All at once she was aware of her nightgown, damp with soup and sauce against her legs, and the cat’s little tongue licking it clean. Revolting.
She thought of the mess she had made in her bedroom, then the mess she had made with Jolyon. Her eyelids grew unbearably heavy. ‘I think you are right, Mrs Holt. I had better get back to bed.’
The sky was a cold, hard blue, devoid of clouds. Brisk wind kept the trees constantly in motion. A confetti of green, yellow and brown leaves lay strewn over the paths, crunching as the carriage wheels ploughed through them. Elsie was astonished just how far into the distance she could see, even submerged beneath her weeping veil. There were no soot flecks in the air; no pall of coal smoke dimmed the light. It unnerved her.
‘Yes, this is the right day for Rupert,’ Sarah sighed. ‘Busy and bright, just like him.’ Her long, horsey face looked worse than yesterday, washed out and baggy-eyed after she had sat up all night with Rupert’s body.
Elsie regretted not keeping watch herself. In the Great Hall, right at the bottom of the house, she would not have been troubled by the scratching noise; Sarah made no mention of having heard it. And Rupert deserved a last vigil. She had not intended to slight him, but with the baby in her belly, she had grown selfish for her own comfort. Sleep, fire and an easy chair had become the vital things in her life.
She leant her head against the window. The land looked better in sunshine. She made out larch and elm growing between the chestnut trees, and a squirrel loping across their path. It paused on its hind legs, watching the funeral procession pass, then shot up the nearest trunk.
The featherman went first, a tray of black plumes balanced upon his head. Next came the mute with his staff. His hat trailed a weeper below his waist.
‘You have put on a good show for him.’ Elsie reached out and squeezed Jolyon’s hand, keen to remove the tension between them. ‘I’m grateful.’
‘It is no more than he deserved.’
Rupert’s coffin gleamed from the hearse. Poor Rupert, trapped forever in this dismal place. Overlooked for eternity by that abysmal church with only half a steeple. When they married, Elsie had never doubted they would spend eternity buried side by side. She might have to review that plan.
As the carriages ground to a halt, she was relieved to see that none of the villagers had ventured to their windows, although it did surprise her. At home a funeral was a spectacle. Here it seemed like no remarkable occurrence.
Jolyon picked up his cane. ‘It is time.’ His black cloak swished as he climbed down the steps and offered his hand, first to Elsie and then to Sarah.
She felt fragile once she touched the ground; as light as one of the twigs blowing about the churchyard. She didn’t know how to behave.
Ma had been hysterical when Pa died. Remembering her shuddering sobs, Elsie felt an instant failure as a wife. She could not cry. She spent her days holding the knowledge of Rupert’s death at a distance, like a dagger against her throat, afraid to let it plunge in and bring with it understanding. Her only sensations were numbness and nausea.
Blasted Sarah started crying the moment she was installed on Jolyon’s other arm. The sight of her tears filled Elsie with an anger she could not justify.
‘Mr Livingstone. Mrs Bainbridge, Miss Bainbridge. My sincere condolences.’
Elsie curtsied before the vicar. Through the net of her weeping veil she made out a young man with dirty blond hair. He had a long nose and large chin that suggested good breeding, but his stole was grimy, off-white.
‘I have only had the pleasure of meeting Mr Livingstone before. My name is Underwood. Richard Underwood.’ A genteel voice, each letter enunciated. What was such a man doing with the dire living of Fayford? Surely his connections could do better for him? As he folded his hands over a prayer book and held it against his stomach, Elsie noticed holes in the sleeves of his cassock. ‘Now I must ask you ladies, before we begin, if you are sure that you feel equal to the service? There is no shame in resting at home.’
Sarah unleashed a fresh burst of tears.
‘There there, Miss Bainbridge,’ said Jolyon. ‘Are you – would you – it is as Mr Underwood says. Would you rather stay in the carriage?’ He looked over at Elsie for help. She nearly smirked. He wanted a sister with keener sensibilities, did he?
Mr Underwood stepped in. ‘My dear Miss Bainbridge, take comfort. Here is my arm.’ He detached her from Jolyon with such delicacy that Elsie was convinced: he must be a gentleman. Slowly, he guided Sarah away. ‘You may sit in the vicarage until you are restored. My maid will fetch you some tea. Salts? Do you have salts?’
Sarah made a gasping reply that Elsie did not catch.
‘Very good. Look, just here.’ His house was one of the unsavoury hovels encroaching on the burial ground – hardly a home befitting a vicar. She was almost worried about Sarah sitting in there for the length of the service; it looked as if you could catch typhoid from the place. ‘Ethel, fetch the stool. You are to watch over this lady for me. Make her a sweet tea.’
A bony hag with missing teeth appeared in the doorway. ‘But it’s the last of—’
‘I am aware of that, Ethel,’ he said sharply. ‘Now do as I ask.’
Grumbling, the woman ushered Sarah inside and closed the door.
Mr Underwood returned to them, seemingly unfazed.
‘That was very kind of you, sir. Thank you,’ Jolyon said.
‘No trouble at all. Mrs Bainbridge, are we quite safe with you?’
‘I would answer for her nerves with my life,’ Jolyon replied.
Underwood appraised her with interest. His eyes were wide but strangely hooded; they peered, rather than looked. ‘Very good. Now, Mrs Bainbridge, I will go to the door of the church and meet the coffin. That will go in first, then the mourners will follow.’
She nodded. It was all she could do.
The pall-bearers heaved the coffin onto their shoulders and shuffled forwards. Wind crept beneath the black velvet pall, flapping it in time with their steps. The Bainbridge crest waved in flashes: blue, gold, blue, gold then an axe.
She tugged on Jolyon’s arm. ‘I need to sit down.’
Weather-beaten gravestones lined the path to the church door: their inscriptions crude. Three memorials in a row bore the name John Smith with dates barely two years apart. Then came another pair, beside a rosebush, both Jane Price, 1859.
Elsie kept her gaze lowered. She did not want to see the mourners climbing out of their carriages or meet their commiserating gaze. Just months ago she had walked in the other direction, decked in silk and myrtle with the peal of wedding bells behind her. She had looked down at her white dress and known that the spinster Miss Livingstone was gone forever. Here stood Mrs Bainbridge, a fresh creation, newborn.
Ashes to ashes, dust to dust. How quickly fortune turned. The woman who walked into church after this coffin – who was she now? Livingstone, Bainbridge? Maybe neither. Maybe she was not a person Elsie wanted to know.