by Gisèle Baxter
All the next day, Fuchsia went about with an absent, inward smile on her face; when she could, she told the doctor she was ready to tell her family. Gertrude was perturbed at his request for a private family meeting, but acquiesced and said he and her children could meet in her room at eight o'clock that evening. While the doctor had often conferred with the countess there on various matters, neither Titus nor Fuchsia had much experience of their mother's vast, mossy, cluttered room with its cats and birds and piles of tattered books and heaps of frayed cushions and rich tapestries. Titus arrived first; he and his mother generally had little to say to each other but he had been riding in the afternoon so could report news from the stables. Fuchsia arrived with the doctor; she sat down on an old brocade-covered bench near the door, while her brother leaned on the fireplace mantel and the doctor hovered in the middle of the room.
"Get on with it, Squallor," said Gertrude. "What's up?"
The doctor smiled and attempted to keep his voice at its customary level of levity, without much success. "I'll come to the point, Ladyship. Something of what we might though perhaps I should leave judgement to you call a crisis has arisen, concerning Lady Fuchsia, who took me into her confidence yesterday after she fainted by the lake."
The countess glanced sharply at her daughter. "Go on," she directed.
Swallowing to regain composure after this interruption, the doctor continued, "After a thorough examination and interview, I have concluded beyond question that the Lady Fuchsia is with child." Since both Gertrude and Titus were too shocked to interject, the doctor summoned even more courage and raised his voice slightly. "She has sworn to me that she was not coerced or molested in any way, and that, in fact, the father of the child is someone she has been seeing secretly and cares deeply about, although, of course, he is no one she can marry as a daughter of the Line. Now, because I didn't want to see her run away or do anything rash, I promised to guarantee her safety in even calling this meeting. I will even at risk to myself live up to that promise, and with permission, can propose a solution."
Titus could say nothing; he stared at his sister, who refused to look up from an intent contemplation of the rug, and he wanted to break something, but he knew he could do or say nothing until his unpredictable mother had responded. Gathering her ornate dressing gown around herself, Gertrude slowly rose and approached Fuchsia, who looked up with her wide, haunted eyes.
"Who did this?" Gertrude demanded quietly.
Fuchsia said nothing.
"All right, Squallor, what's the solution?" Gertrude asked the doctor, while maintaining the staredown with her daughter.
The doctor outlined the main points of the suggestion he had made to Fuchsia. Gertrude listened with her usual implacable stolidity, while Titus started pacing, breathing heavily, face reddening with anger. Fuchsia, meanwhile, fought with something she had kept only to herself: the realization that this was no one's battle but her own, and she could take up the doctor's kind and practical suggestion, and she could if precedent permitted marry the father of her child, and she could if some other path might be found take that, but whatever her decision it had to hinge not on placating anyone or protecting anyone but on what she wanted. The courage needed to admit that in front of her family was terrific and she had to grasp it impulsively or lose it all together. She took a deep breath and at a pause in the doctor's speech, stood up and said, "But I'm not sure I want that."
"We can't make this official," Prunesquallor reminded her gently. "My dear Lady Fuchsia, Gormenghast was not designed to accomodate a child born into the household out of wedlock."
"You have to tell us who did this," Gertrude insisted.
"I did it," Fuchsia almost shouted. "And it's my child and I don't want it to be raised by people somewhere else in the castle after I'm hidden away for a year. I want my child to know its mother and all its family, and to be loved and acknowledged. Is that too much to ask? If it is, then this is a beastly place and I despise it and I will run away."
"Fuchsia," Gertrude said patiently, "you didn't do this alone. I want to know who the father of your child is."
"Why?" Fuchsia replied defiantly.
"Because if you flaunt all law and precedent as recklessly as that, official Gormenghast is going to want to know, or terrible rumours might arise. Do you want people to suspect Prunesquallor, for example? How many men have access to you?"
Titus stopped abruptly, between his mother and sister, amazed both at Fuchsia's fire and Gertrude's sheer calm. "Let it go, mother," he said quietly. "Official Gormenghast, as you put it, probably already does know. Or at least suspect."
"What do you mean?" Gertrude demanded.
Titus turned to his sister. "Because it's him, isn't it, Fuchsia? He's the father. Mr. Steerpike."
Fuchsia returned him an agonized look, but she said nothing.
"Titus, you can't be serious," said Gertrude. "I realize you despise him and we're none of us overly happy with the way he runs things, but that's a very dangerous accusation. If it is true, however, I'll see him hanging from the North Turret. Meanwhile, we shall have to call an official meeting to see what precedent does exist. Depending what it is, since Titus is still a minor, I may have to claim right of precedent. It is our right."
