“As did I,” Richard admitted. “But I realized that I was only unsettled. I had imagined that when I married, there would be no disruption. A very quiet and unobtrusive lady would take her place in my house and everything would stay just as ordered as it has always been since my parents’ passing.”
“Demure,” Caroline said. “And here I am blowing into your life like a gale force wind.”
“True,” Richard said. “But it is not the same chaos that my parents brought with them. That is what I’ve always tried to avoid.”
“You should know, I am not usually as much trouble as I have been. My father has always found me a delight.”
Richard laughed and took her in his arms. “And now I am to be delighted.”
“You should also know,” Caroline whispered into his neck, “that while you were being unsettled by me, I was being unsettled by the stickiest of the sticks.”
“Iama stick, I am afraid.”
“Well, it seems I am rather fond of sticks, then.”
The afternoon wore on and there was shockingly little eaten from the picnic. They only rose and packed up their things to return to the house when it seemed even upright Lord Bertridge might need some cold water thrown on him.
Caroline thought that whatever this marriage would be, it would surely be full of passion. She had wondered about it between her parents, and now she would experience it for herself.
Chapter Twenty
News of whathad unfolded at the Regent’s ball had spread like a fire throughout Brighton, eventually made its way to London, and then set off for distances as far as Falmouth and Inverness. There were even a few letters sailing to Boston and New York about it.
Lord Bertridge had been seen by all of society as the stickiest of the sticks. But then, as many people now said, still waters often did run deep. It seemed the lord was of a passionate nature, hidden behind a costume of caution and reserve.
Those lucky enough to have witnessed the events firsthand were sought out in drawing rooms to tell the story. As all stories were prone to do, the tale grew in excitement each time it was told.
In the end, the facts had been settled upon to everyone’s satisfaction. Lord Bertridge had been in a wild passion. Miss Upton had been a beautiful damsel on the verge of a kidnaping. Mr. Landon was the vilest of creatures and had slunk back to his father’s house, where he would stay, being received by no respectable person.
As for Lord Alvanley, he was generally excused, as everybody privately thought of their own distant cousins who might not be quite up to snuff. Alvanley, himself, grew far more cautious about who he allowed into his circle, and downright wary about who he let into his house.
Not much was ever said about Mr. Mushkell’s role in the events of the evening. But that was perhaps one of the advantages of fading into the cream-colored plaster like a mushroom. He was entirely forgettable and everybody save Alvanley forgot he’d ever been there.
What the tale did not include was some particulars that were arranged in the following days. Lord Bertridge hired a man to track down the poor scullery maid that Landon had compromised. Annie was found easily enough, begging on the street so she might raise enough money to follow Landon out of town.
Richard convinced her to give up the chase, and convinced her that if she ever caught Mr. Landon, she would not like what she’d caught. He set her up as housekeeper to an old great-aunt in Derbyshire who mostly just required company and was delighted to have a baby in the house. Annie would go on to marry a local tradesman and do very well for herself.
Bramley’s summer inBrighton had, he thought, added to his grey hair significantly. Never had he imagined that he could survive such chaos. He did survive, though.
Unfortunately, though he and the mistress had hoped it was a passing phase, it turned out that Lord Easton was determined to keep having ideas and opinions. They were never very convenient and usually upset well thought out schedules. Lady Easton had, to Bramley’s admiration, drawn a line at Brighton. If her lord were insistent on going again, he must go alone.
This turned out to be a successful gambit as the lord did go and it gave his lady some quiet months to recover from a whole season of opinions and ideas. It was in those months that he and his mistress were able to freely follow their own inclinations of quietly ticking clocks and a regular schedule.
Then, of course, there was always the comforting memory of the pineapple. He reveled in visiting his exclusive London social club that was restricted to only the most senior servants and finding himself asked about the pineapple. He delighted in commenting whenever a large dinner was planned by a fellow butler. He would ask about the presence of a pineapple and whether it would be eaten, and then condescendingly sigh at the inevitable response. He was only sorry he’d never bothered to actually taste the fruit, as he was often pressed to describe it. He’d finally settled on “otherworldly.”
Over the years,Lord Bertridge took his wife’s advice and did uncork himself from time to time, shouting at the sky or giving a fencepost a bracing lecture. His children would hang out the nursery windows and listen to their father rail to the moon against one too many unpleasant surprises in a day. They were never frightened of him, as he was a kind and even-tempered father who only ever roared at the sky or berated a fencepost.
Lord Bertridge’s Christmas ’22 explosion became family lore. After a day of mayhem which had seen a carriage wheel broken, curtains set afire in the drawing room, a shoe eaten by one of the dogs and then helpfully regurgitated in the library, Lord Bertridge had found himself on shaky ground. Then, the Christmas roast came up from the kitchens burned to a cinder.
According to the butler, Cook had imbibed too much holiday cheer and was snoring on a bench and the kitchen maid had been terrified to make a move without direction. So, while she peered into the oven from time to time and knew the roast should come out, she did not take it out. The result was like shoe leather and after Lord Bertridge attempted to saw through it unsuccessfully, Lady Bertridge had suggested he’d better go out and give the sky a talking to.
That he did and stood out in the snow demanding the heavens tell him why he was doomed to live in such chaos. After he’d run out of shouting, Lady Bertridge went out with a generous glass of brandy and led the exhausted lord back into the house. Having uncorked himself on Christmas, he was far more cheerful the following day and the servants’ party went off without a hitch.
The children had been vastly entertained by the Christmas explosion and used the phrase to express their displeasure about any and all things. It was not unusual to hear distant echoes from the nursery of some young person plaintively cry, “Why am I doomed to live in such chaos” and then the hearty laughter that accompanied it.
For all their amusement, they did not ever purposefully provoke their father and often hid some mishap or other that might shake his equanimity. It was some years before he discovered that one of the dogs was regularly chewing up his books, as the evidence of mauled covers and torn pages was always speedily disposed of. He only found it out when there began to be large empty spaces on his bottom shelves.
Lord Bertridge did find that unboxing and uncorking himself now and again did not signal the end of civilization, nor did the unpredictability of his daily life kill him. Though, he did notice that the unpredictability of his day had increased in direct correlation to how many children and dogs were roaming the house. His wife, like Lady Dunn before her, seemed always to be blooming.
