'Forgive me,' said Lovell, speaking briskly, 'there does seem to be great haste in seeking a husband for you. I am struggling to understand it. Your guardian will barely take time to supply us with the documents about your orchards — ' Juliana now believed Mr Gadd had decided not to pursue Treves's proposal, yet Lovell still spoke as if he had no suspicion his scheme might be rejected. 'There is nothing untoward, I hope?' His gaze dipped to Juliana's belly, making his suggestion unmistakable.
Juliana had an unpleasant moment, thinking that Lovell and Treves had been discussing her morals, though she knew men did so. Pulling her cloak tighter around her, she answered levelly, 'You think me unchaste, Captain Lovell?'
He seemed to back down. 'I am indelicate.'
'You are unforgivable!'
Lovell for once seemed alarmed. 'Forgive my bluntness. I am a soldier — '
'And soldiers have to be uncouth?'
Lovell looked rueful. 'Please listen. I have a pass "to visit friends", but I must make haste and who knows when I may visit Wallingford again.. Treves and I are now attached to Prince Rupert's regiment. I must rejoin them immediately.'
Juliana did not relent. 'If there is urgency over my marriage, it is because my guardian is eighty years old, and I am otherwise alone in the world!' Still preoccupied and perturbed by Lovell's story of Edgehill, the thought of being alone oppressed her more than usual. She fought to regain her self-command and some control in the interview. 'It is best I am settled quickly. Especially in these troubled times.'
As she fixed her gaze on the lichen-coated balustrades and urns that surrounded the judge's parterre, she was aware that Lovell stared at her with a curiosity that verged on insolence. 'I am admiring your strength of character, Mistress Carlill. You have, if I may say so without annoying you again, a quality beyond your years.' She was too good for Treves, of course; Lovell saw that now. 'Too many difficulties while too young, I think?'
'Too much grief.' Juliana was equally blunt.
Lovell put a hand beneath her elbow and steered her to a stone bench.
He made a desultory attempt to brush it clean, the scatter of leaf litter catching on his hand. He was making it worse, and gave up. Juliana seated herself, her knees turned towards him so he could approach no closer, making space for herself, if not a barrier.
'So, madam. Tell me, what are your hopes in this negotiation? What are you seeking for yourself?'
The question was unexpected. For once Juliana felt uncertain. 'All the talk has been of "necessity".'
It always had been, for as long as she could remember. After her grandmother's long struggle to rise above poverty in a strange country, the need to survive had always driven her family. Her father's lack of business sense had destroyed any security they had. Her grandmother kept the family together and yearned for better things. Now, for Juliana to be respectable, better things could only come through a good marriage.
Her father had been a dreamer. Her grandmother despaired of him, could not believe she had raised a son who was so careless about his own future, or the future of them all. It was left to Grand-mere Roxanne to give Juliana any ambition she would have. Not enough, for Roxanne.
Yet Juliana's ambitions were fixed, and she enumerated them briskly to Lovelclass="underline" A household of my own to run. A husband who values me as his true companion. To bear children but not bury them, nor to die myself while bearing them. Not to despair of how they shall turn out… A garden,' she added suddenly, glancing around. Most of the plants had withered, their few leaves hanging as brown rags. Frost had wreaked instant havoc.
'Well, this is a gloomy autumnal patch!' Lovell commented.
A garden where the autumn die-back would not matter, because I would always see it bloom again next spring.'
Lovell had a sense that the Carlill family had moved about a great deal. He wondered why. However, the young woman did not look particularly hunted. These domestic hopes of hers were pretty conventional. 'There is always the blossom at your orchard in Kent.'
The situation was not as he thought. Juliana smiled again, in her gentle, non-committal way. 'Ah, my father's orchard!'
'So,' probed Lovell. 'Is Edmund Treves to be your life's companion?'
Juliana felt it was improper to give her answer to Edmund's friend. Although she acknowledged that Lovell had authority to hear it, the very fact that Edmund let his sponsor come alone dismayed her. Whatever the reason a man asked for her — and she did not by any means expect it to be love — Juliana wanted direct dealing. Her view of marriage demanded it. 'Edmund Treves has excellent qualities — '
To her surprise, Captain Lovell suddenly interrupted: 'Too young! Too untried, too unworldly, too poorly endowed to match your dowry — ' He had that wrong, thought Juliana almost humorously. 'Altogether too damned milky white. No man for you.' As Lovell saw Juliana recoil at his frankness, his voice rasped. 'Do not make your decision from a sense of obligation, simply because young Treves has offered. You must defend yourself. No one else will. Think on that.'
He sounded like Mr Gadd. Juliana hardly paused. 'You are quite right. I will tell him — '
'I will tell him,' Lovell volunteered. 'I brought him to your door.'
'I would not wish Edmund to be hurt by this, Captain Lovell. I believe he may care for me — '
'He's in love. He'll recover. Edmund', explained Lovell brutally, 'has but one great idea in his head at any time. For the moment he is besotted with his new life as a soldier. However — ' And for once Orlando Lovell favoured Juliana with an open grin, a grin of such enormous sincerity and charm that she felt her first abrupt awareness of him as a man. 'He badly needs your orchard!'
She looked downcast.
'Should you refuse young Treves, we are all left with the other problem,' Lovell mused. Your guardian, Mr Gadd, rightly wishes to procure a husband for you.'
Juliana's gaze slipped across the parterre. She saw the ancient climbing roses, their great stems bent to unseen wires, one with a last brave crimson flower, another with pale buds that would never now open fully since they were browned by frost. A cold breeze was twisting her ringlets and she had hunched her shoulders against the cold. The conversation could not last much longer; she would have to go indoors.
And then she heard Orlando Lovell suggest to her quietly, 'There is an answer. Marry me.'
Chapter Ten — Birmingham: October, 1642
'Why me?' wondered Kinchin Tew.
As the mad parson took hold of her, she felt indignant, resigned, desperate, bewildered. She was a fourteen-year-old girl, just an unattractive scavenger, born among masterless women and men. Kinchin was a nickname: never baptised, never enrolled in school, there were no records of her existence and her real given name was lost.
It was not the first time Mr Whitehall's watery gaze had lighted upon her expectantly. They were both daytime wanderers, so in a small town like Birmingham their paths were bound to cross. Skulking against walls or creeping up backstreets, Kinchin would sometimes startle him; more often, he would loom up from nowhere and cunningly trap her. Then she knew what was in store.
Why me? was a question she posed, yet never answered for herself. To others it would be obvious: she was vulnerable. Her parents and brothers generally left her to herself. She was a starveling, alone on the streets.
Kinchin never invited the man to accost her, but she endured what he did. Mr Whitehall was an adult, and as a churchman he carried authority even if he could no longer practise his calling because of his past. Everyone knew how he behaved to women. Even though Kinchin feared him, it was almost exciting that he chose her. These were the only occasions when she mattered to anyone.