Wild Heritage

by Wild Heritage (retail) (epub)

  In Edinburgh Marie left two bags in the left luggage office of the station and headed along Princes Street to Professor Abernethy’s. He was delighted to see her, dancing about with his hands fluttering and exclaiming, ‘My dear, I’ve a windfall for you. Last week I received a letter offering to buy the snow scene and a bag of money for the full price, sixty guineas! It was delivered by a bank messenger. Look… Here’s the money.’

  From a doeskin bag with a drawstring neck he poured out a pile of glittering coins that winked and sparkled on the dark wood of his table.

  Marie clapped her hands in wonder. ‘How amazing! Who bought it?’

  The Prof shook his head. ‘That’s the strange thing. There was no name on the letter and the bank messenger didn’t know who’d sent him. He was just told to come, give me the money and take a picture away with him. I was a bit suspicious as you can imagine but the coins are real enough.’

  Perusal of the letter provided no clue either, for it was written in a clerkly hand on bank notepaper and seemed to have been dictated or copied.

  ‘A mystery,’ sighed the Professor.

  ‘But a good one,’ added Milly, scooping up the coins and putting them back in their little sac which she handed to Marie.

  ‘This is wonderful,’ she said. ‘It means that I’ve more than enough money to keep me in Paris.’

  At Murrayhill tempers were frayed as the last travelling plans were being laid. Amy sat sullen in the drawing-room and when Marie asked what was wrong, she snapped, ‘We’re being sent to London with Arthur and after that my horrible aunt’s taking us on to Paris. They don’t even trust us to travel on our own.’

  She raised her voice so that her mother could hear and said again, ‘We’re being treated like children.’

  Mrs Roxburgh was imperturbable. ‘You’ll travel to London with Arthur and your Aunt Agatha has kindly agreed to travel with you to Paris, for she knows that city well. She’ll find you lodgings and register you at the class. Then she’ll come home.’ There was obviously no arguing against this, though Amy tried.

  ‘We’re perfectly capable of getting to London and finding lodgings in Paris for ourselves,’ she whined.

  ‘No, you’re not,’ said Mrs Roxburgh sternly. ‘Neither of you know anything of the world and I want to be sure that you’re in a respectable house. I owe that to Marie’s brother at least.’

  Marie looked up startled from the map of Paris she had been studying. ‘To my brother? But he’s not concerned in this. He doesn’t even know anything about it.’

  ‘Then you should have told him. It’s only right that he knows because he’s your closest relative, isn’t he?’

  It was then that Marie knew Mrs Roxburgh had not only received David’s letter but that she believed, or at least sympathised with, whatever he said in it. A feeling of foreboding grew strong in her. Though members of the family were passing through the room there was no sign of Murray and she hoped that she would at least be able to say goodbye to him. Three months seemed a very long time to be away. Surely he would feel the same?

  He did not appear at dinner and, unable to contain herself, Marie asked Amy about him. I he reply was light. ‘He’s working like the very devil. His exams start next week but he’ll come to see us off.’

  Marie sighed. It seemed to her that Murray had done more work for his exams than anyone ever before. If he did not pass, it would certainly not be for lack of trying.

  She slept little that night and when morning came she was dressed in her new travelling clothes before anyone else was up and sat for an hour at her bedroom window, staring down at the vast garden.

  When she went down to breakfast, the sight and smell of food nauseated her. All she could take was a cup of tea. Then the servants started piling Amy’s bags and trunks up in the hall, two carriages were waiting at the door and the family began to appear.

  Oh joy! There was Murray. He looked so stern and handsome in a dark suit and long cape. Marie’s heart leaped into her throat at the sight of him and she stood up from her place at the table to walk into the hall towards him. He greeted her with a smile.

  ‘What an adventure for you,’ he said cordially as if he were talking to a stranger.

  ‘I wish you were coming too,’ she whispered.

  ‘So do I. Paris is lovely,’ he said with a laugh. ‘The time’ll pass quickly,’ he added.

