Merriment & Wisdom

A Mansfield Park fanfiction

Part Thirty-Four:

A Fall, Neglected

When Tom fell from Francis' back, the endlessly noisy world, the constant din of Newmarket which kept him from thinking more than he could bear, became momentarily deadly silent and he saw points of light bursting behind his eyes – points of light he fancied to be stars.

The days having blurred together, Tom was uncertain how long he had been in Newmarket, or how long – even – he had been with his friends. He could not have said what colour the curtains in the house they all currently resided together within were, though he saw them every night, nor recognised the faces of the handful of only occasionally rotating servants who appeared upstairs in a great hurry at his host's smallest, pettiest request.

Still, most mornings, he came out to watch his horse.

Somewhere in the daze of days he couldn't properly recall, he'd (mostly) given up railing at his groom and jockey, concluding, with much visible drunken exasperation, their supposed idiocy to be entirely incurable, a thing he would need to live with until he could replace them.

What possessed him, compelled him, to shove the jockey out of the way and take Francis' reins into his own hands, hoisting his own swaying body into the saddle, even he himself did not fully know.

He decided to, and so he did – need there be more to it?

His companions could not dissuade him, and – in all honesty – none but Mr. Yates really made the attempt even to try.

Then, after miraculously speeding from a few halting, stubborn steps into a fair trot (more than the jockey had managed in several days, to Tom's credit), the horse reared and threw him off.

Mr. Bertram was a good horseman, undeniably; if he had not been intoxicated he might very well have succeeded in keeping his seat and the disaster would have been averted.

That was when Tom felt the pressing silence and saw his stars – before he tasted dirt and mud and clutched his side as he, blinking blearily in a poor attempt to loosen grit and dust from his eyes, rose back up.

There was a sore feeling everywhere about him.

At first, when Mr. Yates – suddenly before his eyes where previously there had been nothing but the hazy stars – spoke to him, the world was still in a muffled hush and he could not make out what his friend had said.

Then a trace of reason dancing tauntingly at the back of his murky mind told him what the words were, just as noise returned and gratingly reaffirmed them, and Tom grumbled, "M'fine. Really. I promise. S'nothing another drink won't set right."

Mr. Yates was uncertain. "I'm sure all will be right as rain soon enough, Bertram, my good fellow, but that was rather a nasty fall. Another inch just slightly to the left, I shouldn't wonder, and your temple would have struck the ground when the rest of you hit it – you'd have been out cold."

"M'fine," he insisted. "Just take m'damn arm and help me out of this muddy ditch, for God's sake."

Mr. Yates lowered his voice – his turned face was hot with associated humiliation. Tom had soiled himself in the fall, and it was rather evident up close. "You'll wish to change as soon as possible – let me take you back to the house."

Tom seemed well enough during a small party – by their standards, not, very likely, by any other, and Sir Thomas would certainly not have considered the gathering in any way diminutive or moderate – in the drawing-room (of the host's mother, upon the rare occasion she was in residence), which involved a good deal more drinking, but afterwards, his companions were unsettled, in the early hours of the morning, to discover him near-insensible, sprawled out in a heap of floppy limbs across a sofa.

Great beads of sweat were breaking across the length of his initially damp and then rapidly soaked brow.

Mr. Yates was more alarmed than the others, and did – with the assistance of a certain valet (not his own, who was not currently in Newmarket with them) – help him upstairs and off with his shoes, cravat, and a layer or two of his clothing, but was – with more ease than did his character credit – readily persuaded Tom would be perfectly well by noon if he were permitted to sleep it off.

Come the prophesied noon hour, however, he had only worsened.

He was no longer merely feverish, but in the thralls of a full, properly raging fever, and his breathing was laboured. He recognised no one who spoke to him or grasped his shoulders – even Mr. Yates was a stranger in this state of growing delirium. He mistook an errand boy with a serious, gentle face, in the house only to convey a message to Tom's host, for Edmund, though, and – with urgency and raspy pleading – implored him to relay if Fanny was well, if he had not come to deliver ill news of her. He did not know where he was, but he still thought it odd Edmund should come so far to bring him news – surely it was far, nowhere near home, wherever it was – if all was as it ought to be at home.

