Of Moths and Butterflies

CHAPTER two





HY DIDN'T YOU tell us your uncle was ill?” Muriel demanded the moment Imogen entered the room. “This is a terrible shock. There must have been some sign, some warning. Why didn’t you send for me?”

“He was well enough yesterday, Aunt.”

“This comes from not taking better care of him,” Muriel said and took a chair near the fire. “Do you never think of others?” The twisting of the lace on her newly adopted mourning betrayed her dismay, but she turned her emotions outward, as was her habit.

Imogen crossed to the window to look out onto the street. All was consumed in a blanket of fog. Within, a bluebottle buzzed and thudded, beating itself against the glass in a desperate attempt to be free. She closed the curtain upon it, leaving the wretched creature to destroy itself in peace.

“Aunt Ellison,” Roger said, breaking the silence, “perhaps there is something I can get you?”

Imogen turned to watch him, grateful for his attempt to diffuse the tension.

“I’m too distraught to eat,” Muriel answered. Her hand waved him away, then paused in mid-air. With a suspicious eye, she examined the sideboard where some morning refreshment had been laid out prior to the arrival of the guests. “Well…perhaps I might take something light, if Paulson made it. I trust her cooking far above that of anyone else in this house.”

“She’s been gone some time, I’m afraid,” Imogen answered, and knew full well that her aunt knew it, too.

“How you do run this house! You don’t still have that Mary person do you? There’s something about that girl I don’t like. Are you sure she’s respectable?”

“Yes, Aunt,” Imogen said, answering both questions at once and seating herself on the sofa opposite.

“It’s a good thing you’ll be coming away with me. I’ll teach you how to manage a house properly.”

“I don’t think I mean to go anywhere, Aunt. Not just yet.”

Muriel stared at her, dumbfounded.

“There is Aunt Julia of course,” Roger suggested.

Muriel’s gaze shifted slowly to Roger. It seemed to take her a moment to understand him. “Impossible!”

“It’s quite impossible.” Julia, just returning from her brother’s room, had overheard enough of the conversation to answer for herself. “I have my hands full as it is with Roger,” she said, opening her fan and taking a seat as far from the fire, and her eldest sister, as possible.

“No, you will come to me, Imogen. It’s already settled. You need guidance, a chance to redeem yourself. After a little while under my care you might be able to recommend yourself for something useful. A governess position, I should think. Nothing grand of course, not with this shadow your uncle has left hanging over you. Are you training to go into service, Roger?” she said, turning a glaring eye on her sister’s nephew as he offered her a plate.

“I’m only trying to be helpful.” He smiled, which Muriel seemed to find all the more irritating.

“Sit down, will you.”

He obeyed.

“You’re fortunate you did not suffer worse, Imogen,” Muriel continued. “And with your education you will be able to recommend yourself better than most. Your uncle provided for you very well in that respect. You should be grateful.”

Muriel’s fingers drummed the table beside her as she narrowly examined her niece. Imogen was not proud, but she nevertheless felt the intrusion. This was her house now, and what she wouldn’t give for a little peace and privacy within it.

This room especially had once been a sanctuary to her. Her own little corner, where she could practice, study and read without interruption. It was here that her uncle had allowed her to try her hand at decorating. She had chosen lilies as the motif. The ubiquitous symbol of purity and virtue. Clusters of them, strewn across every wall. She had thought herself clever in choosing the carpet, a modern design, with its mirrored and opposing blooms—lilies of course—their stems intertwining throughout the centre and around the edges as though they grew as vines—or writhing snakes.

The lilies! They might as well have been cabbage roses or peonies. And they mocked her, their orange stamens staring at her like a hundred thousand little eyes.

Roger cleared his throat. “Is there something more I might get for you, Aunt Ellison?” he asked, that charming grin once more upon his face.

Muriel did not answer him. Instead, she turned to her sister. “What do you plan to do with him, Julia?”

“I’ve long since given up making any plans of my own for him. He is his own man and he must choose his own way.”

“Then I think you should not have undertaken the project in the first place. He needs grounding.”

The beating of Julia’s fan quickened perceptibly as she raised her chin to answer. “Perhaps I’ve not done as well for him as I had hoped to do, but at least I stood up to responsibility when it presented itself and did what little I could.”

“And what do you mean by that?”

“Only that I know better than to abuse him for my own failures. You’re unnecessarily hard on Imogen. She’s not quite so wretched as you make her out to be. What deficiencies she has are as much your fault as anyone else’s, for it was you who ought to have provided for their remedy. You were—are—her godmother, after all.”

“Whatever I may have failed to do in the past, Julia, I mean to make up for now.”

“By treating her like a burden to be shouldered? Do you think she will easily overcome what she has endured? Not with you reminding her of it at every possible opportunity. You may think you mean well, Muriel, but it’s possibly too late.”

Muriel opened her mouth to speak, but closed it again when a small dog entered the room, only to turn back and hide itself behind a mass of black crepe.

“Mrs. Bower has come to dress the body,” Lara announced from her place at the doorway. She sniffed the tears from her eyes. “How are you, Imogen?”

“Her uncle has died, Lara,” Muriel answered for her, then turned back to Imogen as her sister quit the room once more. “Mr. Watts was vague about the details. He said it was a fall?”

Imogen’s chest tightened. “Yes, Aunt.”

“On the stairs?”

“Yes, Aunt.”

“You were with him?”

She closed her eyes against the vision, the memory of his groping hands. His lewd and insinuating accusations assailed her. “I was.”

