On the morning of Whit Monday in 1877 Margaret Lorimer hurried down the marble staircase of Brinsley House. Punctuality was more important than dignity -most particularly when her father, John Junius Lorimer, was the one who would be kept waiting. It was time for the day to start with family prayers - if a day could be said to start when already the servants had been hard at work for more than two hours. Ranges had been stoked and blacked, water heated and carried, horses groomed, carriages polished, lamps trimmed, gravel paths raked, flowers cut and arranged. The footmen had little to do at this hour except look handsome. To the housemaids and parlourmaids and kitchen maids who had crept down from their dark attics so much earlier in the day, however, the assembly afforded a welcome rest from their scrubbing and polishing.
Although the occasion was called family prayers, few of the family were expected to attend. The younger son of the house, Ralph, had already left for school. A day boy at Clifton College, which his father had helped to found sixteen years before as a select school for the sons of the rich Bristol merchants, he was required to attend morning prayers in chapel with the boarders. His elder brother, William, had married six years earlier and was established in his own home. Their mother, Georgiana, did not nowadays leave her boudoir before noon, although Dr Scott had never been able to find a name for the illness of which she complained. Margaret, slipping quickly into her place in the great dining room, was the only member of the family to await the arrival of the head of the household.
As was his custom, John Junius Lorimer arrived in the room while the grandfather clock in the hall outside was striking the hour. In his old age - for he was now in his seventy-eighth year - he had become heavy and moved slowly. But his white hair was thick and plentiful, curling on to his collar, and his square-cut beard and sideburns framed a pink and healthy face. His bushy eyebrows had not turned white but remained the rich chestnut red of his youth. From beneath them his greenish-blue eyes, missing nothing, took a quick roll call of the room.
The force of his personality dominated the room at once. When John Junius expressed a wish in the boardroom of Lorimer’s Bank, of which he had been chairman since his father’s death, that wish passed swiftly downwards as an order not to be questioned. At this hour of the day his requests were addressed upwards in the hierarchy towards the Almighty, in the form of prayers, but this did not prevent them from emerging as instructions. With equal clarity he read a passage from the Bible. Margaret, who knew it by heart, allowed her attention to wander.
The great dining room was used only for entertaining guests and for family prayers. It was furnished on a grand scale, with Venetian chandeliers suspended over the huge mahogany dining table. Round the walls hung a set of family portraits, and from her earliest childhood Margaret had enjoyed studying them and wondering what the men depicted there were really like. Samuel Lorimer had at first commissioned paintings of himself and his youthful son, Alexander, from life. Then - mindful of the social respectability bestowed by the possession of ancestral portraits - he had ordered a complete set of forefathers from the same artist - who consequently found it easy to indicate a family likeness. Even that light-hearted Stuart adventurer, Brinsley, had been awarded a resolute Hanoverian jowl.
With surprise Margaret noticed that since yesterday there had been an addition to the black-framed line - the portrait for which her father had been sitting earlier in the year. She scrutinized it with interest. The artist had succeeded in catching the subtleties of his subject’s expression. The long nose and downward turn of his mouth gave John Junius a forbidding look: yet his cheeks curved with benevolence. It was an accurate picture of a man who tyrannized both his family and the bank which bore his name but who was at the same time capable of large generosities and small kindnesses, a man who judged every business venture by its profitability but who would buy a new piece of carved jade with no motive except to delight his own eyes with its beauty. There were few amongst his business associates, or even within his family, who wholly understood John Junius Lorimer. The artist, Margaret decided, had well earned his handsome fee by suggesting the inconsistencies of character without attempting to resolve them.
Guiltily she realized that the reading was over, and that while she was staring at the portrait, its subject was staring at her. In the same grave voice with which he had intoned the final prayers, he requested his daughter to follow him to the tower.
This was an order which on many occasions in the childhood of his three children had filled them with terror. Every morning after prayers John Junius turned his attention to whatever domestic problems had arisen the previous day, so that by the time he left the house his mind would be free to concentrate on the affairs of the bank. All too often these domestic problems had been solved by harsh discipline. Today, however, Margaret could reasonably hope that he wished only to discuss the arrangements for the afternoon. She climbed the stairs without apprehension.
