Wild Heritage

by Wild Heritage (retail) (epub)

  He jumped up from his chair and towered over his sister. He’d grown very tall, Marie noticed. She also saw that he was adopting the stance of a man of power, the pose of Adalbert Henderson whom he unconsciously copied.

  ‘I’m telling you that you’re to come to Maddiston and live with me. I’m your guardian,’ he ordered.

  She was on her feet too, eyes blazing. ‘I will not come and you’re not my guardian. If anyone is, it’s Tibbie.’

  Tibbie had never seen her so animated or determined and longed to cheer her on but held her tongue.

  David turned to the watching woman. ‘Tell her she can’t stay in your house any longer,’ he said sharply.

  Tibbie shook her head. ‘I can’t do that. She’s welcome here for as long as she wants to stay.’

  ‘I won’t pay for her unless she’s with me,’ he said.

  ‘That doesn’t matter. I don’t need the money,’ said Tibbie calmly. Marie was watching her with eyes full of gratitude.

  David thumped his fist on the table. ‘You’re both against me. But you’ll find out I’m right. She’ll need me in the end. She’ll come begging to me to take her in.’

  He grabbed his coat from the chair where it was drying in front of the fire and struggled his way into it again. Neither of the women tried to stop him as he stormed out of the door into the rain.

  * * *

  It was a relief to Marie when the weekend was over and she could take the train back to Edinburgh. She actually ran along Princes Street in her haste to reach the studio. She was eager to be back with her friends and her work, eager to shake off Camptounfoot, David and all of her past.

  In the big studio she sniffed the heady aroma of turpentine mixed with linseed oil. It was a smell she loved, a smell that made her want to throw off her jacket and start painting immediately. She could hardly spare the time to say more than ‘Good morning’ to anyone.

  Amy looked up, waved and grinned as she came running in, some of the other girls waved too and the Professor bustled over to say, ‘I want you to go across to the gallery on the other side of the road and look at the Dutch flower pieces there. You might like to try your hand at copying one of them.’

  Time passed like magic when she painted. The hours flew by like seconds and it felt as if she had only started when Amy stood beside her wiping her brushes on a cloth and saying, ‘You’re coming back to Murrayhill with me tonight, I hope. We’ve arranged a dancing party and lots of people will be there.’

  Including Murray! was Marie’s first thought but she demurred half-heartedly. ‘I’d love to but I’m always in your house. Your mother must be tired of the sight of me,’ but she hoped with all her heart that Amy really meant to take her home.

  Though she’d stayed at Murrayhill often, she never presumed that she would be asked back. There was no problem with Tibbie, for if Marie was not off the half-past seven train, it was accepted that she would not be home that night.

  Amy laughed. ‘My mother’s got to the stage that she doesn’t know whether you’re one of her own children or not and sometimes I think she prefers you to me. She’s always boasting to her friends about this wonderful artist she knows and that, my dear, is you,’ she said.

  ‘Your mother’s an angel,’ said Marie in a heartfelt tone.

  Amy raised a sceptical eyebrow. ‘Don’t be deceived. My mother’s only an angel so long as you’re doing what she wants. Anyone who crosses her sees a very different side, I assure you.’

  ‘Well, she’s never shown her different side to me,’ said Marie loyally.

  ‘Not yet,’ said Amy, ‘but then she might never. You’re her darling and I know she’d be furious with me if I didn’t bring you home tonight.’

  They drove in Amy’s carriage as usual. The coachman knew Marie by now and smiled when he handed her in. She loved the luxury of the carriage. That was the way people ought to live…

  Murrayhill was a buzz of activity when they turned into the drive. To Marie’s amazement there were flames leaping from oil braziers on each side of the front door. She turned and asked Amy, ‘What’s happening?’

  ‘It’s Mama’s birthday. We always have a ball to celebrate it. I didn’t tell you because you’d have gone off fussing about buying her a present and she wouldn’t want that. But she wanted you to be there,’ Amy told her.

  Marie almost wept. ‘But I want to give your mother a present. You should have told me, oh, why didn’t you tell me. I’d have brought her one of my drawings from the studio. And what will I wear? I haven’t anything grand enough for a ball.’

