Winterwood (10 page)

“I know, Eliza. Oh, dear!” The ship plunged and shuddered, and Charlotte tightened her wraps about her, shivering. Even Edward had decided it might be better to sit on his mother’s lap than to explore the slippery decks. Daniel was not in sight.

“I’ll go down, Mrs. Meryon,” Lavinia said, and made her way toward the companionway, clutching at whatever support she could find.

She had a struggle to open the door of the cabin. Something seemed to be jamming it.

“Be careful!” Flora screamed. “You’re crushing me. I’m on the floor.”

In the greatest alarm, Lavinia edged her way in, to find Flora had somehow fallen out of her bunk, and was lying across the floor, her face distraught.

“Oh, Miss Hurst! I’m so glad you’ve come! Great-aunt Tameson was dying. I had to get her medicine for her.”

Lavinia leaned quickly over the old woman, who was lying very still, her face a frightening bluish color. But her eyes were open, and not at all lifeless. Indeed, they gleamed with their habitual amusement.

“I’m not dying. I—merely had an attack.” She paused, breathing deeply. “This—disagreeable child—somehow got my medicine bottle.” She moved a hand, showing the bottle clenched in her fingers, half of its contents spilled on the sheets. “I—dispensed with a spoon.” She lay quietly, concentrating on breathing.

“Is she—dead now?” Flora whispered.

“No, she’s not dead. I think you may even have saved her life. How did you get out of your bunk?”

“I fell when I was reaching for the medicine bottle. I got a quite dreadful fright. You should have heard Great-aunt Tameson groaning. Will you stay with us, Miss Hurst?”

“Yes, I’ll stay.” Lavinia had lifted Flora and laid her back on her bunk, covering her with blankets.

“Oh, that’s good. This is a most disagreeable ship. I was sick. Did Eliza tell you?”

“Yes. I hope you’re better now.”

The child was shivering violently, her face pinched, the freckles she had got in the hot sun looking dark against her pallor.

“Has Teddy been sick?”

“No, not yet. I’m going to put another blanket over you. You’re cold.”

“Thank you, Miss Hurst. Don’t go away, will you?”

“I told you I wouldn’t.” Lavinia had turned to Aunt Tameson, whose face was beginning to lose its look of terrible exhaustion. “Are you better now, Contessa? Would you like me to get the ship’s doctor?”

“Certainly not. I know—and Flora knows now—exactly what to do if I have another attack.”

Flora shot up. “That doesn’t mean I like you any better Great-aunt Tameson. I simply don’t care for people dying.”

“And I don’t care for people not walking. It’s nonsense. You have a perfectly good pair of legs. I saw them. A bit thin. They only need some massage. I’m sure Miss Hurst will see that you get that.”

“Will that make them less thin?”

“Certainly.”

“I wish I only had to drink some medicine out of a bottle and be well, like you.”

“That’s just an easy way for the old. The young have to fight. Now will you stop chattering like a monkey and let me sleep.”

Quite meekly Flora lay down and pulled the blankets up to her chin.

“Isn’t it odd, I don’t feel seasick now,” she murmured. A little later she whispered guardedly, “I do still hate that old lady. But perhaps not quite so desperately. I hope Edward is being sick.”

Then her eyelids fell and she was asleep. Lady Tameson slept, too, or appeared to, the light catching the diamonds glinting on her bosom. Lavinia sat on a stool in the swaying cabin, pondering on personal involvements. Already no one was escaping—herself, Flora, Lady Tameson, Charlotte with that strange Jonathon Peate. Daniel? It seemed likely, simply because he was not a person to remain uninvolved.

W
INTERWOOD AT LAST.

They reached it as dusk was falling. The carriage had met them at Dover, and driven them across the early autumn countryside, through small villages, and down lanes where the hanging branches of oaks and beeches tore at the carriage roof.

At a bend in the road Daniel suddenly called to the coachman to stop.

“What’s the matter?” Charlotte asked.

“I want Miss Hurst to get her first glimpse of the house from here. It’s a good vantage point. Would you step out, Miss Hurst?”

Charlotte frowned at him in the dusk.

“Really, Daniel, Miss Hurst can walk to this point another day. We are all much too tired to start looking at the scenery.”

Daniel held out his arm to Lavinia, who had no choice but to obey. She stood in the cool windy dusk and looked across the fields to the silhouette of the great house, stark and forbidding in this light, a great mass that might almost have been a prison.