The situation of Brinsley House was a dramatic one. All its best rooms afforded a spectacular view of the tree-clad cliff on the further side of the gorge. From the lowest terrace of the steeply tiered garden it was possible to look straight down at the water of the Avon itself as it curved towards the estuary and the open sea. But the panorama from the tower dwarfed both these spectacles. Through the windows around its highest room John Junius Lorimer was able to look down on the city or over to the hills. From here he could admire the miracle of the new suspension bridge, which owed its existence to his efforts, or catch the first glimpse of a pennant which meant that a ship, of the Lorimer Line was returning safely to port. He could watch with pride as the tall ships passed almost directly underneath, pulled by the little steam tugs which made it no longer necessary for them to wait at the mouth of the Avon until a high enough tide could bear them in. He could observe the bustle of the docks as one cargo was unloaded and another loaded, as sail-makers and carpenters repaired the ravages of a voyage round the Horn. And with pride again he could watch the slow and graceful start of a new voyage which would take the ship and all its crew away from their home port perhaps for as long as three years.
The ships, it was true, belonged to William now. John Junius had made that part of his empire over to his elder son six years earlier – not because at the age of seventy-one he felt himself any less competent to run the line, but in order that William should taste responsibility whilst his father was still in a position to advise him. Soon there would be no more masts, no more of those breath-catching moments when the unfurled sails filled with the wind, seeming almost to lift the craft out of the water and fly with it through the air. But even William’s enthusiasm could not transform the whole fleet to steam overnight. The sailing ships still came gliding up the river, and every member of the family took a personal pride in their brave adventures. With the Lorimers ‘all ship-shape and Bristol fashion’ was no idle boast.
John Junius was standing in his favourite place by the window as his daughter came into the tower room.
‘Good morning, Papa.’
‘Good morning, Margaret.’ He accepted her kiss without warmth. He had never been a demonstrative father, and since the incident of the Crankshaw alliance eleven months earlier he had deliberately withheld even the pretence of affection. Grudgingly permitted to have her own way, she could not expect to be quickly forgiven for it. ‘I wished only to remind you that today is the Bank Holiday.’
He spoke the last two words with distaste, as though he had been asked to sample a new dish prepared from suspicious ingredients. Still as active physically as he had been ten years earlier, he had nevertheless lost the ability -and indeed the wish - to take kindly to new ideas. It was the business of Government, in his opinion, to see that the affairs of the country were run for the maximum of profit and prestige, but with the minimum of interference with the private affairs of its citizens. To impose the obligation of leisure on a conscientious staff and to compel Lorimer’s Bank to close its doors on a day not determined by its chairman was an impertinence. However, the imposition was a law and must therefore be obeyed.
As a sign of his acceptance he had last year for the first time invited the entire staff and board of directors of Lorimer’s, together with their families, to take tea in the gardens of Brinsley House on the afternoon of one of the unwanted holidays. On that first occasion it had been an innovation involving the anxious organization of food and entertainment and an apprehension of awkward social encounters. This year it would be merely a repetition, the development of a new tradition which would one day become an old tradition. Although John Junius had been
grumbling about it for the past three weeks, he was in fact reconciled to the prospect.
In theory, of course, his wife was in charge of the domestic arrangements for the afternoon. She could be expected to appear as the guests arrived, since the occasion was one which justified expenditure on new silks and ribbons, but it was realistic of John Junius to go over the arrangements in advance with his daughter. However much he might deplore Margaret’s stubbornness, he was bound to recognize that she was efficient as an organizer.
Margaret was able to assure him that everything would be to his satisfaction. The only choice still to be made was whether the trestles should be set out in the house or the garden, and she had promised to give a decision not later than noon.
‘In the garden,’ said John Junius definitely. He could lock up his collection of jade animals in their glass cases, but the Indian and Persian screens which he also collected might be jostled or even fingered by a class of person not accustomed to such beautiful objects or aware of their value.
‘The ladies will be wearing their best bonnets,’ Margaret reminded him. ‘If there should be rain - ’
‘It will be a fine day,’ her father told her. ‘Surely you heard me mention the matter in prayers this morning? I have had occasion before to remark on your lack of concentration.’
