Highland Sisters

by Anne Douglas

  ‘Private?’ thundered Mr Thain, a brick-coloured flush rising to his temples as he stared at his son with angry eyes. ‘What are you talking about? That letter might be our only hope of getting Rory back and stopping him from making one of the biggest mistakes of his life! Do you want your brother to be the talk of Scotland for being a silly, blind fool?’

  ‘Hugo, your father’s right,’ chimed Mrs Thain, stretching out to take his hand, which he refused to give. ‘Of course the letter is Mr Malcolm’s letter, but I’m sure he wants his daughter back as much as we want Rory, and this letter may help. Surely you can see that?’

  Before he could answer, it was Rosa who suddenly, surprisingly, spoke next. ‘We don’t mind Mr Thain seeing my sister’s letter, do we?’ she asked Greg, who mutely shook his head. ‘But it will not help. My sister doesn’t say where she’s going. I can show you, if you like. I have the letter here.’

  Opening her bag, Rosa took out the envelope containing the letter and passed it to Mr Thain, who, after studying her for a moment while his risen colour began to fade, opened the envelope, took out the letter and read it.

  ‘Well?’ his wife asked impatiently. ‘What does she say? Perhaps I can read it too?’

  ‘That won’t be necessary,’ Mr Thain replied, folding the letter and returning it to its envelope. ‘It’s correct what Miss Malcolm says – the girl tells nothing of their plans.’ His mouth twisting, he passed the letter back to Rosa. ‘Thank you for letting me see it anyway, Miss Malcolm.’

  ‘Very decent of you,’ commented Hugo, at which his father nodded but said no more, only stooped to give his wife his hand to help her rise from her chair.

  ‘Seems we are no better off,’ Mrs Thain said, sighing again. ‘What did Lorne Malcolm actually say, then, in the letter? You should have let me read it, Frederick.’

  ‘It would only have upset you. She claims that she loves Rory and he loves her. Make of that what you will.’

  ‘Might be true,’ said Hugo, moving towards the cottage door.

  ‘Oh, no!’ cried his stepmother. ‘No, no, that cannot be so. Not of Rory, at least. I would have known.’

  ‘We won’t argue on that, Priscilla,’ her husband said shortly. ‘It is time for us to go.’

  Turning to Greg and Rosa, who were standing at the door, waiting for what might be said next, Mr Thain addressed Greg. ‘I accept your word now, Malcolm, that you had no knowledge of your daughter’s plans, and all I can say is that if she gets in touch – which surely she will – I shall expect you to give me any information you have immediately. Is that clear?’

  ‘Oh, yes, sir,’ Greg answered, visibly relieved, as Rosa could tell, that nothing was to be said about his giving up his cottage. ‘If Lorne gives me any idea of where she might be, I will let you know as soon as I can.’

  ‘Very good. Open the door, then. Miss Malcolm, our thanks again for your help. Hugo, go before us to the carriage. Priscilla, take my arm.’

  At long last, thank God, they were off, the groom giving another of his contemptuous smiles as he drove the solemn-faced Thains away, while Rosa and her father watched until the carriage was out of sight.

  ‘What a relief!’ cried Greg as soon as they were back in the cottage. ‘I’m not to be evicted, Rosa. Is that not good news?’

  ‘Yes, but it doesn’t stop us wondering about Lorne, Da.’ Rosa was moving the kettle on the stove to bring it up to the boil. ‘I mean, what will become of her?’

  ‘It’s her own doing, do not forget. And she is not worrying about Daniel, is she?’

  As Rosa set out cups, she made no reply and, after a moment, her father smiled.

  ‘I was thinking – you seemed to impress Mr Thain, eh? Calling you “Miss Malcolm” as though you were the quality! And young Mr Hugo was sticking up for us, too, I am sure because of you. Maybe you should apply for Lorne’s job at Bluff House, eh? Why not?’

  ‘Why not?’ cried Rosa. ‘I should think, as Lorne’s sister, I’d be the very last person they’d want in her job! No, thanks, I’ll stay in Inverness. I go back tomorrow, don’t forget.’

  And with what a heavy heart she would be travelling, she reflected as she made the tea, compared to the way she’d expected to be returning to work.

  For, of course, she would have been happy to see her sister wed, especially to someone like Daniel, even if some might have thought she could only have been envious of Lorne’s ‘catch’ and would have liked to have been Daniel’s wife herself. But that was never Rosa’s dream. How could it have been, when the only woman for him had been her own sister?

