The House of Lyall

by Doris Davidson

  She was shocked. He couldn’t live in a place like this? It was huge! There were dozens of lums, and turrets at the corners, with tiny leaded windows which wouldn’t let in much light but were real quaint; there was a curved drive up to the entrance; it was too big to be called a door. Before she had time to absorb any more details, they had passed the vantage point and her view was obscured.

  ‘That’s funny-looking trees,’ she observed, never having seen anything like them, their feathery branches sweeping down to the ground.

  ‘I can’t remember the Latin name for them,’ Stephen smiled, ‘but most people call them monkey puzzles. I hope you don’t think I took you this way to boast about my home, it was just that it’s a pleasant way to get out of town – right out Queen’s Road.’

  Queen’s Road being a continuation of Albyn Place, she had to agree with that. All the houses they passed before they came to the open countryside were every bit as grand as the Grants’, and all built from the silver granite taken out of Rubislaw Quarry, so Stephen told her when he took her up the grassy bank to show her the vast, gaping hole. It was so deep that her legs started trembling and she felt a sickness deep in her stomach, and she was extremely grateful that he didn’t make her stand so near the edge for long.

  They had been walking for almost an hour when he asked, ‘Do you want to sit on this dyke for a minute?’

  She shook her head. ‘I’d like a wee seat to rest my feet, but I’d best be getting back.’

  ‘Yes, if you’re late, your aunts might not let you come out with me again, and we can’t have that.’

  Until then, Stephen had been doing most of the talking, mainly about his fellow students and their squabbles, and had told her how disappointed he had been at not getting into Oxford, which had made her realize the vast difference between them, and when he asked which kind of books she read, she was too ashamed to confess that she couldn’t read very well.

  ‘What kind of books do you like?’ she countered, hedging.

  He shrugged wryly. ‘I used to like Sheridan and I quite liked Oscar Wilde’s stuff, but I don’t get time to read anything these days except law books … so dry they turn your brain to sawdust.’ Then he laughed. ‘I expect you’re like my mother. She loves novels – romances and tragedies, you know. She cried all the way through Mrs Wood’s East Lynne.’

  ‘So did I, and I love romances, and all.’ Marianne hadn’t read any novels, romantic or otherwise, but if Stephen’s mother loved them …

  ‘How old are you, Marianne? I didn’t think of asking before.’

  ‘I’ll be sixteen next month.’ His involuntary gasp, ‘God, you’re only a baby,’ made her ask, ‘How aul’ are you?’

  ‘I was twenty-one in July.’

  From then on, Marianne could sense a difference in him, and tried to think what had caused it. Did he think she was too young for him? Or had he seen through her attempt to sound well read?

  At her door in Strawberry Bank, he remarked, very correctly and not at all convincingly, ‘Thank you for walking with me, Marianne, I have enjoyed your company, and no doubt I shall see you again some time. Good night.’

  She managed to hide her disappointment that he so clearly didn’t want to take her out again. ‘Good night, Stephen.’ She had to force her legs to move as she went into the house, only to find that her ordeal was just beginning, because the sisters were waiting eagerly to hear how she and Stephen had got on together. Too vain to say something had gone wrong, she told them about the first half of the evening, letting them believe that things had been the same on the way home, and, urged to tell them as much about his house as she could, she embellished her description until they were satisfied and she was free to go to bed.

  Miss Esther and Miss Emily retired to their room happy that their young friend had enjoyed her entire evening, but Miss Edith, sharper and more observant, had a feeling that this was not the case. Sorry for the girl, she kept her suspicions to herself.

  Marianne felt reluctant to go out with Andrew the following Sunday, but once away from the house, and sure that he would be sympathetic, she asked him if Stephen Grant had said anything to him about her.

  ‘He didn’t say anything about anything. Why? Didn’t you get on together?’

  ‘We did at first, then … oh, I dinna ken what happened. I couldna tell him the names of any books because I’ve never read any, and then he asked how old I was, and after that, he hardly spoke.’

  Andrew pursed his mouth for a moment. ‘Would you like me to tell you the novels my mother used to read?’

