The Silk House : A Novel (2020)

by Nunn, Kayte

  She clapped twice, and was pleased to see that the effect was almost instantaneous silence and eyes turned her way. ‘I’ve met most of you now, and am delighted to be your housemistress until Mrs Jackson has recovered from her unfortunate accident,’ she said, surveying their eager faces. ‘I’ll also be taking some of you for history, and for those among you who are hockey enthusiasts, I’ll be assisting the sports master, Mr Pope, in forming a mixed team. I’d encourage you all to try out.’ She watched several of the girls – Fenella, Joy and Morgan in particular – as she said this, remembering the details of their sporting skills, and was pleased to see them react to the news with enthusiastic smiles.

  ‘You’ve got a big day ahead of you tomorrow, so after we are finished here, I expect you to return to your rooms to finish unpacking, and lights out will be at nine-thirty.’ There was a groan as she said this but she held up a hand. ‘I know most of you have boarded before, but for those of you who haven’t, an early bedtime is a rule we strictly enforce here.’ She noted their seemingly guileless expressions. ‘We also ask that you all place your mobile phones in the charging station at the end of the dining room. They will stay at the house during lesson times and you will be allowed access to them after school every afternoon. I’m sure most of you have noticed the smart alarm in your rooms – it will wake you and alert you to mealtimes and so on. Your rooms must be kept tidy and beds made before you come down to breakfast. Tomorrow morning I will walk you all over to school and show you to your classrooms. Does anyone have any questions?’

  There was a murmur of voices but no one raised their hand, so she resumed her seat. There were so many more rules to get her head around than she was used to but, aside from the early bedtime, most of the girls seemed unperturbed by them.

  She was about to reach for the water jug when a crashing sound made her jump and silenced the chatter. She turned to see Fenella, a worried look on her face, shards of broken glass at her feet.

  ‘I didn’t touch it, honestly,’ she muttered, embarrassment colouring her features.

  Thea got to her feet, but the woman from the kitchen who had served their meal was quicker, descending with a cloth in her hands. ‘Don’t worry,’ she said with a sympathetic look. ‘Accidents happen.’

  As the woman moved to collect the glass, Thea caught the blurred blue of a tattoo on her left wrist, the flash of a shape that looked like an arrow.

  Quarter of an hour before lights out, Thea did the rounds of the girls’ rooms, pleased to see that most of them were in bed, reading or quietly chatting. When she reached Fenella’s room, she was greeted by a maelstrom of clothes and books strewn across the bed and on the floor.

  ‘It looks worse than it is, I promise,’ Fenella said, casting around dispiritedly at the mess.

  ‘How about I give you a hand?’ said Thea. ‘That way we’ve half a chance of creating some order in the next ten minutes.’

  Fenella folded the pile of clothes on her bed and together they straightened the books and papers.

  ‘You were right,’ said Thea when they had finished. ‘It wasn’t as bad as it seemed. Now try to get a good night’s sleep. I know it’ll be strange at first, but don’t worry, we’ll all get used to it. I’m sorry you’re without a roommate, as Camilla’s sick, but it does give you more space to yourself for a while.’

  Fenella shrugged as if it didn’t matter one way or the other.

  ‘You know, you’re not the only one who’s never boarded before,’ Thea added. ‘I’m new to it all too.’ She was reassured to see a small smile from the girl as she went to leave. ‘And I’m only down the hall if you need anything.’

  Returning to the kitchen after lights out, Thea ran into Dame Hicks. ‘I missed you at supper – ’ Thea began.

  ‘I thought I mentioned: I take my meals in my room,’ the Dame interrupted, her tone brooking no objections.

  ‘Oh, okay then.’ Thea didn’t recall her saying anything about that, but didn’t see that it was worth questioning. ‘I’m going to get an early night. We all need to be on our toes tomorrow. Can’t have the girls being late to school on their first morning,’ she said, realising that the responsibility for that now fell to her.

  ‘Exactly.’

  ‘Good night, then.’

