Lament for a lost lover

Great events might be happening away from Eversleigh. I could not think seriously about them; my life was centred round my child. When I heard that the Dutch fleet had sailed up the Medway as far as Chatham and had made themselves masters of Sheerness, I said how dreadful it was, but I was not thinking much about it. The Loyal London, the Great James and the .Royal Oak were burned by the enemy and fortifications were blown up. I shuddered, but my thoughts were all for my child. “We had never been so disgraced,” cried Lord Eversleigh, and I knew how deeply shocked my parents would be by the news.

But I could only think that Priscilla was gaining weight, that already she knew me and would stop whimpering if I took her. Already she would smile at me. I delighted in her.

The boys came to see her, and were amazed at her little hands and feet.

“She’ll never be able to run fast with little feet like that,” declared Leigh. “Silly,” said Edwin. “She’ll grow big, won’t she, Mama? We were little like that once.”

“I was never as little,” boasted Leigh.

“Oh, yes, you were, I saw you,” I told him. I could never look at him without thinking of Edwin and Harriet together. I wondered when he had been conceived. It was before Edwin had been, because he was the elder.

I had to stop thinking of that because it was affecting my attitude to Leigh. It was not his fault that his parents had both deceived me so blatantly.

Uncle Toby was always making excuses to come to the nursery. He was enchanted by Priscilla.

“You lucky man’ he said to Carleton. “I’d give a lot to have a child like that.” Then he would talk sadly of his misspent youth and how different everything would have been if he had settled down and become a family man. “It’s never too late’ said Carleton. “Shall we find a bride for him, Arabella?”

“We’ll have a house party’ I said. “We’ll invite as many eligible ladies as we can muster ...”

And I thought: Someone for Charlotte. Poor Charlotte, she seemed to have grown even more unhappy of late. It was almost as though she had been affected by my marriage. I suppose it was seeing me with the children.

There was great jubilation when peace was declared with the French, the Danes and the Dutch, but Carleton told me that people were beginning to murmur against the King for concluding a peace which it was said was dishonourable. “The country’s honeymoon with Charles is long over,” he said. “They are now murmuring ... not so much against him as against his mistresses.”

“Which is somewhat unfair of them.”

“Alas, dear Arabella, the world often is unfair.”

I agreed it was, and we talked about Uncle Toby and the possibility of his finding a wife.

“We really must bestir ourselves,” I said.

As it happened there was no need for us to do that.

That September Uncle Toby went to London for a brief visit and it became a long one. He wrote back to us that he was enjoying life in London. He was at the playhouse most days. He had seen Nell Gwyn as Alice Piers in The Black Prince, and better still in Dryden’s comedy An Evening’s Love as Donna Jacintha. He wrote lyrically of the charms of Nelly and how the rumours were that the King’s attentions were now fixed on her and poor Moll Davies was nowhere in the running.

“It appears he is enjoying the London scene’ said Carleton. “That will compensate him for all he has missed as a family man.”

Then quite suddenly came a letter which was addressed to Lord Eversleigh. We were all shown it and read it again and again. Carleton laughed immoderately. “I never thought he would have gone as far as that,” he declared.

“What will happen now?” demanded Lord Eversleigh.

“What is natural!” said Carleton. “He will return here with the lady.” The fact was that Uncle Toby had married a wife. According to him she was the most beautiful of women; she was attractive, amusing; everything he had wanted in a wife. He was the happiest man alive and he was going to share that happiness with his family. The day after we received this letter he would be with us, for he was following close on the heels of his messenger.

The whole household waited eagerly.

True to his word Uncle Toby arrived with his bride. As they came through the gates we were all there waiting.

I stared. I thought I was dreaming. It could not possibly be so. But it was. Uncle Toby’s bride was Harriet Main.

THE SHADOW OF DEATH

MATILDA’S IMMEDIATE REACTION HAD BEEN ALARM. FOR A FEW moments she could only stare at her unbelievingly when Toby presented her. I was sure she felt as I did that she was dreaming.

“Oh, I know you’ve already met Harriet,” Uncle Toby announced. “She has told me all about it, have you not, my love?”

“I said we should have no secrets,” she answered softly.

“And the devil of a job I had getting her to accept me,” went on Uncle Toby. “I thought I never should get her to agree.”