Menfreya in the Morning

6

The days had become unreal. I could not believe this was actually happening. Scenes kept coming into my mind like hideous pictures painted by a madman. I saw the faces of Polden, Mrs. Trant and the servants—scared yet excited, horrified yet delighted. This was a tragedy such as they read of, and they at the center of it!

They were saying that my stepmother had been poisoned. There was going to be an inquest, and then they would know for sure and they would find out why she had died, who had been responsible for her death.

Aunt Clarissa summoned me to the library. She looked five years older than she had that morning when she had been discussing the gold-embroidered satin.

“Harriet, this is shocking!”

“Yes, Aunt.”

“Some overdose of drug, they’re saying. It’s terrible, there’ll be a scandal. And in the middle of the season. This could be disastrous . .. quite disastrous.”

“Oh!” I said, and I heard my voice breaking into a laugh, which alarmed me. “The season?”

“It’s no laughing matter, I can tell you.” Poor Aunt Clarissa, she had no sensitivity of her own and failed to recognize it in others. “Who do you think would want to link themselves with a family in which such scandals occur? This will be fatal to all our hopes. It couldn’t have happened at a worse time.”

“It couldn’t have been worse whenever it happened,” I said. “Aunt Clarissa, she’s dead … dead!”

“Don’t shriek. The servants will hear. They’re no doubt discussing this now. I really think, Harriet, that you shouldn’t stay here. After all, if you aren't here, it won’t be so blatantly connected with us, will it? Of course, it will come out that she was Edward’s wife. Oh how could he have been so blind? He was always so wise … except in this one thing. Infatuated by this dreadful woman … and although she is dead I still say it … infatuated by a woman who as soon as he is dead kills herself … or worse still allows someone to kill her.”

Listening to Aunt Clarissa, I felt the hysteria rising in me. I said: “Are you turning me out then, Aunt?”

She did not answer so I went on: “I'll leave the first thing in the morning.”

I was exhausted that night, but I scarcely slept and when I did I kept starting up in horror. Nightmares tormented me, and I was glad to see the dawn.

The maid who brought in my hot water looked at me curiously. I was connected with a tragedy—sudden death, suicide… or murder.

I bathed and dressed very slowly, delaying the time when I must leave. How strange that I should want to linger in my aunt’s house! I had always thought that I should have longed to leave it, and that this should be so, filled me with an even greater desolation. Never in my life had I felt so lonely, so insecure, so uncertain of the future.

There was a knock on my door, and one of the maids entered.

“You’re wanted, Miss. In the library.” I nodded and pretended to look at my reflection in the mirror and to pat my hair, lest she should see the misery on my face.

I could no longer delay, I had packed my bag. I was ready to leave. I expected to find Aunt Clarissa in the library, where she would tell me that in all our interests it was best for me to go and that she had ordered the carriage to come in ten minutes’ time.

Slowly I went down to the library. Aunt Clarissa was there, but she was not alone.

Lady Menfrey came forward and took my hands in hers. She kissed me.

“My dear Harriet,” she murmured. “My poor, dear Harriet”

And then I saw Bevil rising from the armchair. He took me hi his arms and held me against him. I felt weak. The transition was too sudden. From despair, from the sorrow of aloneness to the comfort of the one person in the world with whom I wanted to be more than any other. I could not speak; I was afraid that if I attempted to I should burst into tears.

“My dearest Harriet,” he said in a voice so wonderfully tender that it made me want to weep, “this has been quite terrible for you. You mustn’t worry anymore. We’re here … we’re here to look after you.”

Still I could not speak.

“Harriet!” It was Aunt Clarissa. “Mr. Menfrey and his mother have traveled up from Cornwall for the purpose of looking after you until this wretched affair is over. Lady Menfrey has suggested to me that we take you to Mr. Menfrey’s house, where you should remain with her until some plans can be made. I think it is an excellent idea.”

I felt the relief breaking over my face.

I heard myself cry, “Oh yes, oh yes … please”

I was driven to Bevil’s small town house in a quiet little cul-de-sac on the north side of the park. Here Lady Menfrey remained with me. There were only two servants—a maid and a housekeeper who cooked the little which Bevil had needed in the past. The place was merely the pied PS terre he had acquired since he became a Member of Parliament.

Lady Menfrey insisted on my going straight to bed, for she declared I was exhausted, even if I didn’t realize it. I was submissive; I found it the utmost luxury to put myself into the hands of this kind and gentle woman, particularly as Bevil was making every effort to show me how anxious he was on my behalf.

We talked little of the tragedy, but of Menfreya; and Lady Menfrey said that it was Bevil’s wish—and hers—that as soon as the inquest was over I should return with them to Menfreya to recover from this terrible shock.

Fervently I told them that there was nothing I should like better, nothing I needed more. So it was arranged.

Thus I lived through those days that followed the tragedy; they were long, dreamlike days, but because I saw Bevil frequently and was constantly in the company of Lady Menfrey, whose main idea seemed to make me feel as though she was as concerned for me as she would have been for a daughter, I felt I had something to cling to, and she was the best companion I could have had. She was still serene, she, the heiress who had been kidnaped by Endelion and who had fallen in love so romantically and then been forced to adjust her romantic ideas and learn to live with a man who could never be faithful and whose irresistible passion had been not for her but for her fortune! But here she was, beautiful still, with a different beauty from that of the Menfreys—calm, classical features, gentle, kindly and, could I say, resigned. The result, doubtless, of a life of compromise and adjustment to the wild ways of the Menfreys, who although they were worldly and perhaps selfish and mercenary—for Menfreya—were the most charming people in the world.

And there was Bevil, so anxious for me, so eager that everything should be done for my comfort, tender, in a manner which conveyed to me a suppressed passion. His hands lingered on my arm, his eyes were caressing, and about him there was an air of waiting which seemed to me significant. It was as though I were already engaged to marry him. I was certain that I should soon be. Lady Menfrey conveyed it in her manner, and when she spoke of Menfreya she spoke of it as my home.