There was a moon, not yet grown bright, drifting behind ragged cloud. Its wanness in the colorless sky gave an ineffably melancholy atmosphere.

Lavinia couldn’t control a slight shiver. The wind was cold, after the warmth of Italy. She had imagined that Winterwood, by its very name, would be surrounded by gentle woods and shrubberies. She hadn’t expected it to stand stark and austere on the crest of the low hill. There were some trees, to be sure, great oaks and elms that were giving up their leaves to the tearing wind, and close to the house dark squat shapes indicated clipped yews along a terrace. But the overwhelming impression was one of bleakness.

Daniel was shouting above the wind.

“I plan to build the new wing on the right-hand side. It will make an enclosed courtyard. We catch the wind from the Channel. On a fine day you can see down to the Goodwin Sands, and hear the sea. I intend making another trip to Italy to bring back some statuary for the courtyard. What did you say?”

She wanted to ask where the garden was. She had thought there would be a charming formal garden, not this bleakness, with the chilling wind and the faint smell of the sea.

“It’s bracing up here,” said Daniel. “There are none of the fogs and vapors one gets in low-lying places.”

“Daniel! How long are you going to keep us waiting?” came Charlotte’s fractious voice.

“Miss Hurst, do you see my room?” cried Flora, putting her head out of the carriage. “It’s that one on the second floor at the end. I can see that Phoebe has lit the lamps. Edward’s room is on the third floor next to the nursery. He’s only a baby still.”

Edward’s voice protested shrilly. “I am not! You know you were only moved down because you couldn’t walk. It isn’t because you’re grown-up!”

“Children!” Charlotte scolded.

“Please, Mamma! I’m only telling Miss Hurst how to find her way. Which will her room be?”

“The one Miss Brown had, of course.”

“Oh, no, Mamma, that’s next to Edward’s. I want her near me. Let her have the red room. I may need her in the night.”

“Be quiet, Flora! What nonsense, a governess having the red room. Miss Hurst, you would oblige us if you would get back in the carriage so that we can continue our journey.”

Flora said no more, but later Lavinia noticed the gleam of tears on her cheeks as Daniel lifted her from the carriage at the steps leading up to the great front door. He noticed them, too, and asked what was the matter.

“Nothing, Papa, I was only dreadfully tired.” Her voice was faraway and wan. But over her father’s shoulder she winked at Lavinia. Lavinia suddenly had to straighten her mouth and keep it stern. It seemed obvious that she was not going to be relegated to the small obscure room recently occupied by Miss Brown. For her age, Flora was the most unscrupulous person she had ever met. One would have to start teaching her honesty.

There was a great bustle as the front door was flung open, and servants appeared to curtsey to Charlotte and Lady Tameson, to help with Flora’s chair, to carry baggage. Charlotte presented Lavinia to the housekeeper, Mrs. O’Shaughnessy, and Lavinia felt herself facing a new problem, the approval and acceptance of the maids, from Mrs. O’Shaughnessy down. She knew, remembering her own succession of governesses, the difficulties that could be encountered. Too much favor from the family made one resented, and too little, despised. For instance, they would scarcely have appreciated the master’s stopping the carriage to show her his estate. Nor would she be very popular if she was given one of the rooms intended for guests on the first floor.

Charlotte was giving orders in her high, tense voice. The Contessa was to be assisted upstairs. “Go very slowly, Joseph!” Phoebe was to see that Flora got into bed immediately and had her supper there, Lily—where was Lily? A young girl with apple cheeks came forward, bobbed dutifully, and was told to take Edward up and get him into a bath as quickly as possible as he was filthy. “Don’t stand any nonsense, Lily. He has been very tiresome all the way from Dover.” But this order was softened by a melting smile at Edward, and a promise that she would be up shortly to kiss him good night. Miss Hurst was to be shown her room, “The usual one, Mrs. O’Shaughnessy,” and since it was late and no doubt she was tired, perhaps she would prefer a tray in her room to coming down to dinner.

Before Lavinia could make a grateful assent to that, Charlotte was going on restlessly. Were there letters from Master Simon? Where was Sir Timothy? Surely he hadn’t forgotten the time of their arrival? Had Doctor Munro been told that he would be required to call in the morning to examine the Contessa, and would Mrs. O’Shaughnessy have dinner put ahead half an hour as they would all like to retire early.