The following morning, a proclamation went round announcing that the official business of Gormenghast was to be suspended for one day. Even though it was a dismal, rainy day, people were generally glad of the unexpected holiday, while apprehensive of the promise of another proclamation to follow. The meeting itself was called for the throne room at nine o'clock in the morning. Gertrude went riding at dawn and unexpectedly Titus offered to accompany her, not because he wanted to talk (in fact, he said nothing for the duration) but because he simply wanted to be away from the castle, and the exhilaration of the activity appealed to him. Prunesquallor, who had not slept, paced around the lower floor of his house. Fuchsia slept as deeply as she did now, so did not realize her room was under watch. In the morning she found a note on her balcony, secured with a small stone; she tore it open and read on official paper in very neat though hurried script: "Everything under control: precedent found. Say nothing. One risk (your mother); otherwise, all well. Yours ever, S." She quickly folded this up and put it inside her dress, then went down to the throne room, where for once she found herself the first to arrive. As usual, she sat by the wall, in a place which afforded the best opportunity for escape. She felt vaguely awful, and very powerful, since in a very real sense another person had put his life in her hands, and not only could she save it, but she could give him something she realized he wanted very badly. And she would have this child she was already beginning to picture, to contemplate in terms of names and resemblances. She smiled to herself, and was still smiling when the doctor came in.
Since despite his fatigue he was fidgeting, he was inclined to be voluble. "Well!" he began, an explosive pop! of a statement, then he repeated less exhuberantly, "Well! It does seem strange, the business of the castle having ground to a halt, as it were; one hardly knows what to do with oneself for the rest of the day. Of course who knows how long this might take. I suppose that depends on your mother, though I suspect it depends on your brother as well. They've been out riding and what a lovely day for it: it is really beginning to look and to smell and to feel like spring. Don't you think so, Lady Fuchsia? And how are you, my dear?"
"Don't ask me to move for a while," she replied, still smiling.
"But you look happy," he commented. "Quite at peace."
"I am," said Fuchsia. "Admit: you're looking forward to delivering another one of us."
The doctor smiled nervously, revealing his teeth, which he had not intended to do. At this juncture, Steerpike arrived, and as he had been directed to arrive alone, without his customary escort from his staff. He bowed formally to Fuchsia, who smiled up at him radiantly, which increased his general anxiety considerably, although he simply responded by taking her extended hand and kissing it lightly, also formally. He nodded to the doctor, who seized this opportunity to kill the silence.
"How are you, Mr. Secretary? We don't see quite as much of each other as we did before you'd risen in the world."
Steerpike sat down on one of the thrones, folded his arms and regarded the doctor with a twitch around the mouth that might have been a smile. "I find myself rather too occupied for much in the way of a social life," he said evenly.
For some reason, the doctor found this amusing, and laughed, and the silence fell again with unnatural force so that rather than scream, Prunesquallor clapped his hands together, and said with vigour, "Well! I wonder what her Ladyship wants from us that she's cancelled the entire operation of the castle for today."
Steerpike (amused in spite of himself at the doctor's willingness to play the game) got up quickly at the sound of the countess and her son approaching, and so Gertrude and Titus found everyone waiting in silence, but looking no more anxious or eccentric than they generally did. The two commoners in the room immediately inclined their heads, though strictly speaking, Gertrude rarely required this of Prunesquallor and Titus never did. Fuchsia remained seated, and smiling. Gertrude carried one of her cats; Titus still wore his riding coat and his face was flushed pink from the cold morning air. The countess eyed everyone critically, then began.
"If any of what we're to discuss leaves this room in any form other than one I approve, there are only five people who can be held responsible. The issue is this: my daughter is pregnant. She is of course also the daughter, and the sister of an Earl of Gormenghast, and of a lineage that dates back centuries to the foundation of this castle. She has refused to name the father of her child and has also refused to have it fostered. All I know of the father is that he did not coerce her, and he is not of her rank. I will if necessary claim right of precedent to protect her but would prefer that a solution be found within the precedents of Gormenghast. It's for this reason alone I have made this crisis official. Mr. Secretary: your job is this. You are to research the history of Gormenghast for any analogous circumstances and report your findings to us. Since this must be resolved as soon as possible, you will devote your entire time to this. You may designate one of your assistants to handle your public duties and have the castle resume full operations tomorrow. Is that clear?"