That was how I lived through those days of tension when the Menfreys sought to impose on an image of tragedy one of living happily ever after.

They succeeded, and I loved them for it—Lady Menfrey as the mother I bad never had, and Bevil more than I had ever believed it was possible to love anyone.

There was no need, Bevil said, for me to go to the inquest. It might be unpleasant, and I had not been in the house when the tragedy had occurred.

I was anxious that he should make any arrangements he considered suitable.

“And as soon as it is over,” he said, “you should go to Menfreya. You can travel with Mother, and I’ll join you in a few days' time.”

I replied that I did not know how to thank them, and that I could not imagine how I could have gone back to that house … and lived there through these days.

Bevil took my hand and pressed it reassuringly.

“Well, you know now that you can safely put yourself in the hands of the Menfreys,” he said. I thought he was about to make some declaration of his feelings for me, but he didn’t—not in words, although his looks were full of tenderness and, I believed, a desire to protect me forever.

On the day of the inquest even Bevil and Lady Menfrey were apprehensive, although they tried to hide this from me.

Lady Menfrey was in her room most of the morning, preparing to leave for Cornwall, she said, which she thought we might do the next day.

“I shall need some of my things,” I said. “I shall have to go…”

She shook her head. “There’s no need. Write from Cornwall and send for that maid of yours. She will bring what you need.”

“I’ll do that,” I said. “But the house … What of it now? I feel that I never want to go into it again. I should never be able to forget…”

“There’s no need to concern yourself with that as yet Leave it as it is. There will be the servants to consider. You need help in these matters. My husband and Bevil will give you that help. Let everything stay as it is at the moment. The thing for you to do is to get away … as soon as this unfortunate business is over.”

“Sometimes I think it will never be over.”

“My dear child, what do you mean?”

“I suppose that I shall never forget… that it will always be in my mind …”

“Oh, but tragedies seem so when they are immediately beside us.”

“I find it a great relief to let you make my decisions.”

“I hope you will always agree to let us help you in this way.” I was certain then that soon I should be Bevil’s wife.

It was the day of the inquest, which Bevil had attended. I was in the small guest room overlooking the tiny walled garden when he came in. Lady Menfrey was in the drawing room and I did not go down, because I felt the need to calm myself.

I had felt restless all that day. I had pictured the courtroom so vividly that I felt I was there. So much depended on the coroner’s verdict.

Eventually Lady Menfrey came up to my room and told me that Bevil was back; he wanted to see me. The verdict was death by misadventure.

“But how?” I breathed.

“Come and see Bev. He’ll talk to you. Then we’re going to get right away tomorrow.”

As I entered the drawing room Bevil came to me and took me into his arms.

“It’s over,” he said. “God, was I relieved! I don’t know what I expected. This is the end of it Come and sit down.”

We sat on the sofa and he kissed me.

“But, Bevil,” I said, “what happened? How could it be?”

“It came out that she had been taking arsenic … for her complexion. Apparently it’s not unusual. Women take it to make themselves beautiful, and unfortunately the stuff does have that effect … for a time anyway.”

“Arsenic!” I cried. “For her complexion! Of course, there was something about her complexion! It was quite lovely but…”

“Evidently the effects of the drug. The coroner went on about it. Some people use it in a lotion, but others are foolhardy enough to take it internally. Where she got it, they couldn’t find out Naturally her supplier would lie low. One of her theatrical friends, I suspect But your Fanny had seen her taking it in beverages … lemonade and such things.”

“But the idea of taking arsenic! How dreadful!”

“Apparently it’s used a great deal by doctors in making up medicines, but they, of course, know what they’re doing. The coroner referred to the Maybrick case. There was quite a stir about this practice years ago during the Maybrick trial. The husband died of arsenical poisoning, and the wife was accused of murdering him. She was condemned to death but reprieved at the last moment—I think because there was a doubt, and he could have taken the stuff much the same as Jenny did. You see, it’s not really so unusual, but highly dangerous, as in the case of James Maybrick and your stepmother. They found a quantity of it in her room. The coroner delivered a sermon on the folly of ignorant people using drugs the power of which they don’t understand— and then the verdict of death by misadventure was brought in.”

I couldn’t shut out the vision of bright, pretty little Jenny … dead. Bevil knew this and tried to comfort me.

“It’s over now,” he said. “Tomorrow you’ll be leaving with my mother. I shall be with you in a few days. Will you begin making arrangements at once, because we don’t want any delay.”

“Arrangements … ?”

He laughed. How confident he was—rightly so, for I could never have resisted him even if I had tried.

“For the wedding, of course. It’ll be rather unconventional, but then we are. Married from the bridegroom’s house. That will cause a flutter.”

“There is the house on the island,” I suggested.

“Picture it,” he said. “The bride stepping into the boat in her wedding finery. The southwest wind—if in evidence, and you could be almost certain that it would be—carrying off the veil and orange blossom …”

“And the boat overturning and the bride being washed ashore by the gigantic waves, late for her wedding …”

“I’ve just remembered,” said Bevil. “You haven’t said you will yet.”

“Will… what?”

He looked at me disbelievingly; he went down on to his knees and taking my hand said: “Madam, if you’ll marry me I will give you the keys of heaven .,.”

“The keys of Menfreya will do for a start,” I answered solemnly.

He was beside me, laughing, embracing me. “Harriet, do you know why I love you? You amuse me. That’s why. And I love to be amused more—or almost more—than anything else. I want you to say now that you love me, that you adore me in fact, and that you want to be my wife as much —or almost, for I don’t think anyone else could feel quite so madly eager as I do—as I want to be your husband.”

“You make a wonderful proposal, Bevil,” I said, “although a slightly flippant one.”

“My darling, it is because my emotions are so deeply touched that I am flippant I really should be on my knees telling you how much I want this … how I always have … and there has never been anyone else I could love as I love you. Dearest Harriet, you belong to us … to Menfreya. It was always meant that we should be together there. You do agree, don’t you?”

