"No time, Mrs Edmond! No time!" I cried and rode away.
At John Hollyshoes' house Dando answered my knock and told me that his master was away from home.
"No matter," said I, with a confident smile, "for it is not John Hollyshoes that I have come to see, but my little cousin, the dear little sprite…" – I used the word "sprite" and Dando did not contradict me – "… whom I delivered seven weeks ago." Dando told me that I would find the child in a room at the end of a long hallway.
It was a great bare room that smelt of rotting wood and plaster. The walls were stained with damp and full of holes that the rats had made. In the middle of the floor was a queer-shaped wooden chair where sat a young woman. A bar of iron was fixed before her so that she could not rise and her legs and feet were confined by manacles and rusty chains. She was holding John Hollyshoes's infant son to her breast.
"Dido?" I said.
How my heart fell when she answered me with a broad smile. "Yes, sir?"
"I am the new Rector of Allhope, Dido."
"Oh, sir! I am very glad to see you. I wish that I could rise and make you a curtsey, but you will excuse me, I am sure. The little gentleman has such an appetite this morning!"
She kissed the horrid creature and called it her angel, her doodle and her dearie-darling-pet.
"How did you come here, Dido?" I asked.
"Oh! Mr Hollyshoes' servants came and fetched me away one morning. And weren't they set upon my coming?" – she laughed merrily – "All that a-pulling of me uphill and a-putting of me in carts! And I told them plainly that there was no need for any such nonsense. As soon as I heard of the poor little gentleman's plight," – here she shook the baby and kissed it again – "I was more than willing to give him suck. No, my only misfortune, sir, in this heavenly place, is that Mr Hollyshoes declares I must keep apart from my own sweet babe while I nurse his, and if all the angels in Heaven went down upon their shining knees and begged him he would not think any differently. Which is a pity, sir, for you know I might very easily feed two."
In proof of this point she, without the slightest embarrassment, uncovered her breasts which to my inexperienced eye did indeed appear astonishingly replete.
She was anxious to learn who suckled her own baby. Anne Hargreaves, I told her. She was pleased at this and remarked approvingly that Nan had always had a good appetite. "Indeed, sir, I never knew a lass who loved a pudding better. Her milk is sure to be sweet and strong, do not you think so, sir?"
"Well, certainly Mrs Edmond says that little Horatio Arthur thrives upon it. Dido, how do they treat you here?"
"Oh! sir. How can you ask such a question? Do you not see this golden chair set with diamonds and pearls? And this room with pillars of crystal and rose-coloured velvet curtains? At night – you will not believe it, sir, for I did not believe it myself – I sleep on a bed with six feather mattress one atop the other and six silken pillows to my head."
I said it sounded most pleasant. And was she given enough to eat and drink?
Roast pork, plum pudding, toasted cheese, bread and dripping: there was, according to Dido Puddifer, no end to the good things to be had at End-Of-All-Hope House – and I dare say each and every one of them was in truth nothing more than the mouldy crusts of bread that I saw set upon a cracked dish at her feet.
She also believed that they had given her a gown of sky-blue velvet with diamond buttons to wear and she asked me, with a conscious smile, how I liked it.
"You look very pretty, Dido," I said and she looked pleased. But what I really saw was the same russet-coloured gown she had been wearing when they took her. It was all torn and dirty. Her hair was matted with the fairy-child's puke and her left eye was crusted with blood from a gash in her forehead. She was altogether such a sorry sight that my heart was filled with pity for her and, without thinking what I did, I licked my fingertips and cleaned her eye with my spittle.
I opened my mouth to ask if she were ever allowed out of the golden chair encrusted with diamonds and pearls, but I was prevented by the sound of a door opening behind me. I turned and saw John Hollyshoes walk in. I quite expected him to ask me what I did there, but he seemed to suspect no mischief and instead bent down to test the chains and the shackles. These were, like everything else in the house, somewhat decayed and he was right to doubt their strength. When he had finished he rose and smiled at me.
"Will you stay and take a glass of wine with me?" he said. "I have something of a rather particular nature to ask you."
We went to the library where he poured two glasses of wine. He said, "Cousin, I have been meaning to ask you about that family of women who live upon my English estates and make themselves so important at my expense. I have forgot their name."
"Gathercole?" said I.
"Gathercole. Exactly," said he and fell silent for a moment with a kind of thoughtful half-smile upon his dark face. "I have been a widower seven weeks now," he said, "and I do not believe I was ever so long without a wife before – not since there were women in England to be made wives of. To speak plainly, the sweets of courtship grew stale with me a long time ago and I wondered if you would be so kind as to spare me the trouble and advise me which of these women would suit me best."
"Oh!" said I. "I am quite certain that you would heartily dislike all of them!"
He laughed and put his arm around my shoulders. "Cousin," he said, "I am not so hard to please as you suppose."
"But really," said I, "I cannot advise you in the way you suggest. You must excuse me – indeed I cannot!"
"Oh? And why is that?"
"Because… Because I intend to marry one of them myself!" I cried.
"I congratulate you, cousin. Which?" I stared at him. "What?" I said.
"Tell me which you intend to marry and I will take another."
"Marianne!" I said, 'No, wait! Isabella! That is…" It struck me very forcibly at that moment that I could not chuse one without endangering all the others.
He laughed at that and affectionately patted my arm. Tour enthusiasm to possess Englishwomen is no more than I should have expected of Thomas Fairwood's son. But my own appetites are more moderate. One will suffice for me. I shall ride over to Allhope in a day or two and chuse one young lady, which will leave four for you."
The thought of Isabella or Marianne or any of them doomed to live for ever in the degradation of End-Of-All-Hope House! Oh! it is too horrible to be borne.
I have been staring in the mirror for an hour or more. I was always amazed at Cambridge how quickly people appeared to take offence at everything I said, but now I see plainly that it was not my words they hated – it was this fairy face. The dark alchemy of this face turns all my gentle human emotions into fierce fairy vices. Inside I am all despair but this face shews only fairy scorn. My remorse becomes fairy fury and my pensiveness is turned to fairy cunning.
Dec. 9th., 1811.
This morning at half past ten I made my proposals to Isabella Gathercole. She – sweet, compliant creature! – assured me that I had made her the happiest of women. But she could not at first be made to agree to a secret engagement.
"Oh!" she said. "Certainly mama and Aunt Edmond will make all sorts of difficulties, but what will secrecy achieve? You do not know them as I do. Alas, they cannot be reasoned into an understanding of your excellent qualities. But they can be worn down. An unending stream of arguments and pleas must be employed and the sooner it is begun, the sooner it will bring forth the happy resolution we wish for. I must be tearful; you must be heartbroken. I must get up a little illness – which will take time as I am just now in the most excellent good looks and health."