The Defiance of Frances Dickinson, page 13
I looked to Mrs Dickinson then, as that lady had not yet spoken a word.
Tell my daughter she is needed downstairs, Amy, she said, her face so pale that I feared she might swoon, but I had no choice but to obey and hurry upstairs.
I could give Mrs F no reason for her summons yet she seemed to read in my face that something troubled me as I supported her down the stairs. Stay with me, she whispered, looking frailer than ever.
The dining room was now empty but voices could be heard from the direction of the library. I wanted nothing more than to lead Mrs F away from whatever awaited her there. Instead, I helped her to a low armchair, alongside her mother’s, and Mr Geils stood before the hearth, one hand raised to the marble mantle. Father, my brother Jack and Maria all stood beside him.
I turned to leave but Mrs F said once more, Stay, Amy. I kept my post behind her chair.
Clearing his throat then, Mr Geils said, It is my sad duty to inform you all that this woman – gesturing towards Maria – has brought disgrace upon herself and is today discharged from the service of the lady of the house. He inclined his head towards Mrs Dickinson, who looked as if she had been insulted rather than honoured.
It falls to me, Mr Geils continued, to further resolve this matter by administering an oath to this woman so that she may declare before witnesses the father of her child.
At this, I could barely breathe so fearful was I of the effect this would have on dear Mrs F to have her husband’s shame thus exposed. Such was my concern for my lady, watching her so closely, that I failed to notice Father. If I had, I would have seen the fury mounting in his face. I should also have given more thought as to what had caused my mild-tempered brother to clench and unclench his hands, shifting on his feet like he stood on hot coals. But, as I say, all my attention was on Mrs F, waiting for the terrible blow to fall upon her when Maria spoke.
I do swear, Maria said, that I am wi’ child by Jack Webb and that he hae’na done the jennock wi’ me by marrying me as he should.
Jack Webb!
She lies! Jack said. It is not true. I’ve never touched her – I’ve barely seen or spoke to her! Father, you know it is not true. And I will not marry her!
Come, lad, where is your honour? Mr Geils said. Why would the lass say what wasn’t so?
Mr Geils, my father then said in a riled tone I knew well. You know that Jack has already denied any part in this. If my lad says he is not the father, he is not!
Well, Maria, what say you? Mr Geils said, reacting not one whit but instead fixing his gaze squarely on Maria.
I’ve sayed my trowth, she said, meeting Mr Geils’ gaze.
This is a bad business, Mr Geils continued, but I can do no more. Mrs Dickinson, you must consider what is to be done with young Webb but, if there is to be no marriage, Maria must leave Farley Hill today. And with that, Mr Geils was gone, with not so much as a word or a glance at his wife, who now gulped for air, her head bowed, her shoulders heaving.
Poor Jack! I had seen my brother talk to Maria once or twice but then Maria liked to talk to anyone, especially the men, when she could get free of the nursery for a time. I had not thought anything of it, just as I did not for one moment believe my brother to be guilty. If Jack said he had had nothing to do with the Scotchwoman then I had no doubt it was the truth.
But I could not stay now to learn any more as I needed to assist Mrs F back to her room. I was broken for her and wondered if she believed her husband’s account but she only expressed her shock to discover the immoral behaviour of one who had had the daily care of her own sweet, unsullied child. Not a word about who she thought might have brought about Maria’s state.
I stayed close to her for the remainder of the day, tending both my mistress and little Kate, whom Mrs F would not allow to leave her sight, so it was only when I returned to Lower Cottage that evening that I learned Mr Geils had privately offered Jack fifty pounds to marry Maria, even after Jack had denied Maria’s charge. Jack had refused, saying I’ll not clean up another man’s dirt, and thought that Mr Geils might have struck him then if Mrs Dickinson had not returned to the room at that moment.
