‘Now,’ Nan Easter said to her regional managers, ‘let us turn our attention to enlarging our trade.’
It was March and their quarterly meeting in the Strand was nearly over. The last of their reports had been read and accepted. It was an ideal moment to test young Caroline’s suggestion. ‘Our trade is still in the doldrums, gentlemen. The price of newspapers is still too high, on account of that infernal stamp duty, and we can’t sell the popular papers, cheap though they are, because they en’t stamped and they en’t legal. Now it’s true we handle the bulk of the legal trade, and stationery sells handsome, but we en’t expanding, and that’s the truth of it. We got more than a dozen new railways to carry our merchandise to Swindon and Southampton and Rugby and such, but we en’t expanding. How if we were to sell other articles besides newspapers and stationery?’
They were most upset by the suggestion, ruffling like pigeons in a breeze. ‘What else could we sell?’ they asked. ‘Oh no, no. We are a newsagents after all, Mrs Easter.’ And they begged her to think of the work it would mean, the trade it would lose, the customers it would upset. Profits might not be high, that was true, but they were steady. In their opinion, it would be most unwise. ‘Oh no, no, no.’
How dull they all are, she thought, hard-working and thorough, certainly, but quite without imagination and with no sense of daring at all. If I could think of something sensible to sell, I’d sell it just to show ‘em. She missed the old faces, dear old Alexander Thistlethwaite who’d run the East Anglian side of the business until that awful winter when he’d died so suddenly and quietly, sitting in his chair by the fire with Bessie pottering about their parlour beside him. And Cosmo Teshmaker, who’d been such an ally in London, and had taken his wife off so happily for that awful tour of Italy, from which neither of them had returned. I’ll ask John and Billy, she decided. See what they can suggest. And she dismissed her fuddy-duddies, as courteously as she could, thanking them for their endeavours.
John and Billy had been her lieutenants for so many years now that they knew one another’s ways almost instinctively, which made the final part of their quarterly meeting relaxed and easy and enjoyable. They’d joined the firm when Billy was no more than fourteen, and his brother a year younger, young and slim and eager to do well. Now they were in their forties and looked what they were: men of business, knowledgeable and dependable, between them taking full responsibility for the day-to-day running of the firm, and yet still capable of enjoying a joke and teasing as they’d done when they were boys. If only the committee could be composed of such men.
But today her fat cheerful Billy was ill at ease.
‘What is it?’ she asked him when the managers had gone.
‘I’ve got young Edward in my office,’ he confessed. ‘Tilda thinks he ought to see you.’
‘What for?’
‘To discuss his future, so she says.’ His face was quite woebegone with embarrassment. ‘If you ask me she’s being premature, but you know Tilda.’
Yes, Nan thought, I do know Tilda. She’s been nagging again. She makes a deal too much fuss of that Edward. But she didn’t say so for that wouldn’t have done at all. Billy was upset enough already. ‘Then I’d best see him,’ she said, ‘if that’s the size of it.’ And she rang for her clerk to show him up.
Edward Easter was the most unprepossessing of her grandchildren, seventeen years old and all arrogance and pimples. Left to her own devices she wouldn’t have entertained him for a minute. He and his sister Matty were as different as two siblings could possibly be, although they shared the same pale colouring, the same shape of head and the same baby-fine light brown hair. But where she lowered her beautiful big grey eyes he raised his small bold blue ones; where she stooped to avoid notice, he, like the spoilt child he was, stood tall to attract it; and where she was quiet and unassuming, he grew louder and more demanding the more attention he was given. He was going up to Cambridge in the autumn, and he was very proud of his new status as an undergraduate and the fine new clothes his parents had provided to embellish it.
Now he came strutting into the boardroom as if he owned it and sat down at the table without being asked, which was a very bad start. ‘Ma says I’m to ask you what my position is to be,’ he announced. ‘When I come down from Cambridge, you know.’
‘You en’t gone up yet awhile,’ Nan said, rather taken aback by the effrontery of it.
‘Ah yes,’ he said, looking at her boldly, ‘but it won’t be long now, will it, and I need to know what the firm intends to do for me.’