  Thea climbed the two floors to her room, a dim nightlight was all that illuminated the corridor. She stumbled to her bed and found the lamp, cursing as she nearly knocked it over. She clicked the switch and was relieved when the room was light again.

  Thea woke suddenly, in the dark, early hours of the morning. She lay still for a moment, thinking she’d heard a sound. She sat up in bed and listened again for a clue as to what might have roused her from sleep. There it was again. The distant notes of a piano. She had seen the instrument in the girls’ sitting room on the ground floor, but she couldn’t believe that any of them would be up playing at this time. Then footsteps, a muffled cry. Alarmed, she reached for her dressing gown and thrust her feet into her slippers. Using the torch on her phone, she eased the door of her room open and crept into the hallway, listening carefully.

  A shushing, whispering sound. She took a few steps towards the door of Fenella’s room and paused. No noise coming from there. She went towards the top of the stairs. Nothing. Then footsteps once more, louder this time. She inched her way down the stairs, wincing as one of the treads creaked under her weight, her heart thudding against her chest.

  Stopping on the first-floor landing, Thea listened again for the footsteps, but the sound had stopped, disappearing into the shadows. Had she imagined it?

  Then suddenly she felt something brush against her bare legs and she nearly jumped out of her skin. She looked down: there was a shadow at her feet.

  Her heart rate slowed to normal as she realised it was only Isis.

  As she crept down the main stairs towards the kitchen, there was the chink of glass, the soft thud of a cupboard door closing. She turned on the light and there she was, standing by the sink, frozen in the act of getting a glass of water.

  Thea let go of the breath she had been holding. ‘Fenella,’ she whispered, mindful of the sleeping house.

  ‘Thirsty,’ the girl said, holding up the glass. ‘Sorry, did I wake you? I was trying to be quiet. I promise I won’t break this one.’ She gave her a rueful look.

  ‘It’s fine.’

  Fenella gulped some of the water as Thea reached for her own glass. As she opened the cupboard door, a cloud of tiny moths fluttered out and she jumped, startled, as she waved them away with her hand. ‘Ugh.’ She filled her glass at the sink. ‘It’s not easy, sleeping on your first night in a new place.’

  ‘I’ll be okay.’

  ‘Sure?’

  Fenella nodded.

  ‘Try to get some rest, then.’

  When Thea returned to her room, she found the door shut. She thought she had left it ajar when she went downstairs, but it was now firmly closed. She turned the handle, pushing hard as the door stuck in its frame before it swung open. She looked around the room as she entered. Everything was as she’d left it, but she couldn’t shake the feeling that someone had been in there in her absence. A disturbance in the air, the faint scent of flowers … Her imagination was working overtime.

  She climbed back into bed, but sleep was frustratingly elusive. Eventually, she resorted to a podcast – on Egyptian antiquities, the most boring one she could find – and let the disembodied voice lull her into oblivion.

  As the girls assembled in the dining room the next morning, adjusting ties and doing up the stiff buttons of their new blazers and overcoats, Thea prepared to walk them over to the school. ‘I’ll show you where your lockers are and take you to your classrooms and from there you’ll go to chapel. You should already have your individual timetables,’ she said, before being interrupted by a loud knock on the front door.

  ‘Just a minute, girls,’ she called over her shoulder as she moved to open it.

  Standing in front of her was a tall
, dark-haired man, a camera with a large flash slung around his neck. ‘Jeff Damer, official school photographer,’ he said, thrusting a card under her nose.

  ‘Oh,’ said Thea, taken aback. ‘No one mentioned this.’

  ‘I was told to get a few frames of the girls on their first day. For the annual report, you know.’

  Thea didn’t know, but his card bore the school crest and so she stepped aside to let him in. ‘How long will this take?’ she asked, thinking anxiously of the time.

  ‘Only a jiffy,’ he said, giving her a smile that showed a set of higgledy-piggledy teeth.

  ‘All right, then,’ she said. ‘Everyone’s in the dining room, to the left.’

  ‘Hello ladies,’ he said brightly, as all of the girls stopped their chatter and turned to look at him.