But I could have struck Mr Geils, never having believed that such cruel mistreatment could fall upon Miss Frances Dickinson of Farley Hill. Was there no advantage then in being a rich lady? And was the truth to be forever untold? Even Father kept quiet thereafter, though not out of any respect for Mr Geils, I was sure of that. But as long as I remain under the same roof as Mr Geils, I must keep careful watch.
4
A stronger mind
(January 1843–February 1845)
Sarah Stickney Ellis
The Wives of England:
Their Relative Duties, Domestic Influence, and Social Obligations
(London: Fisher, Son & Co.)
Characteristics of Men
And here we are brought at once to that great leading peculiarity in man’s character – his nobility, or, in other words, his exemption from those innumerable littlenesses which obscure the beauty, and sully the integrity, of woman’s life. From all their underhand contrivances, their secret envyings, and petty spite, man is exempt; so much so, that the mere contemplation of the broad, clear basis of his moral character, his open truth, his singleness of aim, and, above all, his dignified forbearance under provocation, might often put the weaker sex to shame.
And a sacred and ennobling trust it is for woman to have the happiness of such a being committed to her charge – a holy privilege to be the chosen companion of his lot – to come with her helplessness and weakness to find safety under his protection, and to repose her own perturbed and troubled mind beneath the shelter of his love.
What, then, if by perpetual provocation she should awake the tempest of his wrath! We will not contemplate the thought, for there is something as fearful in his indignation, as there is attractive in his kindness, and flattering in his esteem.
Nor, in return for this kindness, are we accustomed to feel gratitude enough; for take away from social life not only the civility, but the actual service done by men, in removing difficulty, protecting weakness, and assisting in distress, in what a joyless, helpless world would women find themselves, left only to the slender aid, and the tender mercies of each other!
Amy Webb
Farley Hill Court, Berkshire
January 1843
Mrs D has bid me watch closely over her daughter, who grows ever weaker with wakefulness. I spend my nights on a couch at the foot of F’s bed.
Build up the fire, Amy, it is as cold as Scotland, F says, stay close by me.
She often talks of that Jane McPhee through these long nights, hinting at some special kindness shown to her by Jane, before then railing against Jane’s watchful eyes and sour temper, and that is the Jane McPhee I know well. Once I confess I had envied Jane, with her fine ways with hairpins and needle, thinking her a favourite of F’s.
Odd it is that F has seemed to give Maria McKichan no further thought. She is convinced that some man on the estate had his way with Maria and that the girl falsely named my brother, knowing how well-regarded the Webbs are at Farley Hill, in hopes of lessening her shame. But I know F to be so clever – how can she not suspect the truth?
Meantime, I listen close for any sounds from the master’s room next door. I don’t mind saying that I am sore afraid of his temper, now that I have seen for myself what he may do to his own wife. His guilty secrets might drive a better man to behave badly. But, mercy of mercies, he has never yet troubled us.
I tell no one of all this, of course, and most of all try to conceal my state of mind whenever I come upon Mr Geils’ man, John Leigh, who waylays me to ask about my mistress in a manner most indelicate. I had not thought Mr Geils could have a more odious manservant than that Muirhead but I dread going below stairs now lest Leigh seek me out. He is very free with his ways, standing too close, staring too boldly, so that he reminds me of his master. Just this morning, when I was leaving my mistress’s chamber at the same time as he was coming from Mr Geils’ room bearing his master’s travel desk, Leigh hailed me again, but I scurried quickly away, descending to the kitchen while he went to his master in the library.
Mr Geils may leave his wife untroubled at night, but he is far from kind to her during the day. Yesterday, while the family were at supper and the last of the plates had been sent up, I was briefly in the servants’ hall alone, from which place sound carries quite clearly from the dining room directly overhead. So it was that I heard Mr Geils railing at his wife, calling F a devil and a damned bitch. I was impatient, then, for Mrs D to ring the bell that dinner was at an end, so that I could go and assist F back to her chamber, leaving her wretch of a husband alone with his port.