  His mother came sweeping into the hall, issuing orders. ‘Murray, you ride with the baggage and make sure nothing’s been left behind. Marie’s bags are in the left luggage office at the station. You must take charge of them as well… Amy and Marie get in the first carriage with Arthur and myself. Now let’s go!’

  When Murray retrieved Marie’s two bags from the left luggage office, he was obviously amazed.

  ‘Is this all you’re taking?’ he asked, for Amy had three trunks and two bags, both of them bigger than Marie’s.

  ‘What else do I need?’ she asked. ‘When I want new clothes, I’ll buy them, if I need new clothes. Things don’t wear out in three months.’

  ‘I hope some of your economy rubs off on my sister while you’re away together,’ he said with a grin and set off with a bag in each hand for the train, which was already steaming at the platform.

  Everyone embraced. Marie found herself crushed to Mrs Roxburgh’s bosom, pecked on the cheek by Mr Roxburgh and Amy’s oldest brother and then, at last, in Murray’s arms. He smelt of pomade as he bent his head to kiss her… on the cheek. Her lips stung with her longing to press them to his but she was very conscious of his mother’s eyes on them.

  ‘Goodbye, Murray. Don’t forget me,’ she whispered.

  ‘I’ll miss you. Have a lovely time,’ he said in a formal voice. Then they were away.

  The journey passed without incident except that with every mile they travelled Marie gained in confidence and Amy seemed to shrink into herself. While one girl enthused about the places they saw from the train window en route; while she relished the French coffee and sniffed the smell of French tobacco with delight, the other grew more and more disdainful, comparing all she saw to Edinburgh and never finding anything that equalled it.

  The lodgings found for the girls by Amy’s aunt, the snobbish Mrs Agatha Wyndham, were on the Boulevard Clichy in a large apartment owned by Madame Guillaume, widow of a pedagogue. For them she provided a stuffy sitting-room and large bedroom with two narrow beds.

  The sitting-room had a long window overlooking the street, but they were denied a view because Madame preferred to keep it permanently shuttered. The whole apartment smelt musty and airless, made worse by the underlying aroma of aged dog which came from the curly-tailed white Pomeranian, the landlady’s constant companion.

  ‘As soon as Aunt Agatha goes home, we’ll move,’ Amy whispered to Marie when they first saw the room but they never did because French-speaking and apparently self-assured Amy was intimidated by Paris.

  She walked the short journey from the apartment to the painting salon every day as quickly as possible and hurried home again at noon for the enormous meal which was always waiting for them in Madame Guillaume’s gloomy dining-room where golden dust motes swam in filtered light coming from the lace-curtained windows. In the afternoons Marie drew while Amy slept and when evening came, they still stayed at home, sometimes playing cards with Madame.

  Marie was frustrated because she felt life pulsating around her when she stood at the window, which she opened in spite of Madame’s prohibitions, and stared down at the people passing by.

  ‘Do come in,’ said Amy when she saw her. ‘Someone might see you standing there and Madame likes the window to be kept closed.’

  ‘But look at those people sitting outside the café over there. Aren’t they smart?’ exulted Marie.

  Amy would not look. ‘They’re horribly flashy. Don’t let them see you. The French are awful about British people. They think every English girl is rich. They’re quite unscrupulous.’

  Marie hoped that Amy’s ca
ution would ease in time but she was wrong. In class she would only talk to other English-speaking students and if any French person, apart from a teacher, addressed a remark to her, she affected not to understand.

  Marie, handicapped by her own lack of language, fretted when Amy would not interpret for her and remonstrated with her friend, ‘Don’t be so stiff with the French people. I think some of them are trying to be friendly.’

  ‘We’re safer with our own kind,’ Amy told her stiffly.

  On their third Sunday in the city the sun shone brilliantly and it was hot from early morning. By dint of much persuasion Marie managed to get Amy to agree to go sketching on the Île de France and they walked through a festively dressed crowd, across the bridge onto the island, and set up their stools and easels in the little garden behind Notre Dame, intending to draw the willow trees dipping into the river.

