A Thimbleful of Hope

by Evie Grace

  ‘Thank you.’ She fancied he was blushing as he continued, ‘It was a team effort. My father, uncle, brother and cousins are all members of Dover Rowing Club.’ He smiled. ‘There’s nothing better than being out on the water.’

  ‘Your father is master of my father’s ship, the Dover Belle?’

  ‘That’s right. He and my brother are at sea at present on a round trip to the Azores, and due back at any time. My mother can hardly wait to see them.’

  ‘It must be hard for her.’

  ‘She misses them, but that’s enough of my family. Oh, I don’t know what else to say … except that you look very beautiful.’

  Violet didn’t know how to respond. Perhaps her expression had been one of shock, because he immediately stumbled on, ‘I’m sorry. I’ve been too forward. Without a sister to guide me, I have no idea how to pay a young lady a compliment.’

  ‘There’s no need to apologise. I’m flattered …’ Her fingers touched the pearls at her throat as she gazed into his eyes. ‘Truly I am. I’m as out of my depth as you are, I think. This is my first ball.’

  ‘And it won’t be the last, I hope.’

  He smiled again, and her heart melted, even though she knew it shouldn’t, because although William was a winning rower, he was a lowly apprentice at the Packet Yard, and his family was not of the same social standing as the Rayfields. Even as the band played, and they danced, smoothly and in step as though they had danced together before, Violet knew that her parents would never consider him as a potential suitor for her or her sisters.

  Chapter Two

  The House in Camden Crescent

  One morning, a week after the ball, Violet was in the schoolroom on the top floor of the house in Camden Crescent, where she and her sisters spent much of their time in the company of Miss Whiteway. Even though Ottilie and Violet considered themselves too old to have a governess, Mama insisted that they continue with their education at least until Eleanor turned seventeen.

  ‘It wouldn’t be a horror to me to have to make my own living. It has to be more interesting than staying at home to run the house and bring up one’s children.’ Violet walked to the open window and looked out at the patch of green where the military band were assembled in their scarlet uniforms, their brass trumpets and cymbals glinting in the summer sun, as they played a stirring march. Beyond the lawns and Marine Parade, she scanned the sea and shingle beach, hoping in vain to catch a glimpse of William and the Dover Rowing Club out on the water in their cutters and galleys.

  ‘There is no need for you to go out to work,’ Miss Whiteway said. ‘Your father is a wealthy man who expects you to become a devoted wife and mother. You may have interests and hobbies to divert you, such as embroidery and growing ferns, but making your own money is out of the question.’

  ‘What if I should go against our father’s wishes?’ Violet said, vexed.

  ‘Heart’s alive! What are you thinking of? A daughter’s duty is to obey her father, and then her husband after that in a lifetime of submission,’ Miss Whiteway said with irony and a certain amount of satisfaction, perhaps, that she hadn’t found herself in that situation. ‘My role is to prepare you for the duties you will take on as a woman in society, whether or not I believe it’s fair. Despite being ruled by a queen, Her Majesty Victoria who has been placed above all men, the rest of us are still not treated equitably by the Church or the State.’ Miss Whiteway sounded very old, yet she was only thirty – Violet and Ottilie had often discussed the fact that she could easily pass for forty-five with her plain clothes and horn-rimmed spectacles. ‘Ah well, nothing will change until more women are able to speak out, and men learn to tolerate living with an equal at their fireside.’

  Could it be said that Pa treated their mother as his equal? Violet thought back to the discussion she’d heard between her parents a few days before, when Mama had asked him to have her room redecorated. He had begun to argue against it until she had cut him short, telling him she would invite Mr Jones to provide a quote. This had not been a question, but a statement of fact.

  ‘However, in spite of what I said before in recognition of your parents’ wishes, it is never a bad thing for a young lady to have something to fall back on. Violet, you have skills you can employ to earn your living.’

  ‘What skills?’

  ‘Embroidery, of course. Your whitework is exceptional.’

  ‘Do you think so?’

  ‘I’ve always been a little envious of your needlework. It comes so naturally to you. But you are diverting me. Please, sit down and continue with your drawing. It is a fair attempt, but it could do with more colour. Perhaps a wash of watercolour will liven it up.’

