Chapter 11: "Down by the Water," by The Decemberists

December 20, 1798

Dearest Elinor,

Now things have settled down, I find that I have a few minutes to write you. First of all, I do hope that you and Edward, and our dear little William, have the happiest of Christmases. I have been instructed to include in my letter that certain articles ought to have been delivered to you by the end of the day on Christmas Eve (though certainly you will not receive this for at least a week), and that with these articles, my husband sends his best regards. (It was all his doing, by way of a Christmas present; I had no knowledge of it until now.) The baskets are also for you to keep, so you need not worry about returning them to the mansion house. My husband thought that you may like them for all the sewing you have recently engaged in on behalf of the parish workhouse, and asks me to assure that we already have a whole room's worth of baskets.

The first several days of our journey were passed in pleasant enough comfort, though both my husband and I grew restless in the carriage, for the sheer fact that both of us tire of long periods of confinement, and far prefer to be active, or at least free to be so. But I find that I never grow tired of his company, or his conversation, and he has proven to be quite a loving and attentive travelling companion to me thus far. Indeed-it seems I am quite the fool in love with him, Elinor, after all my assertions that I would never admit the possibility of second attachments. And I now have plenteous evidence that he is just as strongly enamoured of me. (If I may conjecture, in fact, I feel a bit apprehensive that the same fate that befell you when you returned from your wedding trip is likely to befall me, as demonstrative as we have both been in our adoration of one another; nothing has given me cause to believe anything so soon, but just to be sure, perhaps you should not yet put away all of little William's layette, in the off chance that it may be used again in the near future.) (I take it on trust that you will not show certain parts of this letter to anyone, least of all Edward, who is a man of the cloth and likely to take offence.)

And now it falls upon me to tell you of the reception we've had here since we arrived at Tournesol, the Colonel's brother-in-law's estate.

The property itself is beautiful, though more extravagant than would suit my own liking, and my newly acquired sister Constance has applied impeccable taste in fitting out each room according to the dictates of fashion.

We stepped into the lavish foyer and were shown into a drawing room nearly as large as the entirety of Barton Cottage's ground floor, and announced to a woman and man close to my husband's own age. Constance, the woman, looks a little like her brother: the same sandy hair; the same aquiline nose; the same advantages of height and slenderness-although I must say that there is something in my husband's eyes, a softness, that seems lacking in those of Mrs. Lapointe. Her husband, half a head shorter than she and quite a bit wider, with dark hair and a hawk-like eyes and nose, is called Pierre. Both of them seemed to greet the Colonel with some warmth, though it has been (admittedly) difficult for me to make out all that has been said, for you see, they conduct all their conversations in French, and as you probably remember, I spent all the time with our French tutor at Norland dreaming that he would take me out into the orchard and kiss me scandalously, instead of actually committing the language to memory-so I am rather lost, though the dear Colonel has tried to tutor me some during our journey.

I believe that the Colonel began by introducing me as his wife (and I still thrill to think of the possessive, proud way he took my hand in his arm as he did so), and then apologized for some past offence. It seems (according to Eliza) that, the last time the Lapointes had visited, some years ago, the Colonel and his sister quarreled. Can you imagine Colonel Brandon quarreling with anyone? However, it seems that it is true, for he has described to me certain details from his family life before joining the army that would shock you. It is all the more a testament to his character that he has risen above all that. At any rate, he apologized, and Constance smiled a kind smile and put several questions to me about my family, my education, and my interests, which I believe I answered with no errors. Pierre said very little, but nodded thoughtfully now and then, and soon we were met with the rest of the party.

It being Christmas, it is but a small family party. The Lapointes, of course, are hosting, and they are joined by their two eldest sons, Michel and Paul, who are home from school for their holiday. Michel is eighteen, and his brother Paul is sixteen. It is striking-Michel is very much like his father, but Paul is the very image of a portrait I saw of my husband when he was younger. The two could be father and son. The temperament of the boys is as yet difficult to determine, as they were nearly silent throughout supper, but it was hard to tell if they were surly or shy, or simply afraid to speak in front of their elders. (It is difficult for me to think of myself as an 'elder' for indeed Michel is so near my own age; yet now that I am a married woman I cannot help but think of myself as older in experience than my years would indicate, though perhaps that is a naive way of feeling.) The youngest child is a babe of three years, Sebastien, and we have not seen him yet.

