Clare Avery: A Story of the Spanish Armada

by Emily Sarah Holt

A good deal more of either than Barbara imagined. She knew that Walter had been her father’s name, and she was well aware that “Mistress Walter” from Barbara’s lips, indicated her mother. She knew that her mother had married again, and that she lived a long way off. She knew also that this mother of hers was no favourite with Barbara. And from this conversation she gathered, that in the event of something happening—but what that was she did not realise—she was to go and live with her mother. Clare was an imaginative child, and the topic of all her dreams was this mysterious mother whom she had never seen. Many a time, when Barbara only saw that she was quietly dressing or hushing her doll, Clare’s mind was at work, puzzling over the incomprehensible reason of Barbara’s evident dislike to her absent mother. What shocking thing could she have done, thought Clare, to make Bab angry with her? Had she poisoned her sister, or drowned the cat, or stolen the big crown off the Queen’s head? For the romance of a little child is always incongruous and sensational.

In truth, there was nothing sensational, and little that was not commonplace, about the character and history of little Clare’s mother, whose maiden name was Orige Williams. She had been the spoilt child of a wealthy old Cornish gentleman,—the pretty pet on whom he lavished all his love and bounty, never crossing her will from the cradle. And she repaid him, as children thus trained often do, by crossing his will in the only matter concerning which he much cared. He had set his heart on her marrying a rich knight whose estate lay contiguous to his own: while she, entirely self-centred, chose to make a runaway match with young Lieutenant Avery, whose whole year’s income was about equal to one week of her father’s rent-roll. Bitterly disappointed, Mr Williams declared that “As she had made her bed, so she should lie on it;” for not one penny would he ever bestow on her while he lived, and he would bequeath the bulk of his property to his nephew. In consequence of this threat, which reached, her ears, Orige, romantic and high-flown, fancied herself at once a heroine and a martyr, when there was not in her the capacity for either. In the sort of language in which she delighted, she spoke of herself as a friendless orphan, a sacrifice to love, truth, and honour. It never seemed to occur to her that in deceiving her father—for she had led him to believe until the last moment that she intended to conform to his wishes—she had acted both untruthfully and dishonourably; while as to love, she was callous to every shape of it except love of self.

For about eighteen months Walter and Orige Avery lived at Bradmond, during which time Clare was born. She was only a few weeks old when the summons came for her father to rejoin his ship. He had been gone two months, when news reached Bradmond of a naval skirmish with the Spaniards off the Scilly Isles, in which great havoc had been made among the Queen’s forces, and in the list of the dead was Lieutenant Walter Avery.

Now Orige’s romance took a new turn. She pictured herself as a widowed nightingale, love-lorn and desolate, leaning her bleeding breast upon a thorn, and moaning forth her melancholy lay. As others have done since, she fancied herself poetical when she was only silly. And Barbara took grim notice that her handkerchief was perpetually going up to tearless eyes, and that she was not a whit less particular than usual to know what there was for supper.

For six whole months this state of things lasted. Orige arrayed herself in the deepest sables; she spoke of herself as a wretched widow who could never taste hope again; and of her baby as a poor hapless orphan, as yet unwitting of its misery. She declined to see any visitors, and persisted in being miserable and disconsolate, and in taking lonely walks to brood over her wretchedness. And at the end of that time she electrified her husband’s family—all but one—by the announcement that she was about to marry again. Not for love this time, of course; no, indeed!—but she thought it was her duty. Sir Thomas Enville—a widower with three children—had been very kind; and he would make such a good father for Clare. He had a beautiful estate in the North. It would be a thousand pities to let the opportunity slip. Once for all, she thought it her duty; and she begged that no one would worry her with opposition, as everything was already settled.

Kate Avery, Walter’s elder and only surviving sister, was exceedingly indignant. Her gentle, unsuspicious mother was astonished and puzzled. But Mr Avery, after a momentary look of surprise, only smiled.

“Nay, but this passeth!” (surpasses belief) cried Kate.

“Even as I looked for it,” quietly said her father. “I did but think it should maybe have been somewhat later of coming.”

“Her duty!” broke out indignant Kate. “Her duty to whom?”

“To herself, I take it,” said he. “To Clare, as she counteth. Methinks she is one of those deceivers that do begin with deceiving of themselves.”