  Holding up the skirts of her brown day dress, Violet turned away from the window and returned to the waxed pine table where Ottilie was sewing buttons on to a pair of gloves. Eleanor was leaning back in her chair in what Violet considered a theatrical manner, with the back of one hand pressed to her temple and the end of a pencil in her mouth.

  Violet took her place and scrutinised her picture, a representation of Mama’s white pet cat with a bow around its neck. Its nose was too long, its fur too dark and its eyes too human. There was nothing that could redeem it.

  She glanced up, on hearing Miss Whiteway address Eleanor.

  ‘Have you completed your poem?’ Violet noticed her heavy brow suddenly furrow. ‘Oh no, that will not do. It is too dark, too disturbing to be read aloud – “The Ballad of Whetstone Moor” by Miss Eleanor Rayfield is unsuitable for consumption within the confines of the drawing room. Gentlemen don’t want to hear about dying heroines. Strike it out and start again.’

  Grudgingly, Eleanor picked up the wooden rule and scored a pencil cross into the offending page.

  ‘I’ll be a famous writer one day, you’ll see,’ she said.

  ‘Then you’ll never find a man who wishes to marry you,’ Ottilie cut in. ‘Men find intelligence in a woman most undesirable.’

  ‘Because it means they might answer back,’ Violet said. Her ambitions were changeable and churning like the sea, while all Ottilie wanted was to settle, marry and bear children, and Eleanor to write her stories.

  ‘If you complete the tasks I’ve set in a timely manner, we can take the air this afternoon,’ Miss Whiteway told them.

  ‘Mama has said we must join her at eleven to meet Mr Jones. It’s already half past ten,’ Violet added, looking at the clock on the mantel.

  ‘Do we have to?’ Eleanor sighed. ‘I have no interest in paints and wallpapers.’

  ‘Mama has requested our opinion.’ Violet suppressed a smile, recalling how she had engineered the arrangement earlier that morning.

  ‘If Mrs Rayfield has expressly requested your company at eleven, then I must bow to it,’ Miss Whiteway said. ‘This isn’t an example of your scheming, is it, Violet?’

  ‘No, Miss Whiteway,’ she said sweetly. ‘May we be excused?’

  ‘Of course. We’ll meet again for luncheon.’

  ‘What luck,’ Ottilie said as the three sisters started to walk down the two flights of stairs. ‘How did you get Mama to agree to this?’

  ‘With my natural charm and persuasion.’ Violet smiled. ‘Any excuse to get us out of the schoolroom.’

  ‘I was quite happy doing my writing,’ Eleanor complained.

  ‘There’ll be plenty of time to do it later in the week,’ Violet said, feeling a touch guilty for thwarting her sister’s creative urges.

  ‘Studying is duller than dull.’ Ottilie’s eyes lit up as she flicked through the pile of letters lying on the silver tray on the hall table. She pulled one out and slipped it into her pocket.

  ‘A letter for you? Who sent it?’ Violet asked.

  ‘Oh, it’s just a note from our cousin Jane.’

  ‘Aren’t you going to open it?’

  ‘Not yet. Hurry – we mustn’t keep Mama waiting.’

  They went into the dining room where their mother, dressed in a navy crinoline with wide sleeves
trimmed with ivory silk, was awaiting the decorator’s arrival.

  ‘Good morning, my dear daughters. I hope you’ve been applying yourselves to your studies,’ she greeted them with half a smile, as they took their seats at the highly polished mahogany table.

  ‘Yes, Mama,’ Ottilie answered for the three of them.

  The dining room, which had doors leading out on to the balcony, was in dire need of redecoration. Violet looked up at the five-armed gasolier with its shades of pale blue opalescent glass. It hung from an elaborate plaster rose blackened by the large leaping flames which appeared whenever the gasolier was ignited. The wallpaper above the panelled oak was turning brown and the heavy velvet drapes had seen better days.

  ‘Mr Jones won’t be long,’ Mama said, but he was at least another ten minutes, during which time Eleanor sat fidgeting, and Violet gazed at the curios Pa kept in the cabinet near the door. There was an alabaster Buddha with a topknot, a sandalwood elephant from India, and a shrunken head from the Amazon which gave her nightmares. The head – about one-fifth the size of a living head – was that of a dark-skinned woman with black hair. Although her expression looked peaceful – her eyes were closed, and her lips had been sewn shut with thick cord – Violet couldn’t help wondering if it had been done to keep her from screaming while she was murdered in the depths of the rainforest.

