A Momentous Event at Rosings
Sitting quite erect, Lady Catherine occupied a well-used wing chair that rested in the precise centre of a long corridor. The chair was upholstered in crimson caffoy and amongst the other rather splendid furnishings, it alone looked a bit worn. Although it sagged, it did so with a kind of withered majesty—one of the same sort that graced the countenance of its distinguished occupant. But as the chair appeared quite comfortable, there the similarity ended. For so forbidding was the lady’s figure, the opulence of the room strewn with statuary and ormolu struggled to maintain its impact.
Her finger drummed with great determination. And if the drumming did not, the look of unamused apprehension Lady Catherine bore betrayed her usual hauteur. Clearly, her ladyship awaited an event of some import. But one of a particular nature. Hence, curious of the outcome though they may have been, every soul within the walls of Rosings was of the discipline to make no acknowledgement of the event. This was no small tenacity, for the portentous proceedings unfolded just beyond the enormous oak double doors directly in front of Lady Catherine’s chair. A tall clock stood in an alcove, chimes silenced. Even mice cowered in the crevices, none having the brass to dart across the edge of her carpet. It was as if the house itself was as transfixed as was her ladyship. Indeed, the shadowed niches of the cavernous hall revealed several servants practicing the art of unobtrusiveness with meticulous care.
Henry the parrot sat on his perch in the corner maliciously eyeing the gathering—but even he was silent. The single exception was an otherwise undistinguished footman who cleared his throat of an annoying tickle. When he did, Lady Catherine did not turn in his direction, but her drumming finger stopt. Then it recommenced, giving the footman leave to understand such insubordination would not be tolerated. His rasping throat, however, threatened to erupt into a cough; he subtly began pulling a pocket-square from his sleeve. With even greater delicacy, he stuffed the whole of it into his mouth.
All quiet once again, shadows slowly marched across the floor. So deeply did they intrude, a skulking figure broke rank. Yewdell drew his resin torch like a sword, pranced the length of the room as if a Lancer of the 17th addressing each candelabra as he went. Grand as Rosings was, its mistress bore a parsimonious streak. Hence, the renewing of light that was burdened by the candle tax was not a good sign to those servants who had begun to admire the thought of their beds. Returned to his station, Yewdell stifled a yawn. There may have been an inward sigh from the others, but little more. Although the night looked to be long, nary a head dared droop as long as her ladyship was still at her post.
Lady Catherine had no company upon this watch, nor did she expect any. Irritably, she looked about and saw amongst the statuary another one of Beecher’s ornately framed (and altogether abysmal) water-colours.
“Anne’s doing, no doubt,” she sniffed (making a mental note to have it removed and burnt).
As Lord Beecher held little interest in what jewels of wisdom his mother-in-law had to offer, she saw little worth in Beecher. Other than a fourth at cards in those long evenings at home with Anne and Mrs. Jenkinson, she would have seen him as she did most every other man of her acquaintance—a compleat waste of manhood. He was, however, a fast worker. That conclusion came by way of Lady Anne not only sporting a fiancé, but a womb half-gone with child by the time they left Bath. In light of Lady Catherine’s attentiveness to all that was decorous, it might have been expected that she would have been most unhappy to learn that her daughter had leapt the nuptial broomstick prior to her wedding day.
However, upon this specific occasion, she was not.
Indeed, she was pleased as punch to confirm that the breeding stock of a lord that she had purchased was not merely fertile, but motile as well. It would have been untidy to have to rid Anne of Beecher after the wedding—not to mention the time that would be lost upon obtaining a pregnancy. But that had not come to pass. She congratulated herself upon the thoroughness of her investigations of Beecher’s prolificacy. He had serviced her daughter with unrivalled efficiency. Indeed, from what the servants reported to her, her daughter’s solemn demeanour hid a libido of some magnitude. Lady Catherine had been more bemused than offended to learn of it.
“Well, just when one thought there were no more surprises to be found in this world,” Lady Catherine had reflected in the darkness of her bedchamber, “one learns that little Anne is just as cock-smitten as any scullery maid.”
