“I know nothing of the Miss Owens,” said Mr. Gibson, “but for their sakes, I am sorry for the fact that, should they take up some employment, they will be paid but a fraction of what a man is paid, and will be despised and pitied by their friends, who will think they are not entitled to be called gentlewomen.”
Mrs. Butters could not resist, and hinted, “Fanny, I feel very certain that matters will arrange themselves—pray, do not worry about it—an entirely new occupation will be found for you, I’ve no doubt!”
“We will keep pondering the matter, Miss Price,” said Mr. Gibson cheerfully. “Have you ever thought of writing a three-volume novel?”
And the rest of the visit was agreeably taken up with sketching out a fantastical plot, with a heroine of unimpeachable virtue and unsurpassed beauty, whose safety was threatened by the machinations of a ruthless villain, whose evil character the heroine manages to redeem, but only after enduring tragic vicissitudes and thrilling dangers, while travelling over the mountains of Switzerland and passing through the seraglios of Turkey.
“A story with nothing of nature or probability in it!” laughed Fanny.
Mrs. McIntosh was surprised when Mr. Gibson took every last piece of her baking with him, more than two dozen little cakes and other good things.
“The cheek of the man! He is tall and spare enough, to tuck away all that provender, to be sure! He certainly loves my cheese scones,” she remarked to her husband later.
Donald McIntosh smiled, for he knew what Mr. Gibson had done. The coachman had been called out to drive him back to the city, and Mr. Gibson had requested that they stop in Camden Town. Mr. Gibson slipped into the shop and sprang up the stairs, two at a time, and surprised Mrs. Blodgett in the midst of berating the students over some dereliction.
“Good afternoon, girls,” he announced. “Miss Price wishes to thank you, very kindly, for the lovely flowers and your message. It meant a great deal to her. She will remember you all, with the greatest affection. She asked me to tell you that she is very proud of each of you. And she wishes you to enjoy this.”
He laid the parcel down on the table and left, before Mrs. Blodgett could say anything.
Chapter Twenty-One
Charles and Betsey Price waited for hours, jumping and skipping by the sally-port, watching for their brother William, and when he at last appeared, they each took one of his hands and ran him home through the streets, leaving the porters to follow with his luggage. His parents were both standing in the doorway eager to greet him, to hear of his exploits and to exclaim over his new prosperity in the way of promised prize-monies.
“We’ll toast you tonight with some good claret, see if we don’t,” exclaimed his father, and in his parental pride, he emptied William’s pockets for the monies to purchase the celebratory bottle then and there, while calling out an injunction to the servant to prepare an especially good dinner. “And tell that rascally butcher he will be paid, indeed, now my boy William is home!”
The news of his promotion danced on the tip of William’s tongue, but knowing of the exceeding joy he would be bringing them, William resolved to save the intelligence until the family was all seated together at dinner, so that he could watch each of their countenances as the revelation burst upon them.
Feeling restless and abstracted, William asked for a kettle of hot water, took it upstairs, packed his lieutenant’s uniform away, washed himself and put on his civilian clothes. He next meant to go to the post office and send an express message to Julia, and he had been composing and re-arranging the words in his head.
Dear Miss Bertram, I pray this letter finds you well...
Dear Julia, I have some interesting news...
Dear, dearest Julia, please say you are free to marry me...
A bit of Shakespeare came to him—love’s heralds should be thoughts, which ten times faster glide than the sun’s beams...
He had returned home from Gibraltar, at the speed of the wind which filled the sails of the Protector. Now he was on land, and his yearning could travel no faster than a post-chaise. Could Julia sense, could she feel, how he longed for her? Could she know he was now in England?
No—if Romeo and Juliet could not send a message by sunbeam, and not avoid a fatal misunderstanding—but perhaps it was bad luck to think of that pair of lovers in particular! He was half-exultation, half-panic, fearing his happiness could still slip through his fingers, despite the extraordinary turn of fortune in his favour.
Upon descending the narrow staircase, William encountered his sister Susan, who had been watching and waiting for him.
“There’s something you need to know, William,” she whispered. “And I thought it best to tell you, privately. Miss Julia is to be married, very soon. Our aunt Bertram has written and told us so.”
William was down the stairs and out of the door in an instant. He ran without pause to the naval pay office and shouldered his way past the ordinary seaman who were queuing up, and addressed the nearest pay clerk, a harassed-looking young man whose bony wrists protruded beyond the frayed cuffs of his jacket.
“Mr. Dickens! Mr. Dickens! You must assist me! I must leave Portsmouth immediately, there is no time to lose! I require some funds for my journey.”
“Now, Mr. Price, you know the regulations. We haven’t yet received the authority for disbursement for your crew, and without the proper authority, we cannot venture so far off the pay