  ‘Would you, Andrew? I hated having to read books when I was at the school, but I might enjoy novels with good stories. Another thing, though – maybe he didna … didn’t like the way I speak.’

  ‘You have a very broad country accent,’ Andrew smiled, ‘but that’s nothing to be ashamed of.’

  ‘I hear myself broader than folk in the town, and I dinna ken any big words. And when I get mixed up, it gets worse. Could you help me with that, and all?’

  ‘You want me to prepare you to be a lady, is that what you mean?’

  ‘If I do find a rich husband, I wouldn’t want to let him down by not speaking proper.’

  ‘If he loved you, he wouldn’t care how you talked.’

  She shook her head. ‘Like I told you before, I’m not interested in love. Will you help me, Andrew?’

  ‘All right, I’ll give you lessons in speech and deportment, so that you will be able to hold your head up in any company. I’ll make you read certain books in set times, and I’ll give you others to help you to improve your vocabulary. But once we start, young lady, we’ll go on until I’m satisfied with you, so there must be no complaining.’

  ‘I won’t complain, Andrew, and I’m really grateful. I’ll show that Stephen Grant I’m as good as him … and his mother.’

  ‘Ah, so you’re doing it for him, are you? Well, I can promise you that when we are finished, you can set your sights much higher than Stephen Grant.’

  Her eyes were dancing, her face agog with enthusiasm for what she hoped to accomplish. ‘I’ll maybe end up among royalty,’ she giggled, her expression sobering when she saw how Andrew was looking at her.

  ‘I’d prefer if you stayed just the way you are right now,’ he said softly.

  Chapter Three

  At first, Marianne’s eagerness to improve herself had amused Andrew, but, looking back, he was amazed by her quick assimilation of all he had taught her over the past year. He had given her a list of books he thought would appeal to her as well as add to her vocabulary, and by the middle of 1896, there was a marked improvement in her self-confidence, especially when she was introduced to his friends. What bothered him was that they obviously liked talking with her and lingered on while he wished them at the other end of the earth. But he could not tell her so. She clearly didn’t feel the same way about him as he did about her.

  Another summer coming to an end, the weather turned progressively colder. Sunshine gave way to winds and showers, then to mists and rain and then to sleet and snow … accompanied by gales. The young people did not forego their afternoon walks unless the weather was too bad, but come Marianne’s third November in Aberdeen, they were more often inside than out. This put a temporary end to the lessons, but Marianne surprised the sisters by her newly acquired ability to enter into discussions on current affairs. As Miss Edith observed, ‘Andrew has worked wonders. Except when she is under stress, Marianne has practically lost her country accent, and she can carry herself quite gracefully. And she has grown since she came here; she is almost as tall as he is now.’

  ‘I think they’re a perfect couple,’ Miss Esther beamed, ‘just made for each other.’

  ‘No, no,’ cautioned Miss Emily. ‘I think that our Maid Marianne is looking for someone with better prospects than Andrew.’

  Very much out of character, Miss Edith gave a long sigh. ‘Can’t you see that he already loves her? I am afraid she will break his heart, n
ot deliberately, but he will be hurt, nevertheless.’

  Sighing too, Miss Esther murmured hopefully, ‘She is young yet. By the time she is old enough for marriage …’ The return of the young people at that moment put an end to their conjecturing.

  It soon became noticeable, to Marianne herself as well as to her benefactresses, that her relationship with Andrew had changed; although they were still just friends, a new element had crept in of his wanting to touch her, to brush hands or shoulders, to sit closer to her on the sofa, which made Miss Esther nod happily.

  Marianne herself did not know how she felt about it. While she liked the way that she sometimes caught Andrew looking at her, his eyes soft with admiration … or more? … it made her uneasy. She had now made the acquaintance of several of the students who were at Marischal College with him, and she was hoping that one of them would ask her out so that she could make some comparisons. She did wonder how Andrew would take it, but surely he’d want her to enjoy herself? A few hours of innocent pleasure – what would be wrong with that?