  Oh, poor Daniel! Drinking her tea, which she couldn’t even taste, all the problems of the day faded from Rosa’s mind, as it seemed clear to her that the only thing that mattered in the whole awful nightmare was Daniel’s heartache.

  Nine

  Number twenty-five Wellington Crescent, the fine terraced house in Inverness where Rosa worked, was owned by a Mr Jonathan Fordyce, a young lawyer. It was his pretty wife, Christina, who was remarkable for treating her staff unusually well, believing, as many did not, that they were human beings and not just machines for cleaning and cooking. It followed, of course, that she would have taken an interest in Rosa’s sister’s wedding and, having given Rosa leave to attend it, would be waiting to hear how it all went.

  Just as Mrs Banks, the cook, would also be waiting, along with Hattie, the kitchen maid, Agnes, the parlour maid, and Greta, under housemaid to Rosa, but how Rosa was to tell them what had actually happened was quite beyond her even as she approached the area gate of number twenty-five. How to tell them that there had been no wedding? That her sister had run away with the son of her employer? That the jilted bridegroom was in despair? The whole idea of putting her news into words seemed to Rosa to be quite beyond her.

  Whatever would they think of Lorne, for instance? Of Rosa, herself, for that matter? That she was just such another as her sister?

  Her dark eyes showing the sorrow she wished she could have kept secret, Rosa bravely moved down the steps of the area and rapped on the heavy back door. Being April, the evening was not yet as dark as she would have liked, so that she might be swallowed up, hidden away from all those waiting eyes. Eyes that, yes, were instantly turned upon her as soon as she stepped through the door opened for her by young Hattie, eyes that at first saw nothing wrong.

  ‘There you are, Rosa!’ cried Mrs Banks, who was not like anyone’s idea of a plump, comfortable cook, being painfully thin and generally considered ‘nervy’, given to getting into ‘states’ when meals were due, only relaxing when the plates came down and it was obvious that the master and mistress had finished everything. Now, with dinner over, she was able to take an interest in Rosa, drawing her nearer to the kitchen range that was throwing out a good heat and telling her to warm herself after being on the terrible train, eh?

  ‘And tell us all about the wedding!’ ordered Agnes, the fair-haired parlour maid in her thirties, taking Rosa’s coat and giving it to Hattie to hang up. ‘We’re dying to hear, aren’t we, girls?’

  ‘Aye, been thinking o’ nothing else,’ said Greta, the lanky, easy-going housemaid who worked with Rosa. ‘I mean, what’s nicer than a wedding?’

  ‘Did you bring us any cake?’ asked Hattie, filling the kettle at a nod from Mrs Banks and only widening her eyes when Agnes clicked her tongue and told her not to be so cheeky, as Rosa had had more to think about than bringing back wedding cake.

  ‘Is that not right?’ she called to Rosa, smiling, but when she took in Rosa’s expression as she sank into a chair at the kitchen table, the gaze of Agnes sharpened.

  ‘My word, Rosa, you look as though that wedding’s tired you out. You must have had too much to do.’

  Rosa, keeping her eyes down, slowly shook her head. ‘The wedding didn’t tire me out, Agnes. The truth is’ – she looked around at the interested faces – ‘there was no wedding.’

  No wedding? The silence that met Rosa’s words was so long and strange, so
filled with the same stunned response, it made everyone feel as one. They knew what they thought but not what to say, for what could they say to poor Rosa? No wedding? Her sister had not become a bride? Had been jilted? Left at the church? Or what? Just what had happened?

  As wondering glances were exchanged, still no one spoke as the words sank in ever more deeply: ‘There was no wedding …’

  It was Mrs Banks who at last broke the silence, and no one was surprised that her voice had risen as it did when she thought her cooking had failed or that her eyes were as anxious as when she was working up to one of her ‘states’.

  ‘Rosa, whatever do you mean? No wedding, you say, so how can that be? What happened? What could have happened? Was your sister left at the door? That pretty girl we’ve seen in photos? I cannot believe it, no, no – it’s too bad that a man could do such a thing, too cruel to your sister—’

  ‘Mrs Banks, a man didn’t do it,’ Rosa told her, struggling to be calm. ‘It was my sister who left the bridegroom herself. Sent him a note and ran away with someone from the house where she worked. But look, I don’t want to talk about it.’ Rosa got to her feet. ‘I’ll go up and unpack my bag.’

