Marianna (18 page)

‘Yes, I imagine it must be something of a record,’ Marianna managed to reply in a light tone. ‘Do tell me, Lady Rockingham, how is your daughter? I heard it mentioned the other day that Alicia shows great promise at the pianoforte.’

This appeal to maternal pride succeeded in its objective, and she was able to keep the conversation in safer channels until the menfolk rejoined them.

Marianna glanced at her husband’s face, and from his satisfied expression she gauged that negotiations had been fruitful. There was no opportunity to confirm this, though, even when the guests departed, Ralph, who by now had his own chambers in Regent Street, was immediately taken off by his father for a discussion of the evening’s events over a glass of whisky, and Marianna knew better than to interfere.

But when she heard Ralph leaving the house half an hour later — he did not trouble to come and bid her goodnight — Marianna made her way to her husband’s study.

‘Am I to take it, William, that Sir Percival has agreed to finance your new ship?’

His eyes held no tenderness for Marianna these days. His petted child-bride had grown into a woman with a will of her own, and he regarded her with aversion — aversion, to which a small measure of grudging respect was added.

‘Rockingham and I haven’t smacked hands on it yet, but he will, Marianna, he will.’

‘I’m glad,’ she said, ‘for I know how much this venture means to you.’

It took Marianna a few more moments to gird herself for the action she had decided upon, to drive out her feelings of revulsion. Then swiftly she sat herself down on her husband’s lap and slid enticing arms around his neck, nuzzling her cheek against his. In a hateful, little-girl voice, she said, ‘l knew you would persuade him, you are so awfully
clever. I do not think any man in the whole of England is a match for my darling Billykins.’

Surprised, yet gratified, he stroked her silken hair, and Marianna knew that she had stirred his interest. She added coaxingly, ‘I am going up to bed now. Will you ... will you be long?’

Her husband did not respond, but through her lashes she saw his glance turn towards his desk, to the central drawer. Marianna swallowed back the choking sickness in her throat. That locked drawer contained a leather album in which were mounted the photographs of herself as his still-virgin bride,
taken a few days after their marriage. She knew that William frequently pored over those loathsome pictures; he made no secret of the fact, weeping his reproaches on her because she was no longer this sweet innocent child.

Tonight, Marianna knew, he would take out the album again. And presently, with his senses inflamed, he would come to her bed. Her husband was setting sail for Montreal the following day, to negotiate a new grain-shipping contract, and that would mean a whole month elapsing without any possibility of her being impregnated.

The dread was ever-present in her mind that William’s rare visits to her bed would cease altogether. Each time, afterwards, it was precisely as it had been after that first terrible initiation — he was consumed with anger, with disgust. And the disgust was not with himself, but with her. He despised his young wife for seducing him, for shamelessly permitting the sacred temple of her body to be so vilely desecrated.

That night their union was the same as always, a silent, loveless act of lust on the marital bed. Her husband was a wild animal, careless of the pain he inflicted; while Marianna had to suffer, in addition to the pain, a sense of searing degradation. When finally he stumbled away to his dressing room, she lay trembling and sleepless far into the night, praying fervently that this time he had made her with child. A child upon whom to pour out her love and give some purpose to her barren life.

* * * *

The fire in the bedroom grate was burning brightly, but Marianna still felt chilled to the bone. She could never remember feeling other than wretchedly cold during English winters. From her seat on the window stool she could see the plane trees in the square rimed with frost, and hungry sparrows flocking to peck the scraps of bread being tossed to them by an old lady in a black astrakhan cape.

Behind her, Hilda was moving about the room, busy packing for their move to Hampshire on the next day.

‘Do you want to take your blue taffeta, ma’am?’

‘Which dress do you mean?’ Marianna asked indifferently, not turning round.

‘The one with the little velvet bows, ma’am.’

‘No, I don’t think so. Though ... I suppose you might as well put it in if there’s room.’