Margaret was tempted to defend herself by saying that she had heard the request, but without recognizing it to be a guarantee. However, she had been accused of pcrtness too often already, and there was a matter which troubled her more than the weather.
‘Will Mr Crankshaw be present this afternoon, with his family?’ she asked.
‘Naturally. All the directors have been invited. You can hardly expect Mr Crankshaw to absent himself in order that a foolish young woman shall be spared a moment of embarrassment which, I am bound to say, she richly deserves.’
‘Of course not, Papa.’ It was not the director of the bank whom she was reluctant to meet but his son, Walter. A year ago the two fathers had proposed a business arrangement which would have linked their wealthy families by marriage to the benefit of both. The Crankshaws owned the site of the new docks which were under construction at Portishead and which the Lorimer Line would need to use as its new ships, with their larger tonnage, found it impossible to come up the river to the Bristol docks. The details of the settlements to be made on the young people had already been agreed before Margaret was informed of the plan. She felt no responsibility for the feelings of Mr Crankshaw, but it must have been humiliating for Walter - who had agreed to the proposal with apparent enthusiasm - to be told that she had rejected it. She had not seen him since then.
Both Margaret and her father had another matter which they wished to raise during this daily conference, but neither was anxious to appear too eager. It was John Junius, accustomed to taking the initiative, who spoke first.
‘That young woman who used to give you music lessons,’ he said. ‘Italian.’ He paused to allow Margaret to remind him of the name.
‘Luisa,’ she obliged. Her teacher was only five years older than herself and they had become friends. ‘Signorina Reni.’
‘Of course. My carriage happened to take me past her in the city on Friday. I had remembered her as a handsome young woman who dressed with some style, considering her circumstances. I was shocked to see that she had become shabby. And too thin. In fact, as though at any moment she might faint from lack of food.’
‘I am sorry to hear it, Papa. She left Bristol a year ago to nurse her sister. I was not aware that she had returned.’
‘Could you not send a message to her and suggest that she might come here this afternoon and accompany you in a few songs? Perhaps even join you in a duet. I remember that her voice was pleasing. It would give us the opportunity to make her a small present.’
‘At such short notice it would hardly be possible, Papa. If she has no suitable dress, she would not like to appear before company. Besides, we have not practised together. And I think it would not be proper for me to sing this afternoon.’
‘You have a beautiful voice,’ John Junius declared. Margaret flushed with pleasure at the compliment, not only because her father paid her so few, but because he himself in his younger days had possessed a fine voice and still retained his musical sensibility.
Margaret knew well enough that nothing else about herself was beautiful. She was too small and her expression was too determined, even fierce. Her step was firm and bustling: she had never found it possible to languish in an elegant manner. Her complexion was freckled, and she had inherited the curly red hair which had made her father a striking figure when he was young. On a young man it was no doubt acceptable, but she felt it to be unseemly on herself. She plaited her hair as tightly as she could and coiled it round her ears; but its tight waves eluded her control and she could never give the proper impression of calm tidiness. She knew that her father, who loved beautiful things, who would sit for an hour staring at a detail painted on one of his screens or caressing some tiny jade animal within his cupped hands, had never been able to find in his own daughter anything for his eyes to admire. But it was true that her voice, although not strong, was clear and true.
Nevertheless she felt bound to press her objection.
‘Most of the bank staff are strangers to me, Papa,’ she said. ‘We have hired musicians to entertain them after tea. If I were to join that entertainment, it would be to make myself a public performer.’
‘If you have nothing prepared, that’s the end of it,’ said her father. His displeasure was clear in his voice. Margaret had a favour to beg and could see the need to change his mood before she introduced the new subject.
‘I shall invite Luisa to luncheon tomorrow,’ she said. ‘At least she may enjoy a good meal to start with, while I discover what the trouble is. And then I shall ask her to practise with me. When we are ready, we will sing together for you and Mama and your friends one evening after dinner. You know that I am always ready to do that. The opportunity to make her a present can easily be arranged.’
Her father nodded his approval.
‘The thought does you credit,’ he said, as though he had forgotten that the thought was in the first place his own. He nodded at his daughter to dismiss her. But Margaret’s own request was as urgent as his.
