Julia Justiss - From Waif To Gentleman's Wife

Once, she stumbled into an unseen pothole and fell, losing her grip on the bandbox, which rolled away from her over the side of the road. Almost she was tempted to lay her head down into the mud and give up.

Papa toiled away in the fetid heat of India, she tried to rally herself, ministering to the army and the members of John Company, far from home and all things familiar. Her brother had followed Wellington through the dirt and misery of Waterloo. Her own dear Thomas had braved the baking summers and monsoons of India, proudly serving his nation. All she need do was walk a few more miles along an English lane. Mustering all the will she possessed, she forced herself to stagger upright and collected her bandbox.

She fixed her mind on the image of Greville receiving her warmly, distracting herself from her present misery by painting mental pictures in her head of the estate he managed for Lord Englemere. There’d be a neat sturdy manor house, fields ploughed and newly planted in corn, tenant cottages with thick roofs of fragrant thatch.

Maybe he’d have a wife to welcome her, children, even. She imagined dawdling a chubby toddler on her knee, filling the emptiness in her soul by nurturing a girl like little Susan, instructing her in her letters and numbers and the sewing of samplers. Perhaps, after she had rested and recovered, Greville or his wife would know of a genteel family who might have another position for her.

She must find something else. She’d no more be a burden upon her brother than she would consider contacting her late husband’s family for assistance. Thomas’s father had made it quite clear upon their last painful meeting that the Merrill family wanted nothing further to do with the woman who, he insinuated, had used some potion of the east to bewitch a young man far from home into a most unsuitable match.

Her heart twisted again, remembering the coldness on Lord Merrill’s face, more hurtful still since she could see her dear Thomas’s features echoed in his sire’s countenance. The snug bungalow she’d shared in India with Papa, where she and Thomas had met and fallen in love, had been her last real home. Not since she’d lost their unborn child and Thomas insisted she leave him and the malevolent fevers of India for the healthier clime of England had she felt there was a place she truly belonged.

Ironic that she’d swiftly recovered after the miscarriage, while it was Thomas who had succumbed to a fever. Alone in her London lodgings, she’d patiently awaited his return. He’d been dead for weeks by the time the news reached her.

A surge of grief swept through her, bringing her dangerously close once again to despair.

With Lord Walters having at the last moment cavalierly awarded the living on his estate, promised to Papa when the current incumbent retired, to some distant connection, the joyous reunion she’d looked forward to when Papa and the rest of her family returned from India had never happened. Anticipating their reunion had been her sole comfort as she’d struggled to cope with the enormity of Thomas’s death. The loss of that consolation was yet one more charge she could lay at the feet of a venal, uncaring aristocracy, she thought resentfully.

And as if her spirits were not already low enough, the moon dipped behind a bank of clouds and it began to rain.

She wouldn’t think any more of sad things, she told herself, straining through the gloom to follow the dim road and keep her feet moving while rain dripped off the brim of her bonnet and soaked through her cloak.

She’d think of Greville, his genial smile, his easygoing temperament. He’d always been a charmer, if a bit slow to bestir himself. But having served with Wellington, a notorious taskmaster, would surely have cured him of his lazy ways. The army would be the making of him, Papa always said.

A sudden flow of icy water dripped from an overhanging tree down her neck, shocking her back to the present. It seemed she’d been walking for hours, days, her whole existence. Her feet and fingers beyond numb, she forced herself onwards through sheer will-power, knowing if she missed one step she might lose her balance and fall. This time, she’d not be able to rise again.

She’d begun to fear that this would indeed be her fate when finally, in the distance, she perceived a faint glimmer of light.

Blenhem Hill! She must be approaching Greville’s manor at last.

Now that the moment of reunion had almost arrived, her heart jolted with a gladness tempered by anxiety.

What if Greville were not happy that she’d sought him out uninvited? Certainly she must look a sight, her sopping skirts muddy, her cloak and bonnet soaked through.

Still, regardless of what her brother thought about her unsolicited midnight arrival, surely he would take her in? With a shiver, she made her clumsy-cold feet pick up the pace until, a few moments later, she stood before the front door and knocked, wincing at the pain to her frozen knuckles.

She waited, but when no response was forthcoming, she knocked again. It was late enough that she might have believed everyone within already abed, but for the light still glowing through one of the windows. She’d almost decided to try rapping on that when at last the door swung open.

A man in butler’s attire gazed out at her, the mismatched buttons on his waistcoat suggesting that he had indeed been abed and only hastily re-donned his clothing.

‘Good evening, sir,’ she said. ‘I know it is late, but I should like to see your master, please.’

For a silent moment the man looked her up and down. Then, without a word, he moved to close the door on her.

‘Just a minute!’ she cried. ‘I demand to see the manager!’

‘The manager?’ he said finally. ‘And who would that be?’

Did he think she’d wandered aimlessly across the countryside with no definite destination? ‘Mr Greville Anders, of course,’ she snapped back. ‘Please tell him that Mrs Merrill has arrived and wishes to see him at once. He will receive me, I assure you.’

‘It be Mr Anders you’re wanting?’

‘Yes,’ she replied impatiently. ‘And I warn you, he will be most displeased when I tell him you forced his only sister to stand forever in the doorway before admitting her.’

‘His sister, are you?’ the man asked with a sly look. ‘When did he send for you?’

Though her brain was muddled with cold and fatigue, she thought it was probably best not to admit that she hadn’t been sent for. ‘That’s not your concern,’ she replied. ‘All I require is that you convey me to him at once.’

‘Must have miscalculated the date,’ she heard him mutter before he said in a louder voice, ‘Nothing here for you, miss. Best go back where you come from.’

‘Go b-back?’ she repeated, her voice breaking as alarm jolted through her. Desperately summoning up her best governess tone, she said firmly, ‘At this hour of the night? You must be mad! Why are you keeping me here on the threshold, nattering on in this stupid manner? Just inform Mr Anders I have arrived.’ Ducking around him, she darted into the hall.

And stopped on a sigh. Ah, how heavenly it was to get out of the wind and cold!

The butler-person, mouth pursed in disapproval, stomped after her. ‘Haven’t ever laid hands on a woman and don’t expect to start, so I suppose, being a good Christian, I’ll let you dry off and sleep in the kitchen. But you must be gone first thing in the morning.’

Anger filtering into her desperation, Joanna crossed her arms. ‘Have you heard nothing that I’ve said, my good man? I am not going anywhere until I’ve seen the manager. If you force me out, I will simply come back.’

For a moment they stared at each other, nearly nose to nose. Finally the butler nodded. ‘Very well, I’ll fetch you to the manager. Follow me.’