“Was he...?”

“Yes, he had been drinking,” she said, anticipating the question.

“Do you hear this?” Muriel said to her sister. Then, turning again to Imogen, “How is it you could have allowed him to get himself into such a state that he could not manage a flight of stairs?”

“You can’t blame Imogen, for his overindulgence,” Roger objected.

“Her familiarity with his habits should have led her to use better judgement.”

“I don’t believe there’s anyone alive who could have kept him from doing what he liked.”

“Roger, it’s all right,” Imogen said. “She’s right. It was my fault. It is my fault. His death,” and shaking her head, she added, “everything.”

Muriel’s grasp tightened around the carved rosewood arm of her chair. “I’m not sure I meant to go so far as to blame you for his death.”

“With all due respect, Mrs. Ellison,” Roger argued, “it sounded very much as though you did.”

Julia, having risen quite suddenly, placed a warning hand on her nephew’s shoulder.

“Excuse me, ma’am,” Roger said, taking the cue and sitting back once more in his seat. “Certainly you meant no harm.”

No one said anything for a long time. Imogen was simply frozen with anger and resentment. With suffocating anxiety. Was this truly her fate?

The door opened and Mary entered.

“Mr. Watts has returned, Miss Imogen.”

“Very good,” Muriel said, rising, “I would like to have a word or two with him myself.”

Mary stopped her. “Mr. Watts was most particular, ma’am. He wishes first to speak with Miss Imogen before he will see anyone else.”

Muriel slowly lowered herself back into her chair, watching with narrowed eyes as Imogen followed Mary out.

* * *

Mr. Watts stood as Imogen entered..

“You’ve had a chance to examine the document I gave you?” he asked.

“Yes, sir.”

“Have you any questions?”

She stared at him in silence for a moment or two, uncertain how or where to begin.

“I’m at your service, Miss Everard.”

Imogen, unable to find the words, abandoned her attempt to speak.

“It will be best, I think, to be open,” he said.

Of course he was right. If anyone could help her, it was he. “Very well, sir,” she began with sudden but deliberate determination, though the colour rose high on her face. “I imagine you are familiar with my circumstances?”

Mr. Watts nodded solemnly.

“And you know something of the nature of my life here?”

He nodded again, but with a more condoling air this time.

“It is my fault what happened. I—”

“No one blames you. He didn’t blame you.”

Imogen sat back, lost, for the moment, for words. “Are they quite in stone, these provisions?” she asked when she had at last recovered her ability to think.

“Quite.”

“There are no conditions?”

“Not outside the usual kind.”

“I’m not of age,” she reminded him.

“It will be held in trust until you are.”

“And I am to live with my aunt?”

“You’ve other choices to consider, as well, do not forget.”

“Such as?”

“Your chances are very good, Miss Everard. Your position is a fortunate one. You have much to recommend you. If you were to marry… Of course your husband would have control over the money and all of your earnings, but if you were to marry well...”

“Mr. Watts,” Imogen protested. “Would you want a son of yours to marry someone in my situation? Money aside, I think you know what I mean.”

His answer was given in a blank stare.

“I don’t approve of these provisions, sir. It doesn’t seem right. It doesn’t seem decent.”

“It is not for me to judge the soundness of my clients’ decisions, only for me to see that they are carried out with exactness.”

“Did my uncle have a reason for disinheriting my aunts?”

“He did what he thought best under the circumstances. You’ve been left in a precarious position. The money will make up for—”

“They will contest.”

Mr. Watts, cut short, sighed. “It’s possible, of course.”

“Is it possible to refuse it?”

He offered her a curious look.

“I would much rather make my own way. You will think me foolish, I know, but this money… It’s no blessing to me. I cannot see it as such. You cannot persuade me to do it.”

Again Mr. Watts had no answer to give.

“Is it not possible to make some amendment, to give it to them as though it were never meant to be mine?”

“No. The will must be read as it has been written.”

“Could I give it to them myself, then?”

“You can do whatever you wish once you turn twenty-one.”

Her voice was strained as she spoke. “Until then I am, by law, by my uncle’s act of depraved charity, condemned to the tyranny of those who would seek to gain by it themselves.”

“Your position is regrettable, Miss Everard. But I assure you that with a fortune to your name your chances are much better than they ever could be without it.”

“So there is nothing you can do to help me?”

“I have advised you to the utmost of my ability.”

Imogen blinked, unable to answer more. So that was that, it seemed. She had inherited her uncle’s fortune. She might have been grateful that she was no longer under his power. Instead, he had transferred that privilege to his sisters. That was their inheritance.

She vaguely heard his goodbye through the cacophony of her own thoughts. The clocks had been stopped. There was no noise at all save on the streets outside; the carriages as they drove past, the people walking to and fro in the daily business of their harried lives. At least they were free.

Imogen went again to the window and looked out, envying with unholy passion everyone she saw. As she rested her hand on the sill, her fingers brushed against the dead flies that lay there. She looked at them, found she could not take her eyes from them. That they had beaten themselves to death in their desperation to be free required no supposition at all.

She turned to the door. Could she do it? The answer came without much consideration. She must. There was no other choice. Were she to remain… Her gaze fell once more to the windowsill.

She crossed to the door and opened it an inch or two. Mr. Watts’ voice could be heard in the next room. She stole out into the hallway and up the three flights of stairs to her garret room, where she packed, as quickly as she could, only as much as she could easily carry. She would wait until morning if she must, but by first light she would be gone from this house, never to return. Not willingly, at any rate.