“I love you, Bevil. I couldn't deny that if I wanted to, because I’ve made it plain in the past and I’ve made it plain now. But you…”

“Yes, what of me? Aren’t I making it plain now?”

“You are telling me you love me, but you didn’t always, of course. How could you love a plain child with a limp and a rather brusque and generally unfortunate manner?”

He put his lips on mine. He had all the most charming and irresistible gestures that a girl deeply in love looks for and who refuses to tell herself that they may have been acquired through long practice.

“An interesting child, an amusing child, who had some crazy notion that she wasn’t as pretty as some children merely because she didn’t have the look of a brainless doll. I don’t like dolls, Harriet, but I adore one living, vital young woman whom I am going to marry whether she accepts me or not.”

“You mean you would kidnap me?”

“Certainly. It’s a tradition in the family.”

“And therefore a good foundation on which to build a marriage.”

“You have an example before you.”

Had I? Lady Menfrey was serenely happy, yes. But how had she lived through the years of humiliation when Sir Endelion’s affairs with other women had been the talk of the neighborhood? Was that Bevil’s idea of a good marriage? An unfaithful husband was perhaps one order of life; wifely complacence another.

No, I thought, it should not be so with me. I was not another Lady Menfrey. But I was too content with the immediate prospect to concern myself with the future.

“The kidnaping will not be necessary,” I said. “So you need not go ahead with your plans for that. Instead tell me more reasons why you want to many me.”

He put his head on one side and regarded me with mock seriousness. I thought: We shall always be able to laugh together. That had been the essence of my relationship with Gwennan—our minds were hi tune. Fleetingly I thought of Gwennan, who had run away on the eve of her marriage. I heard Fanny’s voice of grim prophecy: “You can’t trust those Menfreys.”

“As the daughter of an M.P. you’ll make a good M.P.’s wife.”

“A very practical consideration.”

“Why not be practical? Choosing a wife is a matter worthy of the utmost consideration. Far more than selecting a Member, you know. They can be out after five years. A wife must last for a lifetime. So, an M.P.'s daughter is the perfect wife for a rising M.P., particularly when it was for the same constituency.”

“So you will expect me to help you in elections, and the necessary nursing process in between.”

“Certainly I shall. You’ll be excellent.”

I felt the tears in my eyes then and I could not stop them. I was so ashamed, for he had never seen me cry before. In fact I couldn’t remember when I had.

He drew away from me, and I have never seen tenderness such as his as he took a handkerchief and wiped away my tears.

“At such a time” he scolded. “Tears … and Harriet!”

“They don’t go together, do they? Don’t imagine I’m going to be a weeping wife. It’s because I’m happy.”

He too was moved, and he sought to hide it.

“You don’t know anything yet,” he said. “This is only the beginning. We’re going to be known throughout the duchy as the happy Menfreys.”

Before I left for Cornwall I went to see Mr. Greville of Greville, Baker and Greville that he might explain my financial position to me. He told me that the death of my stepmother had made me the heiress to a considerable fortune. Everything would now be mine when I reached the age of twenty-one or on the occasion of my marriage, which must have the approval of himself and the other executor of the will.

“I have already heard from Mr. Menfrey that you have promised to marry him, and I can set your mind at rest without delay. There will be no objection, and your fortune will pass into your hands almost immediately after the marriage has taken place.”

“What of the second executor?”

“Sir Endelion Menfrey.” Mr. Greville’s rugged features were as near a smile as they could come. “I think your father would be very pleased by your engagement. It was a match which was talked over by him and Sir Endelion when you were a child.”

Then,” I said blankly, “we are doing what was expected of us.”

The plump white hands were spread out on the desk, and their owner surveyed them with satisfaction. “I am sure,” he said, in his dry, precise manner, “that this is a highly desirable union, and I can tell you, Miss Delvaney, that it simplifies matters greatly.” He picked up some papers on his desk as though weighing them, and looked at me over his gold-rimmed pince-nez. “Now, your allowance will go on as usual until we have the formalities settled. I hear that you will shortly be traveling down to Cornwall hi the company of Lady Menfrey. Excellent! Excellent! And the marriage will take place there. Congratulations I I do not think there could have been a more satisfactory finale to these unfortunate happenings.”

I felt as though I were being neatly filed away in a cabinet labeled “Heiress safely disposed of as prearranged. Unfortunate matters satisfactorily settled.”

And as I went out to the carriage I wished that my father and the Menfreys had not discussed my future so thoroughly. I wished that Bevil and I had met a few months before and been swept off our feet by an irresistible passion.

I was beginning to suspect that, for all my display of cynicism, I was at heart a romantic.

“Here is no reason for postponing our departure for Cornwall,” said Lady Menfrey. “There you will be able to plan what you intend to do about the house … about everything. Bevil will naturally see that what you want is carried out, when you have made your decision.”

I thought of the house where life would be going on as it had before the accident. It would be a silent house. I imagined the servants speaking in whispers, tiptoeing past the room where Jenny’s body had been found. They would be wondering what the future held for them, and it was unfair to keep them in suspense.

Fanny would, of course, come with me, but the others would have to find fresh places and were no doubt anxious about their future. I discussed this with Bevil and as a result I again went along to see Greville, Baker and Greville, and it was decided that annuities should be arranged for Mrs. Trant, Polden and the elderly servants, and gratuities for the younger, and that although they should remain in their posts for the next two or three months, they should begin making other arrangements, and if any succeeded in finding new places they would be released.

I felt relieved having settled this and went along to the house the day before I was due to leave for Cornwall.

I asked Mrs. Trant to summon all the servants to the library, and there I told them of my situation and what had been arranged. I felt deeply moved to see their relief, and on behalf of them all Polden expressed gratitude and their wishes for my happiness.

“You’ll be selling the house, I reckon. Miss Harriet,” said Mrs. Trant.

“Certainly.”

“Well, Miss, if ever you and Mr. Menfrey should be needing the services of any of us … you would only have to say so, and speaking on behalf of us all, we should be glad to leave what posts we had and return to you.”