  Amy laughed. ‘Stop fussing, we’ve thought of that. Mama asked her dressmaker to send a couple of gowns that would fit you. You’ve to pick the one you like best. It’s to be a present from her to you.’

  There was no use protesting, no use refusing the gift. How wonderful it was, thought Marie, to be so comfortably off that you could buy a gown for a strange girl without thinking twice. But she worried about not having a present for the kind Mrs Roxburgh.

  ‘Would you give me some charcoal and a sheet of paper? I want to make a drawing for your mother,’ she said to Amy.

  ‘What will you draw?’

  ‘I don’t know… I could do flowers…’

  ‘She thinks flower pictures are rather prissy,’ said Amy.

  ‘Then I could draw the house…’

  ‘You haven’t time,’ was Amy’s objection to this.

  I know, I’ll do a portrait of you,’ said Marie in sudden inspiration and this time Amy did not object except to say, ‘I’ll find it hard sitting still for long enough but I’ll try.’

  They ran upstairs to Amy’s big bedroom overlooking the lawns and Marie began her work, but it was harder going than she’d expected. Amy’s face was too mobile to settle into one expression. It took two hours and the maids were ringing the dressing gong by the time she finished.

  ‘I’m not satisfied with it, but it’ll have to do,’ she said morosely looking at the sketch. ‘Oh, I wish you’d told me about your mother’s birthday. I’d have done her a really good drawing if I’d known.’

  Amy did not spare more than a glance at her portrait. ‘That looks good to me. Cover it up and present it to her after dinner. She’ll be thrilled.’

  Marie was not so sure, for there was something she did not like about the portrait but she could not pinpoint exactly what it was. However, she rolled it up in a neat scroll and tied it with a ribbon that Amy found for her. It was too late now to do anything else.

  When she at last went into the room that she was always given when she stayed at Murrayhill, there was a froth of colour on the bed, where two very pretty ballgowns had been laid out for her. The first was sky-blue with ribbons fluttering from a bow in the middle of its low-cut bodice but the second made her draw her breath in admiration, for it was the colour of Kitty’s hair, a lovely amber-red, with a panniered skirt of velvet interlayed with taffeta. The bodice was modestly scoop-necked and two ribbon rosettes crowned the shoulders.

  While she was looking at the dresses, a maid came in and offered to help her dress. Such attentions always embarrassed Marie, who was not used to them, so she sent the girl away. She did not even try on the blue gown but lifted the skirt of the glowing amber-coloured one and slipped it over her head. The silk lining slid over her body with a satisfying rustle.

  She was so slim that she required no corsetting or lacing but the dress was designed to be fastened up the back and she was forced to ring for the maid, who came in and expertly secured twenty hooks and eyes which made the bodice fit tightly to Marie’s breasts and clasp her waist so that it looked even narrower than its actual eighteen inches.

  ‘It suits you very well, miss,’ said the admiring maid and offered to curl the tendrils of Marie’s fine hair with a pair of curling tongs that were already heating over a small candle-holder on the dressing-table.

  Abstractedly Marie said, ‘No, my hair’s naturally straight and it looks best that way. I’d feel like a do
ll with it curled.’ She stood gazing with disbelief at her reflection in the mirror. It was the first time she’d ever worn anything so beautiful and it made her feel like a beggar-girl transformed into a princess.

  The maid saw how delighted she was and offered, ‘I’ll run through to Miss Amy’s room and borrow some of her cologne to make you smell nice.’

  When the cologne was sprayed on, the dinner gong rang and Marie hurried downstairs holding up her panniered skirts. She was greeted by cries of delighted admiration from the entire Roxburgh family, but the one who gave her most pleasure was Murray, who jumped from his chair and held out his arm, saying with a charming smile that made her knees go weak, ‘I claim the honour of leading this beautiful stranger in to dinner.’

  Her heart was beating so fast that she feared he would see the pulse leaping in her neck. The wine that was served with the delicious meal helped her to calm down and soon she was laughing and talking as convivially as all the others round the table.

