … two people. I tried not to look at them for they were in a state of disarray and were in such a close embrace that at first I had thought it was one person who lay there.

I felt my heart begin to beat as the realization came to me that the two people lying there were Dickon and Evalina.

I wanted to turn and run but I felt as though my feet had taken root.

I stammered: “Dickon … Evalina …”

Dickon was looking at me; he was still holding Evalina. She had turned her face toward me.

“Don’t look at me like that,” cried Evalina. “What about yourself, eh? Some people shouldn’t condemn others for what they do themselves.”

I felt sick. I turned and ran out into the blinding rain.

My boots were sodden; my clothes saturated and my hair hung damply round my face as I stepped into the hall.

Jessie was there talking to Sabrina.

“My goodness,” cried Jessie. “You’re wet through.”

“Why … Zipporah,” said Sabrina, “you shouldn’t have come through that rain.”

“You should have stood up … and waited,” said Jessie. “Get them wet things off. Rub yourself down with a towel. Would you like a cup of hot soup?”

“Nothing,” I said. “It was foolish of me.”

I thought as I went upstairs: I want nothing but to get away from this house.

I had discarded my wet things and put on dry ones. I went along to Sabrina’s room.

I said to her vehemently: “I want to go home … soon.”

“Well,” she said, “perhaps we should start making plans. Dickon won’t like it. He’s happy here.”

Dickon. I thought: Don’t talk to me of Dickon! I could not shut out the memory of his face as he lay there in the barn looking at me … insolently.

She would tell him. He would know my secret. It must have been Evalina who had listened outside my door.

What did she know? What had she told Dickon? Most assuredly she would have told him of her suspicions.

I began to feel afraid as I had not before.

I saw her a few hours later. She was in the hall with her mother.

She looked at me defiantly, as though to say, Tell on me and I’ll tell on you.

It was blackmail. I remembered that other occasion when she had bought my silence with the key of my door.

I wanted to get away from this house. It was evil, I knew it.

She was smiling at me blandly.

“You got very wet, Mistress Ransome,” she said. “Mother told me that you came in really soaked. Did you change? You ought to. You don’t want to catch a cold, do you?”

“Thank you for your concern,” I said.

She gave me an innocent smile.

Two days later we left Eversleigh. Sabrina, I think, was happy to go, though Dickon was rather sullen.

“I believe you’ve really fallen in love with the place,” said his mother fondly.

“I like it,” answered Dickon. “I like it a lot.”

And all the way home I was wondering what Evalina had said to him.

MORE THAN A YEAR had passed since our return from Eversleigh. It had been an eventful time as far as the country was concerned for George the Second died and his grandson ascended the throne. The third George was a youth of twenty-two and very much under the influence of his mother and Lord Bute, the man who was said to be her lover and that, most people said, augured no good for England.

In the country I was too immersed in my own private affairs to think much about which George ruled us—second or third, it seemed unimportant to me.

During the year I had not visited Eversleigh. Sometimes I felt I should go but I could never bring myself to it. The thought of facing Jessie and Evalina repelled me so strongly that I made excuse after excuse to myself not to go. There was no need, I would say. Uncle Carl had written—there were about four letters over the year—and he was well and happy and very well cared for. These words he underlined. Life was as good as it could be for an old man who could do little but sit in his chair or lie in his bed and review the days of glory—or folly, whichever way one looked at it.

Time passed so quickly and I had given up hope of ever seeing Gerard again. I did not think of him so frequently as I had in the past and when I did it was to look back on that adventure as something not quite real. I could even believe that Lottie was Jean-Louis’s daughter. She was four years old now and beautiful. I suppose all mothers think that their children are more beautiful and intelligent than others but I don’t think I was exaggerating her charms. Those violet eyes, with their fringe of dark lashes, and dark curling hair alone would have made her a beauty. She was not plump as some children are; her face was oval, her chin a little pointed. There were times when she looked older than her years. She was spritelike, mischievous, not fractious but fun-loving. Needless to say she was adored.

My mother, who could only vaguely remember her own mother—the legendary Carlotta—said she was sure there was a resemblance between my daughter and her great-grandmother.

Dickon had never betrayed by a look or a word that he knew of what had happened to me at Eversleigh before Lottie’s birth. He never referred to my surprising him in the barn with Evalina. Perhaps he had not asked her what she had meant when she had shouted at me. It might have been the sort of remark that could have been thrown at anyone. Perhaps he thought that his behavior with Evalina was commonplace—as it might well be with him—and that my stepping into the barn at such a moment was no more than opening someone’s door before they were properly dressed.

His attitude toward me had never been of a friendly nature. He had always sensed my disapproval—or rather my refusal to adore him as his mother and my mother did.

Our visit to Eversleigh had changed him, though. He became thoughtful and serious; he was to go away to school but he persuaded his mother and mine that he should not go.

He wanted to learn about the estate.

“Darling,” said Sabrina, “you have to be educated, you know.”

“I am. I’ll go on with old Faulkner. But I want to be here. I want to be with you, dear mother, and you, Aunt Clarissa.”

It amazed me how he could get his way with them. He was not demonstrative by nature and to have him declaring that he wanted to be with them—as though for their own sakes—seemed to put them into such a delirium of joy that they were ready to grant him anything.

They exchanged glances, their eyes brim full of joy.

“Well, shall we leave it for a while?” said my mother. “Postpone school for another year, shall we say?”

He was now in his fifteenth year but he looked eighteen. He had shot up amazingly and was nearly six feet tall and there was more growing time left to him. He was very handsome, with light blond hair—thick and waving—and very piercing blue eyes; he had perfect teeth and his skin was flawless; moreover, his feature was so perfectly chiseled that he might have been a Greek god. In fact he reminded me of Michelangelo’s David. There was one flaw and it was only apparent at times. It was most obvious when that calculating look came into his face and then it reminded me of a fox’s mask. Cunning was there, ruthlessness, an absolute disregard for what stood in the way of his getting what he wanted. But I seemed to be the only one who saw this. I knew that he had tried to shift the blame for the fire onto the gardener’s boy. I would remember that because it was the beginning of the decline in Jean-Louis’s health. I knew too that for some time he had come to manhood physically. I had seen his watchful eyes on some of the prettier maids; he reminded me then of a fox waiting to spring on a chicken. I knew that he was growing up into a ruthlessly ambitious man whose sexual appetites would be voracious and that he would not care in what manner they were satisfied as long as they were. Perhaps these qualities were born in him—although I understood his father had been a kindly idealistic man, and Sabrina might have been rebellious in her youth but there was an inherent goodness in her. But the indulgence he had received from those two doting women had certainly not helped to eradicate his less attractive qualities.

But there was no doubt now that he was going to work hard. He was constantly with James Fenton and would ride with him round the estate listening intently to all that passed between the agent and the farmers. He was also often in the company of Jean-Louis, which meant that he came over from the Hall almost every day.

“That boy has a real flair for estate management,” said Jean-Louis. “He reminds me of myself at his age. I always wanted to manage the place.”

“He seems to have changed so suddenly,” I said. “He did not seem to be interested in work before.”

My mother and Sabrina were delighted. They thought he was more wonderful than ever—if that were possible.

I found James Fenton very interesting. He was fond of talking. He had been abroad for some time in France so that he felt he had a knowledge of that country. That was what had first aroused my interest in him. He was a very good agent, Jean-Louis said; and he was grateful to have someone on whom he could rely just now, for he tired very easily and he could not walk at all without the aid of his stick. I often wondered whether he was getting worse but he always shrugged aside my inquiries, and as I knew he hated talking of his disability I refrained from mentioning it.