‘Do you indeed?’ Nan said sternly. ‘I’d ha’ thought it more to the point to consider what you intend to do for the firm?’
‘Why, I shall inherit it, Grandmama. After all, I am the heir apparent.’
‘And how do you make that out, pray?’
‘I’m the only son of the elder son.’
‘We en’t royalty,’ she told him sharply, while his father winced. ‘I got six other grandchildren besides you.’
‘Ah, but they don’t amount,’ he said, and he proceeded to check them off on his fingers. ‘Jimmy means to go into the priesthood, Will is to be a reporter, and you can’t count the girls.’
‘Why not?’
‘Girls stay at home and get married. They don’t work in newsagents.’
‘I might remind you, young man, that I am female and I run the firm. Or en’t you noticed?’
He wasn’t a bit abashed by her sarcasm. ‘But you ain’t the same, Grandmama,’ he said easily. ‘You were born in the old days.’
‘My heart alive!’ Nan said to Billy. ‘He’s got an answer for everything, this boy of yours.’
‘He’s very like his mother,’ Billy apologized.
‘Very well then,’ Nan said, returning her attention to Edward, ‘if you join the firm, what will you do to increase trade?’
‘Why, sell papers, I daresay.’
‘Sales are static,’ she told him. ‘What would you do to increase them?’
‘Pray for a war,’ Edward said smoothly. ‘Another Waterloo somewhere. That ‘ud improve things no end.’
‘Providing we won it,’ John said, giving his brother a wry grin.
‘No fear of that,’ Edward said. ‘The British always win.’
‘No,’ Nan said, ‘that en’t the way forward. Oh, I know bad news sells papers, and good news too if it’s the right kind, but it en’t the way forward. There’s no virtue in waiting for events to increase trade for us. We ought to be a-taking action to do that for ourselves. What would you do?’
‘Well, good heavens,’ Edward said, ‘if you can’t think of something, Grandmama, I’m sure I can’t.’
She was suddenly sick of him. ‘You go to Cambridge, Edward,’ she said, ‘and see how you make out there. Then we’ll consider your future. You’ve got a long way to go yet. And I suggest the first steps you take are out of that door. Your father and your uncle John and I have work to do.’
He went swaggering out, straight-spined and arrogant to the last.
‘What a puppy he is!’ his grandmother said. ‘I hope he learns more sense at Cambridge, I tell ’ee straight, Billy.’
‘Was he right about Will?’ Billy asked his brother, helping them all to brandy and avoiding her criticism because it was too painful. ‘Does he mean to be a reporter?’
‘It’s the first I’ve heard of it if he does,’ John said. ‘A whim, I daresay. He’ll join the firm when he finally comes down of course, just like Edward. Perhaps he means to try something different in the meantime, which is no bad idea, when all’s said and done. It would give him experience of another side of the business.’ Then he too changed the subject, turning to his mother. ‘Is Caroline well?’
‘Settled at last, I do believe,’ Nan said, and told him all about the drawing afternoon, because that at least was easy and pleasant and would soothe poor Billy’s embarrassment.
John listened seriously, inclining his head towards her. ‘Perhaps she will be a little better behaved now,’ he hoped. Her lack of interest in the school had been rather a disappointment to him. This was more encouraging.
‘She’s a deal better behaved already,’ Nan said, defending her. ‘Give her another month and she’ll be a child transformed.’
‘Improvement I might believe,’ he said, smiling at her, ‘but transformation is another thing. If only she were more like her brother.’
‘A good lad, your Will,’ Billy said, Finishing his brandy. ‘I wish my Edward had half as much sense.’
‘Yes he is,’ John agreed. ‘I shall be glad when he joins the firm.’
He would have been very surprised if he could have seen his son at that moment. For the sensible Will Easter was cheerfully drunk and planning a career outside the company.
Will and his two closest friends, Tubby Maltravers, who was short, stout and witty, and Dodo Overthorne, who was tall, sharp and lazy, had dined just a little too well that evening, and had consequently found themselves obliged to drink large quantities of British Hollands to ease the discomfort of their over-distended stomachs. Now they were hanging out of the window of his room in Pembroke College, blear-eyed with drink and waiting for the whores to arrive.