  ‘Ah, I hear voices.’ Mrs Rayfield stood up as their maid of all work, who was in the pink of neatness in her uniform, showed a gentleman into the room.

  ‘This is Mr Jones, ma’am,’ the maid said, bobbing a curtsey. She had long auburn hair plaited and put up under her cap, and Mama had to tell her to wash her neck sometimes, but she had a good heart. May was twenty-five and had been with the Rayfields for seven years. She was calm, capable, and obliging – and rather put upon for all that.

  ‘Thank you, May. That will be all for now.’

  ‘Yes, ma’am.’ The maid pulled the door shut behind her as she returned to the corridor, and all eyes were on Mr Jones. He was a small man with a Roman nose and a wig – at least, Violet guessed it wasn’t his own hair – like a brown doormat affixed to his scalp in three or four places with dabs of glue. He wore a green velvet coat and carried a leather portfolio of drawings and a bag of samples.

  ‘Good day, ladies,’ he said with a bow. ‘I’m very grateful to you for receiving me, Mrs Rayfield. I believe you will be delighted with our plans. I’ve incorporated your suggestions and ideas for the colour scheme, and added a few thoughts of my own – merely to add the finer details which are currently in vogue in London. As I’m sure you’re aware, every house should have a green room. Green is the colour of Nature, and most soothing, entirely suitable for the bedroom and anywhere else in the home where one wishes to find rest and repose.’

  ‘I’m looking forward to seeing how the room will look. I hope you don’t mind, but I took the liberty of inviting my daughters to join us as part of their education, not so much to give their opinion, although …’ Mama smiled, ‘… I am content for them to give it if it tallies with mine.’

  ‘You speak wisely, Mrs Rayfield,’ he said, looking towards Violet in particular. ‘It’s essential for a young lady to acquire an interest in decoration for when she moves into her own establishment.’

  ‘Oh, that won’t be for a while. They’re all too young for marriage – I don’t want to lose them just yet.’

  ‘They are a credit to you, Mrs Rayfield.’ Mr Jones stared pointedly up at the ceiling. ‘I wonder if you would like me to give you an estimate for redecorating this beautiful room, no obligation.’

  ‘That would be most acceptable.’

  ‘If you were to accept my quote today for the bedroom and dining room, and you were pleased with the work undertaken, I’d be very grateful if you’d provide me with a written testimonial.’ He unpacked some wallpaper samples from his portfolio.

  ‘There’s such a vast range of patterns nowadays that I’ve had to be selective in what I show you – my firm deals only in papers of the highest quality, not the cheap alternatives which fade almost as one puts them up.’ He spread the samples across the table, all opulent colours: reds, blues and greens. Some had scrolled floral patterns which caught Violet’s eye. ‘Had you thought any more about your choice of hue, Mrs Rayfield?’

  ‘One of my acquaintances has told me that it’s aesthetically pleasing to choose either adjacent colours, or those on opposite sides of the colour wheel. I found the discussion confusing to say the least.’

  ‘Ah, the latter is more popular. We call it the creation of harmony by contrast,’ Mr Jones said. ‘Are you drawn to any particular colour?’

  ‘I’d like this green for both rooms.’ Mama touched the paper nearest her.

  ‘It is wonderful, I agree.’ Mr Jones smiled gleefully. ‘It’s extremely popular – in fact, if you wish to have this one, I’ll put an order in as soon as possible before the company who makes it runs out of stock.’

  ‘Do you think that’s likely, or is this your way of hurrying me into making a decision?’ Mama enquired.

  ‘Oh no, it’s a genuine concern. There is such a demand for it.’

  Mama turned to her daughters. ‘Well, I’ve asked you here to give me your opinions, so what do you think? Eleanor first.’

  ‘I would like the green if it were darker,’ Eleanor said quietly.

  ‘Ottilie?’

  ‘The wallpaper you have picked is a most acceptable colour, although blue seems more suitable for a bedroom. You did ask for my view, Mama.’

  ‘Yes, I suppose I did.’ Their mother sighed and tipped her head to one side. ‘What about you, Violet?’