"Tell Fanny... Tell Fanny, I never–" he began, gazing helplessly at the boy, before his eyes rolled into the back of his head and he passed out into a violent slumber from which he did not wake again for another half-hour.

The presence of evident illness within these formerly merry walls did not make Tom's companions easy. Supposing they could catch whatever he had? Supposing the fever became putrid? They were none of them natural nurses, eagerly discussing among themselves the best way to quit the house quickly and without fuss or delay.

One of them was the son of an inattentive father who, while living largely in the countryside, kept a house in town – currently it was empty – they might go there, spend the next week or so enjoying the pleasures of London.

Only Yates hesitated.

To see Tom like this... Previously so young and vibrant and full of life... In a state of total helplessness... To imagine the worst possible outcome... To remember all the pleasant times together, all the friendly conversations and laughs, all the confidences and schemes and plans that good mates will hold in common... The plethora of bawdy jokes and jabs and jests and quips...

He took one of Tom's clammy hands in his own and squeezed.

"No." He choked off. "I cannot forsake him. How can I even think of it?"

"What a bloody show you make over nothing, Yates! The servants will remain to look after him – we would do little to speed his recovery by staying, save putting ourselves in possible danger. And it's better, is it not, that we should go and leave him in peace? Any physician would recommend as much. You can't call it forsaking him!"

Mr. Yates glanced down, again, at Tom, who groaned wordlessly and lolled his head to one side. "He shall join us, follow us to London, once he is recovered – that is most probable?"

"Certainly!" They were all treacly eagerness to reassure, to have their way, to move on with as little complaint, guilt, or fuss as possible. "The servants know the address – it will be given him once he's strong enough to follow. A few days of rest is all he needs, fever or no fever, depend upon it."

Did Mr. Yates actually believe them, expect that Tom would soon follow, or did he only want to? Who can say? Afterwards, even Mr. Yates himself was unsure what his real feelings in that desperate moment were. He related the events, later, to a person he loved deeply and who had the reason of close familial ties to wish Tom well, and even for her sake, could not venture an answer which satisfied.

But it doesn't matter.

After all, one may be better than the other, strictly, yet neither explanation makes Mr. Yates seem the ideal companion born for times of distress.

Whatever he thought, he still left.

Only let it be generally known there were tears glittering in his eyes as he released his friend's hand, letting it drop heavily into a pile of crumpled, sweat-stained blankets as it slipped beyond the reach of his uncurling fingers, and his teeth did chatter together dreadfully, preventing him from speaking clearly for several moments, when he whispered, in a shameful, sorrowful voice, "So long, old bean."

How small the school-room now looked!

Fanny could not help but marvel over it; she had been more and more seldom inside this room since moving into her husband's chambers.

It still served, technically, as Susan's personal sitting room, but it usually proved a great deal more practical to invite Susan – especially in Tom's prolonged absence – to visit her and to enjoy a hot fire, instead of sitting beside an empty grate and suffering chairs which were too small.

She'd returned here now only to compose a letter in private, thinking herself unlikely to be disturbed in the school-room, even by the servants. Aunt Norris would not look for her here, either. Susan might come in, if so inclined, if freed from Lady Bertram's side long enough to think of it, but she didn't mind her presence if the desired solitude was not to be had after all. There was nobody else currently in residence at Mansfield Fanny would rather have her peace broken by than her kind, most understanding sister, whose company was preferable even to Sir Thomas'.

And she had the added advantage of not being constantly distracted by that noisy long-case clock Aunt Norris would keep reminding the servants to wind back up again!

Writing to her brother William was her object, and she hastened to start the missive as soon as she sat and gathered paper, ink, and quill comfortably within reach.

My Dearest William, she began, then dipped the quill into the ink afresh and halted.

