“Where did you get these—these clothes?” he asked.
“Out of the old chests,” said she. “You like me thus? . . . love me?”
For answer he hugged her to him and they went on into the kitchen linked arm in arm. Martha in her astonishment let the cauldron spill all over the floor and the idiot daughter threw a fit.
The drugget dress disappeared after that. Teresa rifled the chests and got some marvelous results. The chests held the hoardings of a century, samples of every fashion, washed in from wrecks on the Twelve Apostles, wardrobes of officers’ mistresses bound for the garrison at Tangier, of proud ladies that went down with Indiamen, packet ships, and vessels sailing for the Virginia Colony. Jackdaw pickings that generations of Penhale women had been too modest to wear and too feminine to part with. Gowns, under gowns, bodices, smocks and stomachers of silk, taffeta, sarsenet and satin of all hues and shapes, quilted, brocaded, embroidered, pleated, scalloped and slashed; cambric and holland ruffs, collars, bands, kerchiefs and lappets; scarves, trifles of lace pointed and godrooned; odd gloves of cordovan leather, heavily fringed; vamped single shoes, red heeled; ribbons; knots; spangled garters; feathers and fans.
The clothes were torn and faded in patches, eaten by moth, soiled and rusted by salt water, but Teresa cared little; they were treasure-trove to her, the starveling. She put them all on in turn (as the Penhale wives had done before her—but in secret) without regard to fit, appropriateness or period and with the delight of a child dressing up for a masquerade. She dressed herself differently every evening—even wearing articles with showy linings inside out—aiming only at a blaze of color and spending hours in the selection.
The management of the house she left entirely to Martha, which was wise enough, seeing she knew nothing of houses. John coming in of an evening never knew what was in store for him; it gave life an added savour. He approached Adam and Eve, his heart a-flutter—what would she be like this time?—opened the low door and stepped within. And there she would be, standing before the hearth waiting for him, mischievous and radiant, brass earrings winking, a knot of ribbons in her raven curls, dressed in scarlet, cream, purple or blue, cloth of gold or silver lace—all worn and torn if you came to examine closely, but, in the leaping firelight, gorgeous.
Sometimes she would spend the evening wooing him, sidling into his arms, rubbing with her cheek and purring in her cat fashion; and sometimes she would take her guitar and, sitting cross-legged before the hearth, sing the songs by which she had made her living. Pretty, innocent twitters for the most part, laments to cruel Chloes, Phyllises and Celias in which despairing Colins and Strephons sang of their broken hearts in tripping, tuneful measures; morris and country airs she gave also and patriotic staves—
“Tho’ the Spaniards invade
Our Int’rest and Trade
And often our Merchant-men plunder,