The Ugly Sister (10 page)

As I walked up to my room I did not know what to feel for two moments together. I was deeply upset, deeply sorry, deeply ashamed. But behind that as the waves dwarf the little ships sailing the sea – as the waves in the harbour had still been big enough at times almost to swamp my cutter this morning – were all the memories of last night. First there was
music
, the reedy sob of violins, the deeper moans of the cellos; this new music speaking to me and asking me to unfold my heart. But after that came the experience which carried everything before it. In the cold light of a July morning I was already half-disbelieving what memory told me had happened. It was at once a wonderful exotic dream and a terrifying nightmare. I was not so ignorant as not to know the likely outcome. That was the nightmare. And somehow in the middle of all the sensations, one drowning another in the heady experience of pleasure, had come the feeling of pain, of wrongdoing, of excess, of the utterly forbidden.

Perhaps it was just me, brought up in a not very strict Christian family but a family in which right and wrong were clearly defined. Perhaps it was Bram, exquisitely teaching me too much in a single night. I had a leaden ton of apprehension as to the consequences, but a youthful hope that Bram would somehow be able to ‘make it all right'. Even if he offered to marry me there would be the objections of my family, all sorts of obstacles to overcome. Perhaps he was just playing with my feelings and would want to continue in some way with secret notes and clandestine meetings.

And at the back of it all was the hideous knowledge that I would never be an attractive wife. Yet he had wanted me. Skilfully he had taken me. Seduced was the word, and like a broken leaf I had crumbled in his hands.

God in Heaven, I thought. What happened to me last night? ‘My little starfish' he had called me. I understood now very well what he meant. My knees trembled at the thought of it all. I felt physically sick and bitterly humiliated. I felt half contempt for him and half love. I felt half contempt for myself and half love. Nothing, nothing, nothing could ever be the same again – I was irretrievably damaged, morally and psychologically, as I was irretrievably damaged of feature.

When I got in I sat for a long time in my bedroom, taking nothing to eat or drink. The house was quiet, but that was not unnatural since Uncle Davey had died. I thought: somehow I must go on living – at least for the time being – and somehow I must face my cousins and my sister with the disgrace. But to them my sin was only one of outrageous disobedience – as it was to my mother. She had not mentioned Bram Fox by name, but I had denied meeting anybody special at the concert. My far greater sin was not known – not yet. That I alone had to live with. If Bram came here and claimed me, then more would come out. (But it would not quite so much matter then.) If he did
not
, then more would still only too probably come out, even if that was in the future, weeks, months ahead. For the moment if I could only learn to live with myself and the surging frightening knowledge of what had happened, then I could face them for the time being, be dutifully humble but no more.

Did my mother mean her threat that I should be sent away somewhere to earn a living as a governess or a seamstress at sixpence a day? I was fit for nothing better. There are few occupations for a woman. In other circumstances I might have tried with her influence to get on the stage. That clearly was not a prospect. Perhaps, in view of what had happened at Blundstone's Hotel, I might make a living on the streets of Falmouth. (Bram had praised my body, said it was perfect, adorable, beautiful; but those were love terms expressed in the excesses of the moment and not to be taken seriously or considered in the light of day.) I could certainly earn more on the streets than looking after someone's children. Falmouth had a constantly changing population of seamen who had money in their pockets and would not be too particular about a girl's face.

Somehow the day passed. I supped with the family. In the middle of the meal Desmond appeared suddenly, looking rather subdued, and saying he was glad to be back. After making a fuss of Tamsin, he asked her if she had enjoyed the concert. Tamsin said she did not go but Emma had. I tried to mutter an explanation while everyone else at the table sat stony-faced.

Desmond was not slow to notice ‘atmosphere', so he dropped the subject. Then he said:

‘Has Slade gone?'

‘Oh yes. A couple of weeks ago.'

Slade had left muttering and ungracious, leaving my mother undisputed mistress of the house. He clearly blamed her for his dismissal, but in fact it was chiefly Anna Maria's decision, though all the children disliked him. Anyway, he was Uncle Davey's servant and now the Admiral was gone.

