The Prize Bride Read online

Prize Bride

  by John Ivor

  © Darling Newspaper Press

  All rights reserved.

  Published by Darling Newspaper Press

  [email protected]

  https://www.booktaste.com

  “YOU'LL love Ellen,” said Uncle Charlie. “She's a wonderful girl.” I recall how his eyes of Royal Navy Blue sparked at me, and how his chin jiggled in merry arrogance, as if about to fight the Frogs or the blasted Yankees.

  Wonderful girl. A creature of wonder indeed, I thought without giving reply, a wondrous heroine of fantasy. And, possibly, a total fiction in uncle's striving, optimistic imagination.

  Ellen the young, Ellen the fair, Ellen the saviour of my stilted career, perhaps, now I was shorebound at 28 years of age without a prospect. Ellen the lovably wealthy, whose daddy owned half of India.

  We Stirlings, traditional strivers, had some peculiar family traits. Rapaciously foremost among these was a fervour to marry for money. I encountered it after the peace treaty of 1815 put an end to Britain's rampages against America. This curtailed my quest for prize money on the high seas, alas, before I had collected much more than the price of my uniform.

  I was young then and given to flights of fancy, and was persuaded by Uncle Charlie’s alluring strategy: “A bold boarding, lad, wins the prize. Chin up, Jim boy, and follow me.”

  Lacking only cutlass and pistol, he led on, his wide, white-breeched backside preceding me across the portico, and up the steps to the mansion’s magnificent entry and the prize that was named Ellen. Down on the gravel driveway, a yardboy was attending our horses.

  Uncle's mood said swing-rope and at ’em, and many was the time I had shared his pre-battle euphoria. Unwavering was he. Predatory. Irrepressible. Like him, I could be all of these, but not now. Not here in the genteel English countryside.

  Here on Ellen’s doormat, threshold of my greatest opportunity, I was reduced to jelly-kneed panic by mere thought of the desired maiden. Did I say her father owned only half of India? He was looting the other half under voracious trading contracts imposed by the British Raj. The filthy-rich status of Ellen’s pa put her a stretch beyond even my extended ambitions.

  My fears had grown progressively worse as our nags trotted closer to the square-rigged hedges that marked the boundary of the vast Mangles lair. We had been on the estate for more than 10 miles, a ride that took us through four villages and wide horizons of pasture, like a green ocean where cows and sheep floated in a vista shimmering to the high distance.

  With each new evidence of the endless wealth, my confidence had sagged another knot, even though Uncle referred to his old chum as Manglewangles, a schoolboy nickname from long ago.

  “The Wangler can fix anything,” he promised. “He's looking forward to meeting you.”

  “And fixing me?”

  “His daughter will save your career. She’s a pretty little thing. Writes poetry, and she paints.”

  “What makes you think she’ll have me?”

  I had finally blurted the treacherous doubt that frightened me at first sight of the magnificent rural palace. Fountained, formal gardens stretched before it to an undulating crest of the rich-green landwaves that were typically Sussex. Ever since the days of the Roman Conquest, this part of England had been secured and settled by the most influential families of their era. The Mangles were latecomers, having clawed their way in by means of lucrative trading. But lacking a few hundred years of nobility only hardened their determined resolve to stay at the top.

  “I'm just a sailor, uncle, that’s all I know. Boats and battle. While she is certain to be sophisticated. County elite. Superior friends. She’ll turn up her nose. What chance have I got?”

  He was in uniform. Epaulettes and brass buttons, the lot. Uncle liked to make an impression. My cowardly query caused him to glower and to raise his blue-sleeved sabre arm. “Same chance, Jim boy, as we had at Trafalgar.”

  “Those odds were better. The French fell into your trap.”

  “Okay, same chance you welcomed without quibble, lad, at New Orleans.”

  “We lost that one.”

  “And yet, your gunboat smashed the American forts. You personally were victorious. Strive! Jim boy, the vital thing is to strive.”

  This was true enough. Stirlings are strivers. Win or lose, we strive. Yes, along with marrying into wealth, it is a family custom. Now my striving genes and a matchmaking uncle were tossing me into the game of matrimony against an heiress I had never met, and me a junior sea captain on half-pay. The peace with America had pulverised my promising career. Even my clothes today were borrowed and my shirt stank of cow dung.