  ‘This is Jeff.’ Thea introduced him. ‘He needs a quick photo for the school’s records, if you could oblige him.’ She turned to the photographer. ‘It’s a bit dim in here; perhaps outside in the garden might work?’

  He nodded enthusiastically. ‘Super.’

  ‘Er … girls?’ Without exception, all of the girls had pushed their chairs back and were making their way out of the room and up the stairs. ‘The garden’s not that way,’ she added.

  ‘Just got to make sure we look okay,’ said Aradia, brushing past her. ‘If I’d known about this, I’d have got up earlier to straighten my hair,’ she complained.

  Thea sighed, exasperated. ‘Be quick,’ she called after them. ‘We cannot be late this morning.’

  After ten minutes or so, while Thea fretted over the time, the girls trooped back down the stairs, looking, to Thea’s eyes at least, no different than when they had left.

  ‘All right, stand in three lines, against that wall there if you would.’ Jeff directed the girls into formation. ‘You too, Miss,’ he said, motioning for Thea to join them. As he was about to start snapping, Thea glanced across to her left and saw Dame Hicks standing on the other side of Fenella and gave her a quick smile.

  Jeff was as good as his word, and wrapped up the impromptu photo shoot in under five minutes. ‘Hurry up, girls,’ said Thea as she waved him away. ‘We need to leave right now. Collect your bags and we’ll get moving.’

  Thea had woken early specifically to study the school map, for the grounds were extensive and she still wasn’t sure where all of the classrooms were located. ‘You’ll all be familiar with the layout of the school from when you came for orientation, but each of you has been assigned a guide from among the boys in your year,’ she said as they walked along the high street.

  Aradia wrinkled her nose at this.

  ‘Don’t worry,’ she said. ‘I’m sure they’ll be friendly, and you’ll soon find your way around. I believe there is also a map, among other instructions, waiting for you.’

  ‘Will we all be in the same class, Miss Rust?’ asked Joy, a quiet girl who wore blue-framed glasses and a serious expression.

  ‘No, not for the first period of the day, but you will be in two all-girl pastoral groups, and then of course for your academic subjects you’ll be in different groups. It’s important that you mix in with the boys, even though there are far fewer of you than them. It’ll all become normal in a very short time, I’m sure,’ she said, doing her best to reassure them as they passed through the school gates.

  When they reached the block housing the senior classrooms, Thea consulted her list. ‘Fenella, Aradia, Sabrina and Morgan.’ She checked they had heard her. ‘The four of you are in Dr Adams’s class, up those stairs there.’

  The girls went in the direction she indicated and she carried on with the other nine, depositing them at their classrooms in turn. Congratulating herself on successfully completing the first job of the day, Thea made her way to the staffroom, running into Claire on the way.

  ‘Getting your bearings?’

  Thea nodded. ‘I think so.’ She adjusted the bag on her shoulder. ‘My first lesson isn’t until ten, but I feel like I should go over my notes again one more time.’

  ‘You’ll be fine. It took me a while to get used to the place.’

  ‘I know,’ Thea said. ‘That’s exactly what I told the girls; I should listen to my own advice.’ She rummaged in her bag. ‘Ouch!’ She withdrew her hand and saw that she’d managed to nick the skin on her thumb. ‘Paper cut,’ she explained, sucking on the blood that welled up from it.

  ‘There are plasters in the first-aid kit somewhere, I think,’ said Claire. ‘Come with me.’ They walked into the staffroom, where Claire lifted a large black box from a shelf on the far wall.

  ‘Everything okay?’ It was Gareth Pope, the sports master.

  ‘Just clumsy,’ said Thea with a wry smile as she stretched the Band-Aid over her thumb. ‘But it’s all sorted now.’ She crumpled the wrapper in her other hand and tossed it in a nearby wastepaper basket. ‘Right. I’d better go and find my classroom,’ she said, squaring her shoulders. ‘See you later.’

  There were ten pupils in Thea’s A Level history class, including three of the new girls: Sabrina, Morgan and Fenella. Thea introduced herself and then listened as the students told her their names. Most regarded her with curiosity, a couple with a faint challenge in their eyes as if they were waiting for her to prove herself. ‘Okay, then. Why study history?’

