Читать книгу Eliza for Common - Anna Masterton Buchan - Страница 5

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“I am going to give a party ... and I am in a great fright.”

Letter from William Makepeace Thackeray.

The day at Blinkbonny began with breakfast at a quarter to eight. The two boys had to be at school at nine o’clock, and it took them half an hour to get there. It took, also, constant prodding on the part of their mother and sister to make them eat steadily and not stray into arguments with each other. After breakfast the one servant, Mary-from-Skye, came up and they settled down more or less reverently to listen while Walter Laidlaw read a chapter from the Bible and prayed.

The morning after Jim came home things were rather difficult. Rob and Geordie, aware that they had not done their lessons with anything approaching thoroughness, were in a thoroughly disgruntled mood. They had, in the privacy of their own apartment, brooded over the thought that something might happen to prevent them going to school.

“Old Hutch’ll be mad about that exercise,” Rob said, rubbing his nose moodily. “He’s the worst.”

Geordie considered, with one stocking on and one in his hand. “Would it be all right to pray that old Hutch would be dead? He’s got heart disease anyway; young Simpson told me.”

“Young Simpson only hoped he had—besides, I don’t want him dead. He’s sometimes quite decent, though he’s a beast generally.... Hurry up, we’ll be late for breakfast.”

They were late, and when their father opened the big Bible they wailed in unison, “We’ve no time for prayers, we’ll miss the car.”

“Nonsense,” said their mother briskly, sitting down in her own low chair. “Prayer and provender hinder no man.”

“I don’t think that can be quite true though it is a proverb,” Eliza demurred. “If you were flying from a horde of savages and calmly stopped and ate a meal and held a prayer-meeting, and the savages came up and ate you, then I’d say you had been hindered.”

“I dislike that way you have of arguing about everything, Eliza,” her mother told her, while Rob complained, “Aw, Father, we’re dreadfully late. Read a wee short psalm, or as sure as anything——“

“Well, well, boy, sit down,” Mr. Laidlaw said. “It’s not twenty past yet,” and he proceeded to read, while the boys sat on the edge of their chairs watching the clock. But when they all knelt down to pray, peace, for a few minutes, slid into their souls. It had always been Walter Laidlaw’s way to take his two youngest children within his circling arms when he knelt to pray at family worship, and they shut their eyes tight and kept very quiet, for they knew that when their father prayed he was speaking to God.

Eliza, who, hardly knowing that she did it, watched everything that happened, knew well that action of her father’s. It had begun when the boys were tottering little fellows, apt to move about the room during prayers, and their father had held them, one in each arm, to keep them quiet. There was something beautiful about it, Eliza thought. It made her think of some words that always oddly moved her, How often would I have gathered thee as a hen gathers her chickens under her wing and ye would not ...

The family lingered for a few minutes in the dining-room after the boys had gone tearing out of the gate, their coats half off and half on, discussing the letters the postman had brought, glad of a breathing-space before the work of the day began. Mrs. Laidlaw felt it was the moment to broach a project that she had been pondering on for some time.

“I’ve been thinking,” she said, laying down a letter, “that we should give a party while Jimmie’s at home. It’s years since we had one, and we’re owing a good many people. What do you think, Walter?”

Walter Laidlaw was deep in a leader in the Glasgow Herald, and merely looked up for a moment to say—“Certainly, my dear, give a party,” but Eliza protested.

“Why should we give a party? I hate parties anyway. I’m not allowed to play bridge or dance, so what’s the use of going out?”

Mrs. Laidlaw clicked her tongue impatiently. “As I’ve often told you, Eliza, there are plenty people to dance and play cards without ministers’ daughters.”

“Exactly, but you’re merely a nuisance at a party if you don’t do as others do.”

“You can play games and listen to music and that makes a delightful evening.—But I needn’t put myself to endless trouble and spend your father’s hard-earned money preparing a party if you are going to drop your eyes and look bored about it. I shan’t thrust a party on you.... But when I was your age I’d have jumped at the suggestion.”

Eliza, realising that she had hurt her mother and spoiled something that she had been happily dreaming about, said quickly:

“I’m sorry, Mother. It’s frightfully good of you to be willing to give a party.... Who would you ask?”