  At the end of the dinner, the handsome Roxburgh children stood up with their father, champagne glasses in hand, to toast their mother at the top of the table. She was dressed in ruby-red velvet and the diamonds in her hair and around her neck made her glow in the candlelight. She looked like a queen.

  Uncertain what to do during this family tribute, Marie sat still, but Murray gently reached across and pulled her to her feet, saying, ‘You must join in too. You’re practically one of the family by now.’

  Her heart was bursting with love, gratitude and unalloyed admiration as she stood up and raised her glass to the woman in the high-backed chair. Tonight she felt part of their privileged world, not just a wistful onlooker from the outside, not a waif brought in from the cold.

  When her gaze sought Murray’s he smiled, making little crinkles of laughter lines crease in the corners of his eyes. Marie sighed, sending him unspoken words, ‘I love you, I love you…’

  Before the guests arrived for the ball, the Roxburgh children presented their gifts to their mother. Her husband, she told them, had already given her the magnificent diamond parure which she was wearing as she sat enthroned, receiving her family’s homage.

  Amy gave her mother a china cottage that had tiny flowers round the door and creepers up the walls. It was greeted with cries of delight and a kiss on the cheek, which was also the tribute paid to the elder son’s Paisley shawl, Murray’s gold brooch with a quartz rose in its heart and youngest son Arthur’s crystal perfume spray with a large rubber bulb encased in silver mesh.

  When she received this last gift, his mother aimed the nozzle at him and sprayed him with tuberose that scented the whole room.

  ‘Ugh,’ cried Amy. ‘Why did you buy that scent, Arthur? It’s shopgirl scent, very vulgar.’

  Arthur went scarlet. ‘I thought mother would like it because it’s the kind you wear, Amy,’ he said.

  ‘Not any more,’ said his sister lightly. ‘I’ve grown out of such tastes.’

  Marie,. listening to this, was uncomfortably aware that she was reeking of tuberose too, because that was what the maid had borrowed from Amy. The first faint cloud appeared on her happy horizon. What a terrible mistake, she thought, for to her Amy was the setter of fashion and the expert on everything that was comme il faut.

  Finally it was Marie’s turn to hand over her gift. She had laid it under her chair and bent to pick it up and take it across to Mrs Roxburgh, who protested, ‘My dear, not you too. I expressly forbade Amy to tell you it was my birthday because I didn’t want you spending your money on me.’

  ‘I’ve only done you a drawing. It’s a portrait of Amy,’ said Marie, handing it over and, greatly daring, bending low to kiss Mrs Roxburgh’s cheek. Then she added, ‘I want to show you how much I appreciate everything you’ve done for me, how kind you’ve been… even this lovely dress…’

  With a quaver in her voice she held out the rustling skirt that shimmered in the firelight as if it had been brushed with gold. Mrs Roxburgh beamed at her, ‘You look so beautiful that the sight of you is sufficient reward. I knew that colour would make your hair look lovely and it has. Blondes have such an advantage when it comes to dressing. Amy thought you’d take the blue but I knew that your artist’s eye would tell you this is better.’

  She unrolled the drawing and held it out, gazing at it with her sharp and perceptive eye. For a while she said nothing but then gave a little laugh. ‘You’ve caught my daughter’s sharp look, haven’t you? You don’t flatter. That’s why you’ll never make a fashionable portraitist. People like to be flattered.’

  Marie was disappointed but not surprised that Mrs Roxburgh did not like the picture because she had not cared much for it herself.

  She began to explain, ‘I wanted to do you something else but there wasn’t time. I’ll start something else for you tomorrow, though.’

  Mrs Roxburgh smiled. ‘Please don’t. I’ll treasure this because it’s a very good character drawing, masterly in fact… You’re too good for portraits, that’s what I meant to say.’

  Arthur rose from his seat to look at the drawing over his mother’s shoulder.

  ‘It’s little Miss Do-As-I-Say to the life,’ he said looking at Amy with a laugh. Amy coloured and bit her lip.