I thanked them all and then went up to my old room with Fanny to discuss what I wanted her to bring to me in Cornwall when she came down a few days after me.

I tried to be practical when we reached my room.

“I shall discard most of these things,” I said. “We shall pass through Paris on our honeymoon, and I intend to buy some clothes there. So just a few things will be needed, Fanny.”

“There’ll be your books and some of the little things you cherished.”

I thought of them. My postcard album; letters which I had always kept; little things which had pleased me; a box covered in shells in which I kept buttons and needles; a musical box which played Widdicombe Fan- and which William lister had bought for me when he had taken a brief holiday in the Devon village; a row of pearls which my father had given to me—his Christmas present (he preferred to forget my birthdays) over the years, one pearl added each year. I had never liked it although now looking at the perfectly shaped beads of that deep, creamy color, at the flashing diamonds in the clasp, I realized that it was a beautiful ornament and probably worth a great deal But to me it had been symbolic of bis lack of interest. Custom demanded that he give me something, so there was the pearl, costing so much more than the baubles Fanny had given me, yet far less precious.

I thought again of how much I owed Fanny, who had understood how a child would have felt on waking on Christmas morning and looking in vain for the bulging stocking. She it was who had told me the Christmas legend; she who had bought those oranges, nuts, bags of fondants, fascinating cutout cardboard marvels, penny plain and tuppence colored, those sixpenny dolls. Fanny had put the happiness into my Christmases when she roamed among the market stalls looking for gaudy, glittering objects which would delight a child, not my father in the thickly carpeted jeweler’s salon selecting the pearl to add to my necklace, which would prove an investment.

I put a few things on my bed—the music box from William Lister, my books—yes, they must come, all of them, because they had provided the escape from fact Elsie Dins-more, Misunderstood, The Wide Wide World, Peep Behind the Scenes, A Basket of Flowers ... stories of children whose lot had been as unhappy as my own; Little Women (how I had thrown myself into that delightful family, taking the parts of Meg, Jo, Beth and Amy in turns); Jane Eyre and Wuthering Heights. Stories of endurance and triumph. I could never part with them. Fanny watched me. “You don’t want that” she said.

It was the cutout cardboard stage—tuppence colored.

“Fanny,” I said. “I remember the first time I saw it It was … wonderful. Six o’clock on Christmas morning.”

“You would wake early. I used to lie there listening for you. I was awake at five on those mornings. You used to get out of bed in the dark.”

“Yes, and feel the stocking; and then take it back to bed and hold it … guessing. I had a pact with myself that I mustn’t open it till the first streak of light was in the sky; because if I did it would disappear and all be a dream.”

“You and your fancies!”

“If it hadn’t been for you, Fanny, there wouldn’t have been a stocking.”

“Oh, some of the others would have seen to it.”

“I don’t think so. They were the best mornings of the year. I remember waking up a week later and the terrible disappointment I felt because it wasn’t Christmas, and that I should have to wait fifty-one weeks for the next”

“Children!” said Fanny, smiling tenderly.

I stood up suddenly and threw myself into her arms.

“Oh, Fanny, dear Fanny, we’ll always be together.”

She was militant in her fierceness. “You bet we will, Miss. I'd like to see the one as could part me from you.”

I released her and sat down on the bed.

“I shall be glad to be finished with this house. I don’t remember ever being really happy here except on those Christmas mornings and times with you. Do you remember how we used to go out into the markets—how we used to toss with the pieman and buy hot chestnuts?”

“You always loved the markets, Miss.”

“They seemed so exciting and colorful, and those people who were so anxious to sell their goods … they were poor and I was rich … but I used to envy them, Fanny.”

“You didn’t know what their lives were, Miss. You just thought selling there in the market was a nice sort of game, and never having felt the chilblains driving you mad with the itch and the soreness, and the rheumatics bending you double, you just thought what a good time they had. You can’t always know what’s going on out of sight, can you.”

“I was too sorry for myself in those days, Fanny. Now all that is over. I shall expect you in Cornwall by the end of the week.”

“You can depend upon it, Miss, that as soon as I’ve cleared up here I’ll be on that train. And what about all the furniture and everything?”

“I suppose the good pieces will come down to Menfreya; the rest well sell. Mr. Bevil will make the arrangements.”

“I reckon he’ll be making all the arrangements in the future, Miss.”

I smiled and I suppose my happiness shone through the smile, because she was silent for a moment; then I noticed her own expression harden and I understood, because Fanny was not usually one to hide her true feelings, that she disapproved of my wedding.

“I hope so, Fanny. As my husband it is natural that he should!”

“Oh yes, hell make them all right.”

“Fanny, for heaven’s sake, stop it! This is a time for congratulation—not doleful prophecy.”

“The time for prophecy is when it comes naturally to make it”

“What on earth do you mean by that?”

“I’m not at ease in my mind, Miss. Couldn’t you wait a while?”

“Wait, Fanny? What for?”

“You’ve been rushed into this.”

“Rushed. I’ve been waiting for Bevil to ask me to marry him for years.”

Tm afraid …”

“Don’t be. Now, I’m not going to discuss this with you anymore. Everything will be all right.”

“There’s one thing I’d like to know.”

“All right. What is it?”

“Did he ask you before your stepmother died … or after?”

“What does that mean?”

“It means a lot to me, Miss. Before you had only your income, didn’t you? I don’t understand these things much, but I reckon that when your stepmother died all that money was yours … without strings like … as there was with her. Well, you see, if he waited till after she died …”

I could have struck her because I was so angry, and I knew myself well enough to understand that I was whipping up anger to hide fear. Why had she put that vague, uneasy thought of mine into words so that now I could no longer ignore it? I had to faring it out and examine it in the light of day.

“What nonsense,” I said. “He was going to ask me before she died … only we were interrupted.”

If only Aunt Clarissa had not come in at that moment when he had called on me! I was certain then that he was about to ask me to marry him. But was he? If he had meant to ask me, wouldn’t he have made the opportunity?