  Unlike uncle, I did not own a uniform that was totally free of grease, tar stains and patched powder-burns, so I had been rigged in his footman’s Sunday best. The laced white shirt was a tight fit but impeccably clean, apart from that dung stain. This had been the only casualty in a barnyard ambush half a mile back.

  It was an unfortunate fact that in four years of post-war recession the English peasants had become politically bold and demanding, and their children abusive. An urchin, whom I supposed to be poisoned by the legend of Wat Tyler, hurled a cowpat. The hasty missile broke upon my chest, spattering the ruffed lace with excreta.

  Thereby the dung-slinging waif had made a statement. England entering the 1820s held sullen memories of the recent revolutions in France. Now, covetous upstarts were rioting for something better, and organising marches, rejecting the traditional class structure that made Britain strong.

  In boots of knee-length rubber, tauntingly worthy of Wellington himself, the enemy today had cackled gleeful triumph. And got clean away. A clod-squelching sprint to the rear of the barn. Brushing my fingers at the muck only caused it to spread deeper into the lace.

  “Leave it to dry,” Uncle had advised, which I did. Now I could shake most of it off the shirtfront, but there lingered a terrible stink. Even without this embarrassment, the footman’s clothes would have made me feel like a flunky when presented to the prestigious Ellen.

  “She'll screw up her nose and talk down to me, uncle. I’m scared.”

  “She is your salvation, Jim boy. Go for it.”

  And thus, with a dirty shirt and a mental mix of hope, jitters and desperation, I followed my uncle into the bastion where the tender Ellen awaited as both challenge and prize.

  A BUTLER in bare feet bowed us a welcome, his hands pressed palm to palm, fingers level with his nose. His white sarong, crimson sash and green waistcoat, with pearl buttons no less, would have been incongruous anywhere but in the palladian finery which extended before my eyes.

  We were in a vast baronial hall built to receive the populations of surrounding villages, but in these modern times it held, instead, an exotic panorama of the world’s wonders. No medieval shields, banners or battleaxes remained among the vast domes. The only vulgar boast now was of Mangles’ global connections, his trophies, his treasures. The priceless, the tasteless, the academic, and the macabre.

  The butler, thin and black as tarred rope, began gesticulating on the trot, trying to overtake and announce Uncle Charlie, who was charging across marbled paving towards a Moorish arch in the far shadows.

  But I paused, a stranger to the marvels amid the soaring Doric columns. From behind one of these Grecian antiquities a stuffed tiger snarled silently at me. A befeathered totem pole added its garish ritual carvings. There was more, much more.

  Vivid masks and lengthy blowpipes adorned one wall while, against another, foreign gods and goddesses writhed in erotic statuary. Along a high shelf there danced a row of wooden figures, their extended tongues drooping, while, at an opposite angle, reared exaggerated genitalia.

  Startled, I backed away, bumping
against a jade pedestal, grabbing at its dislodged exhibit and recoiling when I recognised what it was: a human head, shrunken and wrinkled, glaring back at me with glass eyes.

  A weird welcome indeed to my anticipated Opportunity. Could this really be the home of sweet Ellen? Just what sort of a demon was her papa?

  My doubts and fears intensified, when, over at the Arabian arch, I spotted a striking array of pictures displayed in silver frames against the dark velvet wallpaper, identical in their subject. A clearer examination confirmed my first impression of a swollen human penis, yes, semi tumescent, and tinted in flesh tones.

  There were six of them, charcoal drawings with watercolour overlay. In each case the penis was presented half erect on a background of unshaded white card, as if to emphasise its swollen promise from different angles, variously pendulous or rising, smoothly hard, or skinfolded into wrinkles.

  Mesmerised, I peered at the collection, admiring the artist’s undoubted skill yet puzzled why anyone would want to depict and exhibit such strange pornography.

  And what must chaste Ellen think of the obscenity? How could any father expose his innocent child to such blatant filth?

  “My daughter’s work, sir. Is it good art?”

  The speaker was framed by a carved marble portal of palatial magnificence worthy of Andalucia’s historic Alhambra. Maybe that was where it had been looted. He certainly looked like a looter, tall and full-bellied as a sail in a gale. He had ushered uncle through, and now pressed towards me his inquisitive squarish face.