‘Lissen!’ Tubby commanded, holding up a fat hand. ‘Ain’t that the basket, dammit?’
They peered through the darkness of the quod and the fog of Hollands. Something was rattling over on the far corner and they could see two dark figures man-handling a ladder.
‘Chains,’ Dodo said. ‘Tha’s what it is. Chains.’
‘They don’t bring ‘em up on chains, you duffer,’ Will said, pushing his friend’s head to one side so that he could see what was going on. ‘Might hurt ‘em.’
‘Yesh they do,’ Dodo insisted. ‘Weight of the bashket don’t ye know. Couldn’t use rope.’
‘Think of the noise,’ Will said. His head was so muddled he couldn’t even remember how the whores were lifted over the wall although he’d seen it done scores of times. They sat in abasket, he remembered that. And everybody had to be very quiet in case the proctors heard, because of course it was all strictly against the rules.
White skirts bloomed like a rose on top of the wall, and now they could hear the scrape of the ladder and a scuffle of whispers.
‘Tha’s Molly!’ Dodo said, flexing his long legs arid stepping carefully away from the window, like a heron wading through weed. ‘Bags I first.’
‘How can you possibly see who it is?’ Will said. ‘In this dark?’ But his friend was stalking out of the door, and now there were two white roses fluttering astride the wall, and somebody was giggling.
‘Come on, Will,’ Tubby said, pulling him by the arm. ‘Lor’ I’m squiffy. I hope old Shakespeare ain’t right.’
‘Shakespeare?’ Will asked, staggering after him.
‘Yes, you know. The porter in Macbeth. “Drink is a provoker.” You know. “Provokes desire and takes away performance.” ‘That ‘ud be a sell, eh?’ “Makes him and mars him. Makes him stand to, and not stand to.” Eh?’
Personally and privately Will didn’t really care what sort of sexual state he was in. But that was something he kept to himself. Being a gentleman of style, he always joined in with all the antics his friends proposed, but he was careful never to spend any time alone with any of the whores. This wasn’t because he had no desire for them. He was young and easily roused and full of appetite. And it wasn’t because he was afraid of catching one of their diseases. That was something that happened to other people. It was because he feared that if he ever made love to a woman he might become entangled, and this was something he was determined never to do. His father’s terrible grief when his mother died had affected him so profoundly that he had vowed then and there, and young as he was, that he would never allow himself to be crushed in the same way. And as the only way to avoid the grief of loss was to avoid love and entanglement in the first place, he had decided to remain single and heartwhole. It was the most sensible course.
So although he went down to the wall to welcome their visitors and help them down the ladder, he had no intention of making use of their services. But it was a pleasure to lift them from the ladder, just the same, to breathe in their heady combination of strong perfume and musk, to see the swell of their white arms and the cloudy tangle of their loosened hair and their bright, bright eyes glinting at him in the lamplight. Drink or no drink, they roused him most painfully.
Fortunately for him the fourth head over the wall that evening was the tousled mop of their old friend Jeff Jefferson. Tubby and Dodo were none too pleased to see his horsy face grinning at them over the top of the basket.
‘Dammit Jefferson,’ Dodo hissed, ‘can’t you use the gate like any other Christian soul?’
‘Not when you fellers’ll haul me over the wall.’
‘That’s not cricket, old man.’
‘Cave!’ a voice warned. ‘Bulldogs!’
The basket was dropped with a thud on the other side of the wall, and the quod was suddenly full of flying figures, suppressed giggles, swishing skirts, long legs silhouetted against the lamplight, the puff, pant and skid of frantic escape. Will seized Jeff by the hand and dragged him off to the stairway. ‘Quick!’ he whispered. ‘If you’re found you’ll be for it.’
Within seconds the quod was cleared, doors shut, whores chosen and hidden, and Will and Jeff were safe in Will’s room, pouring themselves two full glasses of Hollands while they caught their breath.
