My mother interrupted with: “What colour would you like to wear for the party, Amaryllis?”
“I think perhaps blue.”
“What about white, darling?” asked Claudine. “I can just see you in white. You will look like an angel.”
“Jessica, are you going to have your favourite scarlet?” asked my mother. “Or is it going to be emerald green?”
“I’ll have to think about it,” I said.
“Such matters need weighty consideration,” said my father, “while the country is plunged into war on two fronts.”
“We should never do anything if we waited for those wretched wars to be over,” commented my mother. “And the sooner they have finished one they start another. We’ll go to London to choose the materials. I think we should give ourselves plenty of time. Where are we now … April… Sometime in May. That will give us plenty of time to have the dresses made up. We’ll fix a date. August would be best… somewhere midway between the two birthdays. That’s fair enough.”
There had always been one party to celebrate the two birthdays as they came so close together—mine in August, Amaryllis’ in September; and the parties were usually held at the end of August. Our mothers had started the practice when we were very young and had kept it up.
That was how we came to be in London in the May of that year 1812. There were my mother and myself as well as Amaryllis and Claudine; and as my father never liked my mother to go to London without him, he joined the party. So we all set out in the carriage and in due course arrived at the family house in Albemarle Street.
I had still retained that excitement which I felt when I came to London. The big city always seemed pulsating with life. Everyone appeared to be in a great hurry which always gave me a sense of urgency. I hoped we should visit the theatre while we were there.
The very first day my mother and I, with Claudine and Amaryllis, descended on the shops and after much debating a beautiful white silk was bought for Amaryllis’ dress. It was more difficult to find the acceptable shade of red to enhance my darkness; but my mother said we should not be hurried.
My father always had business in London—rather mysterious business as well as his banking concerns, and one thing we had learned was not to ask questions. We did know that he worked less in the field than he had in the past and that his son Jonathan had lost his life because of his connections with this mysterious espionage. I knew that Claudine was delighted that David had no part in it. Amaryllis had told me so.
I often wondered whether Jonathan’s son, also named Jonathan, who was at this time living with the Pettigrews, was also involved.
However, my father’s interests did not absorb him so much that he could not pay a visit to the theatre and we had a glorious evening watching A Tale of Mystery which was not exactly new but was the first of the melodramas which had since become so popular. It had a wicked villain who the audience liked to pretend struck terror into them when he appeared; and although we laughed we could not help being caught up in the drama, particularly as it was accompanied by the most expressive music which rose in volume for the villain and played sweetly for the unsullied heroine.
When the play was over we all returned home and sat up late drinking hot chocolate and discussing the improbabilities of the plot, laughing heartily at the actions of the villain and the gullibility of the heroine; and admitting that we had enjoyed every moment of it.
The next day was Sunday. We had attended church and afterwards walked in the Park; and my mother said that the following day we really must come to a decision about the material for my dress.
There were callers in the morning and an invitation to dine a few days later.
“And after that,” my mother said, “we must think about getting home.”
“It is a strange thing,” I said, “that when we are at Eversleigh, a visit to London seems very desirable; and when we are here we think how nice it would be to get back.”
“Perhaps anticipation is more satisfying than actuality,” suggested Amaryllis.
“I think you may be right,” I agreed.
“It reminds us that we should enjoy everything as it comes along.”
“Amaryllis, if you are so wise at eighteen, you’ll be a veritable sage by the time you are thirty.”
The callers delayed our visit to the shops but my mother was determined that we should go, so about four o’clock we set out.
We examined bales of material—emerald greens and vivid scarlets, both of which my mother declared were my colours.
I had my mother’s dark hair, but alas, not her vivid blue eyes. Mine were deep set, black lashed but of a deep brown; and I needed strong colours to set them off.
She was determined that I must look my best and she spent a long time selecting the right shade.
It was while we were in the shop, sitting at the counter, that a young man ran in. He was breathless and could scarcely stammer out the important news.
“The Prime Minister… has been shot. He’s stone dead … there in the House of Commons.”
As we came through the streets we realized that the news had spread. People stood about in little groups talking in shocked whispers. The Prime Minister assassinated! Surely not! This could not happen in England. That sort of thing was for foreigners. Spencer Perceval the Prime Minister had not been exactly one of the popular figures in politics. He was no Pitt or Fox. He had been rather insignificant but was no longer so.
My father was not at home when we arrived there. I guessed he would be occupied for a few days, perhaps delaying our return to Eversleigh.
There was a hush throughout the capital. News began to seep out. The murderer had been captured. It had been no difficult task to catch him for he had made no attempt to escape.
He was mad, it was said, a fanatic. Some avowed that it was merely fate that it happened to be the Prime Minister who was shot. It could have been any politician. The madman had a grudge against the government, not against any particular person. The Prime Minister had just happened to be in a certain spot at a certain time.
The trial took place immediately.
The murderer was John Bellingham, a Liverpool broker who had gone bankrupt, he declared, through government policies. He had recently visited Russia where he had been arrested on some trivial charge and when he had applied to the British Ambassador in St. Petersburg for help, it had been refused. Eventually he was freed and returning to England he had applied for redress for the wrongs he had suffered. When this was refused, he went crazy and vowed vengeance.
Now he was pleading insanity.
My father said that he would not get away with it. The whole country was shocked. We could not have our public figures shot at and be told that it was the work of a person of unsound mind. There had to be an example.
He was right. John Bellingham was sentenced to death and a week after the shooting he was hanged. We were in London on the day but we did not go into the streets.
My father’s comment was: “The verdict was a wise one. Madman he may be, but we cannot have anyone with a grievance shooting our ministers and then being freed on a plea of insanity.”
But the affair haunted me. The idea of that man’s being so crazed with grief that he took a gun and shot a man dead depressed me. I could not shut out of my mind the image of his body dangling at the end of a rope. He had done the deed for revenge and two lives had been lost when there need not have been one.
My mother tried to disperse our gloomy mood by talking of other matters—chiefly the birthday celebrations. I responded but my thoughts could not be withdrawn from the tragedy of that poor madman and most of all I thought of the bereaved Perceval family who had lost a good husband and father. I heard there was a sorrowing wife, six sons and six daughters. He had been such a good man, people said; and even taking into account that aura of sanctity which invariably surrounds the dead, there appeared to be some truth in it.