A Contrary Wind: a variation on Mansfield Park (Mansfield Trilogy Book 1)

the family twice, when Mrs. Smallridge was entertaining company and was in need of another lady to balance her table, but since her employers and their guests spoke only of trivial matters and local gossip, there was little that could interest or engage her, and naturally she never volunteered any information or opinions beyond the most commonplace. She was grateful for the self-absorption of the others in that no one ever felt themselves under any compunction, out of ordinary politeness, to see that she was included in the conversation, or to seek for topics of general interest. She was therefore spared the necessity of ever answering questions about herself, her background, or her family in front of them all, questions which would have forced her to evade the details of her life as a baronet’s niece, and perhaps drawn the keen eye of Mrs. Butters upon her, for she felt that she would have dissembled but poorly.

Fanny had fully intended to write to Mansfield Park and explain herself within a week of arriving at Keynsham Hill, to reassure the family of her safety, but she intended to withhold the knowledge of her whereabouts. She wanted to post the letter from Bristol, without giving particulars of her new address, or having her correspondence pass through the hands of the Smallridge’s servants. Her letters to Mansfield and Portsmouth were prepared and sealed—they consisted mostly of apologies and a reiteration of her determination to live independently—but she omitted the details of her situation, stating only that she had taken the post of governess. She thought it best to let some months elapse before revealing her location, in the hope that Sir Thomas and her parents would be reconciled to her choice in time. She was surprised by her own fortitude in foregoing any possibility of hearing a word from Edmund. She yearned for news of him, to know whether he had taken his orders as a clergyman, and if so had he given up Mary Crawford, or she him, or was he still torn between his affection for her and his stated purpose?

Almost a fortnight passed, and Fanny was growing anxious for the opportunity to mail her letters, when Mrs. Butters announced she was travelling into Bristol on the morrow, and that she would take Fanny along, the better to select some fabric and trim for a dress suitable for a governess. Fanny happily retired that evening in anticipation of new sights in a city she had never seen, but awoke to the news that Mrs. Smallridge had been brought to bed some weeks earlier than expected. The midwife was summoned, urgent messages were sent to Mr. Smallridge, who was visiting friends in Bath, and Mrs. Butters of course would not stir from her niece’s side.

All day the household moved about in hushed suspense. Madame Orly was all agitation and tears, and as the hours went by, Fanny found herself growing truly concerned for her mistress, and many a silent prayer on her behalf was made as she looked down at the little heads of Caroline and Edward while they played, insensible of the hazards their mother was facing. Finally, in the late afternoon, as the pale setting sun was tangled in the branches of the bare hazelnut trees, came tidings of twin daughters, small but healthy, and Mrs. Smallridge was as well as could be expected.

*   *   *   *   *   *

The expected letter from Fanny, or from her mother, to announce her safe arrival in Portsmouth had not arrived. Lady Bertram and Edmund had each written to Mrs. Price, and Mary Crawford had also written, as promised, but their enquiries were met with silence. Every day Lady Bertram enquired of Baddeley, “Any word from Portsmouth, Baddeley? Has my sister Price written to me?” and every day the butler answered, regretfully, in the negative.

Almost a fortnight had passed since Fanny’s departure, and Edmund was about to propose that he ride to Portsmouth to assure the family of Fanny’s safe arrival, when Julia burst into the drawing-room and exclaimed, “Our father is come! He is in the hall at this moment.”

The arrival of the master of the house was met with expressions of joy and satisfaction on all sides. For Maria, indeed, it meant that the arbiter of her future happiness had arrived. Tom and Edmund were truly pleased to see the man to whom they could resign the mantle of paterfamilias, yet they were not a little uncomfortable at the prospect of having to impart uncomfortable tidings to him.

Sir Thomas greeted every family member with smiles and embraces, overcoming his habitual reserve to a degree that surprised his household. He was older, his face thinner and somewhat drawn, he was browned from the tropical heat, and he had lost some flesh, but he declared himself, and appeared to be, well. His joy in seeing his family was indeed heartfelt, and he rejoiced to have survived his lengthy sojourn in the West Indies, whose climate had proved so fatal to so many of his countrymen—and, more than that, to have left behind scenes which had affected his peace of mind to no small degree.

He had inherited the sugar plantations in Antigua from his father, and had visited them once before, as a young man, and for many years they had enriched the family, enabling them to live with comfort and consequence and to build their spacious and airy home at Mansfield Park. But his prolonged sojourn on the island, during which time he had managed the plantation himself, had left him without the power of denying what it meant to rely on the labour of slaves. For it was one thing to contemplate these circumstances from half a world away, to regard them as regretful necessities, and another to see, before his eyes, the high cost in human lives, and the use of fear, threat, and punishment to keep the slaves at their miserable toil.