The Elsingham Portrait

Eight


Kathryn lay on the bed for a long time, staring straight above her. Her thoughts went in despairing circles; it seemed impossible to control them. Her eyes ached with the effort of holding them open. She noticed for the first time that the ceiling of the tester bed was exquisitely painted—a lounging Venus, red-haired, was surrounded by a bevy of little cupids. Kathryn hated the silly sensuality of the painting, though in a happier hour she might have found it charming.

But now there was only chagrin, frustration, fear of what was to happen to her in this alien time and place. She had so little control over events! It seemed she could be exiled from the one place where she might have any chance of undoing whatever had happened to her, sent away by a man’s arrogant, unreasonable whim . . .

What would happen to her in Ireland?

At last the unwelcome thought intruded that she might indeed be the crazy creature Lord John obviously thought her. And there was no one to believe—to help . . .

Into the depths of her anguish intruded a gentle scratching sound, very persistent. Kathryn lowered her gaze from the exquisitely painted ceiling to search out the source of the noise. It was coming from the region of the door. After a moment the door swung silently open and a small figure slipped inside, closed the door quietly, and locked it again.

“Oh, Bennet!” wailed Kathryn, and the tears came in a healing flood.

“Hush, now, child,” cautioned Bennet, her own eyes very bright in the candlelight. “No one must know I am here.”

“Will we try to get through the portrait again?” asked Kathryn humbly. “I’m not sure I’m up to it, after what’s happened.”

“¼Twould be no use, Miss Kathryn,” said Bennet bitterly. “His lordship’s had the painting taken down. Roused one of the footmen to help him. I’ve never seen him so angry.” She sighed. “He was a sunny little lad.”

“Then that is the end of it,” Kathryn’s voice was dead. “I’ll be sent to Ireland in the morning. Thank you, Bennet, for being my friend.”

Bennet lifted one finger admonishingly. “No more of that, Miss Kathryn,” she said, as though the younger woman were a child and she the nurse. “It is not like you to give in to defeat. I’ve come to help you. What shall we do next?”

Bennet’s plump face was stern with purpose. Kathryn opened her eyes wider. This was support indeed! She would have to prove herself worthy of this intrepid partisan. She began to feel better. Later, there would be time to relive that dreadful moment when Lord John’s eyes had passed over her with icy contempt—the eyes she knew could warm to passionate intensity. But never again for me, she thought. Nadine—and I, too—have finally killed even the tiny spark of faith he had left.

“Miss Kathryn, I have an idea,” Bennet was saying quietly. “You’ll dress in some of my clothes, with a cape to hide your bandaged arm. You’ll leave the house with me before dawn. We’ll go to the posting house from which the coaches take off for the north, and we’ll get you a ticket for Elsinghurst Village. That’s the village that serves the Manor, his lordship’s country estate,” she explained. “I’ll give you a letter to my brother Richard. We have a farm several miles outside the village. Lord John’s father gave it to my brother and me when Lord John left for school and I was no longer needed as his nurse. Well, you’ll arrive at Elsinghurst about dusk, when everybody’s indoors, eating. Just walk back down the road the way the coach has been coming—” she paused, noting the pale strained face with which Kathryn had been following her instructions.

“No, no, my dearie! What’s wrong with me? You’ll no’ be able to walk several miles after that long, weary ride, and you not well at all!”

“Your plan is better than Lord John’s,” Kathryn said quietly. “Perhaps I might stop at the inn at Elsinghurst, and ask the landlord to send someone for your brother.”

“That’d be a sure way to inform every gossip in the country that a beautiful stranger had arrived in the village. From that, it’d be no more than a cat’s blink till everyone knew that the Lady of Elsingham was at the inn. Och! And I was sure I had such a famous idea!”

It was Kathryn’s turn to rally her companion’s failing spirits. “It is an excellent idea! It just needs a little adjusting. Now, let’s see. Is there any other way to get to the farm than through Elsinghurst Village?”

Bennet nodded eagerly. “Twenty miles before you come to Elsinghurst, there’s a place called Crofton. It’s larger than Elsinghurst, and has two inns. You could dismount from the coach there, and take a room at the smaller of the two inns. Send a boy with my letter to Richard, and stay inside the room until Richard comes for you.” Bennet nodded decisively. “That will serve! Our farm’s about halfway between Crofton and Elsinghurst. Richard could get to one place as well as the other. And he’ll be proud to keep you safe until we can work out something better.”

