Page 21 of A Gentleman’s Offer

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‘I’m so sorry,’ Maria managed at last, when they had both ceased weeping quite so hard and clinging to each other as though they might be torn apart by violence once more. She took off her spectacles and cleaned them rather ineffectually on her handkerchief, then set them aside on a table, smiling anxiously and myopically at her sister. ‘I realised – when it was too late to stop it – that I must be causing you, and my aunt, and Hannah, a great deal of anxiety. But then it also struck me that, even if I’d wanted to come back, it was impossible for me simply to reappear at home, since you were taking my place.’

‘Mama was most worried too,’ Meg said. There was a great deal to untangle in what her sister had said, but she could not help but notice this glaring omission and address it. She feared their mother’s actions would always be a bone of contention between them – for the first time it occurred to her that perhaps her father had intended it so when he forced her to make her terrible choice.

‘Was she?’ There was a hint of bitterness in Maria’s voice. ‘That will be why she has rushed to London to help you in your search for me. Has she even written to enquire about me since you arrived? I can see the answer in your face: no, she has not. I knew my aunt would summon you, and that you would come immediately – I don’t think I ever believed she would. And I have been proved right, have I not?’

Meg said defensively, ‘Mama is obliged to finish her novel by the agreed date so that she can be paid. We need the money to live, though it is little enough in all conscience. You must know that Father does not… But I don’t mean to fall to pulling caps with you, Maria, over Mama or anything else. I’m just so glad that you are safe and well. I’ve been excessively worried about you; increasingly so as time passed with no word.’ This was as close as she meant to come to pointing out that if it was true that Maria could not have reappeared without causing a great bustle, she could, surely, have sent a message quite easily. Just a short letter by an anonymous messenger would have made an enormous difference. She wouldn’t have had to reveal her whereabouts, even, merely that she was in good health and under no duress. It would have meant a great deal.

‘You’re angry with me,’ Maria responded instantly, her face troubled, oddly defenceless without her glasses. Meg should have known she couldn’t hide any part of her feelings from her twin for long. ‘You think I should have told you that I was here, with Primrose, or at least that I was safe.’

‘You must have known how concerned I would be. I’m not angry, truly I’m not, though I must admit I have had moments of… exasperation at how hard you had made it to find you. But I don’t care, really, and I won’t upbraid you. I’m sure you had your reasons.’

Maria took her hand and squeezed it, drawing her to the sofa. ‘Let’s sit down. We won’t be interrupted, and I do owe you an explanation for dragging you into the middle of such confusion and leaving you alone to deal with it. It’s true, I know – I could have written to you before I left, even, and explained what I meant to do. Asked for your help.’

‘Why didn’t you? That’s what’s hurt me, Marie – the fact that you’ve been keeping secrets from me, when I have kept none from you. At first I was annoyed with you, and then I began to feel that I must have been a very poor sister all these years, if you believed you could not share…’

‘Never that!’ Maria said swiftly. ‘I promise you, never. I know our father has done his best to drive us apart, and our mother put her own interests above ours – above mine, certainly. But I have never blamed you for any of it. You were as much a victim of their selfishness as I was.’

It was hard to know what to say. ‘Mama would tell you that it was more complicated than you will admit; that, however difficult it was for you to live with him, and however much you have believed yourself abandoned by her – she knows you feel that, Marie, and it pains her greatly every day – it would have destroyed her, and done me almost as much harm, to live with him and constantly be at outs with him. You cannot claim she broke up a happy home – you must remember that it was never that, when we all lived together. The endless arguments that you above all of us hated so much. I remember you begging me in tears not to provoke him so, instead to behave meekly, as you did, and I recall too telling you that I did not know any other way to be.’

Her sister sighed deeply and said, ‘I do understand, Meggy. I have felt abandoned – that is the perfect word – but just lately I have gained a new perspective on it. It is hard, I suppose, to acknowledge that one’s parents are human beings who have their own lives to live. How easy, to arm oneself in self-righteousness and say that they should sacrifice all for their children, and how foolish. We are grown women now, and should know better. I do know better. I could not ask such a sacrifice of her, and more than that, I know she’s right to think that you and he could never have rubbed along together in relative peace as he and I have done all these years. It’s ironic, really, that it should be so.’

Meg did not have time to ask the meaning of this last rather odd remark, for Maria went on, ‘I have so much I need to tell you, and yet here I am, being a coward and putting it off. How did you find me, in the end?’

‘We thought we would track down all the servants who have left Lord Nightingale’s employ in recent years, and see if any of them might be sheltering you, or at least if they knew something of your whereabouts.’ Meg saw her sister’s eyebrow quirk at the word ‘we’, and was aware that she was blushing. Maria must know that she had been spending a great deal of time with Sir Dominic; if nothing else, Lady Primrose would have told her as much. She went on hastily, ‘Jenny Wood – you remember her?’

‘Oh, Jenny,’ said Maria with a little triangular smile and an oddly conscious look, ‘of course I do.’

‘Well, she ran away from her position in Lord Purslake’s house without giving notice, just about the time you disappeared. We thought that the timing of her flight might be a sign that you were together, though it turned out to be nothing more than a freakish coincidence. But we tracked her down to a most extraordinary house in Covent Garden – a brothel, Marie, can you credit it? – and she told us that if anyone would know where you were, it would be Lady Primrose. She said that even if she had appeared to know nothing, I should question her more closely, for she was sure to be in your confidence. So I came to see Lady Primrose, alone, as she suggested. She was my last hope. And Jenny was right.’

Maria showed herself quite willing to be side-tracked, and Meg could not fail to notice it. What could her secret possibly be that made her so very reluctant to reveal it? ‘Sir Dominic took you to Jenny’s mother’s bawdy house, Meg?’ she said, her eyebrow quirking once again in the way Meg remembered so well. ‘How shocking, and how interesting! I must say, you do appear to have grown excessively close to him in the short time you have been in London. I thought you would have to tell him the truth of your identity, since you could not know whether he had driven me away by some ill-treatment, and you could hardly go on pretending to be me in your interactions with him when you did not know what manner of man he is. But I didn’t imagine he’d actually be helping you so actively, least of all taking you to brothels!’

‘Don’t exaggerate, Marie! You know perfectly well why he went there, and why I had no option but to accompany him. And does all that matter, in any case? You still haven’t told me why you ran away, and surely that is more important just now.’ Meg had no desire to discuss her feelings for Sir Dominic, and really, they could be of no relevance to the coil, of Maria’s own making, that they found themselves in.

‘It could matter a great deal. It could be the perfect solution to all our problems, in fact – yours as well as mine – if you think you might like to marry him in my place.’