“Why, just your young friends and Jimmie’s, and perhaps a few older people.—I’ve been thinking about it for a while. But we must get on now. Put the dishes tidily on the tray for Mary—that mustard-pot needs refilling—and see that the butter and jam are tidy for tea. Open the window before you leave the room.”

Jim looked quizzically at his sister as he followed his father to the study, and Eliza, as she put the dishes together, thought rather enviously how good it was to be a man and have some definite job to do. It seemed to the girl that there was no end to her tasks, and they were all more or less uncongenial. Mrs. Laidlaw was an old-fashioned house-proud woman who detested the modern girl’s attitude to life, and was determined that her daughter should walk in the old ways as long as she had any control over her; so she drilled Eliza, as her own mother had drilled her, in all household duties, trying to make her tidy, methodical, thrifty, as the Victorian women had been. Eliza never thought of rebelling; she had something of her father’s humorous serenity, and also a good deal of common sense. She saw her mother’s point of view and more or less sympathised with it. It was only fitting that a house should be well kept and well ordered; they could only afford one servant, so, naturally, she had to take her share of the work. And there was a time for everything; she hated slipshod ways. A friend had told her one day, “The beds were to make and the rooms to do, but the sun was shining, and I said to myself, ‘The beds’ll wait, but the sun won’t,’ so I went and played a round of golf—wasn’t I right?”

Eliza considered—“You were right if you enjoyed your game. I’d have hated it myself. The thought of the unmade beds and the undusted rooms would have got between me and the sun.”

So Eliza rolled butter and saw that the jam dishes were tidy, and then went upstairs to help Mary to make the beds and sweep and dust. Marketing, visitors, collecting, and attending meetings made up the rest of the day. Sometimes when Eliza went to bed she wondered what she had done to fill the day, for there did not seem to be one thing worth remembering.

Mrs. Laidlaw did not let the proposed party drop. Before the day was finished she had settled to her own satisfaction every detail.

“This day week,” she said, turning the heel of a stocking for Geordie. “That’s the 20th, and not too near Christmas. We’ll give them a cup of tea in the drawing-room when they arrive—no, I know it’s not considered necessary, but it’s cheering, especially to people who have come from the other side of the town—and then supper at ten. I’d like it to be a nice evening. Eliza, couldn’t you and Jimmie do something to make it a little different—invent a game, or do a dialogue or something?”

Eliza and Jimmie made horrified sounds at the suggestion, but their mother continued unheeding. “Yes, set yourselves at once to find something suitable. I do hope Mrs. Shepherd will be free to come; she can be trusted to make things go, though I never feel sure about what she’ll say next—that’s the worst of these vivacious people. Odd that her husband should be so morose!... I often think it would be wise to make a point of cultivating people who can do things—sing or recite or be amusing—for you never know when you may need them.”

“A good plan,” said Jim, who had come in for a talk before going to bed, “would be to keep all the people who can do things in a sort of institution and hire them out as Clarkson hires wigs.”

Eliza laughed, but her mother said seriously, “The paying would spoil everything, it’s your friends you want to see do things.... Eliza, will you write the invitations to-morrow? I wonder if we should get cards with ‘At Home’ on them, or write friendly notes?”

Mrs. Laidlaw, like most other people, was the better of having something to look forward to. She was a very busy woman, for not only did she look well to the ways of her household, she also, largely, ran her husband’s church. Martyrs’ Church was near the river, quite two miles from Blinkbonny, but three nights in the week the minister’s wife attended meetings there, and on Sunday she had a class for young women, which cost her much preparation. Practical to her finger-tips, Mrs. Laidlaw was yet a dreamer. She saw everything in pictures. The long road to and from the church was shortened often by what she saw with the eyes of her mind. And this party she had dreamed over. In the most transparently simple way she was anxious to impress her friends. She wanted them to meet Jim with his Oxford culture thick upon him, and Eliza, who—she half hoped and half feared—was turning out something of a beauty.

To-night as she looked at her young daughter standing holding Jim’s arm and laughing at some joke, she saw Martyrs’ Church decorated with flowers and palms—an awning—Walter with the tall girl on his arm coming down the aisle—herself, heart-broken of course, but handsomely dressed in black velvet—a shadowy figure in the choir seat the bridegroom——

On the 20th December the whole house was turned upside-down. Most of the furniture had been taken out of the drawing-room and stacked elsewhere to make room for more chairs. The family were feeding for the nonce in the room looking out to the garden which was still called the nursery, the dining-room being closed to the public.