Fanny was looking at me steadily, her eyes dark with fear and suspicion. She was firmly convinced that Bevil was marrying me for my money; more than that, she had watered those seeds of doubt in my own mind so that they were already springing into life.

She twisted her hands awkwardly. “You see, Miss Harriet, I want you to be happy. I just want everything of the best for you. And when things start to go wrong, they have a habit of going on that way.”

“What on earth do you mean?”

“I can’t help thinking of that poor lady. She’s on my mind. I see her looking at her lovely skin in the glass and men putting that stuff in her drink , . . and then going like that”

“It’s horrifying. I’m trying not to think of it, Fanny, but I can’t get her out of my mind. Dying like that … without being prepared.”

“Without being prepared,” whispered Fanny. “Yes, that was how it was. She didn’t have a warning. She was there one day and gone the next I expect my Billy had a warning. He’d hear the storm rising, wouldn’t he? They’d be fighting the storm and they’d know there was danger all round… but she, poor lady, she didn’t know...”

“We’ve got to stop thinking of it, Fanny.”

“Thinking can’t do no good,” she agreed.

“Now stop worrying about me. Everything will be all right”

“Oh yes. Well see to that between us.”

Her mouth was set, her eyes hard; she looked like a general going into battle.

And although she had made those doubts spring up in my mind, I knew that as long as Fanny lived I should always have someone to love me.

Lady Menfrey and I were met at Liskeard, and I shall never forget driving to Menfreya. The lanes, made narrower by the summer foliage on the banks, had never seemed so green and colorful; I sniffed the warm breeze as we came near to the sea and when I saw the towers of Menfreya I could have wept with emotion. Now it was more than a house which had caught my fancy, more than an ancient fascinating house; it was my home.

There was the house on the island; and there was the cliff with the walls of Menfreya rising stark above it on the coast side, as though it were part of the cliff face itself.

Through the porch under the dock tower, with the ancient clock which was never allowed to stop, into the courtyard, where we alighted. Sir Endelion was standing on the great porch waiting to receive us.

“Welcome, welcome, my dearest child.”

I was taken into his embrace; I was kissed.

Never had a bride been more warmly welcomed by her new family.

Those days at Menfreya stand out in my memory. I wanted, I told them, to explore the house—every room and passage, every alcove, every nook.

“I think it’s the most wonderful house in the world,” I told Sir Endelion and Lady Menfrey on that first day.

“That’s fortunate since ifs to be your home, my dear,” replied Sir Endelion.

“I want to see everything...”

“You’ll find that the east wing is in need of repair.”

I smiled, remembering the table with the rubies which were no longer there. Menfreya needed money to be lavished on it by those who were fortunate enough to be taken under its roof. But I should never grudge spending my money on the preservation of the house.

The day after my arrival Sir Endelion himself took me on a tour of inspection. He was delighted to show me everything, and told me as we studied the shield over the fireplace in the great hall that nothing in the world could have made him happier than this engagement.

“It was what your father wished, and it is what I have always wanted. The union of our two families. Your name, my dear, will be inscribed on the shield, for there are the names of all the families into which the Menfreys have married.”

I studied those names, and I wondered what the owners of them had felt when they had come to this great house as brides. Very soon Delvaney would be added to them, and I thought of the names going on when my sons brought home their wives.

It was a happy sense of belonging, and that was what I had always wanted.

There was so much to see and admire, so much which I had seen before and which now bad a special interest because it was to be my home. There was the wonderful mosaic floor in the great hall, the staircase and the suits of armor, the inevitable portraits in the gallery. There were so many in whom I discovered the Menfrey look. They could have been Bevil or Sir Endelion dressed in the costume of another period.

I went into the chapel, which was never used but on whose attar fresh candles were kept; I was shown the secret room in the buttress, and Sir Endelion told me the story of me Menfrey who had kept the woman he loved there, unknown to his family.

The story is that the clock hi the tower stopped and no one could make it go. Then the master of the house came home and went to the secret room and found his mistress. And her child dead. But don’t you believe all you hear about the Menfreys, my dear. There are enough stories about our awful doings to make a One Thousand and One Nights’ Entertainment I don’t think you’ll find us as black as we’re painted. Tell me, Harriet, you don’t think we’re half bad, do you?”

“I have known you too long to be afraid of what I may discover.”

“And soon you’ll be one of us. Bevil’s a lucky fellow. I’ve told him so, and I don’t think you’re going to be so hard done by either.”

I loved seeing the place and hearing the stories.

But Lady Menfrey was eager that preparations for the wedding should be put in hand without delay, so we went to Plymouth and chose the material for my wedding gown, and there we passed the theater in which Gwennan had met Benedict Bellairs, and I was sad thinking of Gwennan and wondering why she had never written to let us know what was happening to her. What fun it would have been if she had been with me now! Sisters, in truth! If only she had married Harry Leveret and were now settled happily at Chough Towers with him, how pleasant it would have been!

We chose the white satin for my wedding gown, and I was to wear the veil which Lady Menfrey herself had worn and which had been worn by her predecessor.

She did not mention Gwennan and I was surprised, for I had thought that coming into Plymouth must remind her.

Bevil came down to Cornwall and the banns were put up. When I went driving with him through the countryside, we called on several of the neighboring squires and were greeted with a great show of friendliness.

“I knew your father. Such a charming man. How happy he would be if he could see this day.”

“So appropriate, I am sure you will be a great help hi the constituency.”

“Such a suitable match. We are all quite delighted.”

Bevil would give imitations of our hosts as we drove along. It was a little malicious but very funny, and I found that I was constantly laughing in his company. It was the laughter of happiness, but then that is the best laughter of all.