  After they had been working quietly for about an hour, a group of young men came strolling over and stood behind the girls, making comments about their work. Marie saw Amy’s cheeks colouring but since she could not understand what was being said, she did not mind. Then one of the men leaned over her shoulder and said, ‘Very good, very good… très bon.’

  She smiled up at him and he made a drinking gesture with his hand, inviting her to take a glass of wine with him. She brandished her pencil to indicate that she wanted to finish her sketch and with a grin he ran over to a café, returning a few moments later with a glass of white wine which he presented to her with a flourish. One of his friends followed with another glass for Amy.

  Marie accepted her glass graciously and smiled her thanks. ‘Merci,’ she said, for she had at least learned that word by now.

  Amy, however, shook her head and said loudly in English, ‘No, thank you. Take it away.’ Then she turned reproachfully to Marie and hissed, ‘You shouldn’t drink it. They’ve been making very personal comments about us because they think we don’t understand.’

  Marie, sipping the wine, laughed and asked, ‘What have they been saying?’

  Amy’s cheeks were red. ‘They said I’m an amateur. Such impudence! They admire your work of course and they also like your hair.’ It was obvious that Amy had not come out well in comparisons between the girls and she did not like it.

  The young man who stood beside her holding out his offered glass suddenly said in accented English, ‘But you too, Mademoiselle, are very pretty. Do not worry.’

  ‘I’m not worried,’ snapped Amy, rising to her feet. ‘I don’t have to worry what a party of Frenchmen think about me! I’m going home.’ In her haste she scattered sheets of drawing paper over the grass and spilled her box of charcoal. The young men stood watching and, to her chagrin, none of them tried to help as she scrabbled about picking things up.

  Marie sat still too. ‘I’m staying here,’ she said firmly.

  ‘But you can’t speak French. What’ll you do? Take care you don’t get into trouble. These men look very rough to me,’ cautioned Amy, who was visibly angry and upset.

  ‘I won’t get into trouble. I know the way home. I’ll stay here to finish my wine and my drawing. Then I’ll come back to the apartment. Don’t worry about me, Amy,’ Marie said coolly.

  When her friend stormed off, she started to draw again but the young men did not go away. Instead they settled down, sprawling back on the grass with their legs thrust out, and tried to speak to her. The one who spoke some English said his name was Pierre, and offered to be their interpreter. He invited Marie to have lunch with them in a café overlooking the river. ‘You will be safe with us. We are also painters,’ he told her.

  That was the only encouragement she needed and soon she found herself in the middle of a group of rapidly talking, gesticulating young men, crumbling delicious crusty bread into oil and vinegar sauce while eating asparagus and sardines with her fingers. They filled her glass of wine again and she found her tongue, chattering in a sort of half-French, half-English, which amazingly they seemed to understand.

  They laughed, they flirted, they asked questions and answered hers while the lunch-hour passed into afternoon and fashionably dressed women with little dogs on leads began to promenade along the sidewalk in front of them.

  ‘We’re going to the studio of a friend now. Would you like to accompany us?’ asked Pierre.

  Marie turned to look at the café clock. ‘Oh, goodness gracious! It’s half-past four. Amy will be frantic with worry about me. I must go back to the apartment, I’m afraid.’

  ‘We will walk with you,’ offered Pierre but she shook her head. ‘No, it’s best if I go alone. I’m sorry I can’t come with you, though. Perhaps some other time?’

  She knew that sounded very bold but somehow, in Paris, it did not matter. She could be as bold as she liked.

  ‘Where are you working?’ asked one of the other men, whose name she had discovered was Luc.

  ‘I’m not. I’m studying at the École des Peintures.’

  A gabble of talk broke out over this and then Pierre told her, ‘We think you are too good to be in that place. It is for fashionable dabblers. You are not a dabbler. We will meet you tomorrow at the same place and take you to see some real teachers if you like.’

  For a moment she thought she ought not to accept this offer but her own misgivings about the salon surfaced, misgivings that she had been thrusting to the back of her mind ever since she arrived in Paris. It had not taken long to gauge the standard of work of the pupils who attended the same class as Amy and herself. They were all well-born young ladies who were even more unserious than the girls at Professor Abernethy’s class and the teachers were more intent on gossiping and flirting with them than teaching them how to paint. The fees, Marie was beginning to fear, were a waste of money.