He had left by sea, taking six large bags with him, and no one had dared to ask him to open them. After all, he was leaving after twenty years. I had been specially glad to see him go. He had never laid hands on me since that dark afternoon in the cellar, but he had tried to intimidate me in all sorts of ways.

Just before he went he had said to me: ‘Turned away without so much as a “ thank you” after all these years. And a miserable pension. But you look out, Miss Clever Boots, you and your family, you ain't finished with me yet. I'll put you all in a hole afore I've done with you.'

The following day Tamsin had said to me: ‘Come on.'

‘Where to?'

‘Let's have a look in that cellar.'

‘Oh, Tamsin, you can't still be interested?'

‘Aren't you?'

‘Well, yes. Come to think of it. Yes.'

We went down with a candle lamp to give us extra light. The wine cellar door was open, but the big one beyond was firmly locked. We went in search of the key. None of the servants had it. We sneaked into my uncle's old bedroom. It smelt still of him, dangerously so, as if at any moment he would step out of a cupboard. A lot of his clothes had not yet been moved, but most of the drawers were empty. In one drawer there were three keys, but none of them was remotely big enough to fit the cellar door.

In the end we asked my mother. She said she had no idea. ‘ Perhaps Slade took it with him.'

‘That would be a great liberty.'

‘He was a law unto himself,' said my mother. ‘Or thought he was. Anyway, the place probably hasn't been opened for years.'

‘That's what we thought,' said Tamsin.

M
Y RELATIONSHIP
with my sister had always been uneasy. The four-year difference had always given her an edge which had allowed her to treat me with semi-affectionate contempt.

And I, for my part, often felt jealousy towards her for being everything that I was not, and never could be. But only since I grew into a woman and, after a long period of solitariness, had begun to show independence and initiative had Tamsin seemed to resent me, as if I were an impediment to her enjoyment, a nuisance, a spoilsport, someone with whom she was happier to be without. Always she was derogatory about my disfigurement, drawing my attention to it when sometimes for a short while I had been able to forget it.

Fetch left the following week. I had tried my hardest to move my mother on this point, but she would not budge. It was a tearful parting. I pressed five sovereigns on Sally before she left; these she adamantly refused and I as adamantly insisted she take.

‘I shall be all right, miss. Reely. Thank you. I can stay with my mum till something else d'turn up. Thank you, reely.'

‘But with my mother refusing a reference … That is outrageous!'

‘Well, I got yours, miss. Though I reckon it do make my chances of a good post more harder to come by. But Sister June d'say maybe Mrs Elizabeth might find a vacancy for a scullery maid. Don't you worry, miss. ' Twill all come right in the end.'

The end! I wondered what the upright and very proper Fetch would think if she knew what had happened to me. She would have been as horrified as my mother. And would blame herself most bitterly for having connived at this unimaginable event.
Her
young lady. In the first bloom of her youth and innocence …

Ten days had now passed since the night of the concert. I had hardly stirred from the house, scarcely aware of what to expect of my own physical feelings, desperately hoping for some sign from Bram. Perhaps he would not want to write even in an innocent and formal way until he knew how I had fared. Perhaps he did not want to commit himself to a letter at all. Perhaps he thought any letters addressed to Tamsin or me would be opened. Obviously he had offended both my mother and Tamsin at the Queen's reception, even though I could not guess what it had been about.

After Fetch had left, I began to go out more, on the lawns, and I would loiter a few minutes each day on the little stone quay. The storm of last Thursday week had broken the spell of fine weather, and I had stared out from one window or another of the house at scuttling clouds and curtains of hard-driven rain. As the weather at last cleared, we had a couple of days of sea fog which cloaked Falmouth entirely but only just reached our headland and creek. Being right on the edge of the fog, you could watch it coming and going, moving like engine smoke. One minute the sun would be blazing, burning hot, then it would pale and glow like a new penny trying to break through the shifting mists.