‘I would like your permission, Papa, to engage a lady’s maid for myself.’
‘What’s wrong with Marie-Claire?’
‘She is Mama’s maid. She thinks it wrong that she should be expected to wait on more than one mistress.’
‘Lazy good-for-nothing,’ growled John Junius, but Margaret persisted as tactfully as she could.
‘Mama’s state of health makes it necessary for a great deal to be done for her. I think that Marie-Claire’s time is in fact fully occupied.’
‘I recall that we have discussed this subject before, in a contrary direction. Your mother said that she could not spare Marie-Claire for you any longer, and you were most definite that you did not require a personal maid.’
‘I realize now that I was wrong,’ said Margaret, knowing that the admission would please her father. He grunted a sort of approval.
‘No more Frenchies, though. I absolutely forbid it. Two in one house, jabbering together all day long, idle themselves and setting a bad example to the other servants, definitely not!’ John Junius had been a boy in the years when Napoleon Bonaparte was the Bogeyman whose name was used to frighten children into sleep or obedience. The war had been over for sixty years, but Margaret knew that her father had never learned to like the French.
‘I quite agree, Papa,’ she said tactfully. ‘What I suggest is that I should employ a young girl to be trained to my own taste. Marie-Claire could be asked to instruct her at first in such matters as sewing and ironing. She would not expect, of course, to be paid the salary of a lady’s maid until she had acquired the necessary skills.’
Margaret was never sure whether a consideration of this kind was more likely to persuade her father or irritate him. John Junius Lorimer was probably the richest of Bristol’s rich citizens. He kept not one carriage but two and lived in the grandest mansion in the whole of Clifton. Whenever a subscription list was raised for a purpose which he thought worthy, it was a point of pride that the name of Lorimer should be at its head. His collection of Eastern art was rumoured to be priceless. It had already been promised to the city on his death, with money enough to build a public gallery in which the precious objects could be displayed and admired by the public without charge. And yet Margaret was forced almost every day to listen to her mother’s complaints that she was unable to take her proper place in Bristol society because of her husband’s meanness in such matters as dress and jewellery. Without taking sides in parental disputes, Margaret was tempted on such an occasion as this to use the bait of economy for her own purpose.
‘You talk as though you have the girl already.’ John Junius spoke suspiciously.
‘Naturally I have not engaged her, Papa. But it is true that I have a young girl in mind. I have known her since she was nine years old. Her family was one of those I used to visit in Peel Street.’ It was necessary to hurry over this part of the story. Only with extreme difficulty had Margaret been able to persuade her father that the visiting of sick families in the slums of Bristol was neither dangerous nor unseemly. ‘Her father died in the cholera epidemic. Her mother has been ill for some years. When the Froome flooded in November she lived with Betty for five weeks in a room whose floor was under two feet of water. Now she too has died. Betty has been taken to the workhouse.’
‘Where she will be well looked after.’
‘Where she will be neglected and corrupted,’ said Margaret firmly.
Her father received this statement in silence. As a hardworking citizen he was bound to assert that the workhouse conferred more benefit than they deserved on those who were unable to support themselves. As a humane man he knew that what Margaret said was true.
‘If you wish merely to find a better home for the child, I can nominate her for the orphanage at Ashley Down,’ he said. ‘Mr Wright has reason enough to know of my interest in his work there.’
Margaret shook her head.
‘Thank you, Papa, but her twelfth birthday is approaching and she is ready to work. I have been told of the situation proposed for her, and I am horrified by its conditions. She is an intelligent girl, cheerful and clean, and she deserves better.’
‘She is fortunate to have employment offered to her by those who have her interests at heart.’
‘She would be more fortunate to have it offered to her by myself,’ said Margaret.
She had judged her time well. John Junius had had enough of domestic matters.
‘The engagement of servants is a matter for your mother, not for me,’ he said. ‘Do whatever she thinks is best.’ They both knew that, though there were still formalities to be observed, the matter was now settled.