Hilda had been the subject of her very first victory over William. Faced with her husband’s despotic authority, she had taught herself the arts of patience and subtlety. The French maid, doubtless at William’s instigation, had attempted to be more a governess than a personal servant, and there were numerous clashes between them. Madame Helene Guyot, a Parisienne, did not find rural Hampshire at all to her liking, and Marianna ensured that she found little to like in her work either; while Hilda, an unacknowledged ally, saw to it that the Frenchwoman was cold-shouldered in the servants’ hall. By happy chance, she came into conflict with Harriet Fielding, too. In less than a month, Madame Guyot had given notice of her intention to take another post. Whereupon William had dispatched her immediately. Unwilling to admit defeat, he pretended to be indulging his wife in her preference for Hilda. And Marianna had judged it prudent to thank her husband for his kindness with hugs of childish delight.

The harmony between them had lasted several days — until some petty trifle had sparked off William’s wrath and he had decided it was necessary to correct her willfulness by administering another good spanking, as he phrased it. But even in this, Marianna was able to defeat him. Instead of sobbing and pleading for mercy, she had gritted her teeth and accepted the chastisement in stoic silence, afterwards making her contempt obvious by the look of scorn in her eyes. It was two years now since her husband had lifted his hand to her in punishment.

Slowly, with bitter resolve, Marianna had won through to a state of partial independence. After Eunice’s marriage, and with it the departure of Harriet Fielding, she was permitted increasing control of household matters. Now she even chose her own clothes without interference from her husband.

As always, Hilda was chattering away nineteen to the dozen. It was a pleasant, homely sound which Marianna allowed to wash over her without paying much attention. But Hilda was less than her usual buoyant self today; she and the young footman, Albert, had become greatly attached to one another and she was sad to be leaving London for a month.

Idly, Marianna found herself watching a man who was walking slowly along the pavement opposite and constantly glancing up at the houses ... this house in particular, it seemed to her. When he drew level, he halted by the railings of the gardens and stood there hesitantly, seeming undecided. Safely screened by the net curtain, Marianna studied him with a quickening interest, an interest she could not account for. She could distinguish little of his features between the brim of his top hat and the upturned collar of his greatcoat, yet there was something familiar about him, something that gave her a strangely warm, comforted feeling. It was there in his stance, the way he held his shoulders — a certain arrogant defiance against the world. At that moment he removed his hat and passed a hand through his thick, curly black hair. And it was then that Marianna recognized him, with a breath-robbing leap of joy. The next instant she was trying to quench with scorn her flaring emotions. It was impossible, totally beyond the bounds of credibility. How could that man standing out there on a London pavement in the garb of a gentleman be the peasant lad she had known on an Atlantic island fifteen hundred miles away?

And yet it
was
Jacinto. Certainty surged again, and this time no reasoning would convince her otherwise. She pushed the net curtain aside to obtain a clearer view, and he seemed to notice the movement, for he stiffened.

On a reckless impulse, she said, ‘Hilda, I am going out.’

‘Very good, ma’am. I’ll tell them to get the carriage ready.’

‘No! No... I meant for a stroll.’

‘Ooh lovely, ma’am!’ Hilda still found it exciting to get out and about on the London streets. ‘I’ll only be half a tick fetching my hat and coat.’

‘No, Hilda, I shall go alone. Just for a turn about the square.’

‘‘Alone, ma’am?’

‘Yes. As a matter of fact, there is someone across the street whom I believe I know. I just want to pop out and make sure.’

Intrigued, Hilda came to join her at the window. ‘You mean him, ma’am? That handsome-looking gent?’

‘Yes. I think it’s someone I knew in Madeira.’

All at once, Marianna was in a violent hurry, terrified that the man might decide to walk on and be lost to her forever. She must be certain, one way or the other, whether it really was Jacinto. She would never have a moment’s peace otherwise.

‘For pity’s sake, don’t stand there dawdling, Hilda. Bring me my things at once.’ She dared not take her eyes off him, lest he should vanish.

‘But should you, ma’am? I mean to say...’

‘Do as you’re told!’

It took scarcely more than a couple of minutes to don her hat and cape, to hasten down the stairs and slip out through the front door. Yet standing on the porch steps, she saw with sickening dismay that in those two minutes he had gone. Then her heart leapt with relief as she spotted him a little further along the pavement, standing very still, his breath misting in the frosty air. Hastening across the road on legs that trembled, she realized the shocking impropriety of what she was doing, but she could not slow her steps.