It was on the second of these days when I had come from a walk exercising Parish that the second parlourmaid, an elderly woman called Vennor, told me that there was a letter for me.

‘Letter? Where? Who brought it? …'

‘Young Gunnel. Him what brings the papers and the magazines. He's just gone. You just missed 'im.'

I ran into the entrance hall and looked round. On a silver tray, such as one uses for visiting cards, was a small package addressed to Miss Emma Spry. My mother and sister were out, so no one had seen it who would want to know its contents. I tore it open. A small cardboard box. Inside the box was a brooch in the form of a starfish. Pinkish in colour, the stones looked like coral, or imitation coral. Something you might find in an antique shop. With a little gold pin at the back. But the message? I peered into the box and could find nothing. I pulled at the wrapping and the tissue paper in which the brooch had been wrapped. Nothing.

He had sent this without comment, without greeting, without suggesting that we might meet. Of course, it was infinitely certain whom it was from. Certain only to me. Was he being as cautious as that? He did not have the reputation for such caution. So had he sent it as a joke, a promise, a reminder? I could hear his laugh, see the narrowed eyes, full of predatory fun. Laugh, my little starfish, he was saying. Wear the badge because now you belong to me. My flesh crept. I did belong to him. I felt like a chattel, ready to do what I was told. Did he have many women like me, accepting his favours, waiting for his favours? In what way was I unusual? Just another scalp?

Part of me seethed with anger, part of me prickled with something like pride. I thought, I shall destroy myself – otherwise he will destroy me. Why was I born, mutilated, weak as a kitten yet militantly angry?

There was a step in the hall. I crushed the brooch back into the box and dropped it in a drawer. Tamsin.

‘Where's Desmond?' she said.

‘I haven't seen him.'

‘Where have you been?'

‘Walking Parish. Is Mama here?'

‘She's been out but has a headache, so has gone to lie down.'

‘I see.'

Tamsin looked me up and down curiously.

‘What were you up to that night?'

‘What night?'

‘You know very well. Did you really stay at Blundstone's Hotel?'

‘Of course!'

‘On your own? You know you've broken all the rules of decent behaviour? Why did you not call on Mrs Elizabeth Fox or the Millets? They would have given you a bed for the night.'

‘You've no idea what the storm was like,' I said. ‘I went down to the boat: you know I was determined to get home; but that took me right to the wrong end of the town; I was soaked and nearly blown away. What else could I have done? I was sorry to offend the Mrs Grundys of the town, but I didn't expect my sister to be one!'

It was strange how that wonderfully pretty face could close up and become mean. I was quite used to the change, but very few other people were shown it.

‘Call me what you like, but I'm right: you've created a lot of talk; this is only a little local community though it may think otherwise. I'm always embarrassed by having a sister who looks so peculiar, but I don't want to be associated with someone who brings a bad
name
on the family.'

‘Maybe you won't have to be embarrassed by me much longer!'

‘What d'you mean?'

‘Never mind.' Suddenly the prospect of going somewhere to earn my living had become not so much a threat as an opportunity.

She waited for me to say more, and then evidently concluded I was just being emotional and self-pitying. ‘ Well don't ever forget that Mama is an actress, and that suggests to the Mrs Grundys of this world a rather brassy woman with loose morals. If you go off the rails it won't do
my
reputation any good, and I can't afford to have my life ruined by your pranks. I have to
live
here.'

I stared through one of the hall windows at the slanting sunshine outside. I was thinking of the brooch in the drawer and only half attending. Then it soaked in. ‘Why should you have to live here?'

She said: ‘Desmond has just asked me to marry him.'

I
T WAS
a reasonable solution, as I had part foreseen, as far as my mother was concerned; though she had had much higher hopes for her pretty daughter. Tamsin was still very young and becoming no less beautiful, and even though the prospect of a Boscawen had fallen through, there were others to look for. A Molesworth, a Lemon, a Courtney Vyvyan, would do very well; but either no sons of suitable age seemed to be about or there were evidences that an actress's daughter, and penniless at that, did not quite come up to snuff.