The enormity of what she was asking a completely unknown man to do suddenly became plain to Kathryn. “I can’t!” she objected. “Think, Bennet! A strange woman dropping in on him from nowhere! He’ll hate it.”

“Not Richard,” said Bennet proudly. “Though I say it myself, as shouldn’t, Richard Bennet is the kindest man in all of England. And Scotland too,” she added, after a second’s thought.

Kathryn considered rapidly. The night was passing, and she must make some decision before dawn if she hoped to escape the exile to Ireland, where the frightening Donner might have to be dealt with. There were objections to Bennet’s scheme—too many to list—but it might work, if she were lucky, and if Richard Bennet would accept the responsibility.

“There’s one thing,” she whispered into Bennet’s anxious ear. “Your brother’s neighbors. They’ll be gossiping about his guest. Someone’s sure to mention the new arrival to the servants at the Manor.”

Bennet, momentarily disconcerted, came back triumphantly. “We’ll tell Richard—and the villagers—that you’re a widow of a soldier killed in America—I’ve heard you talking about the war there. That’ll explain how you come to know something about the place—and your accent, Miss Kathryn, which is not at all the London speech, if you’ll pardon me for saying so.”

Kathryn found courage to smile. “Bravo, Bennet! What a scenario writer you’d have made! Being a widow will give me a chance to wear a heavy veil—which I’ve no doubt you can provide me with! Your staff work is as fine as your powers of invention.”

Bennet was delighted with the praise, but said firmly, “We’ll have fun about this when we have you safe at the farm, Miss Kathryn. If anyone questions you, you can say that you and your deceased husband being orphans, both of you, you’d no folk to go to in London, and I’ve sent you to board with my brother, since I knew your mother long ago.”

Kathryn entered into the spirit of the scheme. “I could be a deaf-mute,” she suggested, “and communicate only by writing on a slate. That would hide my accent, and it really ought to discourage casual questions—”

Bennet was forced to smile, but she said firmly, “Now then, Miss Kathryn, you’re being whimsical. Not that you aren’t in the right of it, at that! There’s few enough of them Croftoners can do more than scrawl their own name, to say naught of writing out impudent questions.”

Kathryn smiled. “I’d just nod, or point, or shrug, or whatever seemed appropriate, and smile sweetly.”

“Oh dear, that’s going to be our problem. Any woman who looks like you do will be a nine-days’ wonder for the whole county. They’ll come to gawk at you, and someone’s sure to recognize her ladyship.”

“I never would have believed I’d have trouble because of being too beautiful,” smiled Kathryn. “But that’s easily fixed. I’ll cut this very noticeable hair short, dye it black—and we’ll have to get some dye before the stagecoach leaves—”

Bennet wavered between horror and indignation. “Cut your hair? I suppose you’ll cut your pretty nose off, too . . . oh, Miss Kathryn, it’s wicked you’re having all this trouble, and being driven out into the world, when it’s none of your fault, whatever!” She began to cry.

Kathryn placed a gentle hand on the older woman’s arm. “Come on, Bennet, you’ve given me such a wonderful way to escape being sent to Ireland, so far away from the portrait—” she caught her breath. “The portrait! Without it, I haven’t a chance of getting back to New York!”

Bennet pulled herself together, blew her nose, and set herself to considering this latest problem. After a few minutes she said, “There’s a way. I’ll send the picture to Elsingham Manor. Lord John ordered the footman to ‘store the damned thing out of sight somewhere.’ ” Bennet quoted primly. “I’ll tell the man it’s to go to the Manor. Then when it arrives, I’ll have it hung in a room no one uses—and smuggle you in one night to—try again,” Bennet concluded awkwardly. She trusted and pitied Kathryn, but she felt very uncomfortable with the idea that the portrait was a doorway into another place and time.

