“Your sister is quite right,” said William Gibson. “We are well enough acquainted with Mr. Bellingham to say that we cannot repose any confidence in his judgement. I fear, if he has a pistol, he intends to use it. At the risk of being accused of having a wild imagination, I think the prudent thing to do would be to speak to someone in authority about this.”
“As I recall from his pamphlet, he chiefly blames the English ambassador to Russia for his troubles. Would not that person be his first target?” asked John. “What was his name?”
“Leveson-Gower. Lord Leveson-Gower,” Gibson recalled the name from his lengthy interview with the aggrieved Bellingham. “This person is the target of his ire, would you not agree, Miss Price?”
“Yes, Mr. Gibson. He spoke about him with great resentment. I wonder, is the ambassador still at his post in Russia?”
“I can make enquiries,” said John. “If he is still abroad, he is safe, at least for now. Here we are at the top! How excellent! I hadn’t thought you could climb so far, Fan!”
“Let us find a seat so your sister can rest herself before we descend again,” Gibson suggested.
The trio sat together and took in the scene of tranquillity and prosperity spread out before them, while they discussed the possibility that John Bellingham was contemplating murder. How other-worldly, thought Fanny, to sit under a calm blue English sky, with good and true companions, and canvass such an atrocity! If it were not for the recent Ratcliffe Highway murders, she would have found it impossible to entertain the idea that a civilized man could contemplate such a barbaric deed.
“Unlike some people,” said John, with a significant look at his two companions, “I have regular employment and cannot come and go for my own pleasure. But as it happens, I worked extra hours all last week, and I believe I could obtain permission to take a half-holiday tomorrow. Tomorrow morning, I will make enquiries about the whereabouts of our Lord Leve-what’s-’is-name, and we could all meet again and confer on what to do next.”
The resolution taken, Fanny proposed they all walk down again and return to Mrs. Butters’ house for some refreshment. She took Mr. Gibson’s proffered arm as her brother, lost in his own thoughts, walked on ahead of them.
“I could not part from you today, Miss Price,” said Mr. Gibson, “without expressing my deepest indignation concerning the way you have been treated. Forgive me, but I must relieve my feelings on that score.”
“The certain knowledge that you would sympathize in my distress,” Fanny responded shyly, “I must own—I must own, I have thought of it, and relied upon it, and it has comforted me a great deal. And Mrs. Butters of course, and dear Madame Orly, are also very kind. May I ask, how did you come to hear of—and what did you hear?”
“I was informed by Mr. Wakefield, who had it from Mrs. Wakefield, who had it from Mrs. Blodgett, that you had been dismissed for improper conduct. And I owned to him, I was surprised—extremely surprised—that the committee is evidently content to accept your dismissal, without conducting an enquiry or speaking with you directly as to the veracity of the accusations. It is a violation of the fundamental rules of natural justice. They repose greater confidence in Mrs. Blodgett’s judgement than I had thought would be...”
“They cannot be bothered to exert themselves, that is all,” Fanny said, not attempting to hide the sadness she felt. “It is too much of an effort. Mrs. Butters has written to them. She is insisting they acknowledge, in writing, that the worst accusations against me are untrue.”
Indeed, merely to allude to the idea that she, Fanny Price, had lived with a man without benefit of clergy and had instigated a duel, was excruciatingly embarrassing for Fanny. She rushed on: “But—but I have this comfort— the pain that this has occasioned is more strongly felt by me, owing to a good and growing tendency in my nature. I mean to say, had this occurred to me several years ago, I should have thought I was too lowly and unimportant to protest. Now—you may laugh—but I do think better of myself, I do deserve to be treated with more consideration, more respect. I am not the lowest and the last.”
“‘The lowest and the last’? Whoever would dare to call you the lowest and the last?”
“When you say it, Mr. Gibson, you make it sound so ridiculous, that I can laugh at it now. The point is, because I have lived out in the world for a time, I have more confidence in myself than in—my earlier life.
“What truly pains me though, is there is no acknowledgement of what I have done, what I did accomplish, at the academy. I never thought I should be forced to leave so abruptly, without a word of thanks. I deserved better than to be addressed in such a fashion, in front of my pupils. It was wrong.”
“Indeed you did deserve better! Your abilities, your contribution, will only be appreciated after you are gone, not that any of them will have the decency to acknowledge it, I fear.”
“So you see, I can console myself with this thought—as compared with the past, I now value myself, my own worth and dignity, more highly than before.”
“Still not so highly, I think, as your true friends value you.”
Mr. Gibson felt Fanny’s slender fingers wrap more securely about his forearm. He hesitated, then ventured: “I would be your partisan, Miss Price, if I could presume myself to have the right, the privilege, of speaking on your behalf. But, perhaps... surely Mr. Edifice... what does Mr. Edifice say?”
Fanny looked perplexed, then laughed. “Mr. Edifice? Why Mr. Edifice?”
“Pardon me if I am being indelicate, but I