I was learning about Bevil. He had a quick wit; he was hot-tempered; he was kind but, when he was in a rage, he seemed capable of injustice; repentance quickly followed, and although inherent pride made it difficult for him to admit he was wrong, his sense of justice was even greater than his pride. I was never quite sure whether he was as much in love with me as he implied. He was fond of me— he always had been—but was he more in love with the suitability of the match than with my person? I felt fearful and wondered whether he could have been equally fond of any girl who obviously cared for him and had enough money to make her good for Menfreya. Sometimes in my room I looked at myself critically. My appearance had improved since my engagement, for happiness can give some beauty to any face, but I could not help being conscious of the manner in which his eyes would light up at the sight of a pretty girl; he had a special smile for them all, even a milkmaid whom we passed in the lanes.

When we called on Dr. Syms I wondered what Bevil was thinking. Here it was that Gwennan had been brought when she had had her accident and he had first seen Jessica, but if he was remembering those days he gave no sign.

“Dr. Syms,” he said jovially, “you’ll come to the wedding?”

“Ill be there, duty permitting.” Dr. Syms, chubby-faced, middle-aged and energetic, was beaming his congratulations. “But if somebody’s baby chooses to make an appearance at that time … well, I shall hear all about it, for there seems to be nothing else people can talk of but the Menfreya wedding.”

Mrs. Syms took us into her drawing room, and we drank wine while we talked of the wedding and the constituency and what was likely to happen at the next election. She was, I discovered, an ardent worker for the party.

“I’m sure you’ll be such an asset,” she told me. “An M.P. needs a wife; and your being the daughter of the previous Member is going to appeal. I hear your father was such a fine Member; and now that he is gone and we’re back in the old tradition of a Menfrey for Lansella, it’s so charming that our present Member should be the husband of the daughter of the old one. It'll be as though the seat never really went out of the family. That will mean a great deal here.”

I began to get a glimpse of what my future life would be. I should work for the party; I should have to open bazaars and perhaps speak from platforms. It was exciting though a little alarming, but Bevil would be there. I pictured myself flaking witty speeches—Mrs. Menfrey, the wife of the M.P. a pleasant picture of the future began to grow.

“I’m so glad we came here,” Mrs. Syms told me. “It’s more interesting than being in the town. Yea, we were in Plymouth, but there seems to be so much more social life in a place like this. Mind you, it’s strenuous. Poor Dr. Trelarken killed himself with the work. Such a charming man … his daughter too. You knew her, of course.”

“Very slightly.”

“Rather sad. The poor girl was left almost penniless. I hear she went to London or somewhere to be a governess. It’s no life for a girl—and one so beautiful. She was a real beauty. She might marry—but it’s difficult for a girl hi her position. Life can be very difficult in those circumstances … very difficult indeed.”

When we drove away, I said, “She’s a talkative woman.”

“She talked enough for a politician. Actually she ought to be in Parliament herself. A pity they don’t let women in. Perhaps they will one day.”

“They’re very different from the Trelarkens.” I heard the faint, high-pitched note in my voice, and I wondered whether Bevil recognized it, It was a sign of emotion.

He was silent, and I glanced sideways at him to see that he was smiling.

“Poor Jessica,” I went on.

“Bad luck for her,” he agreed.

“I always remember my own governess, Miss James. She was a timid woman who seemed to be in fear of losing her post—timid, that is, except with me, whom she was inclined to bully.”

“It’s no life for a woman in the wrong family.”

“I wonder how Jessica likes it”

He did not answer, and I was afraid that if I pursued the subject further I would be unable to control my feelings and let loose my suspicions and jealousies.

There was no time for brooding. Only three weeks to the wedding! Lady Menfrey had decided to fill the house with guests, who would be mainly friends from London—parliamentary friends who, Bevil hoped, would be my friends, since I was going to be of use to him in his work. There would be local friends too.

William Lister, my father’s old secretary, who now worked in the same capacity for Bevil, was making most of the arrangements. It was pleasant to see him again, and I was delighted to guess that he was happier working with Bevil than he bad been with my father.

Fanny had arrived to look after me. She irritated me by her obviously resigned attitude; it was as though she was facing some unavoidable disaster and was determined to put on as good a face as possible. But this was just a small irritation hi a wonderful existence. I was happy. Bevil was constantly in my company. He had even wanted to come to the dressmaker’s to see me fitted into my dress until his mother indignantly forbade it as unlucky. We discussed our future life, which seemed to be suffused by a rosy light like the dawn, and I was reminded of that time when I had run away and awakened after a fearful night to see Menfreya in the morning.

I was fanciful. I was happy. I was going to surprise him by the manner in which I would help him. I read politics, and Bevil was first amused, then impressed, when I could discuss-Free Trade and Protection with nun.

I was glad enough to leave to him the disposal of the London house. He said that William Lister would deal with all that while we were away on our honeymoon. My father had collected some valuable pieces of furniture, and Lister, who was an expert on such things, would see that anything of value was brought down to Menfreya, where there was plenty of room to house it The rest could be sold.

We were going to the South of France—to a little town in the mountains from which we should be able to look down on the Riviera, He had been there before, and it was ideal for a honeymoon. Moreover the weather at this time of the year would be perfect.

The wedding was almost on us, and when I could rid myself of a slight uneasiness I was completely happy. I kept thinking of Gwennan, who had run away, and I was terrified that something would happen to prevent my marriage. Then I thought of all the women whom Bevil had loved, and I wondered how different his feeling for me was from what he had felt for the others. He assured me that it was, and with such sincerity that I believed him; but I was beginning to know Bevil very well indeed. When he desired something he did so with such enthusiasm that he believed he desired it more than anything else in the world. But one desire passed, and there was another to replace it. Deep down in my heart I knew that happiness was not a prize on the mountaintop which, when you had reached it, was yours forever. Happiness was a prize, but it was only yours for a brief moment and guarding it was as difficult as attaining it in the first place. Happiness came in moments. Elusive. Unpredictable. It came when Devil’s eyes opened wide in appreciation of some bright remark, when he turned to me in a sudden realization of the bond between us, when he said from the heart, “I love you, Harriet Delvaney. There’s no one quite like you,” He used my surname often in moments of emotion; I suspected, because he did not want to betray the depth of his feelings. He, who was accustomed to quick desires, violent and irresistible while they lasted, was a little surprised that love could walk side by side with passion. At least that was what I liked to believe.