Kathryn was deeply grateful to this little woman, so loyal to the manchild she had been brought from Scotland to nurse, so grateful for his continuing kindness to her when he left her care. It was Lord John’s father who had established the Bennets on the farm near the Manor, but it was Lord John Himself who had begun the practice of bringing his old nurse to the great London mansion for a few weeks every year as a special treat. Of course, Bennet adored him, thought Kathryn. The wonder was that she had not rejected Kathryn out of hand, after the gossip in the servants’ quarters. Bennet was a just woman, enough of a pawky Scot to insist on making her own independent judgments. A compassionate woman, too, as Kathryn could testify.

“Bennet, are you sure you want to get involved in this? Lord John will be very angry with you if he finds out you have helped me defy his orders. He’ll want to strangle both of us!”

“Then want must be his master,” retorted Bennet stoutly. “That’s a saying we have in my country, when someone says he wants something unreasonable. It means he’s got to deal with his problem himself.” She set her lips firmly. “I had little patience with tantrums when he was a child, and I have less now.”

Kathryn chuckled. “Bennet, you’re too much. And that’s a saying we have in my country! But getting back to the plan: I’ve been wondering if the Manor won’t be the first place Lord John will look for me, when he hears we’ve gone off together?”

“That’s the beauty of it,” Bennet explained. “We shan’t go together. I’ll whisk you out of the house and onto the stagecoach before anyone is up and about. Then I’ll come back here. I’ll be standing in the hall when they unlock this door and find you gone. I’ll follow his lordship into the room, and pretend to find this note from Donner. Everyone will believe you’ve gone to Ireland with her!”

“Bennet, you’re a genius!” said Kathryn, giving her a hug one-armed. “But I still can’t agree to stay indefinitely with your long-suffering brother. After a few days I’ll apply for a job in some large house in the neighborhood—”

“Doing what?” sniffed Bennet. “It’s not likely you could manage heavy work, you being brought up like Quality, at a school and all. And you’re far too pretty to be hired as a governess, even if you had letters of reference, which you have not. Besides, in any of the great houses, you’d be at hazard of meeting someone who’s met—Lady Elsingham.”

Kathryn was forced to agree. She sighed. “Very well, then. Help me dress and lead me to your stagecoach! You’d better write that letter to your brother. And you’ll have to lend me the money for the fare, you know.”

“I’d be happy to, Miss Kathryn, but you’ve got far more than enough in your reticule.” She indicated a frivolous purse on the bureau.

Kathryn set her jaw stubbornly. “I shall not take one penny of That Man’s money—” she began, but Bennet interrupted briskly.

“Then I shall, and give it to you. Now Miss Kathryn, don’t be childish! Do you really think his lordship would be deceived for one minute if I said you’d gone off to Ireland without a penny in your pocket? Be sensible, Miss Kathryn, do!”

Kathryn smiled reluctantly. “Yes, Bennet,” she said.

“Good! Now I’ll help you dress, and then I’ll write the letter to Richard, and then we’ll smuggle you out of the house.” She was bustling about as she talked, but she managed a surreptitious glance or two at the pale beautiful woman whose lovely face was drawn with pain and exhaustion. “I’ll just pack a wee bag for you, Miss Kathryn: some underthings, a comb and brush, soap, and the laudanum Dr. Anders sent over to dull the pain and help you sleep.”

Kathryn, dressed in what she suspected was Bennet’s best dress and cape, found them a very snug fit. A bonnet and heavy veil were carefully fitted over the glorious hair.

“I could be Jack the Ripper and no one would know it, with this disguise,” whispered Kathryn. She was feeling lightheaded with pain and nervous tension. Bennet forced her to sit down while the letter to Richard was being written. Then, with Bennet in the lead carrying the neat satchel of clothing, the two women crept down the great stairway in the dark. Kathryn was almost glad she couldn’t see the elegance and beauty of the mansion she was leaving so stealthily. She had never really belonged here—even Nadine had been an interloper—and a fool, Kathryn thought, angrily. To have all this—and throw it away! Into her mind, unbidden, unwelcome, flashed a picture of a tall, golden-haired man, asleep somewhere in a magnificent bed, the master of this house. Perhaps in sleep the angry, contemptuous frown would be smoothed away, and his face would be relaxed and kind . . . Bennet opened the ponderous front door cautiously. The foggy chill of predawn struck into the warm, scented hall. Shivering, Kathryn followed the older woman out, waited while she closed the door, and then hurried after her down the street.