‘Madness,’ Will said admiringly. ‘What possessed you to come in over the wall?’
‘The hell of it,’ Jeff said. ‘Damned good Hollands, Will.’
‘What if you’re caught?’
‘On an assignment.’
‘Prove it.’
‘Fight between town and gown in Petty Cury yesterday afternoon,’ Jeff offered.
‘True.’
‘Interviews with protagonists?’
‘Possible. Who?’
‘Unable to reveal sources. Honour of the press and so forth.’
‘Dammit Jeff, you could lie black was white.’
‘Well now,’ Jeff said, putting down his glass, ‘what was it you wanted to see me about?’
‘Matter of business,’ Will said, trying; to sound casual about it.
‘Oh yes.’
‘I want a job, Jeff. I’ve decided to be a reporter. How should I go about it?’
‘Here or in London?’
‘London preferably.’
‘Try the Morning Advertiser,’ Jeff advised. ‘They’re looking for reporters. Might take you on straightaway if that’s what you want, particularly as you’re a Pembroke man. It’s as good a place as any and you can always move on if it don’t suit. What’s brought this about?’
‘I sounded my grandmother.’
‘Ah! And?’
‘I think it’s on.’
‘She said “yes”.’
‘Well, she didn’t exactly say “yes”,’ Will admitted, ‘but then again she didn’t exactly say “no” either.’
‘And what about your father?’
‘I shall speak to him later.’
‘Make a name for yourself first, eh?’
‘Something of that.’
‘Very wise,’ Jeff said, holding up his glass for more Hollands. ‘Try a royal story for a start. They always sell. The old king’s a-dying, so they say.’
‘Is he?’ Will said, refilling his own glass. ‘Well, I can’t say I’m surprised. And what’s the rest of the gossip?’
Frederick Brougham, that other, more reliable gossip, was back in London. He had been Nan Easter’s lover for more than twenty years, and although she saw rather less of him these days now that he had an estate in Westmoreland to care for, she was always glad of his company and warmed by his affection, for he was a gentle lover and a witty man, urbane and tolerant and wise in the ways of the world. Even now, after all these years, every homecoming was an event, and the time they spent together in her town house in Bedford Square or her country house in Bury or out in the wilds of his estate in Penrith were occasions to be cherished and savoured. As they drove to Holland House that Saturday evening, they were both bubbling with the pleasure of their reunion, and Frederick was primed with the latest unofficial news.
‘The King is ill again,’ he told her. ‘Mallory heard it of the Queen’s physician. A weakness of the lungs with high fever, so ‘tis said.’
‘There was no mention of it in The Times,’ she said, as the carriage jolted over the uneven cobbles.
‘Look for it tomorrow,’ he said, putting out an arm to steady her.
‘How so? Is it like to prove fatal?’ If he died they would have a queen on the throne of England, and a young one at that, for the Princess Victoria was only seventeen. That would improve trade and no mistake.
‘The physicians have taken up residence.’
‘Then he’s in a poor way, and Princess Victoria still under age. Who would be Regent, do ‘ee think?’
‘You would, I daresay,’ he teased, ‘if they gave you half a chance.’
‘And make a better job of it than the Duchess of Kent,’ she said, grinning at him.
‘Old though you are,’ he smiled at her, still teasing.
‘You may admit to advanced years if you wish, Frederick Brougham,’ she teased him back, ‘but I don’t. I’ve a deal too much spirit to sit in the chimney corner and wait to grow grey.’
‘We grow grey together, my dear,’ he said affectionately, ‘and yet I love you more dearly than ever. I fear this must betoken a fundamental laziness in my disposition.’
‘Long may it continue,’ she said, kissing him, as the carriage wheeled into the avenue of limes that led to Holland House.
The London season progressed, and no news concerning the King’s health appeared in the papers, but the rumours continued to circulate, and alarm and speculation increased together, so that the sales of newsprint were marginally improved. And in May, when the Princess Victoria celebrated her eighteenth birthday and so came officially of age and able to assume the throne in the event of her uncle’s death, sales and speculation increased even further.
