Priorsford (Historical Novel). O. Douglas
with the brindled locks! I love the way your hair is quite black in some places and white in others: it's so attractive, with the rose of your cheeks and the blue of your eyes. I don't remember what you were like in your youth, but I don't think you could ever have been as good looking as you are now.'
Miss Hutton took Mirren's compliments with great calm.
'You couldn't remember me in my youth for I'm almost ten years older than you are. Yes, I'm sixty: and a very nice age I find it.'
'Do you? I'm fifty and I think it's horrible. Half a century sounds so terrific, and birthdays occur with such alarming frequency. Kirsty Home's small girl, Fanny, since she was two and could toddle, has always appeared at Hopewaterfoot on my birthday morning in March with the first daffodils (generally kept on the nursery mantelpiece for days to bring them out), and really, you know, it seems as if the child were constantly there! I'm fairly appalled at the shortness of life. You are young, and before you know where you are your youth is gone. That's why I don't think we should ever be angry at youthful follies and impertinences: even while the young things are scoffing at age it is upon them. . . . I suppose I should be rather ashamed to confess it, but, fifty and all as I am, I've still got a great zest for life. I enjoy everything--getting up in the morning and having my cold bath: going down to eat a good breakfast: my letters: work (though I malign it): motoring about our adorable Tweeddale: my friends: my books: my holidays: the seasons as they come: bird song: the sunsets. . . . It's a great life I tell you, Janet, given decent health, and even with poor health there are compensations. I wish I could get Rebecca Brand to enjoy things: she will never own to being happy. Isn't it odd?'
Miss Hutton carefully picked up a dropped stitch, then said:
'As to odd--living with an enthusiastic eager creature like you might make a person as naturally contrary as Rebecca become all the more apathetic. How is Rebecca?'
'Oh,' said Mirren, 'as well as ever woman was. I think she's glad to be back with me, at least she's glad to be near the Manse and her brother. She gets on well with her sister-in-law, and the baby is a great delight. She must have been miserable in that place in Edinburgh, for Rebecca was never intended by Providence to be a companion to an old lady. To begin with she never sees anything to do, and when she sits down to sew or read she doesn't at all like to be disturbed. I can imagine the impotent wrath of the old lady waiting for cushions and hot-water bottles that never came!'
'But is she any real use to you?'
'Well, I wouldn't call her useful, exactly, but I like having her. She isn't stupid, and there is something so utterly honest and decent about her that I can't help respecting her. And she makes the place seem more like home. I'm always glad to go back to her. And you know, Janet, it isn't every one who is supportable as a companion. If I got one of the really helpful and agreeable kind I'd probably weary of her and curse her.'
Janet smiled: she knew her friend. Presently she said: 'I'm glad you've got Rebecca. I never liked your living alone. I am alone, but, being a ruminative, cow-like creature, I don't mind, and, besides, in Priorsford I'm in the middle of a busy brisk little community. Hopewaterfoot is removed from the haunts of men. . . . By the way, have you heard the latest news? Lady Bidborough is coming with her children to Priorsford for the winter.'
'Lady Bidborough? Little Jean Jardine! Whatever for? Hasn't she houses and lands in England? This is great news. Where are they going to live?'
Janet laid down her stocking. 'I am the fountainhead of knowledge, so to speak. Jean wrote to me about a month ago asking if I knew of a house to let furnished anywhere near The Rigs, and told me that her husband had to go for a voyage with his greatest friend, who was recovering from a severe illness. . . . There is a house just behind The Rigs, rather a nice place, called "The Neuk," owned by people who only use it in summer, and she has taken that. Jean herself wants to stay at The Rigs with her children; The Neuk will be used as an overflow. I think she said her secretary would live there, and the boys when they come. . . . Three maids are coming from Mintern Abbas.'
'Dear me, this is great excitement. . . . How long is it since Jean left? Nine years, is it? Won't Priorsford buzz!'
Janet looked up quickly. 'Why should it?' she asked. 'Everybody assumes that a country town is a hotbed of gossip; it's most unfair. In Priorsford we certainly take a friendly interest in our neighbours, but we are not gossips,--with one or two exceptions.'
'Yes, I know the exceptions! But I believe you're right. "Let live" is more or less the motto of Priorsford. . . . Well, I'm vastly excited about Jean coming back into our lives. She was a duck of a child, but I didn't see much of her after she grew up: I was away so much. Were you in Priorsford when the romance was going on?'
'No. Mother and I were abroad that winter. I wish I had been here to see a fairy tale come true. For the whole thing really was a sort of fairy tale. But it seems to have stood the test of time. Nine years, and this is the first time they have been separated, and it's evidently a great wrench. It was Lord Bidborough who thought of the Priorsford plan. Jean herself wanted to hold the fort at Mintern Abbas: she always had a conscience, the child.'
'She could hardly escape it,' said Mirren. 'You remember old Miss Alison Jardine, the great-aunt who brought them all up? An old terror!'
'She was, rather. But you'll admit her training was very successful. She managed to give Jean a certain distinction, to make her just a little different from other girls. Jean's manners were so good. She was neither affected nor offhand, but frank and natural, rather like a nice boy. And remember she was left at the age of eighteen to look after not only her own two brothers, but little Gervase Taunton, her stepmother's child by a second marriage.'
'Mein Gott! It sounds like "Ministering Children." How did she escape being a horrid little prig?'
'I know. But Jean was gay as well as sedate, and it was a very happy home. . . . Yes, I wish I could have been here when Miss Pamela Reston took Bella Bathgate's rooms, and Lord Bidborough arrived to visit his sister. You were away too, I think?'
Mirren nodded. 'Most people were glad to settle down after the war, but Peace sent me wandering. . . . It made things so final somehow. The bells on Armistice Day! I don't think I ever realised that Robbie was really gone until old Watty Somerville began to pull the Muirburn Kirk bell because Peace had come. I had hardly cried through it all, but that day I wept myself sick.' She stared out at the autumn flowers for a minute, then turned to her friend with a laugh. 'Life's a comic business. D'you know, I'm rather sorry Jean's coming back. She's grown into a legend. Jean, Lady Bidborough, who was an ordinary girl in Priorsford till the "baron's heir" appeared and carried her away to reign amid unimagined splendour. And here she is walking out of her fairy tale and back to the little house in the little town, bereft (for the time) of her husband and accompanied by three (probably very ordinary) children. She may even have grown stout . . . perhaps a little pompous . . .'
'Oh, no, Mirren,' Miss Hutton protested. 'Jean pompous is unthinkable. . . . Oh, dear, this sounds like a caller.'
'Mrs. Duff-Whalley,' the maid announced.
A small woman came into the room, with an important air, and stopped in the middle, surveying the two occupants.
'Actually I've found you in, Miss Hutton! How d'you do? And Mrs. Strang. How d'you do? Quite a pleasant day, isn't it?' She chose a chair and sat down, while her companions meekly resumed their seats. Wherever Mrs. Duff-Whalley was she elected herself mistress of ceremonies, relegating her hostess and every one else to the background.
She began: 'Did you motor down from Muirburn, Mrs. Strang? Oh, you have a car? Then you aren't quite cut off from society.'
'Not quite,' Mirren said gravely.
'And of course you have the Homes fairly near you and Lady Carruthers, dear woman. D'you see much of the Laverlaw people?'
'When they are at home they are hospitable. But they are away a good deal in winter, and of course you know they go to their place in Ross-shire from July to October.'
Mrs. Duff-Whalley reared her head in a way she had, as she replied, 'Of course, I