“It’s a blessing we’re all well,” said Mrs. Laidlaw. “That’s always my nightmare about giving a party, that someone will take measles or influenza.”

She wore a large blue pinafore, from the pocket of which, like a flag of truce, floated a white silk duster. Her hair was slightly dishevelled, and she looked at her family without seeing them, in a distraught manner.

While her husband was telling of a grave political crisis she broke in with, “Is it twenty-seven counting ourselves, Eliza, or guests only? I always forget....” Her lips moved. “Four from Atholl Gardens, three from Glenholm—seven. Three Scotts—ten; the artist people, I forget their names—twelve. From our road six.... Is that eighteen?” She began to count on her fingers.

Mrs. Laidlaw had been up since six o’clock laying the supper-table. She liked to do it herself, and to do it just as she had done it in the early days of her married life, when, in wide fluted skirts and enormous puffed sleeves, she had rustled about receiving her wedding callers. In the middle of the table were placed the fine old Sheffield-plate candelabra that had come to her from her great-grandmother, and these she draped with smilax. Tea-cups were at one end, coffee-cups at the other, and all down the shining white cloth were plates of sandwiches and cakes, and all manner of sweets, trifles, meringues, honeycomb shapes, not to speak of chocolates and preserved ginger. She delighted in getting out all her silver and recalling from whom each piece had come, and Eliza liked to help her mother and hear the old stories. Mr. Laidlaw sometimes looked in too, to steal a bit of preserved ginger, and listen for a minute with a smile.

Two silver salvers which lived a guarded life between folds of chamois leather were gazed at admiringly.

“Solid,” said their owner, lifting them out and rubbing them thoughtfully. “One from Uncle James in London, and one from Aunt Jessie.... You never knew Aunt Jessie, Eliza; she died before you were born. She married my Uncle Thomas—a handsome woman and gave dinner-parties. Uncle Thomas was rather a trial to her; she said he was bucolic. He was, of course, but she knew it before she married him, so it was unreasonable to make a fuss. He hated fuss, and she liked things properly done. I’m afraid my mother was a trial to her too; she didn’t take her seriously. Aunt Jessie invited her to dinner and to stay the night—it was a long drive—and not realising it was a formal dinner, she took my brother John, who was a firebrand at home. When Aunt Jessie saw him she said, ‘Annie, if I had wanted John I would have asked him.’ She died of heart trouble, poor soul, and Uncle Thomas fell back into his old easy ways. These entrée dishes—it’s a pity not to use them. If we unscrew the handles they will make silver dishes for the meringues and things. The Normans gave me them—don’t you remember Mrs. Norman?”

“Did she give me a doll’s cradle with curtains and real pillows and blankets?” Eliza asked uncertainly.

“She did indeed. The kindest woman! She had four daughters all over six feet, and they all had chinchilla coats. I think they came from some relative in Russia.... They all made rather unhappy marriages, generals and people like that, middle-aged but not very steady. It was a pity, for they were nice girls, but full of silly pride; they could never forget that their grandfather was a lord.”

“Where are they all now?” Eliza asked, her imagination fired by the thought of four tall young women dressed in chinchilla coats and married to generals.

“Dead,” said her mother, routing in the silver chest.

“What! All four?”

“Three anyway, but I’ve lost trace of Sophie, so she may be alive. They were too big to be really strong, and then India—— Shall we put out these silver vases? I never liked them, but poor Peter Young gave us them.”

“I remember Mr. Young,” Eliza said. “He brought us Edinburgh rock. He is dead, isn’t he?”

“Oh yes. He was a bachelor of fifty, most comfortable in his country cottage, with an old housekeeper and a good income. He came to stay for a few days, and as it happened, there was a Miss Greig with us one night, to address my class social. I knew nothing about her except that she was a good speaker, and I told Peter that, but she asked him to call the first time he was in Edinburgh, and he did it, the poor innocent, and the next we heard was that they were engaged. We went to the marriage, your father and I, and we both felt very uneasy. There was nothing that you could take hold of, but I didn’t like either Miss Greig or her relations.... And Peter died within a year. I’ll never forgive myself, for he was so comfortable with his old housekeeper. No, it wasn’t my fault exactly, but still—— We’ll put poor Peter’s vases out anyway, on the sideboard, with yellow chrysanthemums.”

