Alternative Bride 13 cliffie bonus

 

Chapter 13

 

“Excuse me, but would it be possible to borrow a lantern, and perhaps someone to hold it?” the voice was cultured when Jelves answered the door. “One of my horses is lame.”

Gerard got up and went to the door.

“For goodness sake, my dear sir, bring your team into our barn, and let Jelves look your horse over in the warmth and light, and join us for dinner,” he said.  The youth at the door was startlingly dark of skin, but was plainly a gentleman.

“S... sir, I have a lady with me....”

“Then you must certainly bring her in, she must not stay out in the night air,” said Gerard. “My wife will be an adequate chaperone, I think.”

“Oh! Then... Lucy! Lucy, we have been invited to dinner.”

“I’ll take your team into the barn, and look them over,” said Jelves. “Will you want me to take a message to your folks, to let them know you are safe?”

The girl, a girl with light brown hair, gave a rather hysterical laugh.

“Oh, anything but! We’re eloping!”

“Dear me,” said Belwether. “My lord, you know that aiding an elopement is illegal?”

“My lord?” said the youth, doubtfully looking about.

“Rented. After a... carriage accident,” said Gerard. “Dear me, you both look quite done in; come and sit down, and Mrs. Marsh will make you a cup of tea, and you can tell us all about it.”

“It’s because I’m a mulatto,” said the boy. “I’m Peter Franklin; this is Lucy Frith. Her father intended her to marry my older half-brother, David, who was white, as the estates march, but he died. Only he had asked me to take care of Lucy if anything happened to him, and we pledged ourselves to love and friendship forever in the church; so even if I didn’t love Lucy as much as I do, I would be bound to marry her by a sworn oath before God.”

“Amen!” said Beulah Marsh.

“And your father is opposed to this?” Jane asked Lucy.

“Oh, it’s because of Peter’s colour, which is just foolishness,” said Lucy. “And we might have waited until we were both twenty-one, only my father has decided that the best way to separate us is to have me married off as fast as possible to someone else, and he said that an older man would steady me. So we ran away, and headed for Watling Street to go north.”

Belwether cleared his throat.

“Mr. Franklin, did your father adopt you, and did you bear the same name as your half-brother?”

“Of course he did not adopt me; why would he have to? And yes, naturally, we have the same name,” said Peter, bridling.

“Oh, that is unfortunate; but you were perhaps named in your father’s will?”

“I believe I was mentioned, what of it? It has nothing to do with us getting married.”

“I think the gentleman is wondering if I have a document in which my father mentions that he wishes me to marry Mr. Franklin,” said Lucy. “And yes, I do, a letter he wrote to me at school, saying that I might marry Mr. Franklin, by which he meant, but did not specify, David, when I was back home.  Only before I might return, David had a heart seizure, and d...died.” A tear trickled down her face.

Gerard glanced at Peter to see grief clouding his face too.

“He seems young to have had a heart seizure,” he said.

“Oh, he had always had a weak heart,” said Peter. “My mother started it going when his mother gave birth to him. She died, and my Mammy was always Mammy to both of us.  And before you say anything, I was born ten months after my parents married.”

“Ah, if your father married your mother, that removes all complications,” said Belwether. “Forgive me; it is not always a given.”

“Mammy was his first wife’s closest companion, and looked after her in Jamaica,” said Peter. “Papa sold up the plantation, though, because of David’s poor health, to move back to England. I think Mr. Frith thought I was some kind of inferior poor relation as a companion to David; and I did help him a lot because he needed it, but that’s what brothers do!”

“Quite so,” said Gerard. “From whence have you fled?”

“Near Aylesbury. They should be missing me about now,” said Lucy.

“Miss Frith, have you that letter from your father with you?” said Belwether.

“Oh, are you thinking what I am thinking?” said Gerard.