After supper, the Colonel and Pierre remained in the dining room, as did Michel; Paul disappeared to his own chambers, apparently; and I was left to retire to the drawing room with Constance. She continued to pepper me with questions, but as they were more in-depth, I couldn't answer them so well in French, and made one or two embarrassing blunders-to my own mortification, I asked if it would be possible to revert to my own native tongue (which, I now recall, is also her own-perhaps it was presumptuous of her to assume my facility with a language not of my birth country, when she herself was perfectly capable of using English-I cannot help but think that perhaps it was a slight, though as you know, Elinor, I am working so very hard not to take umbrage at the slights of others the way I used to, and to be of a more docile disposition, rather than the headstrong girl who was so eager once to observe insult where there was none intended). She acquiesced. We began to speak of composers then, for I had told her that I liked music, and she asked if I had heard of several newer ones (whom I had not), and then proceeded to set me up at the pianoforte with new sheet music and-well, it felt as if she were testing me. She listened to me play a piece I told her I had never seen, and gave me numerous tutorials about how I could play it better, pointing out notes I missed, noticing flaws in my execution, and even finding fault with my posture. It was with great relief, as I was nearing tears from the distress of the past three-quarters of an hour, that I saw Pierre and Michel enter the drawing room with my husband in tow. We resumed French as the common tongue, and my husband sat by my side and took my hand, squeezing it from time to time whenever I glanced at him with an overwhelmed expression-which, I fear, was all too frequently.

At last we excused ourselves and were shown to our chambers. This too was surprising: they were not adjoining, and were, in fact, on opposite ends of a hallway in the guest wing. My husband and I are accustomed after the past week to sharing quarters, and it seemed odd that we should be parted thus. He suggested once the servant left us, therefore, that I share his own room, but I reminded him that we were guests, and that perhaps his sister was squeamish about the thought of a newlywed couple taking advantage of the mutual privacy afforded by a shared room. He allowed for his sister's presumed discomfort (and my own; for the last thing I wanted to do before this formidable woman was embarrass myself), and now I am here, alone, on a cold winter's night, and regretting my decision, for I find that my husband (euphemisms aside) is quite adept at keeping me warm, and that I enjoy having a bedfellow again, having missed your company, dear sister, quite apart from the new intimacies that my husband and I can now share. But, I shall resign myself to a cold few evenings, and long for the day when we are safely bundled into yet more carriages and trouncing across the Alps, through Italy and Switzerland, and finally to our farthest stop in Vienna. The adventurous spirit has not quite left me, despite all my maturation, and I find that I am quite excited to begin the next stage of our expedition.

Please send any replies to the hotel in Vienna, for which we provided you contact information. I regret that I won't hear about your first Christmas as parents of a wiggling babe until then, but I do so long for the time when I may; until then, I remain

Your devoted sister

Mrs. Brandon!

25 December, 1798

My dear Eliza,

After five days spent among these people, it is my honour and privilege to allow you to bask in the glory of your own correctness. You told me so. I ought to have insisted upon it. I ought to have become the sort of domineering husband who denies his wife things she desires with no thought, for it seems that by allowing her to have her way in this detour to Avignon, she has become miserable and wretched, and now will no longer love me anyway.

The first night we were here, Constance tried. I could tell she was trying, because she was actually smiling, and I felt as though perhaps she had changed for the better-that age, and motherhood, and the long-suffering state of being married to one of the most calculating and greedy men I have the dishonour of calling an acquaintance, much less a distant relation, would have softened her into something like a true sister. But it was clear from minutes into the evening that it was not the case. She did direct questions to Marianne and take an interest in her, but was completely insensitive to the fact that Marianne's French was weak (it is not Marianne's fault entirely, for you know, having heard me discuss it, how methodically and ruthlessly my father drilled us all in the languages of the Continent; Constance and I had always possessed a gift for languages that it seems my wife does not share, and it is no real discredit to her, for I am still convinced that she is near-perfect in every other way that I have observed). Then, she took it upon herself to tutor Marianne in the correct way to play some fashionable new songs on the pianoforte (and you have of course heard Marianne play-it is not with merely the fondness of a husband, but the finely-tuned ear of an aficionado that I say that Marianne's playing is qualitatively superior to Constance's in every way); and finally, the greatest slight of the evening was in the revelation that we were to sleep in separate chambers, it having all been arranged ahead of time, presumably, to provide the greatest possible affront to me, and to my wife, whom Constance is determined not to like under any circumstances.

