The House at Riverton aka The Shifting Fog Read online

  And then there were the books, so many books, more than I had ever seen in one place at the one time: adventures, histories, fairytales, jostled together on huge shelves either side of the fireplace. Once I dared pull one down, selected for no better reason than a particularly pretty spine. I ran my hand over the fusty cover, opened it and read the carefully printed name: TIMOTHY HARTFORD. Then I turned the thick pages, breathed mildewed dust, and was transported to another place and time.

  I had learned to read at the village school and my teacher, Miss Ruby, pleased I expect to encounter such uncommon student interest, had started loaning me books from her own collection: Jane Eyre, Frankenstein, The Castle of Otranto. When I returned them we would discuss our favourite parts. It was Miss Ruby who suggested I might become a teacher myself. Mother had been none too pleased when I told her. She’d said it was all very well for Miss Ruby to go putting grand ideas in my head but ideas didn’t put bread and butter on the table. Not long after she’d sent me up the hill to Riverton, to Myra and Mr Hamilton, and to the nursery…

  And for a time the nursery was my room, the books my books.

  But one day a fog blew in and it began to rain. As I hurried along the corridor with half a mind to look at an illustrated children’s encyclopaedia I’d discovered the day before, I stopped short. There were voices inside.

  It was the wind, I told myself, carrying them from elsewhere in the house. An illusion. But when I cracked open the door and peeked inside: shock. There were people in there. Young people who fit perfectly in that enchanting room.

  And in that instant, with neither sign nor ceremony, it ceased to be mine. I stood, frozen by indecision, unsure whether it was proper to continue my duties or to return later. I peeked again, made timid by their laughter. Their confident, round voices. Their shiny hair and shinier hair bows.

  It was the flowers that decided me. They were wilting in their vase atop the fire mantle. Petals had dropped in the night and now lay scattered like a rebuke. I couldn’t risk Myra seeing them; she had been clear on my duties. Had made certain I understood that Mother would learn if I were to run foul of my superiors.

  Remembering Mr Hamilton’s instructions, I clutched my brush and broom to my chest and tiptoed to the fireside, concentrated on being invisible. I needn’t have worried. They were used to sharing their homes with an army of the unseen. They ignored me while I pretended to ignore them.

  Two girls and a boy: the youngest around ten, the eldest not yet seventeen. All three shared the distinctive Ashbury colouring-golden hair and eyes the fine, clear blue of Wedgwood porcelain-the legacy of Lord Ashbury’s mother, a Dane who (so said Myra) had married for love and been disowned, her dowry withdrawn. (She’d had the last laugh though, said Myra, when her husband’s brother passed and she became Lady Ashbury of the British Empire.)

  The taller girl stood in the centre of the room, wielding a handful of papers as she described the niceties of leprous infections. The younger sat on the floor, legs crossed, watching her sister with widening blue eyes, her arm draped absently around Raverley’s neck. I was surprised, and a little horrified, to see he had been dragged from his corner and was enjoying a rare moment of inclusion. The boy knelt on the window seat, gazing down through the fog toward the churchyard.

  ‘And then you turn around to face the audience, Emmeline, and your face will be completely leprous,’ the taller girl said gleefully.

  ‘What’s leprous?’

  ‘A skin disease,’ the older girl said. ‘Lesions and mucus, the usual stuff.’

  ‘Perhaps we could have her nose rot off, Hannah,’ said the boy, turning to wink at Emmeline.

  ‘Yes,’ said Hannah seriously. ‘Excellent.’

  ‘No,’ Emmeline wailed.

  ‘Honestly Emmeline, don’t be such a baby. It’s not really going to rot off,’ Hannah said. ‘We’ll make some kind of mask. Something hideous. I’ll see if I can find a medical book in the library. Hopefully there’ll be pictures.’

  ‘I don’t see why I have to be the one to get leprosy,’ Emmeline said.

  ‘Take it up with God,’ Hannah said. ‘He wrote it.’

  ‘But why do I have to play Miriam. Can’t I play a different part?’

  ‘There are no other parts,’ Hannah said. ‘David has to be Aaron, because he’s the tallest, and I’m playing God.’

  ‘Can’t I be God?’

  ‘Certainly not. I thought you wanted the main part.’

  ‘I did,’ Emmeline said. ‘I do.’

