by Joan Aiken
If I am not able to write well here, said Alvey to herself, then there is no hope for me as an author; and Wicked Lord Love sparkled at her, from a cranny in her mind: Feel no concern on that score, my duck! you and I will do very well in this place, very well indeed! Only take care not to become too enmeshed in the concerns of these Winships; you have to get away at the end of the year, remember that.
Suddenly, the end of the year presented a rather bleak aspect; like a door opening from a warm busy kitchen into a cold, frosty yard.
Parthie stole up close to Alvey and whispered: “Sister! Sister Louisa! Have you brought me something pretty from London? When you went away you promised that you would; do you remember?”
Oh plague take the child, thought Alvey—she had already formed an adverse opinion of Parthie, who looked, she thought, like a pale pink pig, with her china complexion, lashless blue eyes, and straight flaxen hair. Would Louisa really have made her such a promise?
“Did I indeed?” she temporized.
“Oh yes, sister! Indeed you did!”
“Hold your tongue, Parthie!” ordered Lady Winship. “How often have I told you that it is very impolite to whisper while your elders are talking.”
Parthie pouted and hung her head. At this moment an old, black-shawled woman arrived, panting and curtseying, who was greeted as Mrs Umfry and led off upstairs to give counsel in the matter of the poor famished baby.
Parthie immediately started again.
“Sister Louisa—!”
Fortunately by this time Alvey had remembered an amber necklace, the best piece among the modest collection of trinkets which Louisa had taken with her to school, and which she had insisted on leaving with Alvey when they parted.
“For I shall not want such adornments where I am going; and Mamma would certainly think it strange indeed if I did not return with great-aunt Maria’s locket and the corals and my christening ring and seed-pearl brooch.”
So, with considerable reluctance, Alvey had taken charge of these articles, resolving to find some opportunity of returning them all into Winship keeping; this seemed just such a chance.
“After supper, perhaps,” she murmured, and Parthie’s eyes brightened.
Meg and Isa now ran down the stairs. Isa, despite Grace’s assistance with her toilet, looked untidy and flushed; her hair had escaped from its ribbon and her white dress was bunchy and specked with damp. But she greeted Alvey with a friendly smile.
“There you are, Emmy! You must be as hungry as I am. Parthie, find Amble and tell him to ring the gong; Mamma and Grandmother will be down directly.”
“But what about Nish and Tot? They haven’t come in yet!” declared Parthie impressively; Alvey could not help feeling that she had delayed making this announcement until she could be sure of its maximum effect, for her mother and grandmother had appeared at-the stair-head, and Sir Aydon had limped as far as the library doorway, supporting himself on two sticks.
But Amble, picking up the long-handled, felt-swathed drumstick, was able to deprive Parthie’s statement of its impact by saying in a deflating manner, “Yes, they have, Miss Parthie, they’ve been in the kitchen these ten minutes past, getting out of their wet shoes and stockings by the grate,” before beating a thunderous tattoo on the brass gong.
The family filed, with some ceremony, into the dining-room, Sir Aydon in the lead, supported on either side by his wife and mother, then Meg and Alvey, then Isa, with Parthie a step behind her. Sir Aydon was helped by Amble into his massive chair at the head of the large table, and the rest seated themselves on either side. They all bowed their heads and for a moment kept silent; but as soon as the pause for grace was done, and Amble had begun serving soup from a china tureen on the sideboard, Lady Winship said sharply, “Did I hear you say, Amble, that Nish and Tot had but just come in?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“Where are they now?”
“Mrs Slaley’s giving them their supper in the kitchen, ma’am.”
“At this hour? They should be sent supperless to bed,” pronounced old Mrs Winship in a tone of strong disapproval. “Coming home after dark? Disgraceful!”
Sir Aydon lifted his head and said with an effort, “No, not supperless. They should have something.”
His wife and mother exchanged glances.
“Very well,” conceded Lady Winship. “But tell Mrs Slaley, Amble, to send them in here when they have had their supper.”
“Yes, my lady.”
Dinner proceeded, principally in silence. With Sir Aydon, speechless as a ghost at the head of the table, his head bowed, pushing away each plate after he had taken a couple of bites, the atmosphere was not conducive to light talk. Meg and Isa gave their mother some news of her cousin Lady Matfen, and all three girls supplied a few details about the journey on the ship.
The only person to ask Alvey anything about the Abbey School was old Mrs Winship, who put one or two sharp questions regarding Mrs Camperdowne’s curriculum and régime; these Alvey answered composedly and concisely. A little embarrassed at her own appetite, she made an excellent meal, as courses of trout, roast mutton, vegetables, and some game bird, nature unknown, came and went, but she noticed with relief that Meg and Isa likewise ate heartily. When the cloth was removed, and silver dishes of nuts, apples, and dried plums set on the table, Amble withdrew.
Alvey, whose seat was nearest the door that led to the kitchen region, caught snatches of a low-voiced but vehement argument being conducted just outside the door, and sounds of a slight scuffle.
“Na, ye don’t! Ye’ve to gan in and see your Ma and Pa. Her leddyship said so.”