  ‘No!’ cried Mrs Banks, seizing Rosa’s arm with a thin hand. ‘No, you cannot do that. The mistress wants to speak to you. She said so particularly, is that not right, Agnes? Did not Mrs Fordyce say if Rosa was back in time to take up her tea – you know she likes a cup of tea at nine o’clock – that she wished to hear all about the wedding? You must go up, Rosa, you cannot say no.’

  ‘It’s not my job to take up tea!’ Rosa said, pulling away from Mrs Banks’ hand. ‘How is she to know I’m back, then?’

  ‘Why, if I go up with her tea, she will be sure to ask me,’ Agnes declared. ‘And what am I to say? You’re not, when you are? I am not telling lies for you, Rosa.’

  ‘No, no, I’d never want that, but what am I to say about the wedding when Mrs Fordyce asks me, then? How can I tell her what my sister did? She will think it’s too terrible and maybe I’m part of it, that I knew all about it—’

  ‘She will not think that – why should she? Come on, now, let us all have a quiet cup of tea ourselves, and then you and me, Rosa, will get Mrs Fordyce’s tray ready and we’ll go up together. When the mistress asks about the wedding, you needn’t tell her who your sister ran off with, just say she changed her mind and that she has gone away. That’s all you need do.’

  But Rosa’s eyes were dark and tragic; she could not see everything going as smoothly as Agnes had said. What could she do, though? Mrs Fordyce must be told, there was no way round it, and maybe she would, after all, understand, especially as sensible Agnes would be there. Everyone respected Agnes.

  After a short pause, during which Rosa’s face reflected her scurrying thoughts, she said at last, ‘All right, I’ll go up. I’ll speak to the mistress.’

  ‘Make our tea, then, Hattie,’ Agnes ordered. ‘You’ll feel better when you’ve had something, Rosa, eh? Then we can go up.’

  Ten

  Young Mrs Fordyce’s drawing room was unusual for its time, being, her critics declared, ‘too plain’. Where were the numerous pictures on the walls? The tables full of framed photographs? The cushions, shawls over tables, lace covers over chairs, the mirrors, the rugs, the bowls of artificial flowers, dried leaves and reeds you could usually find in the best reception room of a house in 1910?

  True, there were a few of those things – a small selection of pictures and photographs, one or two cushions, a smart hearth rug – but only the flowers were real and there were no covers over chairs or shawls over tables. Who would have thought Mrs Fordyce’s husband was a wealthy lawyer when she kept such a poverty-stricken drawing room? the critics would ask. But there were plenty of artists and others who thought Mrs Fordyce’s taste to be truly modern and much to be admired. As for her housemaids, they loved it. Less to dust!

  On that April evening, when Rosa and Agnes brought in a tray of tea, the room might have seemed to them particularly attractive, with the lamps lit and a fire burning in the grate, except that they had no thoughts for anything other than Mrs Fordyce’s questioning. As it was, they set down the tray in silence while the genial Mr Fordyce excused himself for work in his study, wedding talk not being his sort of thing as he explained, while his wife, tall and slim in a bright green evening dress, had a special smile for Rosa.

  ‘There you are then, Rosa, back from the wedding! Did all go well? I’m sure it did. Now you must tell me all about it.’

  But only silence fell, for Rosa couldn’t begin, and it was Agnes who finally stepped in with her usual confidence.

  ‘We have to tell you, ma’am, that there was a problem with the wedding. Rosa here is very upset – I came with her to help her explain.’

  ‘A problem?’ Mrs Fordyce turned her sympathetic gaze on Rosa. ‘Oh, I’m so sorry! Was someone taken ill?’

  ‘Nothing like that, ma’am. The fact is Rosa’s sister changed her mind. She decided not to marry after all.’ Agnes gave Rosa a quick glance, prompting her, as Rosa knew, to enter the conversation herself. ‘Everything was cancelled, is that not right, Rosa?’

  Meeting Mrs Fordyce’s wide grey eyes with her own troubled gaze, Rosa put her shoulders back and stood very straight, willing herself now to find the courage to speak, to discover at last what would be thought of her story that would be so different from anything her mistress might have expected. And of the consequences, if any, for herself.

  ‘It is true, ma’am,’ she said quietly. ‘There could be no wedding. My sister left a note for the bridegroom and one for my father and me, telling us she was going away with someone else. Then it was left to us to tell the minister. The bridegroom was too upset.’