“I was thinking that if Miss Frith remains here, and Mr. Franklin retires to an inn with me as my... secretary, say, for fifteen days, with her father’s written permission, they can marry legally without having to subject the young lady to a long drive to Scotland in, I collect, a light vehicle?”

“I have a curricle, sir. It does have a hood, but it is not ideal, but I could not pick up Lucy clandestinely in a big old-fashioned coach. But surely Mr. Frith would seek us at the last spot we were seen?”

“And where was that?” asked Gerard.

“Well, here, sir; servants will gossip.”

“Ours will not,” said Jane. “Mr. and Mrs. Marsh will appreciate your vow before God, which in their eyes makes you next thing to married; Jelves is not a gossip and he will prevail upon Alice and Minnie to keep mumchance. And Gerard, light brown hair, and a swarthy man. You were thinking of acting the decoy, weren’t you, since we had already pretended to elope?”

“It crossed my mind as a rare bit of sport, if you didn’t mind, my dear; here I am worrying about Miss Frith being bounced about on her way to Scotland and taking no account of you.”

“Oh, it will be an adventure,” said Jane. “Besides, I have the clothing for it. But our quilt goes with us.”

“Of course,” said Gerard. “And we’ll raid the kitchen for an iron pot for a fire, a cook-pot, and plenty of chocolate and tea, and I saw a tarpaulin in the barn which will do if we are stranded, extending the folding hood. If you will trust me with your curricle, Franklin?”

“Oh! Yes, sir, but my horses...”

“I will take two of mine,” said Gerard. “Lady has a bruised hock so she needs to rest, anyway. Do you run tandem, or abreast?”

“Tandem, sir.”

“Ideal. Bess and Beau will run tandem. Buck is a bit temperamental without Beau, but Jelves can handle him.”

“Ain’t I going with you on the rumble seat, milord?” said Jelves, disapprovingly.

“I need you to hold the fort here, Jelves,” said Gerard. “Meanwhile, we’ll set off predawn, and make a spectacle of ourselves at the next tollgate. If you say you’re just likely to be missed, Miss Frith, can I assume your father will spend some time going to demand of Mr. Franklin where you are, and, finding that he is missing too, conclude a flight to Gretna, and wait until the morning’s light to set forth?”

“Yes, my lord, I think so,” said Lucy. “I expect he will send someone to follow the road which joins the main western road north from Oxford, and will come himself to Watling Street.”

“And he will be asking for a dark young man and a brown-haired woman, and he will find them,” said Gerard.

“He... he might use unkind words for Peter,” said Lucy.

“Keep your muffler up and your hat low, Gerard, and with the powder stippling, I wager most people would swear you were a black man, if any asked about the same, trying to conceal his face,” said Jane.

“That can work; and the powder turns out to be useful,” said Gerard, gaily.

“You’re a madcap, Gerry,” sighed Belwether.

“Yes, isn’t it fun?” said Gerard. “And we can always double back.  So long as we keep Mr. Frith tied up for fifteen days, it doesn’t really matter. And if we always appear to be ahead of him, he will keep going.”

“S... sir, my lord, why would you do this for us?” stammered Peter.

“Because I got married just a few days ago, and our honeymoon has been disrupted by an unpleasant fellow, and I have just recovered from being temporarily blinded, and I want to celebrate my sight, and cut loose a little to shake him from my shoes,” said Gerard. “Also, because I think you could do with the aid, and I’m trusting you and Miss Frith to take care of our servants, and help Bel... Mr. Eversfield... to find me a decent size of house in this vicinity and to remove to it.”

“And, if necessary, furnish it,” said Belweather. “And find a suitable building for the school for the blind you wish to endow.”

“And make sure the stairs are not too perishing steep there,” said Gerard. “I damn nearly stumbled up these ones, and coming down blind is a nightmare.”