Margaret went straight to her mother’s boudoir. A fire was burning there as usual, although it was May. Georgiana complained incessantly of the dampness of the Bristol climate and exposed herself to it as little as possible. She was almost thirty years younger than her husband, but ever since the stillbirth of her last baby, eight years earlier, she had retreated from her marriage – as from every other form of exertion — into the shelter of this one stifling room.
As well as being over-heated, the boudoir was over-furnished. It was impossible to move anywhere without brushing against some small side-table laden with ornaments or silver-framed family photographs. The day-bed and the chairs were covered in plush and protected by tasselled antimacassars, and the heavy curtains were never fully drawn back. The smell of Georgiana’s pug dog and of her latest meal or hot drink always lingered to make the room stuffy. Margaret could hardly bear to remain in it for long. She had been brought up in a house which had been built and furnished in a classical style a hundred years earlier and little changed since then, and liked its uncluttered spaciousness. She did not begrudge her mother this private island of clutter, of course, but she spent as little time in it as possible.
The doctor was just leaving the boudoir as Margaret arrived. Dr Scott had brought all Georgiana’s three surviving children into the world, as well as the four who had failed to reach their first birthday, and since then his weekly visits had brought him near to being a friend of the family. Through his wife he was well-connected, and had recently inherited from his father-in-law a legacy which John Junius’s interest had helped him to invest to advantage in Lorimer’s Bank. His new prosperity had enabled him to move to the growing suburb of Clifton, in which so many of his wealthiest patients lived. His only regret at this time of his life was that his son, Charles, on qualifying as a doctor, had taken a permanent appointment on the staff of a London hospital instead of returning to join his father’s practice.
However, Dr Scott had no intention of retiring for a good many years, so there was time enough for the situation to change. He was in a cheerful mood as he greeted Margaret and asked for her co-operation in ensuring that in the afternoon Mrs Lorimer did not go straight from her overheated room to the garden.
Georgiana too was in good spirits, less petulant than usual. Although the afternoon’s party was to be of such a humble kind, it would provide her with the chance to show herself as a hostess. She agreed without argument that Betty Hurst should be engaged and trained as a lady’s maid, and then spent half an hour quizzing Margaret about which costume she intended to wear for the afternoon. It would be too cool for lace, Georgiana said; safer to wear the brown dress which had a velvet jacket. Margaret listened politely to her mother’s opinions without allowing them to change her own plans. She was shown Georgiana’s new buckles of cut steel and admired them dutifully, although in her heart she considered such small details of costume to be worth no more time than was needed to buy them. When the arrival of the chairs which had been hired to set around the garden was announced, she took the opportunity to escape.
Supervising the arrangements could have occupied her for the whole morning. But the household servants were well trained. Margaret had already explained the day’s requirements, and they would work with more responsibility if she did not oversee them directly. It was as much to remove herself from the temptation to interfere as to implement her father’s wishes without delay that she asked for the victoria to be ready for her at eleven.
First she went to her music teacher’s old lodgings and was there able to discover Luisa’s new address. This was in a respectable area, although not a prosperous one. Margaret was admitted at once and shown to a small room on its upper floor. Like her father, she was shocked by Luisa’s emaciated appearance, but concealed her horror by a close embrace.
‘You should have told me you were returned,’ she said when Luisa had recovered from her surprise at the visit. ‘I am here only to insist that you come to Brinsley House tomorrow for luncheon. I shall expect to hear all your news then. And news of your sister.’
‘My sister?’
‘Have you not been nursing her?’ asked Margaret.
‘Oh yes. That was my reason for leaving Bristol. She recovered quickly, but afterwards I was myself ill.’
Luisa’s cheeks flushed briefly as she spoke, but at once returned to the unhealthy pallor which Margaret had observed when she first arrived. The skin had tightened over her high cheekbones and her eyes seemed to have sunk into sockets darkened by tiredness. It was difficult to remember how vivacious she had been at their last meeting, and how strikingly good-looking.
Once Margaret had obtained Luisa’s agreement to come the next day, she turned to leave, feeling that she ought not to prolong an unexpected visit. But her attention was caught by the sound of a cough coming from a dark corner of the room - a sound so small and faint that perhaps only a woman who loved babies as much as Margaret did would have noticed it. She stopped and turned back.