  ‘Why, I should think so!’ cried Mrs Fordyce. ‘What a terrible thing to happen! How he must be suffering, the poor man! And you, Rosa, and your father too – you must have had such a shock to have this coming out of the blue?’

  ‘At first, we could not take it in,’ Rosa said after a pause. ‘It’s true my sister has always liked her own way, but she’s good at heart, she’s never wanted to hurt anyone, so when she … did this … I couldn’t believe it. Still can’t,’ she added as Mrs Fordyce shook her head.

  ‘How sure she must have been, though, that she knew what she wanted this time. I mean, to be willing to leave her bridegroom.’

  ‘Maybe thought she had found someone better?’ asked Agnes, looking at Rosa, whose colour had risen, whose eyes had for a moment flashed, then lost all expression.

  ‘She was wrong, then,’ she whispered and turned away to pick up Mrs Fordyce’s tea tray. ‘It was very good of you to see me, ma’am. I appreciate it.’

  ‘I just wish I could have been able to help.’ Mrs Fordyce sighed. ‘But what can anyone do?’

  As Rosa and Agnes bobbed a small curtsey and made their way slowly from the drawing room, they made no answer. It was true, of course, that there was nothing anyone could do.

  Even so, on their way down the back staircase Agnes remarked that Rosa must surely be feeling better, having talked to the mistress, who had been so sympathetic.

  ‘You see, you’d no need to worry about telling her, eh?’

  ‘I do feel a bit easier,’ Rosa answered. ‘And it was good to talk to the mistress. Seems she doesn’t blame me at all for what happened.’

  ‘Of course she doesn’t!’ cried Agnes, staring at her. ‘Why should she? You’re not responsible for what your sister does!’

  ‘Well, her employer thought I might be. Or at least thought I knew what Lorne was going to do and didn’t try to stop her. I hope Mrs Fordyce doesn’t think the same.’

  At the foot of the stairs, Rosa stopped to look into Agnes’s eyes. ‘But I didn’t know,’ she said quietly. ‘I’d never have let her hurt Daniel that way.’

  ‘Daniel?’

  ‘The man she was going to marry.’

  ‘Oh, I see.’ For a moment, Agnes studied Rosa’s face, takin
g what she could from her shuttered expression. ‘No, I’m sure you’d have done what you could to help him. But people always do what they want to do in the end, you know. Even if you’d known what your sister was planning, you could never have stopped her. So don’t go blaming yourself for something you couldn’t help.’

  ‘I just wish …’ Rosa shook her head. ‘But it’s too late for wishing, eh? Too late for wishing I could have done something.’

  ‘Try not to dwell on it, that’s my advice,’ Agnes said briskly. ‘Get on with your own life and stop worrying.’

  At which point, Rosa almost laughed. As though she could!

  Eleven

  It was work in the end that saved her, and everyone’s interest in news that wasn’t hers. The sad death of King Edward, for instance, and the succession of his second son, George the Fifth, who wouldn’t have succeeded at all if his elder brother hadn’t died. No one knew much about him except that he was married to a very serious-looking princess, Mary of Teck, but as Greta said, what had royalty to do with them, anyway? Their lives were so different. When would you catch Queen Mary sweeping and dusting?

  ‘They make life interesting is what I say,’ Agnes told her smartly, ‘and I wouldn’t be without them. Who’d want a president like them Americans? That you’d have to vote for?’

  ‘Seeing as we don’t get to vote, maybe you’re right!’ laughed Greta, but Rosa let the chatter sweep over her. She had personal worries enough to occupy her mind without seeking anything beyond. Over what might happen to her sister, for instance, and also poor Daniel: whether or not he was learning to live with his loss and whether he would one day be really free – free to see others in the world apart from Lorne. But when she got as far as that, Rosa’s mind always went blank, as she wanted it to do.

  All the time, she was wishing Da would write and give her what news he had, if any. But he was hopeless with a pen, and for Lorne herself to get in touch was probably out of the question. She would want to give no clue to the Thains, who would be desperate to find Rory to make him come home but had no idea where to start looking. Was it possible that he might after all marry Lorne? If he really loved her, perhaps it could happen? But even if he did, Rosa couldn’t see the Thains accepting Lorne as a daughter-in-law. All they’d probably do would be to sever ties with Rory, cutting his allowance as well, in which case – oh, heavens, it didn’t bear thinking of what might happen then.