Although Beecher had been secured for Anne by the time Lady Catherine had learnt the extent of his gambling debts, she was not prepared to call foul in the matrimonial sweepstakes. As she saw it, holding that information gave her the whip-hand over her son-in-law. She secretly paid off his creditors, thereby becoming his true obligator. She could sic the dogs of the bailiff upon him at her own will—that was a handsome thought, indeed. There would be little meddling from him when she put her plan into play for her grandchild. So long as she held the financial reins, he would back her every move. Moreover, money properly applied would cinch his compleat compliance—perhaps even his assistance. If there was one thing she had learnt in her life, it was that there were few sorrows in which a good income is of no avail.
Lord Winton Beecher was not about this evening. Everyone in the house knew he was in London—but only Lady Catherine knew he was gambling at Boodle’s. She cared little. The proprietor would only allow his losses to reach a level of her determination before his credit was halted. She looked in the direction of the clock once again. Only on the half-hour did she allow herself a glance to reckon the time. Yewdell noted that thrift and was not surprised. It was with compleat dispassion that he observed the hands of the clock as they slowly circled. And it was with no little irony that he realised that the swinging of the clock’s pendulum acquiesced to the mistress’s will, keeping time to the beat of Lady Catherine’s drumming finger, rather than the reverse.
When at last all thought they would run mad from the interminable wait, the drumming ceased. The silence was broken with such force, everyone, to a person, leapt in their skins. Lady Catherine had struck her stick but once, but it landed with a resounding thud upon the floor. At the cracking blow of her stick, all who had uniformly given a start punctuated it with a great gasp. As for Henry the parrot, he went into such a flapping frenzy that it alone would have startled everyone out of their stupor. All this came about because even Lady Catherine’s perversely persistent patience had had enough. (When the silence was finally ruptured, that it was pertinacious Lady Catherine who finally broke it was more startling than the act itself.) Unfortunately, the footman who had the whole of the pocket-square stuffed in his mouth gasped too. He began to turn the colour of a boiled beet, further distraught as to whether to break his stand and extract that which was choking the life from him, thus enduring his lady’s displeasure or dying on the spot—in Rosings, ’twas no quick decision. Yewdell cut his eyes in the footman’s direction daring him to suffocate.
The strangled footman let out a small, gurgling cough, all others gulped in anticipation, but still the doors before them did not open. This a unique occurrence, for few things did not yield to Lady Catherine de Bourgh’s wrath.
Lady Catherine’s finger paused atop her stick, her eyes fluttering in exasperation. Just then, as if bidden by the huge Javanese gong sitting quietly in the corner, the doors were thrown back and Dr. Brumfitt strode momentously into the corridor. Whilst still wiping his hands, he initiated a small ceremony. Stepping back, he hid the bloody rag behind his back and swept his freshly wiped hand in the direction of an equally be-stained nurse who had followed in his wake. Now the centre of all notice, Nurse made an awkward, off-balance curtsy. In her arms lay a squirming, swaddled bundle. She raised the child before her ladyship as if a gift from the Magi.
With a self-conscious flourish, Dr. Brumfitt bowed, saying, “Lady Catherine, I present your grandchild!”
For one whose arthritic hip had been the subject of a great deal of complaint, Lady Catherine came to her feet most expeditiously. She nodded once, abruptly turned, and with great purpose, carried herself down the corridor. She neither peered at the infant nor took notice of the silence from the room from whence the surgeon had emerged.
Simultaneous to her leave, the enormous beads of perspiration that had formed at his hairline began to seep down his face.
Standing quite still, Dr. Brumfitt closed his eyes and drew a deep, heartfelt breath of stagnant air and mopped his brow. It was not his place to prophesy. He could only praise God above that Lady Catherine believed he had done well seeing that her grandchild survived such a troubled birth. If Lady Catherine spoke no question of it, he was beyond caring the fate of Lady Anne.