When the bell finally jangled, I flew up the backstairs to find F paler and more downcast than ever. After I had prepared her for her bed, she told me that her husband was insisting they return to Dumbuck, saying that all the family was needed at home where his father was likely on his deathbed and that it was her duty to be there too.
I cannot go back to Scotland, Amy! she said.
My heart was quite breaking at the thought of her in that place with none to protect her but I soothed her as well as I could, saying that she must not fear, that perhaps she might yet be spared the journey north if Dr Bulley forbade it.
Then today, when I saw Mr Geils and John Leigh riding out in the afternoon in the direction of the Anderdons, I was seized by a sudden thought. Here was a chance! After I had made F comfortable, sitting in the China Closet with her mother, I slipped upstairs and into her husband’s chamber, my breath coming so fast that my hands quite trembled. The travelling desk was atop the dresser where it usually stood. I opened it to find it quite stuffed with papers – I don’t know what I hoped to find there, except that a man so boldly false as I knew Mr Geils to be might be careless about keeping hidden what should not be seen. But there were only letters from his family and that man Nepean, as well as notes of business and such, nothing of an improper nature that I could see. It was a foolish notion, I suppose, and I rated myself then for a silly, silly girl, putting the papers back just as I found them – my hands no longer shaking – before closing the lid of the desk.
But then I paused, my hand on the doorknob. On the back of the door hung Mr Geils’ greatcoat, the one he had arrived from Scotland wearing, much mud-spattered, that had since been brushed clean. When I had seen him just now, he was wearing his shorter, blue jacket that he usually wore for riding and hunting when the weather was dry. I slipped my hand into one front pocket of the greatcoat to find a flask and a coiled length of leather such as might have been snapped from a riding crop. In the other pocket was a tweed muffler and a tobacco pouch, but as I was removing my hand, it slipped through a gap torn in the lining, and I felt the edge of a piece of paper within. I took it out to see that it was a rough page, containing just a few lines written in a weak, wild hand and signed with a J. Thrusting my hand once more carefully inside the torn lining, I found several other pages, bound together with string, in the same hand. I blushed to read them, these bold words of Jane McPhee – it must be, from what she said of Dumbuck, and Farley Hill, too.
So Maria is not the only one!
Could it be I have found a way to save my F at last?
Frances
Farley Hill Court, Berkshire
January 1843
I am saved! But what a cruel, cruel mother I seem to myself in saying that, since it is only by little Lucy being afflicted with a cold that we have escaped leaving Farley Hill. John and his man departed yesterday evening, sparing my children and me the journey north for the present – and that is all I care for now.
I hold no real fear for Baby’s health; it was more a kindness of dear Dr Bulley’s on behalf of his treasured patients at Farley Hill when he pronounced the child should not be removed at this unseasonable time. To my infinite relief, John accepted the judgement and so here I remain with my girls and my dearest mama – and my stalwart Amy!
I am truly sorry to hear that the old Colonel is so poorly, as is Mother at the prospect of losing another old friend. I forget sometimes that long before I first crossed the threshold of Dumbuck, the Colonel and his wife had been dear to both Mama and Papa. Now I cannot but think of John’s parents as parties to my misery, and quite blind to the failings of their eldest son. In truth, I think that Mother no longer feels quite the same regard for her old friends that she did before my marriage. Mrs Colonel means well, I suppose, but she will never do anything to displease John, for which I blame her most heartily when I know she has heard the dreadful names he calls me and the way he orders me about at Dumbuck saying, Am I not your husband? until I could scream with vexation.
My reprieve, however, is only a delay at best – unless I can hit upon some way to vacate that wretched place for good, which is surely a hopeless ambition. John coming into possession of Dumbuck may even make matters worse. The house will remain as cold and poorly-arranged as ever; I can expect no latitude from him on that front, knowing how he rants so over any expenditures I propose. Nor would my becoming mistress of Dumbuck carry weight with anyone there. Mrs Colonel – Mammy, I should say – will not want to give up her home and I have no hope that Bella and Nepean might be kept from the door. Then there is the question of what might come to pass regarding the two shadowy ladies upstairs. But, above all, I know that I cannot expect any change in John, and that alone clouds every thought of the future most darkly.