Since this was a direct question, Steerpike looked up just enough to return her gaze, and said, "Perfectly, your ladyship."
"Breathe a word of this in your office and one of your assistants will find himself elevated to your position. Now go."
He bowed politely to the countess, perfunctorily to the earl, and deeply to Fuchsia, then departed.
Through the day that followed, Fuchsia felt confident, elated by a general sense of having accomplished something. She assumed Steerpike would spend a reasonable amount of time pretending to look for the precedent he had already found. How her mother was going to prove an obstacle was still unclear to her, so she simply decided not to think about it. She spent hours in the doctor's garden, watching his gardener at work, admiring the first tulips.
Meanwhile, Steerpike was not engaged in looking for a precedent and in fact had never been; he was engaged in the laborious process of forging it into the principal texts and crossreferences. He had told his staff that the countess had asked him to work on a proclamation of some importance (which he hoped would be the announcement of his wedding to Fuchsia) and that he wanted to work in privacy. He spent long hours at his desk, consumed by this finicky task, until his back and shoulders were stiff from the lack of opportunity for movement. The practical piece-work he mostly did overnight. A couple of hours before dawn, he found he had to stop before his eyes became hopelessly strained. He rubbed at them with his inkstained fingers, then pushed away from the desk to stretch himself and walk around the office. Hours ago he had taken off his jacket and rolled up the sleeves of his shirt; now he realized the night had grown chilly and he put the jacket back on. He stared out the window, chewing at his thumbnail, which had become an annoying habit he had to break.
By law, depending on the official interpretation of what he had done, according to every precedent he had been able to find, he could be put to death or banished. He idly wondered which he would prefer, given the choice. Obviously, he wanted to live, but he had no conception of life beyond Gormenghast either. He had a gnawing acidic feeling in the pit of his stomach, which he ascribed partly to not having eaten in several hours. He supposed he could ring for something but did not want anyone to see what he was doing. Alternately, he supposed he could simply go down to the kitchen and get something, but having come up those stairs, he had decided never to descend them again, for whatever reason. That was merely irrational stubbornness, he knew. There was half a cup of cold coffee still on the desk and he drank that, even though it only made him feel worse. His mind abruptly shifted to contemplation of the baby. His child: of the blood of centuries' worth of Groans and of his own quite differently compounded blood. He thought bleakly of a smaller version of Fuchsia, with all her difficulties in mere survival, then of a smaller version of himself. He thought of himself as the founder of a dynasty. That worked.
The second meeting was called for eight o'clock the following evening, in the secretary's office. By this point, Steerpike had not slept in almost forty hours, and was almost shaking with fatigue, but appeared as calm as ever. The others arrived en masse, Gertrude in the lead, Fuchsia last of all, in blood-red velvet. The antiseptic neatness of the place, which so irritated her brother, she hardly noticed at all.
"So what have you found," Gertrude demanded.
Sometimes Steerpike wondered if there was a secret history of Gormenghast he had not yet unearthed, since the daughters of the house seemed with only a few tragic examples to be so resolutely virtuous. None of the tragic examples involved a child. He had decided his precedent would, but the circumstances had to differ sufficiently that his subterfuge would not be detected. He cleared his throat, found the place on the page, and began: "The third daughter of the eleventh earl of Gormenghast was raped and became pregnant. Her assailant was never identified or discovered. It was decided that she should marry, so that the child could be brought up in the castle. There being no eligible sons of noble families, she was permitted to marry one of the leading citizens within the royal household."
"This is ridiculous," Titus protested. "That was hundreds of years ago. Fuchsia shouldn't be bullied into marrying someone. I say just let her have the baby and raise it in the household."
Gertrude slowly rounded the desk to look over the secretary's shoulder at the passages he pointed out in the various books he had marked and annotated. Meanwhile, she took the opportunity to examine him, to test her suspicions. She tried to imagine this odd creature coupling with her daughter, gaining her protection. For his part, Steerpike knew exactly what she was doing and realized he had to steel himself for the moment of risk.
"Tell me, Mr. Secretary," she said slowly and thoughtfully, "would it, in your opinion based on your considerable knowledge of the laws and traditions of this castle, would it have made any difference if the child's father were acknowledged? Not a stranger in the forest but someone known and trusted by the girl?"
"The royal family would still determine the match to be made," Steerpike said carefully. "The father's fate would be according to law. The decision of mercy would rest with the girl."
Two premises were about to be tested: Gertrude's desire to maintain good appearances, and the family's power over Fuchsia. He took a deep inward breath, so harsh he almost winced visibly, and waited for the axe to fall.
