“You can tell your mother from me, that Grandmamas buy nice things for granddaughters who have been taught to write thank-you letters.”
Isabella was confused by this answer, but understood it to mean ‘no,’ and she desisted in her efforts, and pouted and glowered until Fanny led her away and tried to distract her with examining a collection of beetles under glass, left over from her father’s school days.
“You see how your mother has contrived to acquire a companion without the expense of paying for one,” the younger Mrs. Butters whispered to her husband after they took their leave for the evening.
Had Fanny actually been paid for those services which she provided out of affection, the circumstance would have been as equally useful to Cecilia Butters. Whether Mrs. Butters had extra money to spare, or whether she had been spending funds that could be better spent elsewhere, her daughter-in-law could draw the appropriate moral lesson.
* * * * * * *
Lieutenant William Price, red-eyed and weary, stumbled into his cabin at the end of his watch, tore off his hat and jacket and collapsed at full length in his bunk, too tired to remove his boots. He closed his eyes and fell into a dreamless sleep, all-consuming and all too brief. The cabin boy came banging through the door with his kettle, jolting him awake.
“Four bells, Mr. Price, sir. Here’s for your tea, sir.”
William groaned, swung around, and sat up. In the cramped confines of his berth he only had to reach out his hand to pull open the biscuit box that held the last of his supply of dried rose hips. Starting every day with a cup of rose hip tea had become almost a superstition with him. He drank it even when there was no sugar or honey to be had—he ignored the bitter taste and the friendly jibes of his brother officers.
After eighteen months patrolling the shores of Western Africa, the HMS Crocodile was returning home. The crew laboured day and night to catch the feeble winds of the horse latitudes to fill her sails as she tacked her way north; everyone was anxious to feel the cold, freshening breezes of the Channel. Only then, the sailors said, would they escape the miasma of the fevers that clung to the unlucky ship, that had killed two dozen members of the company. More were lying on the brink of death—including, most lamentably, their captain, Edward Columbine.
Thinking of the captain, William resolved to look in on him before resuming his duties. He threw some rose hips into the kettle, grabbed two enamel mugs from the wardroom, and made his way to the captain’s quarters, thanking his good fortune that unlike Lieutenant Lumley, he did not need to shave every morning to make a creditable appearance. William had a handsome head of thick golden hair, bleached almost white by the African sun, but his cheeks and chin seldom needed to meet with a razor.
His captain lay, grey, weak and drawn, in his cabin; the unmistakable mask of approaching death on his face. William took care to compose his features carefully to greet him with his usual good cheer.
“The wind’s picking up sir, veering to the west. We’ll be home soon.”
Columbine answered him with a slight smile, then closed his eyes, as though even that effort exhausted him. “Lieutenant Lumley is most impatient to be home. He is to be married. A vice-admiral’s daughter—a good catch for a lieutenant!”
“Yes, sir.”
“I wish him a better fate than mine.”
“I am sorry, sir, extremely sorry for your loss.”
Captain Columbine’s wife and baby daughter had died of fever in Sierra Leone.
“Listen to me, Price,” Columbine spoke with an effort. “I would not say this to Lumley, but so far as I know, you are a bachelor and have not engaged yourself to any young person. If I am wrong, pray stop me.”
“Please go on, sir.”
“Did you know I was married once before? Jane is—was—my second wife.”
“No, sir.”
“Of course, you were just a youngster at the time, otherwise you would have known of the matter,” said the captain with a sigh, “for it was in all the papers.” He drew a breath and continued: “I married in ‘97, after I made lieutenant, but almost immediately I received a posting to the West Indies aboard the Sybille. Anna Maria was young and beautiful, and I was gone for nearly three years. Another man seduced her, and she ran away with him.”
William did not interrupt the Captain, but dipped a cloth into the washbasin, wrung it out, and gently dampened his captain’s forehead as he spoke.
“A few years later, I wished to re-marry. But to obtain my divorce, our sorry history had to be paraded before the House of Lords. The vultures of the press reprinted all the sordid details. My first wife’s shame was made notorious across the country! The experience was in every way horrible.”
William tenderly lifted the captain up from his pillow and placed a cup to his lips. Captain Columbine rested against William’s arm, silently for a time, then resumed:
“I determined that I should never expose Jane to the temptations and regrets that destroyed my first marriage. I would not leave her at home for years at a time, so upon my appointment to Sierra Leone, I urged her to come with me. My fears for her fidelity became her death sentence! Africa killed her, and killed our daughter.”
Columbine took a long, slow, rattling breath. The effort to speak was tremendous, but so was his need to share his burden of grief and remorse.
“My first wife is