Beloved, Mansfield Park is well, and I hope all is well with you, that you have met with no contrary winds or sea monsters –

She tore the parchment and crumpled it into a ball. The tone was too light – too teasing, too forced in jest, it failed to match her painfully heavy heart. It seemed to her that William must know she was pretending and should suspect her of false cheer and forced merriment.

To be dishonest, even in so slight a way, with him was a manner of thing she could never permit herself.

It might be a frightfully sacrilegious thing to admit, even to herself, but she would sooner lie to a priest than to William.

William, I'm afraid – having no wish to distress Susan, I professed, to her, a confidence I did not altogether feel and which you would have seen through at once – but I fear I have made a terrible, terrible blunder. I have behaved ill without meaning to. I have much, as late, enjoyed friendship with the Crawfords and believed Mr. Crawford safe company within reason... In testing him in regards to this, I wore a certain necklace... How can I explain...?

Yes, indeed, how could she?

Mr. Crawford behaved just as he ought, and I was relieved and thought myself – or wanted to think myself – on solid footing in our friendship. For some glorious hours I was perfectly happy in him. I rejoiced in my quiet manner, letting myself believe him the most stalwart and honourable of companions, though nothing in virtue to yourself and Edmund. But doubt will not leave me, brother – I cannot stop doubting him and being, still, a more than little frightened. I am better at concealing it than I used to be, yes, a little, but I cannot... May God preserve me from any ingratitude, William, but...

She crumpled the letter in despair. Her knuckles turned snowy white as they clutched the balled-up paper.

For Fanny realised, then, she couldn't write such a letter to William – although he might be the dearest, most cherished soul in the world, her favourite brother, one whole half of herself.

For once, she was faced with a thing she could not expect him, reasonably, to understand.

Mr. Crawford was the author of his present happiness; the one who had brought him to the Mansfield ball to see his sister so honoured, gotten him his commission by applying to his uncle.

William Price would no more willingly think so very ill of Henry Crawford than he would of a venerated saint.

How could Fanny ask him to, and on the flimsy basis that – though Mr. Crawford behaved well – he was not, somehow, all she believed he should be? She was unkind to Mr. Crawford – as well as to William – in daring to compose such an evil letter.

No one need know, however – there was no fire in here, but she'd take the scraps down to her own sitting room when she was done and burn them to ashes.

But she felt she must write to someone. She was in an agony of feeling and desperate – desperate for she was not certain what.

My dear cousin–

Her fingers played with the simple, perfect chain at her neck from which William's amber cross dangled. She had some vague notion of writing to Edmund, though not of Henry Crawford, put in mind – since she was in this room, surrounded by memories – of his lessons and kindnesses to her, before giving it up as she realised it was not really Edmund – of the two Bertram brothers – she wished to write after all.

It was not he she believed could set all to rights again if only he would return to Mansfield Park with no further delays.

Husband–

She struck out the word. The greeting seemed cold, harsh.

Husband Mr. Bertram–

Ah, no. Worse. Much worse. He wouldn't like that.

Husband Mr. Bertram My Dear Husband–

"Tom," she breathed, quill hovering miserably over the parchment, fingertips stained and trembling.

Husband Mr. Bertram My Dear Husband

Tomcat–

Perhaps it is for lack of news of you, save one poor report I do not for a moment permit myself to believe, whatever anyone else may think, for I know it to be incompatible to your nature, but I cannot stop thinking of when we last saw one another – our coldness at breakfast before you departed with William, he eventually for Portsmouth and you away to Newmarket.

And constantly upon my conscience weighs my harshly spoken words to you the morning after our ball.

It was ill-judged of me to pick upon your faults while clinging so stubbornly to my own and giving you no further explanation of my unhappiness. I'll not trouble you with it now, Tom, though if I am so fortunate as to have another chance, I should dearly like to tell you in person, whatever it may cost us...

But, in truth, I write only to say this: pray do not allow my cross temperament when you saw me last to deprive you of hope. Life without hope is intolerable.