  ‘Well then. God doesn’t even get to be on stage,’ Hannah said. ‘I have to do my lines from behind a curtain.’

  ‘I could play Moses,’ Emmeline said. ‘Raverley can be Miriam.’

  ‘You’re not playing Moses,’ Hannah said. ‘We need a real Miriam. She’s far more important than Moses. He only has one line. That’s why Raverley’s standing in. I can say his line from behind my curtain-I may even cut Moses altogether.’

  ‘Perhaps we could do another scene instead,’ Emmeline said hopefully. ‘One with Mary and the baby Jesus?’

  Hannah huffed disgustedly.

  They were rehearsing a play. Alfred the footman had told me there was to be a family recital on the bank holiday weekend. It was a tradition: some family members sang, others recited poetry, the children always performed a scene from their grandmother’s favourite book.

  ‘We’ve chosen this scene because it’s important,’ said Hannah.

  ‘You’ve chosen it because it’s important,’ said Emmeline.

  ‘Exactly,’ said Hannah. ‘It’s about a father having two sets of rules: one for his sons and one for his daughters.’

  ‘Sounds perfectly reasonable to me,’ said David ironically.

  Hannah ignored him. ‘Both Miriam and Aaron are guilty of the same thing: discussing their brother’s marriage-’

  ‘What were they saying?’ Emmeline said.

  ‘It’s not important, they were just-’

  ‘Were they saying mean things?’

  ‘No, and it’s not the point. The important thing is that God decides Miriam should be punished with leprosy while Aaron gets no worse than a talking-to. Does that sound fair to you, Emme?’

  ‘Didn’t Moses marry an African woman?’ Emmeline said.

  Hannah shook her head, exasperated. She did that a lot, I noticed. A fierce energy infused her every long-limbed movement, led her easily to frustration. Emmeline, by contrast, had the calculated posture of a doll come to life. Their features, similar when considered individually-two slightly aquiline noses, two pairs of intense blue eyes, two pretty mouths-manifested themselves uniquely on each girl’s face. Where Hannah gave the impression of a fairy queen-passionate, mysterious, compelling-Emmeline’s was a more accessible beauty. Though still a child, there was something in the way her lips parted in repose, her too-wide-open eyes, that reminded me of a glamour photograph I had once seen when it fell from the peddler’s pocket.

  ‘Well? He did, didn’t he?’ Emmeline said.

  ‘Yes, Emme,’ David said, laughing. ‘Moses married an Ethiopian. Hannah’s just frustrated that we don’t share her passion for women’s suffrage.’

  ‘Hannah! He doesn’t mean it. You’re not a suffragette. Are you?’

  ‘Of course I am,’ Hannah said. ‘And so are you.’

  Emmeline lowered her voice. ‘Does Pa know? He’ll be ever so cross.’

  ‘Pooh,’ said Hannah. ‘Pa’s a kitten.’

  ‘A lion, more like,’ said Emmeline, lips trembling. ‘Please don’t make him cross, Hannah.’

  ‘I shouldn’t worry, Emme,’ said David. ‘Suffrage is all the fashion amongst society women at the moment.’

  Emmeline looked doubtful. ‘Fanny never said anything.’

  ‘Anyone who’s anyone will be wearing a dinner suit for her debut this season,’ said David.

  Emmeline’s eyes widened.

  I listened from the bookshelves, wondering what it all meant. I had never heard the word �
��suffragette’ before, but had a vague idea it might be a sort of illness, the likes of which Mrs Nammersmith in the village had caught when she took her corset off at the Easter parade, and her husband had to take her to the hospital in London.

  ‘You’re a wicked tease,’ Hannah said. ‘Just because Pa is too unfair to let Emmeline and me go to school doesn’t mean you should try to make us look stupid at every opportunity.’

  ‘I don’t have to try,’ David said, sitting on the toy box and flicking a lock of hair from his eyes. I drew breath: he was beautiful and golden like his sisters. ‘Anyway, you’re not missing much. School’s overrated.’

  ‘Oh?’ Hannah raised a suspicious eyebrow. ‘Usually you’re only too pleased to let me know exactly what I’m missing. Why the sudden change of heart?’ Her eyes widened: two ice-blue moons. Excitement laced her voice. ‘Don’t tell me you’ve done something dreadful to get yourself expelled?’