  Andrew sprung his surprise as soon as he arrived on the first Sunday in December. ‘There’s a Hogmanay Ball being laid on for the Law Faculty,’ he announced, his eyes going round the four smiling faces. ‘I want to go, but … I need a partner.’

  ‘Take Marianne,’ beamed Miss Esther. ‘She won’t have to worry about a ballgown, because there’s plenty of time for me to –’

  ‘I can’t let you make one for me!’ the girl gasped, scarlet-faced.

  Miss Edith, the decision-maker, stepped in. ‘That is not the point in question, Marianne. Do you really want to go, or do you feel that you had better go for the sake of appearance, since most of Andrew’s friends will have seen him out walking with you?’

  ‘I want to go,’ Marianne cried, ‘but it’ll be an awful lot of work for you and such an expense …’

  Miss Esther stood up. ‘I was not meaning to make a dress. I am sure one of the old gowns in the trunk in our cellar would fit without too much alteration. Emily, will you come down with me to hold the candle while I look?’

  After her sisters left the room, Miss Edith got to her feet. ‘I may as well go with them. I would quite like to see our gowns again. Mamma had them made for our one and only ball, but …’ She shrugged this off as though she did not regret it, but her wry smile and rather sad eyes told a different story.

  ‘Your one and only ball?’ echoed Marianne. ‘Why was that?’

  ‘Father did not approve of dancing, but he was away at the time when Lavinia Tennant – Father Bernard’s mother, you know – invited us to her twenty-first birthday ball, so Mamma let us accept. She said we would never meet any young men otherwise, but when Father came home and found out, he locked the gowns up in his old trunk, and took it down to the cellar. Then Mamma died, and … well, we didn’t feel like dancing after that, and by the time Father passed on, we were all past marrying age.’ Miss Edith dashed away the solitary tear that had edged over her bottom eyelid as she closed the door behind her.

  ‘I don’t think I’d better go to the ball with you, Andrew,’ Marianne whispered. ‘It would likely upset them to see me wearing …’

  He came towards her, eyes wide and pleading. ‘Please, Marianne? I can’t go unaccompanied. Please?’

  A flash of irritation made her say, ‘You just want me to come with you because you can’t find another partner, that’s all! Why don’t you ask that Vi, or one of the other ladies of the street? You told me once you wanted to –’

  He stepped back like a wounded animal and lashed out in the only way he knew how. ‘Maybe I will.’

  ‘Go ahead, then, and see if I care!’

  ‘Oh, how stupid I’ve been, thinking you … liked me a little bit.’

  Her conscience smote her. ‘I do like you, Andrew! Quite a lot! But I don’t want to bring back bad memories to your aunts, they’ve been so good to me. Can’t you understand that?’

  ‘Yes, of course I do, and I’m sorry. All right, if you think even one of them will be upset if you wear her dress, I won’t try to make you change your mind.’

  They left it at that, and he sat down to await his aunts’ return.

  The elderly ladies, whispering excitedly, came in with their arms empty and explained that they had taken the dresses up to Marianne’s room. ‘You can try them on when you go to bed,’ Miss Edith told her.

  Andrew smiled broadly. ‘I get the impression you don’t want me to see them.’

  ‘Of course we don’t, not yet!’ declared Miss Esther, who was now harbouring secret dreams of him taking one look at the girl in her chosen gown and being so overcome by love that he would gather her into his arms and shower her with kisses in front of them all.

  Pretending to be offended, he got to his feet. ‘I suppose I’d better get out of the way.’

  ‘You don’t need to leave yet,’ Marianne protested, although she was desperate to see the gowns.

  ‘I have a lot of revision to do for the end-of-term assessments,’ he assured her. ‘I wasn’t intending to stay anyway.’

  As she had been doing for some weeks, she saw him to the door, but tonight, instead of his usual joking farewell gesture of tipping his forelock, he took her hand in both of his. ‘Choose the dress you want, Marianne, and don’t worry about the aunts. They’re not as vulnerable as they look; they’re really tough old birds.’