  A couple of hands shot up.

  ‘To know what happened in the past?’ offered one of the boys. Edward, she thought he had said his name was.

  A snicker went around the room.

  ‘It might sound obvious, but Edward is right,’ said Thea.

  ‘To prevent us from making the same mistakes in the future,’ said Sabrina.

  ‘Though people and civilisations don’t always do that,’ said a boy named James.

  ‘True.’ She smiled at him. ‘Anyone else?’

  ‘To balance understanding and knowledge and to learn to think independently,’ said Fenella.

  ‘Good,’ said Thea. ‘That’s a start. And what is the first rule of historical analysis?’

  ‘No one is impartial, not even a participant or witness,’ said Fenella again. ‘There are two sides to every story.’

  ‘Sometimes more than that.’ Thea thought of her father. He had been held in such high esteem, but her feelings about him were rather more complicated. The face he’d presented to the rest of the world was different from the one he showed at home. He hadn’t always been an easy person to be around; he had little patience for shortcomings of any kind, and she and her sister had spent their early years terrified of disappointing him. He had been known to lash out in frustration if he thought Thea or Pip weren’t trying hard enough, and she had been on the end of many a humiliating whack to the shoulder or backside when she was small. As she got older, she’d become better at burying feelings of inadequacy, but they were still there, a knot in her stomach whenever she faced a new challenge, the fear that she might fail and he would be proved right.

  She swallowed and looked around the classroom; now was not the time to dwell on such things. ‘There are the known facts. And then there is the interpretation of those facts. We have to examine the situation from every angle, sift and analyse the material – primary and secondary sources – to gain a thorough understanding of events and determine their importance, before arriving at a conclusion,’ she said.

  Sabrina’s hand shot up. ‘Isn’t it a bit like peeling away the layers of an onion, to get at the central truth?’

  A few of the other students nodded.

  ‘It can be,’ agreed Thea, though she couldn’t help thinking that sometimes you kept on peeling until nothing certain, nothing true was left.

  TEN

  December 1768, London

  Mary tucked her sheaf of drawings, embroidery samples and dot patterns under her arm and prepared to knock on the door of every master weaver on Spital Square, Old Artillery Ground and beyond.

  Few would admit her.

  Some drew their shutters at her approach, as if they had be
en forewarned of her purpose. Others – especially the French weavers – pretended not to understand her. Most scoffed at the notion that a woman might have the required artistry and technical understanding, and refused to let her so much as open her sketchbook. Those who did take a glancing look at her designs dismissed her scornfully: ‘Who would pay to be dressed in the flowers of the field?’ was the comment from more than one. ‘What is embroidered cannot so easily be woven, surely you must understand that,’ said another. She was given no opportunity to argue her case.

  The light was fading by the time she found herself back at home at the end of her second week of knocking on doors. She dragged her blistered feet up the steps and flung her sketches to the floor in anger as her sister approached. ‘Why did I even think this would amount to anything?’ she cried, as Frances’s hopeful expression turned to one of dismay.

  ‘Oh my dear,’ Frances replied, taking in Mary’s slumped shoulders and downcast demeanour, ‘we will think of something’. She gathered up her sister’s work, smoothing out an edge that had become crumpled and running a finger over the fine pencil strokes.

  Mary did not remain despondent for long. She believed her designs were good, she simply had to persuade someone to take a chance on her work and everything else would surely fall into place. In any case, she had no choice but to keep going, for she could foresee no other way of adding to the household income, at least not in a manner befitting a woman of her class. True, she might manage to secure a position as a governess, but as she would not dream of leaving Frances, that ruled out that avenue of employment. Besides, she knew herself well enough to realise that she did not possess the required patience with children. She was considered – with no small sense of relief on her part – too old to think of making a suitable marriage. The institution held little appeal for her: she had no wish to live at the mercy of another, to promise to obey. All she really wanted was to design and draw and paint, and enjoy the quiet company of her sister. Was that too much to ask?