  ‘Course not,’ David said quickly. ‘I just think there’s more to life than book-learning. My friend Hunter says that life itself is the best education-’

  ‘Hunter?’

  ‘He only started at Eton this form. His father’s some sort of scientist. Evidently he discovered something that turned out to be quite important and the King made him a marquis. He’s a bit mad. Robert, too, if you believe the other lads, but I think he’s topping.’

  ‘Well,’ Hannah said, ‘your mad Robert Hunter is fortunate to have the luxury of disdaining his education; but how am I supposed to become a respected playwright if Pa insists on keeping me ignorant?’ Hannah sighed with frustration. ‘I wish I were a boy.’

  ‘I should hate to go to school,’ Emmeline said. ‘And I should hate to be a boy. No dresses, the most boring hats, having to talk about sports and politics all day.’

  ‘I’d love to talk politics,’ Hannah said. Vehemence shook strands loose from the careful confinement of her ringlets. ‘I’d start by making Herbert Asquith give women the vote. Even young ones.’

  David smiled. ‘You could be Great Britain’s first play-writing prime minister.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Hannah.

  ‘I thought you were going to be an archaeologist,’ Emmeline said. ‘Like Gertrude Bell.’

  ‘Politician, archaeologist. I could be both. This is the twentieth century.’ She scowled. ‘If only Pa would let me have a proper education.’

  ‘You know what Pa says about girls’ education,’ said David. Emmeline chimed in with the well-worn phrase: ‘“The slippery slope to women’s suffrage.”’

  ‘Anyway, Pa says Miss Prince is giving us all the education we need,’ said Emmeline.

  ‘Pa would say that. He’s hoping she’ll turn us into boring wives for boring fellows, speaking passable French, playing passable piano and politely losing the odd game of bridge. We’ll be less trouble that way.’

  ‘Pa says no one likes a woman who thinks too much,’ Emmeline said.

  David rolled his eyes. ‘Like that Canadian woman who drove him home from the gold mines with her talk of politics. She did us all a disservice.’

  ‘I don’t want everyone to like me,’ Hannah said, setting her chin stubbornly. ‘I should think less of myself if no one disliked me.’

  ‘Then cheer up,’ David said. ‘I have it on good authority that a number of our friends don’t like you.’

  Hannah frowned, its impact weakened by the involuntary beginnings of a smile. ‘Well I’m not going to do any of her stinking lessons today. I’m tired of reciting The Lady of Shallot while she snivels into her handkerchief.’

  ‘She’s crying for her own lost love,’ Emmeline said with a sigh.

  Hannah rolled her eyes.

  ‘It’s true!’ Emmeline said. ‘I heard Grandmamma tell Lady Clem. Before she came to us, Miss Prince was engaged to be married.’

  ‘Came to his senses, I suppose,’ Hannah said.

  ‘He married her sister instead,’ Emmeline said.

  This silenced Hannah, but only briefly. ‘She should have sued him for breach of promise.’

  ‘That’s what Lady Clem said-and worse-but Grandmamma said Miss Prince didn’t want to cause him trouble.’

  ‘Then she’s a fool,’ Hannah said. ‘She’s better off without him.’

  ‘What a romantic,’ David said archly. ‘The poor lady’s hopelessly in love with a man she can’t have and you begrudge reading her the occasional piece of sad poetry. Cruelty, thy name is Hannah.’

  Hannah set her chin. ‘Not cruel, practical. Romance makes people forget themselves, do silly things.’

  David was smiling: the amused smile of an elder brother who believed that time would change her.

  ‘It’s true,’ Hannah said, stubbornly. ‘Miss Prince would be better to stop pining and start filling her mind-and ours-with interesting things. Like the building of the pyramids, the lost city of Atlantis, the adventures of the Vikings…’

  Emmeline yawned and David held up his hands in an attitude of surrender.

  ‘Anyway,’ Hannah said, frowning as she picked up her papers. ‘We’re wasting time. We’ll go from the bit where Miriam gets leprosy.’

  ‘We’ve done it a hundred times,’ Emmeline said. ‘Can’t we do something else?’

  ‘Like what?’

  Emmeline shrugged uncertainly. ‘I don’t know.’ She looked from Hannah to David. ‘Couldn’t we play The Game?’