  The drawing was passed round and when it reached Murray, he was tactful. ‘The handling of charcoal is masterly. Look at the clever way Marie has toned the skin. It reminds me of a Raphael cartoon,’ he said. Amy still said nothing and kept her eyes fixed on her plate. She was obviously far from pleased.

  Marie’s heart was like lead and it took all Murray’s blandishments to prevent her quietly slipping away and spending the rest of the evening in her bedroom.

  When he saw that she was upset, he crossed the room to stand behind her chair and lead her out on his arm when the family prepared to go into the hall to receive the ball guests.

  There was hubbub there. When the host and hostess started shaking the hands of the first arrivals, Murray whispered in Marie’s ear, ‘Save me the first waltz. I think you look beautiful.’

  There was a singing in her ears and her eyesight seemed to be somehow affected, but delightfully so, for everything was suffused with light and colour. Her embarrassment over the drawing of Amy was forgotten as she went into the huge drawing-room which had been transformed. Furniture had been pushed back or carted away and the carpet unrolled to reveal an expanse of parquet that shone like ice and looked equally slippery. The grand piano and harp that always sat in a corner were still there, but there were people sitting by them as well as a trio of string instrumentalists and a stately-looking gentleman in a tailcoat with a baton in his hand.

  Pots of ferns, flowering plants and bamboos from the conservatory had been brought in and were massed behind the little orchestra. When the host and hostess stepped into the room, the music began and would not stop till midnight.

  Marie Benjamin was to remember Mrs Roxburgh’s birthday ball for the rest of her life. Many, many times, she was to relive it in memory.

  The only dancing she had ever done till then was when she and Kitty had pranced about as children to the music of a fiddle in the main street of Camptounfoot where, on warm evenings, the villagers came out of their houses and one of the men played. The younger folk would start essaying a few steps and soon everybody, even Jo and Tibbie, would be hooching and hopping about in an impromptu display.

  It was very different at Murrayhill. When the music struck up, Murray bowed before her and took her hand to lead her onto the floor. Her heart was thudding so fast that she was really afraid that she might faint. His hand holding hers, however, was cool and reassuring and his wonderful brown eyes were looking at her with unguarded admiration. ‘I never thought you could look so lovely,’ he whispered.

  She stammered, ‘I’m not… I’m not a good dancer, I’m afraid.’

  He laughed. ‘Of course you are. I can tell by the way you walk,’ and saying that he put a firm arm around her waist and swept her into the middle of the
eddying crowd. Feeling as ifher bones had turned to rubber she yielded herself to him and was swept along like a bobbing cork on the top ofwater. It was so lovely to let him guide her, to be as light as a feather and feel her feet barely touching the ground, to be in Murray’s arms. If I were to die now, she thought, I wouldn’t really mind.

  Miraculously, she found that if she listened to the music, she could dance… it was as easy as that! Everything was easy when she had Murray to share it with her. When the final chord was played, she looked up at him with her cheeks pink and eyes sparkling. He held her tight for longer than was necessary and breathed softly in her ear, ‘Did you hear me when I said that you look lovely tonight?’

  To her own amazement she actually managed to flirt. Dropping her eyelids, she whispered back, ‘Yes, I heard you and I thank you for the compliment, but does it mean you don’t usually think so?’

  He laughed. ‘Don’t fish, Miss Benjamin. I’ll think about that question and let you know.’

  Deliriously, happy, she danced after that with the other Roxburgh brothers and a crowd of their friends who clustered round her and whose names she instantly forgot, for all the time she was making conversation with them, she was acutely conscious of Murray. She noticed every person he danced with — his mother, Amy, his aunt, three girls in pastel-coloured gowns, a bouncy, plump girl in scarlet whose laugh was like the Maddiston mill hooter, and a tall, dark-haired girl in a dress of dark green plaid. These last two he danced with twice before he finally returned to Marie.

  This time the music was sweet and sentimental and he seemed solemn as they circled the floor. They hardly spoke but when they were dancing at the back of the room out of sight, he dropped a quick peck on her cheek and whispered, ‘I’ve been thinking about your question. You’re always lovely.’