‘You are too kind! And I shall say no more upon the subject on purpose that I may pass for an educated – but modest – woman. But I interrupted your very interesting account just now. I believe you were going to tell me that you and your sister decided that the most unwelcome intrusion upon your time – the very worst disturber of your studies – would be marriage.’
‘We did. For have you ever met a married woman who practises upon her instrument or touches her crayons?’
‘No, on that we would certainly agree. The demands of a husband, a household and a family prevent even the most talented woman from pursuing any endeavour which does not relate directly to them.’
‘Quite so, Miss Kent. Marriage is so very final. It changes everything.’
Dido gave a little start. For some reason those words touched something deep inside her. It was almost as if they answered a question she had been asking herself, but just at the moment she could not remember what the question had been. It was something which she must think of later. For now Miss Sophia, quite blind to anything but her own concerns, was continuing with her strange tale.
‘…and so, you see, we laid our plan. We knew that to declare our intention of never marrying would do us no good at alclass="underline" we would only be laughed at and disbelieved. So we set ourselves parts to play. Amelia’s quieter character made her prefer to adopt a repelling silence; while I chose – well, I need not explain. You have seen my behaviour in company. We aim to disgust sensible men with our silly manners and devotion to accomplishments in which our performance is less than mediocre.’
‘And what,’ asked Dido with a smile, ‘of men who are not sensible?’
‘They,’ said Sophia solemnly, ‘do not generally present a problem. Our parents do not expect – or wish – us to marry foolish husbands.’
‘I cannot fault your plan, Miss Sophia,’ said Dido after a few moments’ thought. ‘And yet I wonder whether it is entirely necessary. For I have a great idea that real accomplishments, education and intelligence might frighten away lovers – even sensible lovers – more surely than any amount of silliness and incompetence.’
Sophia’s face clouded. She clasped her kid gloves in her lap and frowned down at them. ‘You may be right, Miss Kent,’ she said at last. ‘It is a subject which Amelia and I sometimes talk about. And yet, there is this to consider: whatever means we use to escape marriage, we will be mocked for it. That cannot be helped. It is the way of the world.’
‘Yes,’ said Dido with a pang, ‘an unmarried woman will always be a target of laughter.’
‘Exactly so,’ said Miss Harris, quite insensible of the pain she was causing. ‘And I believe, Miss Kent, that there is not a woman born who would not rather suffer ridicule for what she knows to be a pretence – a part she has acted – than for the very thing that she most wishes to be true – the ideal to which she aspires.’
‘You are right, of course,’ said Dido politely. ‘I am sure you have found the best way of arranging things.’
Sophia breathed a heavy sigh and shook her head. ‘Except, of course,’ she said, ‘that our scheme is powerless against Mr Tom Lomax. This is quite a different sort of danger.’
‘Yes, your plan cannot protect you against such a suitor.’
‘I don’t doubt,’ said Sophia slowly, ‘that if we both refuse him…’ She broke off and her fists curled in her lap. ‘Amelia and I care little for what the world thinks of us, and the shame would only protect us more certainly from marriage.’
Dido rather doubted that she could be as insensible to disgrace as she declared – but she let the matter pass.
‘But poor Mama,’ Sophia continued, ‘her greatest pleasure lies in society and I will not…’ One fist struck the palm of the other hand. ‘I will not allow him to be the means of destroying her happiness.’
Dido, who had been finding the girl’s self-satisfied manner rather repulsive, was touched by this concern for her mother. It strengthened her resolution of helping.
‘Listen,’ she said, ‘I have a plan. We shall confront Mr Tom Lomax after dinner. But, first, this is what I would like you and your sister to do…’
After Miss Sophia had left her, Dido sat for a quarter of an hour in the gloomy arbour, struggling with the ideas which those words about the finality of marriage had suggested. And when, at the end of that time, the contemplation of clipped hedges and crumbling cupid had done nothing to relieve her mind, she set off across the park to try what exercise might do.
So occupied was she with her own thoughts that, for some time, she hardly knew where she was walking and was rather surprised to find herself approaching the yew-shaded path that led to the family chapel. However, the little old building with its one squat tower and its windows winking in the last feeble light of the day had a rather reassuring appearance. She turned into the path and paused on flagstones which were stained red with fallen berries from the yew trees. She was surprised to see that the heavy door of the chapel was standing ajar.
She stepped forward and peered around it, but could make out nothing in the gloom. She slipped silently through the door and looked about. The air was stale and dead and cold; the stone arches rose up into darkness, the white marble of family monuments loomed in a side aisle and the only patch of light, tinted blue and green from the coloured window, fell upon the white cloth that covered the altar. The place seemed to be deserted. She advanced several steps, then her eyes became accustomed to the poor light and a slight movement caught her attention. There was a figure – a man’s figure – kneeling in prayer close to the altar rail.
Her first impulse was to withdraw politely before she was detected; but then – as it so often did – her curiosity got the better of her manners. She took a few more cautious steps and peered through the dusk. The kneeling figure was Mr William Lomax. His head was bowed on his clasped hands and his shoulders were shaking with the violence of his supplication.
As she stared, she began to make out the faint sound of the familiar words he was repeating. ‘Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil… Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil…’ The whispered words echoed faintly in the holy chill of the chapel.
Dido turned and hurried out into the daylight, not pausing even to draw breath until she gained the knoll and the green bench in the park. What, she wondered as she sat herself down, was the evil from which Mr Lomax so ardently wished to be delivered? And what was the temptation into which he dreaded being led?
She sighed and shook her head. Of course it had been quite unpardonable to listen to a man’s private devotions. It would be very wrong to suspect him on such evidence, would it not…?
It was six o’clock before Dido returned to the house and the outcome of her many troubling reflections was such that left her face, in Catherine’s opinion, looking ‘sour and old-maidish’.
However, since they were divided by almost the full length of the table at dinner, it was not possible for her niece to get at her with this pleasant remark until after the ladies removed into the drawing room. Then, finding her upon the distant sofa with a piece of work lying untouched upon her lap, Catherine demanded to know why she must sit all alone and talking to no one. ‘It is a sure sign of encroaching age, you know,’ she said.
‘Then you had better leave me alone to doze quietly. That is the privilege of dotage, is it not?’
‘But you are not dozing,’ Catherine pointed out. ‘You are merely sitting in this corner watching everybody with that sharp, satirical eye of yours. I wish you would not do it; you make me quite ashamed.’
‘Oh dear! And I had hoped that since I am now a clever future-gazer and since I am at this moment wearing neither pattens nor pelisse, I could not embarrass you before your friends.’