  No. It wasn’t The Game then. It was just the game. A game. Emmeline may have been referring to conkers, or jacks, or marbles for all I knew that morning. It wasn’t for some time that The Game took on capital letters in my mind. That I came to associate the term with secrets and fancies and adventures unimagined. On that dull, wet morning, as the rain pattered against the nursery windowpanes, I barely gave it a thought.

  Hidden behind the armchair sweeping up the dried and scattered petals, I was imagining what it might be like to have siblings. I had always longed for one. I had told Mother once, asked her whether I might have a sister. Someone with whom to gossip and plot, whisper and dream. How potent the mystique of sisterhood that I had even longed for someone with whom to quarrel. Mother had laughed, but not in a happy way, and said she wasn’t given to making the same mistake twice.

  What must it feel like, I wondered, to belong somewhere, to face the world, a member of a tribe with ready-made allies? I was pondering this, brushing absently at the armchair, when something moved beneath my duster. A blanket flapped and a female voice croaked: ‘What? What’s all this? Hannah? David?’

  She was as old as age itself. An ancient woman, recessed amongst the cushions, hidden from view. This, I knew, must be Nanny. I had heard her spoken of in hushed and reverent tones, both upstairs and down: she had nursed Lord Ashbury himself when he was a lad and was as much a family institution as the house itself.

  I froze where I stood, duster in hand, under the gaze of three sets of pale blue eyes.

  The old woman spoke again. ‘Hannah? What’s going on?’

  ‘Nothing, Nanny,’ Hannah said, finding her tongue. ‘We’re just rehearsing for the recital. We’ll be quieter from now on.’

  ‘You mind Raverley doesn’t get too frisky, cooped up inside,’ Nanny said.

  ‘No, Nanny,’ Hannah said, her voice revealing a sensitivity to match her fierceness. ‘We’ll make sure he’s nice and quiet.’ She came forward and tucked the blanket back around the old lady’s tiny form. ‘There, there, Nanny dear, you rest now.’

  ‘Well,’ Nanny said sleepily, ‘maybe just for a little while.’ Her eyes fluttered shut and after a moment her breathing grew deep and regular.

  I held my own breath, waiting for one of the children to speak. They were still looking at me, eyes wide. A slow instant passed, during which I envisaged myself being hauled before Myra, or worse, Mr Hamilton; called to explain how I came to be dusting Nanny; the displeasure on Mother’s face as I returned home, released without references…

  But they did not scold, or frown, or reprove. They did someth
ing far more unexpected. As if on cue, they started to laugh; raucously, easily, collapsing into one another so that they seemed somehow joined.

  I stood, watching and waiting; their reaction more disquieting than the silence that preceded it. I could not help my lip from trembling.

  Finally, the elder girl managed to speak. ‘I’m Hannah,’ she said, wiping her eyes. ‘Have we met?’

  I exhaled, curtseyed. My voice was tiny. ‘No m’lady. I’m Grace.’

  Emmeline giggled. ‘She’s not your lady. She’s just miss.’

  I curtseyed again. Avoided her gaze. ‘I’m Grace, miss.’

  ‘You look familiar,’ Hannah said. ‘Are you sure you weren’t here at Easter?’

  ‘Yes, miss. I just started. Going on for a month now.’

  ‘You don’t look old enough to be a maid,’ Emmeline said.

  ‘I’m fourteen, miss.’

  ‘Snap,’ Hannah said. ‘So am I. And Emmeline is ten and David is practically ancient-sixteen.’

  David spoke then. ‘And do you always clean right over the top of sleeping persons, Grace?’ At this, Emmeline started to laugh again.

  ‘Oh, no. No, sir. Just this once, sir.’

  ‘Pity,’ David said. ‘It would be rather convenient never to have to bathe again.’

  I was stricken; my cheeks filled with heat. I had never met a real gentleman before. Not one my age, not the sort who made my heart flutter against my rib cage with his talk of bathing. Strange. I am an old woman now, yet as I think of David, I find the echoes of those old feelings creeping back. I am not dead yet then.

  ‘Don’t mind him,’ Hannah said. ‘He thinks he’s a riot.’

  ‘Yes, miss.’

  She looked at me quizzically, as if about to say something more. But before she could, there came the noise of quick, light footsteps rounding the stairs and beginning down the corridor. Drawing closer. Clip, clip, clip, clip…

  Emmeline ran to the door and peered through the keyhole.

  ‘It’s Miss Prince,’ she said, looking to Hannah. ‘Coming this way.’