  ‘I have it on good authority that green is bad for the constitution.’

  ‘Pray, tell me on whose authority?’ Mama said, annoyed. ‘You’ve read it in one of those dreadful novels.’

  ‘Miss Whiteway told us about it when we were discussing chemistry. There have been many cases of poisoning in fashionable society recently.’

  ‘Your governess has no business teaching you such terrible and disturbing untruths. Nobody in Dover has been poisoned by the colour green, or I would have heard about it.’

  ‘That’s correct, Mrs Rayfield,’ Mr Jones agreed.

  ‘She says it’s been in the newspapers – there were letters in The Times on the subject of arsenic in wallpapers.’

  ‘I will have Scheele’s Green – Mr and Mrs Chittenden have it in their dining room and they have always struck me as being in excellent health.’

  That’s because they usually dine out, Violet wanted to say. The Chittendens were more often to be found dining at the Rayfields’ house than their own.

  ‘Really, Violet, your claim is quite outrageous. I’ll be having a word with Miss Whiteway about her tales.’

  ‘Everyone in Kent has at least one green room in their house nowadays. I accept that arsenic is a poison if taken by mouth in large doses, but when applied to the walls of the home as paint and wallpaper, it is perfectly safe. Look at me – I am the very picture of health.’ Mr Jones puffed himself up and strutted about like a rooster to demonstrate.

  Violet suppressed a giggle, but Ottilie caught her eye, and it turned into a cough. Eleanor patted her on the back as Mr Jones went on, ‘If it will ease your minds, I will personally eat a pound of paper to prove it.’

  ‘That isn’t necessary. It’s clear that it wouldn’t be in your interest to go around poisoning your customers,’ Mama said, but Mr Jones was determined not to lose her patronage.

  ‘I use only the best quality wallpapers – I can rub it with my fingers.’ He demonstrated on the green paper. ‘I can even …’ he bent over the table and pressed his mouth to it, leaving the wet imprint of the tip of his tongue when he straightened ‘… lick it. You see – the colour does not come off.’ He licked it again and Violet couldn’t contain herself any longer.

  ‘Excuse me,’ she said, choking back laughter as she fled the room.

  They didn’t get to
take the air that afternoon because she had displeased their mother, but they were allowed to dine with their parents as was their habit before Mama and Pa retired to the parlour, and the sisters to their rooms.

  ‘The decorator called today,’ Mama said when the maid was clearing dessert away.

  Violet sat very still, afraid her mother was about to reveal how she had run out of the room, but she merely gave her a glance and continued, ‘He’s bringing an estimate for the work.’

  ‘We should obtain some comparisons,’ Pa said as Violet breathed a sigh of relief. ‘When you look after the pennies, the pounds look after themselves.’

  ‘We have money in the bank. We aren’t penniless,’ Mama went on impatiently, at which Pa nodded. ‘Then you will permit me to have the dining room and my bedroom completely redecorated.’

  ‘It seems rather excessive to me. Can’t we have somebody in to touch up the paint?’

  ‘Oh no, that won’t do. The paper’s peeling from the walls, and the damp is getting on my chest. We can’t be seen to be letting the place go to rack and ruin. Perhaps we should consider moving to one of the East Cliff Mansions, for example. Mrs Chittenden says there’s one coming up for sale.’

  ‘This is our family home. I have no desire to leave it.’

  ‘Then we should look after it, not allow it to fall down around our ears.’

  ‘All right, Patience. You have twisted my arm.’ Pa’s eyes twinkled with amusement, and Violet smiled to herself, relieved that her father had been taking the rise out of his wife. ‘I’ll set a budget and you will promise not to trouble me with this again. Suffice to say, business is buoyant, and I have great expectations …’

  ‘But?’ Mama said. ‘You seem troubled. Is there something wrong?’

  ‘Nothing’s wrong,’ Pa said.

  ‘I know you too well …’

  ‘I shall tell you then. Much as I have no desire to disturb your peace of mind, the fact is that the Dover Belle hasn’t arrived back in port as expected, and there’s much speculation as to what’s happened to her. However, for the moment all we can say is that she didn’t arrive when she was due. Seafaring is unpredictable, subject to the vagaries of Nature, and of God’s will. She was supposed to have returned from the Azores with her cargo of oranges and lemons last Monday.’