“But—”
“There’s na buts aboot it. Gan along in wi’ ye.”
Two children appeared sidling round the door, their heads ducked apprehensively. That end of the room was in shadow, and Alvey received only an impression of smallness and skinniness. She remembered that Nish and Tot were eight and nine respectively, but thought they looked smaller, and shabby, and undernourished, hardly like children belonging to this comfortable, prosperous household.
“Is that Nish and Tot? Come here!” ordered Lady Winship, and they approached her slowly, with reluctance, holding hands, bumping awkwardly against one another, and arrived at a point halfway between their father and mother, where they stood staring at the floor. The boy was darker, Alvey noted, with soft lustreless black hair and a pale oval face; the girl’s face was rounder, and her tangle of hair nut-brown, bleached in streaks from being so much out of doors; the colour of her eyes could not be seen, for she gazed fixedly at her feet, clutching her brother’s hand for comfort.
“Hold your head up! Turn out your toes!” ordered their grandmother, for Lady Winship said nothing. The sight of them seemed to have depressed her so much that she sighed profoundly and went into a kind of melancholy reverie; like Isa, thought Alvey.
“Look at you!” scolded old Mrs Winship. “Your breeches wet—your skirts torn—you look like a pair of gipsy children. Barefoot, too! Where are your stockings, miss?” The girl murmured something inaudible.
“You do not know? How can that be?”
“Mrs Slaley has them; she is washing them,” put in the boy nervously.
“Speak when you are spoken to, sir! Not before.”
Sir Aydon roused himself sufficiently to put the question, “Where have you been all day?”
“Up the Hungry Water,” muttered Tot.
“And who gave you leave to run off from your books?” demanded their grandmother.
Neither child replied, and, as their parents did not seem inclined to pursue the matter, Mrs Winship, shaking her finger at the pair, exclaimed, “Bread and water is what you deserve, and to be locked up until you promise better behaviour. If ever there was a pair of marred young ones—”
But now Lady Winship, rousing herself from her cheerless thought
s, whatever they were, sighed, and said, “Come! You have not greeted your sister, who has been away for so long. Have you nothing to say to her?”
At this apparently innocuous observation, Alvey noticed that the children huddled even closer against one another. They made no attempt to approach or greet her. Can they remember Louisa with such dislike? she wondered. Or fear? She was trying, without success, to think of some appropriate friendly remark— Alvey had had very few contacts with young children—when Sir Aydon, who appeared, in his state of grief and fatigue, to take several minutes before responding to any new piece of information, slowly inquired,
“Did you see Annie Herdman while you were out of doors?”
Mutely, the children appeared to consult one another as to whether it would be politic to answer this question. Then, as if calculating that to do so might excuse them from the need to greet their returned sister, the boy said, “Yes, We did see her.” And the girl added softly,—
“Twice. We saw her twice.”
“Twice?”
“This morning, early, she was out about the yard looking for Wee Geordie,” said Tot.
Do they know what has happened to the child? wondered Alvey.
“And where else did you see Annie?” demanded their grandmother. “And at what time?”
“Coming home this evening. When it was all but dark.”
“Where did you see her then? What was she doing?”
“Along Blinkbonny Height. She was walking very fast, carrying a heavy bundle. We called to her, she saw us, but she wouldna stop. She was a fair way off, across the other side of the Hungry Water.”
“Walking which way?”
“Up the track towards Pike’s Force.”
Nish opened her mouth to speak, changed her mind, and shut it again. No one seemed to be aware of this but Alvey, who wondered what the child had been about to say. Something this Annie had said to her then? Alvey’s eyes met those of Nish, who looked down quickly. But it seemed that some spark of confidence had passed between them. Or had Alvey imagined that?
Sir Aydon had turned and was calling for Amble.
“May we go to bed, Mamma?” asked Tot in a voice little above a whisper. “We are very tired.”
“Tired! I should think so! And it is not more than you deserve—rambling off like tinker children the livelong day,” their grandmother scolded, but her daughter-in-law murmured, “Yes, yes, run along.” Her voice was threadlike with fatigue. “Ellen is to see that you have a thorough wash. Tell her I ordered it. Say goodnight to your sisters now.”
“Goodnight,” muttered Nish and Tot, scuttling, like two small creatures released from a trap, past Meg, Isa, Alvey, and Parthie. Tot never lifted his eyes, but Nish, following him, clutching his hand, looked up and gave another quick, scared glance at Alvey, taking her in, it seemed, from head to foot; again, Alvey had a brief, odd sensation of mutual recognition.
As soon as the younger ones had left the room, Parthie exclaimed, “Mamma! It is unfair! If I had run off in such a way, at that age, I should have been whipped.” Her voice trembled with injury.
“Hold your tongue, Parthie. Do not let me hear you address your mother with such liberty!” exploded Mrs Winship. “Charlotte! How can you allow your children to be so ungovernable?” But Lady Winship, with a weary gesture, left her chair and walked stumblingly from the room.
Her husband roused himself to call after her.
