Chapter 24 Oxford #2
“Mr Green, Mr Keeley. How are you?”
“We’re very well, but how are you, Georgie dear? You’re in fine looks. Must be that new husband of yours putting roses in your cheeks.”
Georgie blushed crimson, which made them laugh uproariously, and triggered a bout of muttered comments followed by laughter from the other men on the benches, listening in avidly and no doubt inspired to ribaldry.
“Good day, gentlemen,” Georgie said crisply, turning away.
“Ah, no, don’t go, Georgie,” Mr Green cried.
“Aye, come and have a drink with us,” Mr Keeley said, his speech slightly slurred. Not yet one o’clock and already he was foxed.
“I don’t think so,” Georgie said, casting dark looks at the other men, still grinning at her and chuckling.
“No, no, not here… inside,” Mr Green said. “For poor Henry’s sake, Georgie. They have a decent sherry here.”
She had no wish to drink sherry with them, but they had been Henry’s best friends and she could hardly slight them. Reluctantly, therefore, she let herself be led inside and into the common room.
“There now, this is our table, and that there was Henry’s chair,” Mr Green said. “You sit there, my dear, while Keeley fetches a sherry for you, and we can share our remembrances of our dear departed friend.”
The sherry arrived with another pair of tankards for the two men, who imbibed freely, while taking it turns to tell her how well she looked, how fitting that she should be in Henry’s very own chair, and how they had played cards there every night, and sometimes during the day, too.
“Don’t let me keep you from your cards, then, if that’s what you usually do,” she said, hopeful of a rapid escape.
“No, no, not the least wish to play, dear Georgie,” Mr Green said.
“Not a bean between us,” Mr Keeley said. “Henry was the one with the readies, wasn’t he, Silas?”
“Hush, Willie,” Mr Green said with a frown. “No money talk in front of ladies, remember? So how is that new husband of yours, Georgie? Harwell… Hadley… wasn’t it?”
“Mr Hammond is very well,” she said firmly.
“Wha’s he like? Tall? Short? Handsome? I’ll wager he’s very handsome, ain’t he?” Mr Keeley said, waving at the potboy for more ale.
“Idiot!” Mr Green said. “You’ve met him, you chump. Very pleasant fellow.”
“Oh aye, when he bought that picture thing from me,” Mr Keeley said.
“The miniature?” Georgie said, startled. “He bought it from you, Mr Keeley? But I thought—?”
“Won it from him, didn’t I?” Mr Keeley said. “Cards. Terrible unlucky at cards, Henry was.”
“But… but I thought Jamie found it in a shop?”
“Aye, Silas’s shop.”
“You mean to tell me that Henry lost my miniature at cards and then you pawned it?” she cried.
Mr Keeley shrugged. “Needed the readies, dear girl. Thought Halbert would have told you that.”
“Well, he didn’t,” she said indignantly. “Great heavens! I thought Henry must have dropped it somewhere. Well!”
“Wagered it quite often,” Mr Green said, nodding sagely. “Always won it back… until he died, of course.”
“And it never occurred to you that I might like to have it back?”
“But you’ve got it back, haven’t you?” Mr Keeley said, puzzled. “That husband of yours got it back.”
“Bought it back, I imagine, after you pawned it.”
Another shrug. “Needed the readies,” he said again, as if no other explanation was needed.
Georgie got to her feet. “Thank you for the sherry, gentlemen. I dare say we shall not meet again.”
She strode determinedly across the room and out into the passageway, where she had to step aside for the landlord carrying a tray of food dishes. That was when she saw the stairs.
“Is that where he fell?” she said, grabbing the landlord by the arm, to the imminent danger of the tray. “Henry Hastings… was that where he fell?”
“Aye, all the way from top to bottom. Broke his neck, poor fellow.”
“But his chair’s in the common room… so… what’s up the stairs?”
“Only the bedrooms, ma’am.” Then, perhaps realising that this was not an idle enquiry, he licked his lips and added, “Know him, did you?”
“He was my husband, but it seems I didn’t know him at all.”
“Ah. ’Scuse me, ma’am, must get this lot delivered.”
He scuttled away from the awkward moment. Georgie found Green and Keeley watching her from the common room door.
“So who was it?” she said, with cold determination. “Oh… was it Sally?”
“Her name was Nancy,” Keeley said. “Chambermaid.”
Green nudged him in the ribs. “Shut your mouth, fool! She don’t need to know that. It weren’t serious, Georgie, just a bit of playing around.”
“That makes me feel much better,” she said savagely. “I think I shall go and have a word with Henry Hastings.”
“What?” Keeley said. “But… he’s dead!”
“I know exactly where he is,” she said. “At least I can be sure he won’t answer me back, which is good, because I intend to give him a piece of my mind.”
“Aye, you ring a peal over him,” Green said. “Dare say he deserves it.”
“I’m sure he does. Pity I didn’t do it when he was alive.”