  He had a generous mouth, I noted, the kind that knows its whiskies, and a brown smile that revealed over-familiarity with Havanas. A grabber. Smart dealer. Obviously the Wangler in the flesh. He who had amassed this stupefying collection of the bizarre. I glanced again at the obscene pictures. “I confess sir the, er, the artwork gives me more mystery than enjoyment.” It was the simple truth. The work of his daughter? Thus confused, I added, “And perhaps, sir, anatomically speaking, a bit misleading.”

  “By god, anything but that.” His eyebrows flared. “What d’you mean by misleading? Every inch, sir, and each fat wrinkle is enticing as can possibly be.”

  “The subject is so, er, unattached.”

  “Torres Straiters,” said the Wangler with a frown. “They don't have attachments as far as I know, but I'll ask young Ellen to take another look.”

  A weak smile accompanied my uncertain nod as I followed him through the intricate pillars into a room that was furnished more traditionally. Although tasteless as anything in the museum I had just passed through, its style was undoubtedly Wealthy English.

  “Aye sir, every inch and wrinkle,” persisted Mangles at my shoulder. “The Chinese chew them voraciously. Yes indeedy, we’re working on different images to get the best penetration. Market factors are so complex over there and reliable statistics difficult to come by. Stiff or flaccid, as Shakespeare would say, that is the thousand guinea question.”

  He squinted at me as if I might have the thousand guinea answer. “Colouring’s vital also y’know. The reddish tones appeal in China ― it is good luck or healthy or something. Ellen paid particular attention to the colour because the chows believe all that superstitious muck. According to Confucius, one wall poster is worth a thousand words. With the right posters I’m going to conquer China. There’s big money to be made in the New Empire.”

  My polite grunt blended disbelief, bafflement, and an attempt to change the subject. “Er, I didn't think China was in the New Empire, sir.”

  He winked. “Not yet.”

  We were in a large study, walls lined with maps, and Uncle Charlie was waiting beside the decanters. “My nephew,” he grunted. “James Mangles meet Jim Stirling, Royal Navy of course.”

  “Naturally.” Mangles beckoned the hovering barefoot butler to pour drinks.

  “You are making a mistake with those posters,” Uncle growled, never a man to tolerate lewdness. But then to my amazement he added: “They should be shrivelled and black and have green warts. When dried, they’re nothing like what you are advertising.”

  “No, Charles, black is out of the question, puts people off, kills appetite.” The Wangler sipped his sherry. “China trade demands red, fat and virile. That is what sells. Ellen sketched ’em from the real thing.”

  Glaring at me, he appealed: “It’s not really misleading is it? Young Ellen and her mother flogged themselves to achieve the perfect position, the most tempting bite. Long life and good fortune in a brush stroke. Posters sell the product, Captain Jim. I’ll bet you never suspected it was the Adonis Label, above all else, that scored a coup for my Ceylonese High Jinks Primeleaf Tea.”

  “I never did,” I replied with total truth.

  A rumble came from Uncle, causing the butler to hurriedly replenish his brandy goblet. “Keep your price down and you’ll not need fancy marketing. There’s no need for consumer identification, not with seaslugs.”

  “Seaslugs!” I shouted. My face must have turned the colour popular in China. As they gaped, I gulped my sherry.

  Uncle announced: “When I was in the East ― humble second lieutenant then ― the Malays sailed whole fleets to dive for the vile things. Called them trepang. And the Chinese junks waited at the nearest port to buy every blessed one. Advertising? Waste of time. Seaslugs sell themselves.”

  As Uncle held forth on the demerits of advertising, the Wangler took my elbow and turned me to face a scab-kneed child who, while we were talking, had clomped in wearing oversized boots on her sticklike legs. Wellington boots.

  A tattered bandage swathed one muddy elbow, her hair was tangled as coral weed, and a streak of cowdung slashed across both freckled cheeks like a horrid scar.

  “My daughter Ellen. Prettiest flower of the bunch.”

  “She’s big for twelve,” Uncle blared with an anxious glance my way.

  My hand went unbidden to the spattered shirtfront as I glared my accusation. Betrayed! The alleged heiress was a grubby, mud-haired, shit-hurling brat.

  What happens next?

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR. A journalist migrant to Western Australia with his young family, John Ivor became fascinated by the state’s unusual history. This led to six novels, researched at the Alexander Library Archives in Perth. Here he discovered a treasure trove of personal diaries, old government reports, and newspapers long out of print yet crammed with human drama.

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