Our wedding day arrived. It was the beginning of September. I awoke early and looked across the sea to the house on the island. The sea was tinged with pink as it had been on that other morning and the rosy glow was on the house.

Since Sir Endelion was a sort of guardian, as my father had made him an executor of his will, he would give me away. The bride given away by the bridegroom’s father! That had surely happened rarely, and the best man was Harry Leveret, who was to have married Gwennan. An odd choice, but Harry himself had suggested it. It might be that he wanted the world to know that he no longer cared for the girl who had treated him so badly.

There was I hi white satin and the flowing Menfreya veil and my orange blossom. They all declared that I looked lovely, and for once I almost believed I did.

I looked at my reflection in the glass. “Don’t worry, Fanny. I’m going to be lucky. I’ve made up my mind about that.”

“You’re tempting Providence.”

“Don’t be such an old ghoul, Fanny. You didn’t want me to become a Menfrey, did you? Well, I’m going to be one, and there’s nothing you can do about it.”

“No,” she said, “there’s nothing I see to do.”

“Now I know what they mean by a skeleton at the feast.”

Lady Menfrey was coming into the room. “How are you getting on, dear? Oh, but you look lovely! Doesn’t she. Fanny?” Her eyes filled with tears. She was thinking of the abduction, the seduction and the hasty wedding. Like me, she had been an heiress. If she had not been, there would have been no abduction, no seduction—but perhaps there would. The only certainty was that there would have been no marriage.

“Dear, I think we should be getting along now.”

To the village church with Sir Endelion. “You look lovely, my dear. I’m proud to give you away … This is a happy day for us all.”

Bevil was already there, and his eyes were on me. There were special glances for me alone. A pity we have to go through all this fuss, he meant A simple ceremony would have been so much better … and then away to that little town overlooking the coast, where we can be alone and I can show you that I love you as I never loved anyone before and that, if your stepmother had not died and so released your father’s fortune, I would have married you, Harriet Delvaney … no, Harriet Menfrey, now.

So we walked down the aisle to Mendelssohn’s “Wedding March.” I saw the faces in the pews that watched us … blurred and intent No relations of mine were present Aunt Clarissa had pleaded her inability to leave home at such a time, but I knew the truth was that she could not have borne to see me married when Sylvia and Phyllis had failed to secure husbands.

Out to the carriage and back to Menfreya, Bevil beside me, holding my hand tightly, laughing now and then—a new Bevil, I thought serious, contemplating the future. I was so happy I felt that if I could have had a wish it would have been to prolong that drive for the rest of my life, to sit there in the carriage with Bevil beside me, serious and tender, telling himself—as I was sure he was—that this was the beginning of a new life for nun. He was going to love and cherish me, for better, for worse, as he had vowed to do; it was going to be an end of the life of light adventure. He was going to be the reformed rake who made the best of husbands.

Under the clock which only stopped when a Menfrey was going to die a violent death, into the courtyard where the stones were worn with the wheels of carriages and the hoofs of horses over the centuries.

I had come home—a Menfrey.

Bevil must have been thinking the same for he said, “Well, Harriet Menfrey, we’re home.”

Happy women like happy countries, they say, have no histories; so there is little to report of the first weeks of my honeymoon.

We went first to Paris, where I bought the clothes I had promised myself. An exhausting business, standing before mirrors, listening to cooing compliments in French-English. But I did acquire some charming clothes; and Paris, when one loves and is loved, is one of the most wonderful cities in the world.

The Eiffel Tower, the Bois de Boulogne, the Sacre Coeur and the Latin Quarter—they are all sanctified memories to me still. Bevil beside me, laughing, making me do the talking because I had a better command of the language than he had, for he refused to attempt to discard his English accent. I remember the soft lights of restaurants- and the looks of those who served us who, with true Gallic intuition in such matters, knew that we were lovers. We betrayed it— both of us. That was the joy of it—he as much as L

But our ultimate destination was that little town in the mountains, so we left Paris and made our way south.

The Provencal flower season was over, but how I loved the country with its magnificent mountain scenery and its glorious coast! I was immediately enchanted by our hotel, and when I stood on the balcony and looked away to the sea, I thought I had never seen anything so beautiful.

They were happy days.

Madame, the proprietress, knew Bevil. He had been here before.

“And this tune he comes with Madame Menfrey. That is very beautiful.”

Her dark eyes were speculative though, and I wondered with whom Bevil had stayed in this hotel before. Perhaps alone, but it might have been that he had made friends in the town. During the ten days we had spent hi Paris I had had no such thoughts; I had begun to believe I had conquered them; but here they were, at the first sign of suspicion.

But I forgot it when we went down to the dining room, which opened on to the terrace with its view over the mountains. There we dined by candlelight, and all my happiness returned.

“We should stay here for four or five weeks,” Bevil said, for he wanted me to love Provence as he did. Here life was lived simply, and that was how to get the best out of a honeymoon. “No distractions,” he said. “Not that anything could distract me from Harriet Menfrey—but it’s the simple life for me.”

I was content enough. In the mornings we explored the old town with its winding streets and worn steps and alleyways. The dark-eyed children watched us almost furtively. We were so obviously foreigners; and the stall holders were delighted when we paused to buy fruit and flowers in the market square. We sat outside cafes and watched the life go by. During the afternoons we would sit under the palm trees in the garden and lean on the stone balustrade looking over the mountains away to the sea. We hired horses and rode into the mountains, through lonely villages, along dangerously narrow paths. Bevil insisted on leading my horse along such places, and although I was a good horsewoman and capable of managing my mount, I enjoyed the protection. Sometimes we stopped at inns for dinner; we tried all the native dishes and the wine of the country, and we would sit sleepily content half through the afternoon before we rode on.

We rarely made plans. We let each golden day take care of itself. How I loved the warm, sunny days and the evenings when the sun disappeared taking the heat with it Then I put on a warm wrap, and we went out sometimes to walk in the cool mountain air.

