“I beg your pardon?”
“Or, I suppose, if you want to be even grander and older still, Julius Caesar,” Caroline explained.
Had they been alone, the old lady could have disclaimed all knowledge of what she was talking about, and indeed of the conversation at all. But ignorance was not a satisfactory riposte to Samuel Ellison. He would only believe her, and then she would have to explain, probably at length.
“I have no idea whether my ancestors came over with William the Conqueror, or Julius Caesar, or were here before either of them,” she replied, drawing in a deep breath. “Half a dozen generations should be sufficient for anyone.”
“I agree with you wholeheartedly,” Samuel said with great feeling, leaning towards her a little. “It is who a man is that matters, not who his father was. Good men have had bad sons, and bad men good ones.”
Mariah wanted to say something to end this subject before it became catastrophic, but suddenly her throat was too dry to speak.
Caroline was regarding Samuel with gentleness and concern. She had caught a deeper note of meaning in what he said, or else she had imagined it. Mariah shivered. This was appalling. What did he know? How much was possible? Anything! Everything! What would a woman tell her son? A decent woman, nothing at all. How could she? It was unspeakable-literally-beyond the power of being put into speech. She must get rid of him! Out of the house forever. Caroline must be made to see the unsuitability of this-immediately.
But for now, she must make her heart calm down, cease choking her. This was all unnecessary. His choice of words was unfortunate, but it was accidental, no more. Face him down.
Caroline was talking again. “Bicycles!” she said with delight. “How interesting! Have you ridden on one?”
“Of course! They’re wonderful, and incredibly fast,” he enthused. “Naturally I’m speaking of gentlemen’s machines.”
“I’m sure ladies’ could be very fast as well, if we wore the correct clothing,” she countered. “I believe they are known as bloomers.”
“Bloomers are hardly ‘correct clothing’ for anything at all!” the old lady said. “Really! What will you think of next? As if your theatrical antics are not sufficient, you want to dress like a man and career around the streets on wheels? Even Joshua would not allow that!” Her voice rose sharp and high. “Presuming you care what Joshua likes? You used to be besotted enough upon him, I think you would have jumped off Brighton Pier into the sea if you thought he wished it.”
Caroline looked at her with wide eyes, perfectly steady and unblinking. For a moment the old lady was quite alarmed at the boldness of them.
“I think that might be a pleasant thought on a hot summer afternoon-a tedious one when everybody is gossiping and talking essentially nonsense,” Caroline replied deliberately. “Not to please Joshua, to please myself.”
That was so outrageous, so perfectly idiotic, that for a moment the old lady was robbed of a reply adequate to the occasion.
Samuel was only too apparently entertained by the notion, and that Caroline should not only think it but say it. But then he did not have to live with her.
Then the perfect answer sprang to her tongue.
“If you act to please yourself, Caroline”-she glared at her former daughter-in-law-“then you may very well end up pleasing no one else. And that, for a woman in your situation, would be catastrophic.” She pronounced the last word with relish.
She was rewarded by a look of startling vulnerability in Caroline’s face, almost as if she had seen an abyss of loneliness opening in front of her, yet the old lady did not feel the satisfaction she had expected to feel. This was nearly victory, and yet isolation, inadequacy, guilt and the burning sense of shame were too familiar, and she wanted to put them behind her forever, so far behind she would never see them or think of them again, not in Caroline, not in anyone. It was intolerable that Caroline, of all people, should remind her.
“It is vulgar to speak so much of oneself,” she said quickly. She turned to Samuel. “How long do you intend to remain in London? You will surely wish to see the rest of the country. I believe Bath is still very attractive. It used to be. And highly fashionable. Anyone who had the slightest aspirations to be anyone would take the waters, in the right season.”
“Oh yes.” He must have been aware it was dismissal, but he refused to go. “Roman baths, aren’t they?”
“They were, yes. Now they are entirely English, if anything can be said to be.”
“Please tell us more of your own country.” Caroline poured more tea and offered the sandwiches again. She seemed oblivious to decency. “How far west did you go? Did you really see Indians?”
A sadness came into his face. “Indeed I did. How far west? All the way to California and the Barbary Coast. I met men who panned for gold in the Rush of ’49, men who saw the great buffalo herds that darkened the plains and made the earth tremble when they stampeded.” His eyes were very far away, his face marked with deep emotion. “I know men who made the desert blossom, and men who murdered the old inhabitants and tore up what was wild and beautiful and can’t ever be replaced. Sometimes it was done in ignorance, and sometimes it was done in greed. I watched the white man strengthen and the red man die.”
Caroline drew breath to say something, then changed her mind. She sat silently, watching him, knowing it was not a time to intrude.
He turned and smiled at her.
The understanding between them was tangible in the quiet room.
“Caroline, will you pour me more tea!” Mariah demanded. How could she make him leave? If she claimed a headache she would have to retire, and he might well be gauche enough to remain even so- alone with Caroline. And she was stupid enough to let him. Couldn’t see a foot beyond the end of her own nose. Ever since poor Edward died it had been one disaster after another.
“Of course,” Caroline said willingly, reaching for the pot and obeying. “Samuel, would you care for another sandwich?”
He accepted, although he was doing far more talking than eating or drinking. He was showing off, and enjoying it thoroughly. Could Caroline not see that? He probably did the same to every woman who was fool enough to listen. And there was Caroline, simpering and hanging on his every word as if he were courting her. Joshua would be disgusted-and then she would lose even what little she had, which now she had let the world know about it by marrying him, was at least better than nothing. Then where would she be? A disgraced woman! Put out for immorality-at her age-with no means and no reputation.
Caroline was looking at Samuel again.
“The way you speak of it makes me feel as if there is much tragedy attached. I had always heard of it as brave and exciting, filled with hardship and sacrifice, but not dishonor.” She sensed in him a real wound, and she wished to understand, even to share a fraction of it. There was an emotion driving her she did not realize, but there was a need for reassurance, to find her own balance and certainties, and she was drawn to Samuel’s pain. If one could not gain comfort, one could at least give it. And she could not remember when she had liked anyone so quickly and easily before, except perhaps Joshua, and that was not something she wished to think about just at the moment.
She watched his face for an answer, avoiding Mariah’s eyes. The old lady was in a strange frame of mind, even for her. If Caroline did not know such a thing was impossible, she would have said she was afraid. Certainly she was angry, but then Caroline had never known her when there was not an underlying emotion in her which she realized now was a kind of fury. She had always been quick to find fault, to criticize, to strike out, as if hurting another person released something within her.
But today was different. Was it loneliness, the grief she referred to every so often because she had been a widow so long? Did she really mourn Edmund still? Was she angry at the world because they went on with their own lives regardless of the fact that Edmund Ellison was dead?
Caroline had loved her own husband, but when he died her grief was not inconsolable. Time had not robbed her of the need for affection. Occasionally she still missed him. But shock had certainly healed, as had the momentary numbing loneliness without him.
Now, of course, there was Joshua, and that was a whole new world: exciting-sometimes too much so- exhilarating and threatening, full of laughter deeper than any she had known before, and disturbing new ideas-