***
The churchyard was quiet. For a while the sexton and a boy worked at a grave in a distant corner, but when they went home for their dinner, Georgie had the place to herself.
She had never been to Henry’s grave before.
At first, she had been too distraught to consider it, but even afterwards she could not bring herself to go.
If it had been at her own local churchyard, she could have visited Henry whenever she liked, but in death he no longer belonged to her, for his aunt had reclaimed him.
Now she was surprised to see how neglected it was. The stone was very ornate, of course, for his aunt had paid all the costs, but the little square of walled ground surrounding it was infested with weeds, and a cheeky strand of ivy had begun to wind its way around the stone itself.
She sat on the low stone wall and, for a while, she had nothing to say, for the cut was too deep.
Nancy! How many times had he passed the evening with Nancy and then come home to Georgie, speaking of love and playing the part of a faithful husband?
So well had he played it that she had never for one moment suspected the lie beneath the smiling words and his passionate kisses.
For a long time she wept and wished she had never come back to Oxford, for then she would never have known the truth about her treacherous husband.
After a while, she pulled out his miniature to remind herself of his deceitful face, but no, he was still in looks the same charming man she had fallen in love with.
No matter how she tried, she could not reconcile the warm smile she remembered with a man who slipped away upstairs at the inn for an assignation, when he had a loving wife waiting for him at home.
She was so absorbed in her thoughts that she was quite unaware of anything else around her, the soft footsteps approaching on the grass too quiet to disturb her. So it was that she was taken by surprise when a shadow loomed over her.
“Oh! Oh, Jamie, you startled me! What are you doing here?”
“I needed some fresh air and thought to escort you home.”
“But how did you find me?”
“I tried your friends, and learnt you had left some time ago, but then I was accosted by Henry’s friends at the Angel, who told me how to find you.
But why is Henry buried here and not at St Thomas’s?
His aunt, I suppose. This must be her parish church.
But I beg your pardon. I will not intrude on your grief. I will wait for you at the lych gate.”
“No need to go, Jamie. I am done with grieving for such a wicked, treacherous man. I am so angry, I could push him down the stairs myself if he wasn’t already dead.”
“Oh.” He sat down on the opposite wall, his face surprised but asking no questions.
“Don’t you want to know why?”
“If you want to tell me.”
“He wagered the miniature of me at cards — oh, but you know that! And you didn’t tell me. How kind you are.”
“There was no need for you to know,” he said, so gently that it almost made her want to cry again.
“You wouldn’t do that, would you?” He shook his head. “Do you still have it safe?”
“It is very safe.” He unbuttoned his coat and reached into a waistcoat pocket.
“Here it is. I do not like to leave it in a drawer somewhere, so I carry it with me wherever I go. I think there was something else those two imbeciles told you, Georgie, because they kept apologising. Something about how Henry died?”
“Oh, Jamie, I’ve been such a fool! I thought it was just beer and friends and cards that kept him at the Angel for so many hours, but there was a woman.”
“Sally?”
“That’s what I thought, but no, her name was Nancy. She was the chambermaid! How lowering to my pride! And to think I believed him when he said he loved me.”
“Of course he loved you!”
“Do you think so?” she said doubtfully. “Mr Green said he was just playing around with Nancy. What do you suppose that means?”
“I cannot imagine. Flirting, maybe?”
“Men flirt over the dinner table, or at a ball, or in the drawing room, in full view of everyone. No one needs to go into a bedroom to flirt.”
“True. Perhaps kissing, then. Georgie, I cannot believe he was truly unfaithful to you, not when he was so much in love with you.”
“You say that with such certainty, but how can you possibly know?”
“He was married to you,” he said, with sudden heat. “How could he not love you?”
And then he blushed fiercely, making her wonder just what was in his mind. She was weak, suddenly — weak with surprise, and with a rush of hope. Could he mean what she thought he meant? And then there was fear, of reading too much into words that were only intended as gentle encouragement.
He jumped up, his hat twirling in his hands, not looking at her. “I have intruded too long. I shall wait for you at the lych gate. Take your time.”
But she could not bear to see him leave without knowing what his words meant… if they meant anything at all.
“Jamie…” He stopped, turned, his expression unreadable. “Do you want me to go?” she blurted.
“Go?”
“Move back to Oxford. I will if you want… I can get my tenants out at the next quarter day. And then you can go back to your quiet life, before I ruined everything for you. I’ll go if you want me to.”
There was a long moment of silence while he stared at her, and she waited, with the terrifying feeling that she had jumped off a cliff and whatever was at the bottom, it was going to be dreadfully painful.
“Is that what you want?” he said hoarsely.
“I want to mend what is broken… to set right everything I ruined when I married you.”
He looked away from her then, his face set into stony indifference. “Then you must do whatever you wish.”
When he turned and walked away from her, her heart broke into a thousand pieces.