Even I dare hope that...

Please, whatever has or has not happened, come home. Nothing else can matter any longer. Please come home again.

Your wife,

With love, then and now and forever, I remain,

your creepmouse

A splodge of ink, forming an illegible black puddle, upon the e at the end of mouse made her stop – she was pressing too hard onto the page and nearly breaking through.

With a sigh, she reached for a fresh page and painstakingly re-wrote the letter without the errors and strikeouts, and did a better job, as far as her trembling hands would allow her, of neatly blotting the ink, keeping it from being too difficult to read.

When the letter was thus completed, clear and satisfactory, Fanny gazed down at it for a long time with moist eyes and a dripping nose (which she wiped, in what she knew to be quite an unladylike manner, on the back of her wrist) before folding and sealing it.

How, though, to send it to him? She hadn't anything beyond a general knowledge of where he was. She could hardly post a letter to all of Newmarket and expect it to reach him. She knew not if he was at an inn or with friends, or nowhere near there at all – if he hadn't left Newmarket without sending word back and was even now in London or Weymouth, or anywhere else in the world.

She might post it to Edmund (if Sir Thomas would frank it), urge him in a short note to pass it on whenever he heard of his brother's whereabouts.

But who knew when that would be?

"Tom," she said once more, brokenly, blinking away tears. "Oh, Tom."

"But who is he?"

The servants were distressed, to say the least of it, at having been left the charge of a dramatically ill young man whose name they didn't know. He was a gentleman – this much they could ascertain from their own common sense. A few of the keener-eyed staff noted he had seemed the particular friend of the Honourable John Yates – but as he was also gone, along with the others, and could not be asked, that way, too, led only to a dead end.

A physician was called to the house; it could not be avoided; the gentleman's state was such as to make any other course impossible.

But the physician (a local fellow, but not, unfortunately, the same one who had recently recommended opium for the dying mistress of a certain Mr. B.) didn't recognise him, either, and referred to him only as 'the patient' until the servants, out of growing habit, did likewise. That is, among themselves – in front of the invalid, they called him 'the gentleman' or, when they attempted to address him despite his delirium, 'sir'.

There were many anxious reports between the housekeeper and maid-servants reporting on the progress (or lack thereof) in 'the patient'.

Out of all the maid-servants, only one hadn't been sent above stairs on some errand or other since the host and his friends departed so hastily and, because of this, had not seen 'the patient' yet.

She was a little, fair thing with a small, dainty nose and a pleasing form. Not so long ago, she had had a very different sort of employment, but fate – which had been so unkind to Anne and Sally and the other girls – had spared young Sophie in the long run. She'd suffered no worse than a desperate week or so – where, to be sure, she had been truly frightened and friendless and quite on the verge of putting into practice one of three or four previously unthinkable ideas which came into her mind in order to live – and, then, there was an opening here as a servant. She was not ill-looking enough from the street to be turned away at the door by the prim housekeeper, and whatever shabbiness she had entered with was soon smoothed out. Discovered to be a hard worker and stronger than her delicate looks suggested, she was gratefully welcomed. She'd invented references that conveniently could not be checked on, but she must have appeared honest, for they never suspected her past, or – if they did – they'd fully turned a blind eye. Any worries over being blackmailed or dismissed had quickly faded from her mind.

She retained only one object from her previous life in Weymouth as a prostitute – a gold ring she wore upon a chain tucked between her breasts under her clothing.

Sally had taken it – well, demanded it until he was cowed into letting her take it, more like – from a vulgar-mannered and decidedly tactile visitor who, despite being on good terms with the man under whose protection they'd then lived, and thus gaining entry, had not been able to pay for the pleasures he'd insisted upon having from her.

A few discreet questions were asked, later, and Sophie ascertained that Sally's bedfellow was not the original owner of the ring; it was a wedding band lost at a game of cards.

Whose wedding band?

A few more questions to the right persons answered that question also.