He remained unmoving until she was quite close, no more than a few feet away, then he raised his hat to her and bowed.

‘Marianna!’

‘Jacinto!’

It was the merest whisper. She reached the kerb, half stumbled in her agitation, then stood before him. He was less tall beside her than she remembered, but even more upright and sturdy. She gazed up into the beloved face which had never long been absent from her mind, the face which her pencil had so insistently remembered, and she wanted almost beyond bearing to throw her arms around his neck. Instead, she held out her two hands to him.

‘Oh, Jacinto,’ she gasped, half-laughing, half-crying, ‘it’s so good to see you. So very good! I could not believe it really was you, when I saw you from the window!’

He said, after a long pause, ‘I realized you had noticed me just now, but I hardly thought you would recognize me. And even if you had done ... whether you would want to speak to me.’

‘But why?’ she exclaimed. ‘Why should you doubt that?’

‘We quarrelled, didn’t we, that last time?’

‘But you could not seriously have thought that I wouldn’t want to see you, Jacinto?’

‘No, not seriously,’ he agreed, with a rueful twist of his lips. ‘But that did not prevent me being afraid, all the same. For days now I have been wondering how best to get in touch with you. Whether it would be permissible for me to call at the house.’

‘No!
The word jerked out of her in horror, and Jacinto’s face hardened in the old familiar way.

‘I would not disgrace you, Marianna. As you can see, I am dressed quite like a gentleman, though the quality of the cloth is not of the first order. And if I am very careful and watch my words, I can even speak like a gentleman.’

‘You misunderstand me, I meant it would not be wise for you to come to the house.’ She was aware, with a sinking heart, that she had betrayed far too much. She knew, too, that inquisitive eyes might be watching from the windows. ‘Come, let us stroll a little way,’ she suggested.

But this was easier said than done; she was unsteady on her legs, and could have used the support of Jacinto’s arm. But that would be too outrageously foolish. They walked together in a fragile silence until they turned the corner into Pont Street. Then the pent-up questions came pouring out of her.

‘Jacinto, how is it possible that you should be in England? How long have you been here? What has happened? Tell me, tell me.’

‘It is easily explained,’ he said. ‘When I had shown that I could read and write, in both Portuguese and English, and was quick with figures, I managed to secure a post at the Custom House in Funchal. A very junior post, but it gave me the chance to prove my worth and I was soon allowed greater responsibility. I came to know the master of one of the steam packets, Captain Anderson of the
Eclipse,
and when he learned that I wanted above everything to get to England, he recommended me for a position in his company’s London office. I am only a ledger clerk, Marianna, but it is a beginning.’

‘It’s a wonderful beginning. Oh, I’m so proud of you, Jacinto, so proud of my pupil. You must have worked extremely hard at your studies after I left.’

‘I had all your books,’ he said. ‘When Linguareira told me you had insisted that I should have them, it was a challenge to me. I knew that I must never give up my struggle to improve myself.’

Marianna glowed with happiness.

‘And how is Linguareira?’ she inquired, suddenly a little fearful. ‘I do hope she is all right.’

‘She is much the same as ever. She has remained at the
quinta,
and still lashes everybody with that tongue of hers.’

‘Dear Linguareira!’ Marianna smiled in fond remembrance. ‘And your family, Jacinto? Your father and mother?’

‘Everyone is well. My people make a livelihood from the
fidalgo’s
land, like all the workers and servants. Now that there are no vines, they grow extra vegetables and keep more animals. They manage.’ There was a little pause, then he said, ‘It was a sadness for you, when your father died so soon after your marriage.’

‘Yes,’ she said tonelessly. ‘I wanted to come back at once. Especially so because under the terms of my marriage settlement my father’s properties had become mine, not my husband’s, and the management of them was therefore my responsibility. Naturally I felt very concerned about what was to happen. But my husband insisted that a journey to Madeira was quite unnecessary. His agent in Funchal could attend to whatever small matters might arise. With the
phylloxera
still rampant, he pointed out, the tenants would be unable to pay any rents. As for trying to find a buyer for my inheritance, it was virtually worthless. Who would want to acquire a run-down
quinta
or a wine lodge in Funchal, when there were no grapes?’