For a moment the two young women stared at each other. Luisa met Margaret’s gaze steadily. Then she stepped aside, allowing her visitor to go further into the room.
Looking down into the wooden cradle which stood against the wall, Margaret was amazed. The sleeping baby was very young, but her peaceful face was in an extraordinary way mature. It was impossible to doubt that she was a girl, and one of exceptional beauty. Already all the features of her oval face were perfectly formed.
‘She’s lovely,’ whispered Margaret. ‘Luisa, you should have told me of your marriage.’
Luisa did not reply and Margaret, startled, looked again into her steady eyes.
‘You mean - ?’ But the question was unnecessary. It was Margaret’s turn now to flush, for it was difficult for her not to feel shocked. ‘It would perhaps be as well,’ she said doubtfully, ‘if we did not mention the baby to Mama.’
Luisa continued to keep silent, forcing Margaret to make up her own mind. Postponing a decision, she looked again at the baby.
‘What is her name?’
‘She is christened Alexandra. But the name is so long for someone so small. I call her Alexa.’
‘Goodbye, Alexa.’ Margaret stroked the baby’s downy golden hair softly with a finger. Then she kissed Luisa goodbye. It was time to return to the arrangements for the afternoon.
They had proceeded smoothly in her absence and by two o’clock it was obvious that John Junius’s instructions about the weather had been obeyed. The sun shone from a perfect May sky. Even the wind which at almost every season rushed up the gorge to toss the heads of the chestnuts and acacias on the western boundary of the garden seemed today to be enjoying a Bank Holiday rest. Margaret could think of nothing likely to spoil the occasion except her meeting with Walter Crankshaw.
What made the situation more difficult was that she had never liked to explain her objection to a young man whose reputation was a respectable one. Margaret visited her sick families under the auspices of the Gentlewomen’s Aid to the Distressed, a charity sponsored by the most prominent ladies of the city. They subscribed generously to its purposes and by their names protected the reputations of the younger women who actually ventured into the less pleasant areas of Bristol. Margaret went into the slums without fear of scandal, but even she accepted that there was one part of the city which a young lady should never visit.
Just once, in an emergency caused by an accident to a child, she had broken this unwritten rule, protected by her father’s coachman. It was on this occasion that she had seen Walter emerging from a house off Joy Hill. Unlike the dockside stews, the establishments in this district were outwardly respectable, but their costs were often defrayed by gentlemen who would not in public admit to knowing the females who occupied them. Margaret’ upbringing had been strict, and she accepted the restrictions which were designed to protect her before her wedding day. But she was young enough to be an idealist, not accepting a double standard for men and women. If Walter behaved before marriage in a manner that she could not approve, might he not continue afterwards in the same way?
Margaret was well aware that she was not supposed to know why the Joy Hill area was forbidden to her. Georgiana would have been horrified to discover how her twenty-year-old daughter’s mind had been corrupted by conversation with the sick and poor. Any admission of what she had seen, much less the deduction she had drawn from it, would result in an immediate prohibition on any further visiting.
But for Margaret these journeys were not merely a way of passing the time. They were the only part of her day’s activities which she felt to be of any value, and she did not intend to put them at risk merely so that Walter could have an opportunity to explain his movements or, alternatively, that her own repugnance for the proposed association should be understood.
This was why she had given her father no reason for her rejection of Walter Crankshaw, which in turn made her fear an embarrassing encounter at the party. But when the afternoon came Walter bowed politely over her hand without speaking and his parents were fulsome in their compliments about the appearance of the garden.
With her small ordeal over, Margaret felt able to relax. The upper lawn and terraces, usually deserted, were crowded by now. Since everyone must have arrived, it would be in order for her to move away from her parents’ side. But just as she began to turn away, a late guest made his appearance. He was a stranger to her - a good-looking young man, clean-shaven and bright-eyed, revealing dark curly hair as he raised his tall hat. She waited while the new arrival exchanged a few words with her parents. Then Mr Lynch, the manager of Lorimer’s, brought him across to be introduced to her.
‘Miss Lorimer, you will not have met our new company accountant. He is only recently arrived from Scotland to take up the post. May I beg leave to present Mr David Grcgson?’