“Charlotte! Will you tell Amble to have the men go up towards Pike’s Force?”
“Yes; I am going to do so,” her voice came back.
The old lady got up, stiff and grumbling, from her chair.
“Come girls, into the drawing room. We will leave your Papa in peace. But do not stay here too long, Aydon,” she said, tapping his shoulder with a clawlike hand. Alvey thought what she probably meant was, Do not drink too much port. But he shook his head irritably, flinching away from her touch.
As the four girls entered the drawing room, Alvey was impressed anew at Birkland Hall’s handsome appointments. The room was low-ceilinged but spacious; oval mirrors in stucco garlands were set at either side of a marble fireplace; many family portraits hung on the walls; a large, if worn Turkey carpet covered an extensive area of floor; chintz-covered couches and ottomans were disposed around yet another blazing fire; a grand piano stood open, and pots of blooming indoor plants made the air fragrant.
Old Mrs Winship had hobbled away with some murmured remark about little Kate and Mrs Umfry; Parthie now seized the opportunity to twitch Meg’s arm and demand,
“Well? What of the bridesmaids’ dresses, sister Meg? Were you able to get the stuff? Is it pretty? When can I see it?”
“Oh, Parthie! Do not be such a pest! Yes, yes, I bought it. But tomorrow will be time enough to see it. Grace has not unpacked all the boxes yet. What about John Chibburn? Is there no message, no note from him?”
“Oh yes. I forgot. He rid by this morning to say that he could not come in tonight; his aunt Clara is visiting them at Tinnis Hall.”
“Well! I like that!” exclaimed Meg in tones of strong displeasure. “I should have thought that he would rate me above his aunt, on the night that I return from London!”
“Perhaps they think old Mrs Forbes will leave John all her money,” suggested Parthie shrewdly. “Have you brought back any new songs from London, Isa? Or did you spend all your time looking at pictures?”
“I brought some new songs. But I do not think Mamma would like us to be playing and singing tonight. You shall see them tomorrow.”
“Tomorrow—everything is tomorrow,” said Parthie discontentedly. She gave a great yawn, and scrutinized herself in one of the oval mirrors, tugging at her stringy flaxen hair. “Do you think, Meg, that Mamma would allow me to do my hair like yours? Is that a new London style?”
“Yes, it is. Cousin Matfen’s maid taught me how. But I think Mamma might say it was too grown up for you.”
“Oh, psha!”
“Perhaps just for the wedding,” Isa said kindly. “And Meg will ask if you can have your bridesmaid’s skirts made down to the ground—won’t you, Meg?”
“Only if you will leave off pestering and asking questions when we are all tired to death,” snapped Meg, whose spirits had been greatly cast down by the absence of her betrothed. Frowningly, she picked up a book of engravings.
Parthie stuck out her lower lip in a grimace that made her look like a twelve-year-old.
“I declare I am sorry you and Isa and sister Lou are come home again, if there is to be no talking or singing, if we are all to sit like mutes after a funeral.”
“Well, but, Parthie,” said Isa reasonably, “our father is terribly distressed about poor Annie and her baby. We must respect his feelings—”
“Why?” demanded Parthie rebelliously. “When our sister Maria died he hardly seemed to notice. Why is he in such a taking?”
The sisters glanced at one another.
“It is not a suitable subject for your ears,” Meg said.
“I am only three years younger than Isa. And in any case I know! I suppose,” went on Parthie querulously, “it is because our brother James was said to be wee Geordie’s father.”
“Parthie! You are not to talk about such things.”
“But why should Papa grieve so because James’s baby died? He is not pleased with James,” argued Parthie. “Last year when James was at home on furlough I remember how angry Papa was because James said he wanted to sell out of his regiment and Papa would not let him and said no Winship would do such a thing and that it would be the act of a base coward. I remember that if you do not. I don’t believe Papa loves James above half. So why would he be in such a to-do about the baby?”
“Parthie: it is grossly indelicate to discuss such subjects—about which we can know nothing—and if you persist you must leave the room,” began
Meg, but at this moment Lady Winship reappeared in the doorway.
She gazed for a moment, vaguely, at the girls, without speaking, then wandered to a window-table covered with pot-plants and occupied herself in tending them, nipping off dead leaves and withered heads, using a small pair of gilt scissors which she carried on a chain attached to her belt. The girls fell silent. Absorbed in her task, their mother seemed, for a little time, dreamily content, away in some mental realm of her own. When Isa addressed her she started, and her expression at once grew dejected and harassed.
“There is still no word about Annie, Mamma?”
“No,” sighed Lady Winship. “The men have gone up the track to Pike’s Force. But the night is so dark . . .” Her voice trailed away.
Meg gave a great yawn, then apologized. “I think, if I may, that as soon as Amble has brought in the tea, I shall go to bed,” she said. “I am very fatigued, are not you, Emmy?” Alvey nodded. She was finding it hard to keep her eyes open; the day seemed to have lasted for a week.
“Shall I hurry Amble with the tea?” suggested Isa, and, taking her mother’s inattentive half-nod as permission, rang the bell.
