Slammerkin - Emma Donoghue [127]
He spent his time fretting.
He had read all the right literature. He had paid good money for volumes with titles like Aristotle's Masterpiece and Conjugal Love; he kept them in a locked drawer in this very desk, so as not to cause scandal among the servants. Between their covers he had gleaned much wisdom, such as: never perform your duty on an empty stomach. Or, a woman who lies on top will give birth to a dwarf. Thomas Jones considered himself a conscientious husband. He watched his wife for the sure signs of pregnancy: thickened ankles and a swollen vein under the eye. He did his best to give her pleasure, because without it, he knew, a woman never conceived.
But these days he had the feeling she was lost to him.
Mary Saunders had been making little stifled exclamations for some time. Now she jabbed at the ledger with her stubby quill. 'Twenty-two pounds, five and sixpence!'
He leant over to read the total. 'Ah. The Morgans.'
'They haven't paid you a penny in fourteen months.'
Mr. Jones licked his lips. 'Is it so long? Well, the Honourable Member is a busy man.'
'His wife swans in here every month.'
'Mary.' He sighed. 'You don't seem to realise the difficulty of our position. Such patrons must not be pressed.'
'Are you a worm under their boots?'
Mr. Jones gave her a very cold look, and she bit her lip. He tapped the ledger to indicate that she should carry on with the accounts.
He wondered where his wife was now. Sewing away in the shop, no doubt, her needle moving as fast as a swallow. She always let him know when she was going out to a patron's house, and informed him of what she'd told Abi to serve for dinner. And whenever he asked after her health, she would say, 'Very well, thank you, my dear,' or mention some trivial face-ache or stye. But for a long time now she hadn't told him anything that mattered. Above all, she didn't explain why she always seemed to fall asleep between the hour they retired to their room and the moment he climbed into bed after her.
Mr. Jones was not an excessively demanding man. Not as far as he knew. In the old days, for instance, whenever his wife was pregnant, he'd quite understood the importance of refraining, so the child wouldn't be shaken in the womb. Those had been burdensome times, but at least he had felt that he and Jane were at one, conspirators in a thrilling enterprise; their eyes might meet above the tea-kettle, and he would take a long scalding drink and know that all this self-command would be worth it in the end. After they'd lost Grandison last year, they had tried again at once, but it came to nothing, and then he hadn't wanted to put Jane to the trial again so soon. But the months had gone by, and still she didn't turn to him in bed, or so rarely that he hardly even remembered the last time. He didn't want to press her, but considering her age, their time was running out. And to wait, as he now did, without knowing when or why, was more than he could stand.
A terrible thought struck him. Had it not, in fact, been understood between them that they did indeed mean to try again? Perhaps Jane was worn out. Perhaps she had given up, without ever saying the words. And who was he to oblige her to hope again? What did he know of the dreadful disappointments of a woman's body?
He could hear Hetta in the passageway, bumping into something over and over, and laughing. Heaven knew, he was grateful for her. But a daughter, no matter how devoted to her parents, was only theirs for a time; she would marry into another family and bear children with another name. Was it presumptuous to long also for one single son? A son that would inherit the business, and support his parents when they were too old to work? It was a lot to ask, but he asked it. It was part of his quiet bargain with the Maker. It was the triumphant future for which the boy Thomas