One late afternoon we rode into the mountains. We were going into one of the villages for dinner, where Madame had told us we could see some Provencal dancing.

We set off, promising ourselves a ride home by moonlight We were very gay and happy as we rode along, and we sang together a song which Monsieur, Madame’s husband, had taught us. The words were set to the Maid of Aries music, and was about the three wise men coming to Bethlehem. Whenever I hear the tune I am back on that rough mountain path singing, with Bevil beside me … a happy moment which was, in a way, a finale to the complete contentment But, perhaps fortunately, I did not know this then.

Trois grands rob,

Modestes tous les trois,

Brillaient chacun comme un soleil splendide;

Trois grands rois,

Modestes tous les trois,

Etincelaient sur lews blancs palefrois.

Le plus savant

Chevauchait devant,

Mais, chaque nuit, une etoile d’or les guide;

Le plus savant

Chevauchait devant:

J’ai vu flotter sa longue barbe au vent

Bevil, singing out of tune in his atrocious British accent, made me laugh immoderately, and he cried: “Well, you do better, Harriet Menfrey.”

“That won’t be difficult,” I retorted. “There’s so little competition.”

And as I sang he told me: “Your voice isn’t half bad, sweetheart. And you speak the language like a native.”

So we went on singing until we came to the little village, where we were warmly welcomed by Madame and Monsieur. We had been expected, they told us. They would have been disappointed if the English milord and his bride did not come to visit them. Madame from our hotel mothered us, but she gossiped about us evidently. In any case in that small dining room we were given the place of honor near the violins which would provide the music for the dancers.

Food was served with the ceremony to which we had become accustomed; the wine was brought and poured as though it were nectar of the gods, and Madame and her waiter watched us as though they were admitting us to paradise, while we tasted the highly spiced food and declared it to be delicious.

It promised to become one of many happy evenings until the English couple came into the room. Immediately I noticed Devil’s astonishment; and as the woman’s eyes fell on him she stopped short—as surprised as he was. She was delighted, too.

As she approached our table, I noticed her bright, honey-colored hair and long, grey eyes, that her lips were smiling, her body voluptuous, and that in spite of this she walked with a jungle grace which was made more obvious because her companion moved clumsily beside her and was inclined to be chubby.

Bevil had risen.

“Am I dreaming?” she asked. “Pinch me, Bobby … then I shall wake up.”

“I hope it’s not a nightmare,” said Bevil.

“It’s the nicest sort of dream. What are you doing here, Bevil?”

Bevil was smiling at me. “This is an old friend,” he began.

She grimaced. “Did you hear that, Bobby? An old friend. I don’t like the description. It could be ambiguous.”

“Only to the blind,” replied Bevil.

“You should introduce us, my dear,” said Bobby.

“Of course,” put in Bevil. “This is my wife.”

The woman’s gray eyes swept over me, and I fancied they missed little.

“This is my husband.”

Then she laughed, as though it were a great joke that Bevil should have a wife and she a husband.

“Don’t tell me,” she went on, “that you’re having a honeymoon, too.”

“It calls for some sort of celebration, I’m sure,” said Bevil. He turned to me. “Lisa and I knew each other … a long time ago.”

Madame was at our table. “You are friends? You would like to dine together?”

“What fun!” cried Lisa. “Now, Bevil, you can tell me all.”

Madame signed to the waiter to bring chairs, and soon we were all seated round the table, and the fuss of serving began. She was Lisa Dunfrey, Bevil told me. Not now, she reminded him. There was Bobby. Lisa Manton. “You know,” she said, “Manton Biscuits. Bobby makes them, don’t you, darling. Not personally, of course. Merely profitably. But, Bevil, this is so amusing. Both honeymooning at the same place!”

I wish that Bobby and I could have found it so amusing. He hated it as much as I did, for she turned her attention to Bevil and left him to me.

The weather was glorious, said Bobby. What did I think of the mountain scenery? How did I like French food?

He was no more interested in my answers than I was In his questions; we were both listening to the conversation of his wife and my husband; and none of us paid any real attention to the Provencal dancers who performed so charmingly for our pleasure.

I knew the look which came into Bevil’s eyes when he was . attracted by a woman; I had seen that look for me; now it was there because of Lisa. If Bobby and I had not been there, would they have resumed a relationship which they both seemed to look back on with nostalgia? I wondered.

At one point she turned to me and said: “So you’re Sir Edward Delvaney's daughter. I saw the announcement in the papers, and I remember thinking that it would be a very suitable match for Bevil.”

“Thank you,” I replied. “I hope yours is as suitable.”

She laughed and looked into her glass. “Oh yes. Isn’t that satisfactory. All so suitably married—all at the honeymoon stage together. And Bevil has his politics ..."

“And you your biscuits,” I replied.

She surveyed me coolly and turned back to Bevil. I gazed at the dancers, not seeing them; instead seeing Bevil and this woman together making love. Was this a foretaste of the future? Would I now and then meet friends of Bevil’s and suffer the acute jealousy which was tormenting me now?

I thought the evening would never end; but at last there was no longer any excuse for staying, and we left them there to return to our hotel. I was relieved to feel the night air, but I had lost my peace of mind.

We did not sing as we rode back. Bevil was silent—still, I believed, in the past.

“How well did you know her?” I asked.

“Know whom?” he queried unnecessarily.

“The beautiful Lisa.”

“Oh, I just knew her.”

It told me nothing, yet I imagined it told me so much.

When we reached the hotel, Madame wanted to know if we had enjoyed the dancing. Bevil was unusually quiet, but I managed to reply brightly that it had been a most illuminating evening.

Bevil made love to me fiercely that night, and I asked myself as we lay in the darkness: Is it Lisa to whom be is making love? Am I the substitute?

We didn’t meet them again, and in a few days Bevil had recaptured his high spirits and I was able to hide my misgivings. The honeymoon continued, but nothing was quite the same.