The first mishap of the day occurred after early dinner, when Eliza scalded her arm. It was not a bad burn and, covered with boracic powder, it soon lost its sting, but almost immediately she was seized with a violent cold in her head.

“Good gracious,” her mother cried, “I’ve heard of people getting pneumonia from a burn, but never a cold in the head. Eliza, how did you do it? I expect it will be pneumonia next.”

It stayed a cold, however, and had somewhat abated when the time came to dress. Eliza had a new dress and had been looking forward all day to putting it on. Her mother had wanted white, but Eliza had got what she had set her heart on—the green of young beech-leaves, and she stood like some nymph strayed from a woodland glade in the best bedroom of Blinkbonny and studied herself in the mirror door of the wardrobe, while her mother, struggling into her one and only evening dress, said, “I can’t say I care for these sacks of dresses, they are neither shape nor form, but the green does make your hair very golden.... Help me with this, will you?... A hook has caught somewhere....”

They were both standing before the glass, and Eliza, looking over her mother’s shoulder at the reflection, said, “Why, Mother, what have you done to your hair? I believe you’ve been to the hairdresser?”

“Yes,” Mrs. Laidlaw admitted in a shamed way. “I ran down before tea and got it waved a little. You see, Mrs. Hartree is always so neat and well dressed, and I thought—but what was the use? I’m like a heather-bush already.”

Eliza laughed into the glass as she caught up a stray lock and fastened it securely. “It only needs the comb run through it. You look very nice, but why don’t you show more of your pretty neck and arms?”

“Oh——” Mrs. Laidlaw was studying her reflection, not ill pleased with what she saw. “A minister’s wife should never be conspicuous.”

“Then,” said Eliza, beginning to tidy the room, “I’m glad I’m not a minister’s wife, for I want to be conspicuous.”

“Mother” (it was Rob’s voice), “I’ve lost my sporran and Geordie’s stolen my tie.”

“Are you boys never dressed yet?” Mrs. Laidlaw bustled away to set things right, and as Eliza put everything straight she heard Geordie’s voice chanting from his room a low ditty he delighted in:

“Said the wee bull-dog to the big bull-dog,

Will ye let me pull your tail?...”

When she went into the drawing-room some few minutes later she found all three brothers there. Rob and Geordie were in high fettle. They were only to stay up for an hour and then slip quietly away to bed, but they were to have sandwiches and meringues in their own room—indeed they had already supped on jam tartlets and whipped cream and drunk deep of lemonade.

When Eliza came in the two boys greeted her with derisive shouts, but Jim was impressed by his sister’s appearance, and said so. Eliza, pleased with his approval, smiled and preened herself, and her complacent air exasperated Geordie. As she stood peacocking before a mirror he whipped out an ancient air-gun that he had concealed behind a cushion, and creeping up behind his sister he placed the nozzle behind her ear.

“Die, traitress!” he cried, pulling the trigger.

Eliza, convinced that she was fatally wounded, dropped like a stone. Rob threw himself on the floor beside her howling like a wolf, while Jim shook the culprit violently and asked—“Was there anything in it, you amazing young idiot?”

At the sounds of distress Walter Laidlaw came rushing upstairs, followed by his wife, and in a minute or two Eliza was so far recovered as to sit in a chair and weep bitterly.

“What happened?” demanded her mother.

“Geordie shot me,” Eliza sobbed, “but he didn’t mean it.”

Geordie gulped and looked very white.

A large blister was rising behind her ear, and half-choked with crying and the cold in her head, the poor nymph was in no state to receive the guests that were almost due, but her mother’s bracing voice spurred her to make an effort.

“Stop crying, Eliza, and go and sponge your face well with cold water. You’re not really hurt. Walter, do for any favour go and change. Geordie, what I think of you I shan’t begin to say just now.... Good gracious, is that someone arriving?”

There was a tense moment, followed by a relieved shout from Jim. “Only Ewan,” as a tall young man was ushered in.

He hesitated in the doorway. “I’m afraid I’m too early....”

“No, you’re not,” Jim assured him, “but Geordie has been shooting ‘Liza, so things are strained for the moment.—Poor old ‘Liza—you go and wash your face.”

Ewan Cameron murmured sympathy, but Eliza passed him without a word. She felt it to be a humiliating moment.