Daniel, after carrying Flora upstairs, had disappeared. As Lavinia waited for the maid who was to take her to her room, she heard his voice from an open doorway off the wide hall, “Well, Uncle Timothy, we’re safely back, in spite of your dire predictions.”

“And the old lady?”

“The old lady, too, safe and sound.”

“Ah ha! I must pay my respects to her. How has she weathered?”

“Not badly. Charlotte worries about her.”

“She was a redhead, I remember. Damned handsome woman. We all thought Willie Peate a lucky fellow. But her looks went off after her boy died… She finally did well for herself, though. A Contessa, eh? I don’t trust foreign titles. I’ve lost my spectacles again, Daniel. The maids will tidy up…”

“This way, miss,” said the maid, appearing in front of Lavinia.

Lavinia followed her sprightly little figure up the stairs. She couldn’t have been more than twelve years old, and, when asked, said that her name was Mary and she had just been promoted from the kitchen. It was her ambition to be a housekeeper one day, since she never intended to marry.

Lavinia was amused by such an emphatic opinion coming from such a tiny creature.

“Why do you say that, Mary?”

“Well, miss, my dad drinks and treats my mum something awful. And my sister Nellie, her husband has a fair temper and beats her. It seems to me being married isn’t a happy thing. There’s even the master and mistress here. You’d think living in a big house and everything they’d be—” She stopped abruptly. “I shouldn’t have said that, miss. Mrs. O’Shaughnessy said we were never to gossip about the family. If you’ll come down here, miss. This is your room.”

The little maid opened the door of a small, austere room. It had all the necessary equipment, to be sure, even a writing desk, which Lavinia supposed was a luxury. And who was she to take exception to a neat iron bedstead after the filthy straw pallet that had been her bed for that terrible three months?”

“It was Miss Brown’s room, miss.”

Mary’s eyes in her shrewd little face were speculative as she looked at Lavinia.

“And don’t ask me why she isn’t here now, Mary,” Lavinia said cheerfully.

“No, miss. I expect she didn’t get on with Miss Flora. I’ll bring your supper up, miss.”

Lavinia had taken stock of the room, determinedly finding it more pleasant than she had at first thought, with its square of Turkey carpet, its flower-patterned washstand china, its one comfortable chair and even a small water-color above the dressing table, when Mary returned with her supper tray.

“Oh, miss, there’s ructions. Miss Flora is screaming for you and the mistress says she’s to behave, she’s getting altogether out of hand. I wasn’t listening specially, miss, you just couldn’t help but hear as you went by. And the master went upstairs looking that angry.”

“I’ll go down,” said Lavinia.

“Oh, miss—don’t say I told—it’s just I can’t bear that poor Miss Flora being scolded. There she is helpless in a chair. Wouldn’t you scream?”

“Yes, Mary, I would.”

Having begun to understand fairly well the workings of Flora’s shrewd and devious mind, Lavinia had thought she would time her scene for the next morning, when the flurry of settling Lady Tameson in was over. Then she would produce some forlorn tears, say she was nervous of sleeping alone, and begging for Miss Hurst to be given the room adjoining hers. If her wish was not granted quickly enough, she would probably faint once or twice and be unable to eat any luncheon.

But something had precipitated the scene.

Lavinia reached the door of the big pleasant room with its thick carpet, its spotlessly white curtains and white frilled bedspread, its leaping fire and cheerful lamplight, to find the room full of people. Flora was sitting very straight in her chair by the fire. Her face was scarlet with fury. Her mother stood over her, an angry unyielding figure, while Edward, in his dressing gown, capered about laughing shrilly. Daniel, his face troubled, looked down at Flora, and Phoebe, the scared maid, tried to be as unobtrusive as possible with a jug of steaming water at the washstand.

“I won’t give it to you, Mamma. I won’t!”

“Flora, you heard me!”

“Papa! Oh, Miss Hurst! Please, dear Miss Hurst, tell Mamma this is mine.”

Charlotte turned a face as angry as her daughter’s. She clearly resented Lavinia’s appearance and opened her mouth to order her not to interfere, when Daniel intervened in a calm judicial voice, “Yes, perhaps Miss Hurst can throw some light on the matter. Flora has a brooch, Miss Hurst, which she says the Contessa gave her.”

“She stole it, she stole it!” Edward chanted, swooping around the room in a mad undirected rush.

“I did not! Edward, you are a liar! Great-aunt Tameson gave it to me for saving her life. I told you, Mamma!”