"Was it you?" Gertrude asked, in a quiet voice, retaining her position at his side.
For a brief searing moment, he wished he were passionate as well as eloquent. This had to work, he told himself firmly. Aloud, he said, without altering his position or raising his head, "Yes, your ladyship."
Gertrude shot a glance at Fuchsia. "Is this true?"
Fuchsia was not sure this was part of the plan that was all under control, but felt she was supposed to nod at this point and whisper, "Yes, it is."
Gertrude tossed her masses of dark-red hair with an air of contemptuous self-satisfaction that at last she had ferreted out the secret she had guessed almost immediately. She rounded the desk and sat down in the one reasonably comfortable chair in the room, then gestured the secretary down from his desk. He stood before her, his hands loosely clasped behind his back, his head slightly inclined though since she was seated he could stare straight at her. There was no reading her expression.
"You know the penalty for compromising a daughter of the line," the countess said, still calmly and quietly.
His mouth began to get very dry, but he offered a level affirmative.
"Yet my daughter claims you did not compromise her, and intends to raise this child of yours within the royal household," Gertrude continued. "Did you plan this? Did you expect it? Did you trade on her trust?"
Yes to all three, Titus thought.
"No, your ladyship," said Steerpike.
"Explain yourself, then," the countess directed.
"I have known the Lady Fuchsia since we were both little more than children, and I have always realized that she is above my station, doubly so since I am not, strictly speaking, of the class from which the Masters of Ritual have traditionally come. However, despite what we have come to feel for each other, there is no justification for my behaviour, except perhaps that I was as ignorant of its implications as she was. I place myself entirely at your mercy."
There was a long silence, then Gertrude said, "I'm not sure you deserve my mercy, or anyone else's for that matter. However, precedent does permit my daughter to grant it. Fuchsia?"
"Yes, I will," Fuchsia said firmly.
Gertrude frowned; she had expected this. "And this precedent you must have been very relieved to find would permit her to marry you. This she cannot decide; it must be a matter of family consensus. Prunesquallor, I could insist she marry you. Titus?"
"I won't sacrifice my sister for Gormenghast's good name," said Titus, glaring at Steerpike's back. "I just want her to be happy. If she wants to marry him, I won't stop her, but I'd rather she did it for love."
The proclamation was read at dawn before the whole of the castle. It fell to Titus to read it, and every word galled him, although the population seemed oddly both pleased and perturbed by the announcement that in two weeks, with full ceremony, the only daughter of the House of Groan would marry the secretary, who would then be elevated to the household, although he would carry on in his current position and while becoming one of the first citizens, would remain common and untitled. Fuchsia, resplendent in crimson silk, beamed radiantly through this speech; her betrothed was his usual self, although he did allow her a rare public smile, and with it, an indication that he wanted to see her privately.
Not that Fuchsia had much in the way of private time any more. The matter of the ceremony itself was outside her control; the only wedding she had ever attended had been that of Irma Prunesquallor to Professor Bellgrove, and despite the extravagance of Irma's gown and a decidedly lovely reception at the doctor's house, the ceremony itself had been quiet and private. She had to be married in front of the entirety of Gormenghast. Her brother would read the invocation, which went on for an hour. Her own vows seemed to cover at least five pages of tiny script, which made her gasp at the thought of what she might be promising, though she suspected it had a lot to do with upholding tradition. The worst part was contemplating reading this aloud in public. There would be original music; the laureate would compose an ode. And she would wear the gown her mother had worn when she married Sepulchrave Groan, Fuchsia's lamented father, over thirty years ago, and which numerous countesses of generations past had also worn. Fuchsia had never seen the dress, but the afternoon following her public betrothal, her mother had taken her to one of the family vaults, accompanied by a trio of maids and a dressmaker.
The gown had stood there on its form since Gertrude's wedding, covered with a large cloth which the countess twitched off to reveal an impossibly ornate dress in pale ivory silk, with a fitted bodice and an immense skirt whose circumference seemed to fill the room. The silk was covered with handstitched embroidery flowers and other heraldic motifs, as well as intricate beadwork. The train, of sheer white and iridescent gold fabrics, was at least twenty-five feet long; the veil was like a cloud around this impossible garment. This is what you'll wear, her mother told her unsentimentally. It'll have to be altered to fit you, of course, but we do have two weeks. Fuchsia figured it would take at least that long. She knew that the ceremony required her to hold hands with her husband through its duration and wondered how she would managed to reach him across the skirt. She tried to picture a younger version of her mother in this gown, and realized that the ivory and gold would have looked much more regal against her thick dark red curls than against Fuchsia's dead-black hair, which of course would have to be worn long and straight.