In one way, however, his tyranny has been checked of late, and it is no small way. While he was here at Farley Hill, he made no attempt to enter my chamber. It is most strange – I have never gone so long without his attentions, whatever my state of health. I do not believe it was out of compassion for me, and even Amy’s presence with me he might have easily overcome if he had been minded. Perhaps he is more distressed about his father than I give him credit for, but I have long since given up any belief that wifely affection might in time transform my husband into a kinder man. Those fleeting moments of tenderness I had with him during that summer at O—are so utterly obliterated, like a dream or something from a book. I long to lavish my affection on someone; I may no longer be the girl dreaming of a noble suitor but there is much within me that I yearn to express without being scorned as I am by the man to whom I have joined my life.
I wish I had not thought of that Highland place just now, but such memories rise unbidden of late, even from the distance of Farley Hill, and with them, Jane McPhee has been much on my mind, too. In my troubled sleep, I even dream of her at times, a dream in which she lies half-buried at the foot of that loathsome tree, wrapped in my filthy wedding shawl.
I talk to Amy of all this – not of my dream, of course, although once I said that I had a presentiment about Jane and she frowned and asked if that meant a feeling about a before time? And in a way it does; when I cast my mind back to all I have known of Jane, and my husband, and indeed myself since I first visited Dumbuck House, it seems the life of a stranger named Frances Geils, a sorry creature trapped in a place where nothing is as it seems and worse may be yet to come.
My only comfort – apart from my sweet babes – is that here with Amy I have some reminder of my former life. When I see her each day, I see the same trusting face I recall coming to my chamber every morning, bearing her heavy pitcher, when we were both little more than children ourselves. I marvel now that I was so eager to leave Farley Hill, believing that a better life lay elsewhere.
But even here, I sometimes fear that Amy is hiding something from me – she, who has ever been the picture of frankness and friendship to me! How could that possibly be? It must be simply a trick of my sad, weary mind, clouded by the fears and anxieties I cannot dispel.
But that Jane McPhee, now, she was always too knowing, wise beyond her station. She could pass for a lady, with the right clothes, with my clothes. As long as she remained silent, of course.
Amy Webb
Farley Hill Court, Berkshire
February 1843
When word reached Farley Hill of the death of old Colonel Geils, I could remain silent no more. Knowing that F would no longer be able to delay her return to Scotland, I could not bear her to go back in ignorance. So I have spoken to Father. It was such a relief to speak at last of what I had read in those notes signed J – by none other but Jane McPhee, I am certain!
I had long been in no doubt that Father held a low opinion of Mr Geils, not only for his false charge against Jack and his behaviour towards Mrs F, but also because of the high-handed way he treated him when at Farley Hill. Father had, however, tolerated all this in the belief that if one day Mr Geils and his wife took up permanent residence at the other Dickinson estate, Queen Charlton, he would have made himself so useful to Mr Geils that he might be made steward there, with an increase of income as a result. A man didn’t have to like his master to like his money, Father would often say.
So when I approached Lower Cottage, where I knew Father to be at work on the accounts that morning, I could not be certain if he would take the ladies’ side as I hoped, or cling to his grudging loyalty to Mr Geils in the hope of future gain. I could do no other than trust to his better nature in telling him what I had learned of the improper understanding between Mr Geils and Jane McPhee.
The how of what I had learned, though, was almost as bad as the what: I feared lest Father rate me for bringing any suggestion of dishonesty or thievery to the Webb name by tampering with Mr Geils’ belongings. He had taken the slur against Jack hard, even though folk at Farley Hill seemed to hold nothing against my brother, such was the low regard in which Maria had been held here. Father, though, had begun to talk a great deal of the pride of the Webbs, telling Jack, Lydia and me how we were better than our betters, as he put it.