 

oOoOo

 

 

Lucy took the spare bedroom, which did, at least, have a fire in the grate, in anticipation of Belwether staying over, but he took himself and Peter to find an inn, well off Watling street. The Bull was the obvious venue for anyone stopping on the way North, though it was not the smart inn it had once been, so Belwether eschewed it. Likewise, the Bird In Hand, the Britannia, The Shoulder of Mutton, The Swan with Two Necks, and of course the Sugarloaf, as well as other inns catching the traffic. He left his coach in the back yard of Rose Cottage, obviating the need for a coaching inn; and two gentlemen on foot attracted less attention than anyone in a carriage.  Peter recalled passing an inn, on the Tring Road, and Belwether was happy to move out of town. He represented himself honestly enough, as the man of affairs of a wealthy man, looking for a property in or around Dunstable, where a quiet life was also near the amenities of a thriving small town. The innkeeper was helpful, suggesting several properties in the vicinity.

“Well, that’s a piece of luck,” said Belwether, to Peter. “You and I can be out on our lawful occasions, visiting properties, and so long as you keep your gloves on, I don’t think mine host has even looked at your face.”

“I wager, if Frith turns up, if I put on an apron and plied a broom, he would not recognise me,” said Peter. “He might peer closely at the remarkable incidence of a black man, but I fancy he would just see me as a servant which, to his mind, is the right place for black people. He hates Mammy as a jumped-up servant as he sees it.”

“Dear me, how very shallow some people are, to be sure,” said Belwether. “I am glad you have your own land and money; such a man is likely to cut his daughter off without a penny, because of not wanting his wealth to pass to mixed race offspring of hers.”

“He can be damned,” said Peter. “I’ve met his idea of a suitable bridegroom, because he was bragging about it at the County Fair. The fellow is a parson of the worst kind, you know, who try to live the lives of country gentlemen with a nod to the Almighty on Sunday, reading the published sermons from books, and not a thought for the spiritual welfare of his parishioners. He won’t see forty again, he’s not only balding, but he has grown one side of his hair long, to plaster over the bald patch. And his hands look like they feel like handling a dead cod.”

Belwether nodded.

“Now, are you sure he was not to be used to push her into marrying her father’s true choice, who is by comparison personable?”

“No, Frith was in a flaming temper when he said he would pick someone steady enough to school a wayward filly. And this fellow laughed and said that women were tractable enough when the lesson was driven in the right end with a good spanking, being... what did the loathsome creature say? Oh, yes, being ‘closer to the organ they use for what passes as thought in womankind, their heads being incapable of the act.’”

“Good G-d!” said Belwether, revolted. “You have great fortitude in not planting him a facer.”

“How could I, sir? A big black bruiser attacking a harmless man of the cloth.”

Belwether huffed.

“Well, if I ever meet him, I’ll damned well do it for you,” he said. “I have eight daughters, any one of whom would outdo such a lost soul in education, intellect, and Christian charity. I could just imagine my Florrie on that comment.”

Peter laughed.

“May she have a suitor who deserves her, then,” he said.

“I confess, I had some hopes of Wintergreen; but then he decided on marriage à la mode with some little ninnyhammer.”

“Come, Mr. Eversfield, you cannot tell me his lordship and his ladyship are not head over heels in love, and I swear she is no ninnyhammer!” said Peter.

Belwether laughed.

“She’s the ninnyhammer’s step-sister, who angered his lordship enough that he gathered up a girl who is as suitable for him as if she had been made especially for the match. Which I ain’t denying might even be so; the Good Lord works in mysterious ways.”

“Amen,” said Peter. “They aren’t in the least top-lofty or starchy.”

“Oh, Wintergreen can be, if he chooses,” said Belwether. “I confess, I regret not being a fly on the wall when Frith catches up with them, and Wintergreen shows why his nickname is Winterheart. His sarcastic periods are delightful... unless you are on the receiving end of them, which, I give thanks, I have never been. I see the schoolboy with lovely natural manners, not the pokered-up society grandee that he can be, and he has chosen to let you and your lady see his happy side as well. And perhaps that’s down to her ladyship at that,” he added with sudden perspicacity.