The worst of it is that I can feel the old anger coming back. My hackles are raised. I grow irritated easily, and it is all I can do to bite my tongue. Pierre is even more repellent to me than I remember from the last time I saw him. Just yesterday, as we've had a reprieve from the incessant snow flurries, he took me down to the carriage house and showed me his new toy-a carriage, painted a shiny black with gold trim, small and aerodynamic and with a new steering mechanism that he spent an inordinate amount of time explaining to me (and I will not lie-I did salivate; I am not immune to the beauty of a finely-tuned machine, even if it is owned by such a man). While there, he outlined some of his plans for me-he has just gone in on a plantation in Haiti, you see, and wanted my advice, as I had been in India for so many years, on the best methods of "keeping the natives properly in line" so as not to harm his business interests. I demurred as much as possible-my own opinions about the treatment of natives being well-known to you, but not desiring of becoming ensconced in a political debate so close to Christmas, and in the current delicate situation with my wife already being poked and prodded like a new horse, metaphorically speaking, by my disagreeable sister.

And then he said the thing that really rankled me: "Though, in the event that I am able to inherit Delaford, in addition to my house in Devonshire, perhaps I will give up my interests in the Caribbean; with two properties in England as well as this house, I will have a much more stable income."

So-you see? He is still, even in the face of my marriage, certain that he will be named heir. Or at least, he is hopeful-and to ensure this, he has made my wife feel like a stranger, a foreigner, in her own sister-in-law's home, and he has made it clear what he thinks of our engaging in any act that might lead to procreation, by boarding us separately. It is my belief that these little things are deliberate, though perhaps I am making unfair assumptions, and Pierre and Constance are simply unconsciously callous and unwelcoming.

I fear that you will think me extremely familiar to express these things to you, Eliza, but I find that now you have become as much a friend to me as a daughter, and I know not to whom else I can confess my feelings and my history, especially as it concerns my wife, for you know all that relates to her, how I came to love her, how desperately I longed for her, and my joy now that I have married her. But I fear that my love for her, like so much else, has become corrupted in the face of Constance and Pierre, and their conniving ways.

Last night, the memory of Pierre's words still fresh in my mind, I took myself to my room after dinner and imbibed some brandy to gather my courage, and then-again, I hate to confess this to you, but I know not to whom else I can turn-I knocked on my wife's door and begged entrance. I found her weeping, and though she allowed me in, I was disappointed that she would not let me stay. She had been crying, she said, because she was emotionally drained, now that it neared her special time of the month (I did not see fit to pry, as I never do in these things); but I could sense that something else was amiss. And I? I left her to her tears, and returned to my own room. I admit that I was angry at her because I felt, in my frustration, that she pushed me away after all that we had shared; I also grew flummoxed, and this is where I find myself reeling with self-loathing, because at that moment I had primarily wanted to be near her, not to comfort her, or even to be comforted by her, but because I wanted to thwart my brother-in-law's desire to inherit Delaford by ensuring that there would be an heir of my own making, instead.

This morning I have confessed all to Marianne-what my wishes were, and the reason I failed to be a proper comfort to her-and she responded to me with silence. It is our first Christmas together, and we are, apparently, in the midst of a quarrel, though she has not told me how she is feeling or why, precisely, she is angry, or even if I am the chief recipient of this anger.

You look up to me as a hero, I know, but I want to show you these moments of weakness so that you do not idolise me. I am no hero; I make the same mistakes as most men, most notably the mistakes of failure to communicate my true wishes and desires as clearly as I ought, and failure to understand the wishes and desires of others, even sometimes those most dear to me. I have prided myself in the past of being mindful of others' feelings, and now my own wife has shown me that my pride here is misplaced.

For what it is worth, happy Christmas, though I know you will not receive this letter for some weeks. I hope the parcels I have sent by way of my staff have reached you without harm. I know how much you like ham and I think I remember Charity loving fig preserves and chocolates. The new dolly is to be named whatever Charity likes, and is to be invited to our next tea party with Raja, if Charity and her friends will all accept the invitation.

Wearily, and a little desperately, I offer you my sincere friendship and love, and ask that you pray for a swift end to these joyless days in France.

CB