"We have to give some thought to your arrangements," her mother suggested.
"What arrangements?" Fuchsia wondered.
"Where you'll live, for example."
"Well, I'll go on living here, won't I?" Somehow it had not occured to her that marriage would involve much change in her life other than being able to acknowledge and speak to her husband in public.
"You will have to establish your own residence within the castle. You'll need rooms and furniture; you'll need a staff. Your fiance seems able to live without much in the way of material possessions but you can't and if he's to move into this household, then he has to accommodate its traditions. You're not living in anything that looks like that prison cell of an office."
"No, of course not," said Fuchsia, thinking wistfully of her attic. "Well, could my rooms be part of my residence?"
"There's no space around them to spare. And remember you'll have a child by the end of the year and your staff will have to expand then to accomodate at least a nurse. There are various apartments dating back to times when the royal family was larger; one of those could be opened and furnished. They have large windows and I believe rather good views of the mountains."
So a good part of Fuchsia's time was spent either standing in the dress, which was moved with its stand to the attic, while the dressmaker and her assistants made the necessary alterations and repairs, or touring what proved to be immense, chilly rooms and trying to imagine them with furniture in them. First they had to be divested of centuries of dust, then the floors and walls and windows were scoured, revealing some interesting frescoes and fine stained-glass work. The views of the mountains were a little foreboding, in fact, but the windowsills were broad enough to sit on and one room had a little balcony.
But that first night Fuchsia made her way to the secret room, and as always, the door opened almost on the first knock. She and Steerpike had not seen each other alone since before her pregnancy had been made an official, if secret issue. Now that he had been given his life, and he would never admit to her how terrified he had been during the moment of calculated risk, he felt a fierce desire for her that had only persisted and grown through the business of the day. He insisted to himself this was purely functional, a physiological response like thirst or hunger, heightened by having gone through this great fear. By her arrival it had been exacerbated to the extent that he could only think of getting her in the room and having her against the wall if necessary. Yet when he did see her, the fear returned in such a dreadful wave that he could do nothing. He kissed her lightly, almost experimentally, on the mouth, and she stared at him with her unreadable wideopen eyes then went to sit on the edge of the sofa and wait. When he reached her he was shaking so badly he almost collapsed into her arms and she clung to him, pulling him against her, crushing his damaged face into the warm crimson silk of her bodice, drawing them both back into the cushions. Over and over again he heard his own voice placing himself at Gertrude's mercy, and he would go to the rack but he would not tell Fuchsia that had been a genuine, not a calculated risk. Perhaps she guessed, however, and perhaps she loved him for it.
When the shaking subsided, he pushed himself up, taking most of his weight on one arm and with his free hand pushing up her skirt. Her eyes were luminous, feral. She raked her fingers back into his hair and pulled his face down to lock her mouth on his, and all the fierceness of his desire returned.
In the consequent wreckage of clothes and cushions, they lay on their backs, side by side, hands touching. He had learned to accept this aftermath part and felt himself drifting exhaustedly into a wholly relieved sleep. But she was alert, watching him, and at length she said, "Steerpike. I want you to tell me, and I want you to be honest: do you really want to marry me?"
"Yes," he replied sincerely. "Even though your family hates me and the entire castle probably has me under suspicion, I do want to marry you."
"My family doesn't hate you. My mother is giving me the dress she was married in, and is giving us apartments that belonged to one of the oldest branches of the royal family."
"I'm amazed she's letting us inhabit the same part of the castle. As far as she's concerned this wedding is strictly to save face. She wanted me dead yesterday."
Fuchsia said nothing, but she was intrigued by this admission. She glanced over at Steerpike, whose eyes were closed. He was very pale, and even in the dim light his scars seemed more vivid than ever, and she traced a fingertip around the worst of them.
"Do you wish I were better-looking?" he asked her quietly.
"No," she replied. She remembered her mother saying at the family meeting that she would see him hanging from the North Turret if he did prove to be the father, and she wondered why she had spared him after all, and permitted Fuchsia the right of mercy, knowing she would take it. And so she asked, "Were you really afraid of what my mother might do?"
He glanced over at her. "Yes."
"If she'd had you executed, everyone would have thought you raped me," said Fuchsia.
"I suppose so. I had to know what she believes. And now I know she doesn't believe that, and neither does your brother, much as they despise me. They simply think you were naive."