Mr. Bertram's.

The very same Mr. Bertram who had rendered her a service once under a very precious circumstance.

He'd danced with her, that night, when no one else would, when she'd been snubbed by the gentleman of her choice.

Even prior to the unexpected kindness he'd shown her, Sophie liked Tom Bertram a good deal; she had thought him charming and funny and greatly enjoyed his company. In those days, she'd secretly rather dreaded his finishing the portrait and leaving, certain it would mean she should never see him again.

And after he danced with her?

Well, after, she was more than half in love with him.

She knew, of course, nothing could ever come of it – she was perfectly (and contentedly) aware he was in love with somebody else. Anne had spoken of his true love when Sally teased him too cruelly (a love who was evidently, much to Sophie's initial surprise, making her rethink her original assumption about his lack of interest in trying to actually touch the subjects of artwork, not Mr. Yates) and he had referred to himself as 'an old married man' despite being only six-and-twenty.

So there was a wife.

And Sophie was certain Mrs. Bertram was loveliness itself.

She had imagined her many times. She liked to think of charming Mr. Bertram with somebody pretty and sweet, somebody worthy of him, rather than a simpering shrew wedded for connections or wealth.

Also, if he – despite doubtless having an angel for a wife – did decide to take a mistress one day, Sophie was convinced she wasn't the sort he'd pick out. He'd probably want somebody mature, who shared his interests, someone – perhaps – more like Anne than herself.

Mr. Bertram struck her as the sort of man who might well prefer a companionable lover to one whose entire role in his life was simply to satisfy his more carnal needs.

Still, she'd created a little place in her heart for him and never disturbed that carved-out corner of her affections. Her unending feelings for Mr. Bertram were simply there, the same way water is wet and the sky is blue.

It hadn't been at all easy to get Mr. Bertram's ring away from Sally, secured into her own possession, to persuade the temperamental woman to trade and barter with a prize she'd thought hard-won in her own right, but Sophie had succeeded in the end. Her conscience whispered to her more than once about how she ought to find a way of sending it back to him – for surely it was sorely missed by the future baronet – but she quieted her better nature with the notion that he must have long-since replaced it.

And so she kept it, always.

Most days, she didn't give the ring – dearest object though it was to her – any thought.

If she had ever the sad misfortune to lose Mr. Bertram's ring, it would have been foremost in her thoughts, would have positively eaten her up, but as long as she had it, as long as it was still attached to the chain, where it belonged, she had, hourly, precious little reason to remember it.

The last she had heard of Mr. Bertram was from a recent newspaper article. He had, it appeared, taken a mistress after all – not only that, but he'd seemingly had one a long time before he was married.

It was strange, how people could surprise you. She would not have suspected him of having had a mistress – either here in Newmarket or else set up somewhere in London, perhaps – while he pined for his wife in Weymouth.

All the same, she did not feel any resentment towards him. She only pitied him his loss. Whoever the dead woman was, he must have loved her. Must have absolutely adored her.

He'd paid for her funeral, after all.

And as Sophie loved him – or at least, to be honest, her short Weymouth memories of him – she could not wish upon the amiable Mr. Bertram the pain of permanent separation from someone he cared for.

Well contented in her belief she would hear nothing more of Mr. Bertram for so long as she lived – that is, beyond what the papers reported – Sophie in no way imagined him connected to 'the patient' upstairs.

So when the question was asked again, the same question all the servants had been asking for so many days now – but who is he? – she did not expect, peering down into his sweat-soaked face as he turned listlessly on the pillow while another maid placed a cold cloth upon his fiery brow, poor soul, to know him.

But their eyes met – his rolled back and unseeing, hers sweetly curious.

And she did know him.

Oh, God, she did know him.

The tray in her hands fell to the floor in a great clatter. Her eyes were wide, utterly stunned. She pressed a hand to her chest.

"Mr. Bertram! It is Mr. Bertram!"

A/N: Reviews Welcome, replies may be delayed.