IV.
"I told you this would happen," Littimer said to Emily after she'd risen, washed the dust out of her hair and got dressed, only to find the house was quiet still, and Littimer's the only voice in it. Sleeping late was something she'd never done before; it had not been in her who'd had to rise before the dawn for all of her life. But this time, having not fallen asleep until sunrise, she'd slept until noon. "Yet you would not listen. Well, listen to me now, young woman."
The midday sun that fell through the windows exposed every bit of dust the maids, so recently hired from the village, had overlooked. It made her think of the castle where the princess had slept for a hundred years, and for a moment, she was absurdly grateful Littimer was there, unchanged, and thus evidence no more time could have passed than a few days since last she saw him.
Then it sank into her that he'd switched from calling her "young lady" to "young woman", and the memory of Aunt Clara saying how the housekeeper at her first place of employment had chided her for using the wrong designation for any friend of the Master's returned. There was a significance there, a fatal significance, if only she could grasp it in that strange daze her long sleep had left her with.
"Mr. James has gone. He had me pack while the two of you were on your little expedition, so don't think he's run off on a whim. You see, we've been receiving letters from a noble mother prepared to receive a repenting son again and to release more funds to him, but only if he ends a certain unbecoming association. And it is her money, after all, which is providing the means for this fine life. We're not inheriting until she is departed from this Earth."
Mrs. Gummidge had done this sometimes, Emily thought, used "we" in this peculiar way. "We're getting too old to stay out all night at sea, Dan'eel, we should think of those that worry at home about us," she'd told Uncle Dan when she meant he should let Ham do more of the fishing. Madame Jouvet had called this "plural" and added something about "pluralis majestatis" and "pluralis modestiae". Which Emily had taken as differing modes to unite pompousness with entitlement. The way Littimer used it right now also sounded smug. She heard the words, and in purely technical terms, she understood what he was saying, but at the same time, it was as if someone had put her beneath a wall of glass, with Littimer's mouth opening and closing without making sense or sound.
"Now, Mr. James is of course aware that you yourself are not in a position to return to the joys of hearth and home in England, such as they are. Nor does he wish you to feel abandoned. Therefore, it is my pleasure to inform you a worthy man and a restored reputation will both be yours."
She shook her head; this made even less sense than anything else he'd said so far.
"Well, I'll admit it is something of a sacrifice on my part," Littimer said, looking her up and down in a mixture of amusement and contempt. "If I'd thought of marriage before, it was to a respectable woman with an even more respectable dowry, not a penniless cast-off hailing from the gutter. But you do possess a certain adaptability, your countenance is undeniably pleasant, and if making you Mrs. Littimer is the price I have to pay for reconciling Mr. James to his worthy mother, well, it is a most Christian thing to accept, is it not?"
The little pleased smile with which he added the last part, the way he wetted his lips after finishing the sentence, this finally did it; the horror of what he'd said became real to her. She was not dreaming. The sea hadn't come for her, nor death on land; betrayal had, fitting, given her sin. Betrayal in the form of this creature, to whom she'd been handed over the way the boat bearing her name in Yarmouth had the moment Steerforth had been done with it. If she'd had held one of the knives in the kitchen right then, she'd have used it right then and there, but she did not. In fact, Littimer seemed to have made very sure there was nothing but some soft fruit in the room. Whether this was for his own safety or for some belief she would harm herself, she had no idea, and cared less. It came to her then, every curse ever used in Yarmouth among the boatmen and the fishwives; they rose in her like the flood after the tide, and she spilled them on Littimer, screaming as she'd never done in her life, for screaming was not what ladies did, and she'd so desperately wanted to be a lady since she had first understood that she was not. Screaming now felt like cleansing fire, and if she'd known, oh, if she'd known, she would have pushed him not onto the ground but into the volcano.
Once she'd arrived at "boat-licker," she had to draw breath. By now, Littimer's expression was mildly indignant.
"My, my," he said. "What a common person. I'll have to cure you of that. But then, we do have the time. You're young and healthy; we'll spend a good long life together. And a profitable one; I'd be surprised if Mrs. Steerforth does not increase my salary once she has learned of my sacrifice, and as for Mr. James, if you listen to me, we can use any twinges of guilt that might come our way for the occasional precious little trinket. In fact, I think we should adopt one of the mewling infants from the Neapolitan streets and present it as yours before returning to England. This would set us up for life."
He was using "we" again, this time creating a conjunction between him and herself that disgusted her as much as the idea of a child raised by this man horrified her. She tried to leave the room then, with no other destination in mind than the wish to be out of Littimer's presence, but he was quicker than she'd have anticipated, and she found herself locked into her own room.
"For your own protection," he said through the door. "I'll let you out again once I can see some gratitude and acceptance of life's necessities on your part, my dear. As I said: we do have the time. The villa's rent has been paid for until the end of this month, and June has only just started. Mr. James will have to do on his own for a while, and you know, I suspect in his current mood he might indeed wish to."
A part of her thought: this is what you deserve, Emily Peggotty. Ham was a good man, the best but one, and you broke his heart because you could not bear the thought of sharing life and bed with him, so now you have been given to a villain like this, to do with you as he pleases. That almost hurt more than Steerforth leaving her in the first place, for that was what had happened to Martha and the man she'd fallen in love with, and so Emily had always been aware it was a possibility. But she had thought that at least there was truth between them, and that they both sought the same in each other, even if it was a dark thing. That he had regard for her that was greater than for a toy you could hand over to another after growing tired of it.
But why should he? He had shown no such regard for anyone else, save perhaps David, and that, too, might have been a reason for doing this to her; that she had seen him as clearly there as he'd seen the wickedness in her. There was still some torn, discarded clothing lying on the floor that smelled of him. If the room had a fireplace, she'd have burned it, like the fishermen and their wives burned the seal skin of their selkie lovers. As it was, she crumbled it beneath her hands, and hated herself even more for crying while doing so. Cursing had helped her before, so she started doing it again, but her voice failed her and turned those curses into cries as well. Weak, weak, weak: no wonder that loathsome creature outside thought he could claim her. Then she thought of Uncle Dan, and imagined him saying: "Em'ly, Em'ly, what are ye doing, child?"
It was a picture that used to torment her when she painted it in her mind. Yet now, it had the opposite effect. Uncle Dan had a dignity that had nothing to do with the pride she'd seen on display in the salons and ballrooms. He'd call gentlemen Mas'r and Sir, but he knew his worth, and he'd never crawl, nor would he allow a man like Littimer to determine his fate.
No matter how much she deserved punishment, Emily thought, she would not bear it from Littimer. Her bedroom was on the third floor, but there were vines trailing below, and she did not have much weight. The villa was so near the beach that she could hear the sea roaring, for it was a windy day, and the sound called to her with its aching familiarity and promise.