"But would you want to die thinking people believe such an awful thing of you? It was a horrible risk to take."
He smiled. "Wouldn't matter much, would it? I don't particularly care about my legacy, only what I can accomplish in this life." This was about four-fifths true, since it pleased him no end to think that now his blood would flow in the veins of a child of the Line, but that would have pleased him even if he had gone to the gallows. It was an unalterable fact. That he should now be marrying into the line was just icing on the cake.
"But it was a great risk," Fuchsia insisted.
"Yes. All right, it was," Steerpike admitted.
She leaned over him and with both hands continued stroking his face, and pushing her fingers back through his hair. He closed his eyes again and put his arms around her, drawing her down on top of him. "I love you very much," she said. "I feel very honoured to be having your child."
Fuchsia took to spending a lot of time in Prunesquallor's garden. She regretted that her house would have nothing much in the way of grounds, because she would have liked a retreat of this sort. Meanwhile, the ongoing painstaking process of altering and repairing her dress went on, and she was called upon to spend hours in the vast cold rooms or in various vaults, choosing things. Fuchsia liked acquiring things, and often invested them with immense value even if they were apparently useless and ugly: this was why her attic was full of portraits of long-forgotten people, toys she had long outgrown, books she embellished with her own drawings. But furniture was something she had simply always had in her rooms, and it had done for her, and she hadn't thought about it. She also realized that while on the one hand, the place had to look "regal", on the other Steerpike had very austere tastes, and a preference for the new. She debated asking the doctor's advice, or even Irma Bellgrove's, but finally decided not to take the trouble, to pick things on impulse, and if after they were married, Steerpike wanted to throw everything out and start over, let him.
Somewhere in the background, she realized, the wedding itself was being organized. She preferred not to think about that. The ceremony would take place outdoors, by the lake, and she would at dawn proceed from the castle with her brother, who at the moment seemed to be avoiding her. When the sun reached a precise spot (or after a certain lapse of time in cloudy weather), Titus would begin the invocation, and the ceremony itself would go on for something like two hours. Gertrude called it the ordeal, and through it she would be wearing the impossible dress. Fuchsia preferred to think about afterwards, about the baby.
The doctor found her inspecting the crocuses with the gardener one afternoon when the sun came out blazingly and hundreds of saffron blossoms suddenly scattered the lawn.
"My dear Lady Fuchsia, what a lovely surprise," he began.
"Do you mean me or the flowers?" She smiled radiantly from under her pleated paper sunshade. She took the arm he offered and they walked up and down the garden pathways.
"I am worried about you, Lady Fuchsia," said the doctor.
"Why?" Fuchsia twirled the stem of a tulip around between her fingers and stared off into some undefinable distance.
"My dear, I have known you longer than any living person except your mother; in fact, I delivered you when I was a raw young newly appointed personal physician to the House of Groan." The doctor smiled rather tightly at the memory; Gertrude's labours had been fierce and her verbal abuse during them imaginative. "And I am flattered that over the years you have made me your confidante. Growing up in a household with so few friends and so much expected of you can't have been easy, and you are a young woman of an intensely sensitive and loving nature who would have deserved much more. May I have permission to speak freely?"
"You always have with me," said Fuchsia.
"I wish I were happier about your marriage. Frankly, I agree with young Titus on this point: if you chose not to foster your child, then your mother should have claimed right of precedent and simply let you raise the child in the castle. I think you will take being a mother very seriously and that in itself is an enormous responsibility. I can't even conceive of it myself." The doctor could not help laughing at his own joke, but it was a nervous laugh, with many teeth revealed.
Fuchsia considered this; the idea had for a while appealed to her and then she had been appalled at herself for letting it appeal to her. "But how could I do that when I come into almost daily contact with the child's father? How could I do that to him?"
Prunesquallor could not see Steerpike viewing this pending arrival as anything other than a hazard of this affair he had entered into, or a wedge into the Groan household. "Do you even know that he likes the idea of having a child? His own childhood was no doubt profoundly unhappy in ways you and Titus couldn't imagine. Sometimes such people prefer a solitary life as adults."
"We'll be all right," said Fuchsia, smiling distantly.
Chapter 1 | Chapter 2 | Chapter 3 | Chapter 4 | Chapter 5 | Sequel | Table of Contents
Copyright 2000-04 by Gisèle Baxter; all rights to original narrative, characters and characterizations reserved. Do not reproduce without permission.
Last updated 2 August 2003 by G.M. Baxter.