  ‘All right. I’ll meet you here tomorrow afternoon at three o’clock,’ she said.

  Pierre laughed. ‘Not three. Meet us at seven. We are working, or sleeping, at three…’

  She only hesitated for a moment. ‘At seven then,’ she agreed and hurried back to the gloom of Madame Guillaume’s apartment.

  It was best not to tell Amy about her afternoon, she decided, and Amy did not ask. They were scrupulously polite towards each other for the rest of the day and all of the next morning but as they were walking back at noon, Marie said, ‘I don’t think much of the standard of work in the class, do you?’

  Amy screwed up her nose. ‘It’s all I want. Perhaps you’re setting your sights too high.’

  ‘I think it’s a waste of time,’ Marie protested.

  ‘We’re not all touched with genius,’ was Amy’s retort.

  ‘Oh, Amy, I don’t think I’m a genius. But I want to learn more. None of the teachers at that place seem capable of teaching me anything worthwhile,’ she protested.

  Amy sniffed. ‘I don’t think you’ve given them a chance. We’ve only been here for three weeks remember.’

  Marie frowned, almost one month gone out of three. One month wasted when she could be learning something worthwhile.

  And one month gone without hearing anything of Murray.

  When they entered the apartment, however, there was a letter waiting on a tray in the hall. It was for Amy. She read it, folded it up and stuck in her pocket, saying casually, ‘Murray sends you his love.’

  ‘Is he well?’ asked Marie eagerly.

  ‘Very.’ That was all that passed between them about him but Marie treasured the little bulletin from across the Channel and longed to ask Amy to let her see his writing, to let her read his message of love for herself but that would have been considered impossibly presumptuous. Amy’s letters were private and she never left any of them lying about.

  Their afternoon passed in boredom. ‘Come and walk along the street to look at the shops. There’s a lovely bookshop on the corner that I’d like to visit,’ said Marie, but Amy shook her head.

  ‘The books are all in French and you can’t read French,’ she said.

  ‘I’m going to learn it,’ Marie sai
d with sudden resolve.

  Amy laughed. ‘You won’t learn much in the time we’ve got left.’

  ‘I might stay longer,’ Marie said and Amy looked up with a light of interest in her eyes.

  ‘Really?’ she asked.

  ‘Yes, I like it here and there’s nothing much to go home for at the moment. Murray’s so busy that I never see him…’ Marie threw caution to the winds and spoke his name openly instead of carrying it around in her head all the time.

  Amy flinched as if Marie had uttered an obscenity. ‘I told you not to rely on Murray,’ was all she said as she rose. ‘I’m tired. I’m going to lie down.’ Then she walked from the sitting-room into the bedroom next door.

  She was still sleeping, or at least lying with her eyes closed, at half-past six when Marie dressed to go out.

  ‘I’m going for a walk,’ she whispered, leaning over the bed where her friend lay.

  ‘Take care,’ was the mumbled reply.

  Pierre and Luc were waiting at the café near Notre Dame and when she arrived, they gave her a glass of wine and suggested that they go to Montparnasse where their friends lived. Marie agreed without hesitation because her initial liking for them was growing with further acquaintance.

  Pierre, who had a streak of oil paint down his face but seemed oblivious of it, told her that he worked as a restorer, but Luc did less well because he scraped a living selling watercolours of local scenes to people strolling in the Boulevard St Germain.

  He was very thin, his shoes were cracked and his clothes threadbare but he was ebullient and cheerful, always laughing and from the way his friend guffawed at his remarks, apparently very funny. Marie longed to know enough of the language to understand his jokes as well.

  He’d been selling his work that afternoon from the rails outside the Church of St Germain and had seven francs in his pocket. He counted them out on the metal top of the café table and said he was going to buy the next round of drinks.

  She demurred. ‘Let me buy the drinks!’ she said. It seemed awful to take Luc’s last seven francs when she had a roll of francs in her purse. The men looked at each other and allowed her to pay.