  ‘I still wouldn’t want to hurt them,’ she said gently. ‘You wouldn’t be angry if I didn’t go with you, would you?’

  ‘I wouldn’t be angry,’ he said softly, ‘I’d be broken-hearted.’

  His eyes held the same strange look she had noticed briefly before; a serious look that she couldn’t have described if anyone had asked her; a look which, combined with the squeezing of her hand, had made her heart speed up, her stomach turn over with a pain that wasn’t a pain, the kind of feeling she welcomed and wished would never go away. Hoping that he was about to kiss her on the mouth, she was disappointed when he raised her hands to his lips. ‘Good night, my dear Marianne,’ he murmured.

  ‘Good night, Andrew.’ She closed the door and leaned against it. She couldn’t be falling in love with him? She couldn’t be! She certainly hadn’t counted on anything like that! The rich man of her dreams still hadn’t materialized … but he would!

  When she went back to the parlour, Miss Esther said, ‘Shall we go to your room now?’ and at Marianne’s nod, they all trooped upstairs.

  When she saw the array of shimmering loveliness spread across her bed, she gasped with awe and glanced helplessly from one to the other of the elderly ladies. ‘I’ll never be able to choose one.’

  ‘We will leave you to try them on,’ Miss Edith said, in the brisk manner she used in the shop, pushing her sisters towards the door.

  ‘Yes, take your time, dear,’ Miss Esther smiled. ‘Move around and see how you feel in them. Nothing is worse than spending a whole evening in something uncomfortable.’

  Miss Emily nodded. ‘When you’ve picked the one you feel happiest with, Esther will do any alterations it needs.’

  Ignoring the smell of camphor emanating from the gowns, Marianne tried to judge, while she tried them on in an imaginative euphoria, which suited her best. First, she wriggled into Esther’s soft peach – tulle underlined with stiff taffeta – with layers of ruffles looped round the hem of the huge skirt, and so narrow in the waist that she would have to be laced in very tightly before the buttons down the back would fasten; Miss Esther must have been much slimmer when she was young. Holding the back together as she twirled in front of the long cheval mirror, she gasped at the way the yards and yards of material moulded into her body instead of looking bulky as she had believed they would. She had never given a thought to her figure before, but her curvacious reflection elated her – this was the one!

  In case Miss Esther’s sisters would be offended, she decided to try on theirs too, and so, lifting the deep rose which had been Miss Emily’s, she slipped it over her h
ead and turned back to the mirror. It was not a girl she saw this time, but a tall, elegant woman, the décolletage displaying every inch of her neck and shoulders … and most of her bosom. The front of the skirt flowed to the floor, but the back was padded out by a bustle, not big, but enough to be a talking point these days. She considered for a short time and came to the conclusion that she didn’t have the nerve – nor the figure, if it came to that – to wear this gown. Maybe when she was older …?

  The ice-blue creation that was Miss Edith’s seemed at first glance to be too cold a colour, not what Marion had thought would appeal to her, but as soon as she put it on and pirouetted to get an idea of how it looked from behind, she knew that this really was the one. There was just a shadow of cleavage showing at the bust, much more demure, though the bodice was constructed so as to make the most of small breasts. From the waist, which was not quite so small as the peach, the skirt billowed out over a wide crinoline. It was … oh, perfect didn’t do it justice, but it was the best word she could come up with.

  A quiet tap at her door made her call, ‘Come in.’

  Miss Edith opened the door and asked, ‘Have you decided yet? Please don’t laugh at my haste, but I had to find out.’

  ‘I’m not laughing. They’re all lovely, but I’m going for yours.’ Although Marianne had told Andrew she would give up the idea of going to the ball if any of his aunts seemed distressed, she knew now that she wasn’t so self-sacrificing. Whatever happened, she would be there as his partner.

  Miss Edith, however, did not appear at all distressed. ‘Do you not think it too old-fashioned?’ she asked, as she began to fasten the tiny cloth buttons. ‘Crinolines of this size were going out even when I wore it, and that’s … great heavens, almost forty years ago!’

  Marianne shook her head. ‘I don’t care how old-fashioned it is!’