Mrs Flowerdew read the reports of the birthday celebrations to her pupils during their drawing afternoons.
‘It was all done in great style, my dears,’ she said, ‘as you would expect when you consider that this young woman is heir to the throne of England. What a blessing it will be when this country is governed by a woman. Think of that. Oh, we shall see some changes then, I can tell you. Women will come into their own then.’ And she read happily from The Times.
‘“At 6 p.m. the Union Jack was hoisted on the Old Church at Kensington, and on the green opposite to the church a large white silk flag was unfurled with Victoria inscribed upon it in letters of ethereal blue.” How perfectly charming. “At night a ball, seldom equalled in magnificence, was given in her honour in St James’ Palace. The princess herself opened with the quadrille in which she was led by Lord Fitzalan, the eldest son of the Earl of Surrey, who is grandson to the Duke of Norfolk.” Oh, entirely fitting, my dears. He would be an excellent match. “H.R.H. later danced with Prince Nicholas Ester-hazy.” But how splendid. The Esterhazy family own half of Europe, my dears. “There was great general regret at the absence of Their Majesties.” Ah, you see. There is something amiss. There can be no doubt of it now. The poor man must be ill. He would never have slighted his little niece if that were not the case. We will say a special prayer for him tomorrow morning. Remind me, Helen.’
But although special prayers were said at the seminary for the next seven days the King took no benefit from them.
On 9 June his two physicians put out a statement from Windsor Castle, which The Times printed in full, admitting that the King was suffering from an infection of the chest, which had confined his majesty to his apartment, and produced considerable weakness. From then on they issued a bulletin every day.
Mrs Flowerdew read every single one to her assembled school, either first thing in the morning or during their drawing afternoons, which she increased to three a week in view of the gravity of the situation, and to the great delight of her pupils.
‘“Crowds are gathered before the palace gates,”’ she read. ‘“The archbishops of York and Canterbury have said special prayers for him.” Poor man!’
‘“19 June. The King is in a very weak and feeble state and has received the sacrament from the hands of the archbishop of Canterbury, with attention and great apparent comfort.” Then the end is coming!’
And the next day, dressed in really rather splendid half mourning of lavender and white, she called the school to assembly to read the final solemn words. ‘“It has pleased God Almighty to release from his sufferings our most gracious sovereign King William the Fourth. His majesty expired this morning at twelve minutes past two o’clock, at his castle of Windsor, in the seventy-second year of his age, and the seventh year of his reign.” So now we have a queen. Miss Butts will provide each of you with a black ribbon to wear upon your straw bonnet for the next two weeks as a token of respect. You will dismiss quietly, I know.’
But Caroline never got around to wearing her particular token of respect. That afternoon a letter arrived from Nan, telling her that she was to travel to London on the first coach out of Bury the next morning. ‘The new Queen is to be proclaimed in St James’ Palace in two days time,’ she wrote, ‘and that’s a sight we shouldn’t miss when reigning queens are such a rarity. Frederick has arranged seats for us all in the palace grounds. Be sure that Bessie travels with you. No escapades, mind. I will send Benson to meet you with the carriage and bring you straight to Bedford Square. Your brother will join us by dinner time, when I have a surprise for you both. Your loving Nan.’
Caroline needed no second bidding. She threw her straw bonnet into the cupboard, black ribbons and all, the minute she’d read the letter, and next morning she dressed herself in her prettiest gown and her new silk bonnet and her new blue mantle, and she and Bessie caught the coach with time to spare.
‘Pussy cat pussy cat, where ‘ave you been? Off to London to see the Queen,’ Bessie said happily as she settled into the corner seat. ‘What a lark!’
‘And a surprise too,’ Caroline said. ‘What can it be, Bessie?’
‘Could be anything knowing your Nan,’ Bessie said. ‘You’ll know soon enough.’
But it was an intriguing puzzle to entertain them during the journey. And such an easy journey this time, with the horses in fine fettle and the roads just damp enough to lay the dust but not so wet as to make mud. ‘One benefit of a showery spring,’ as Bessie pointed out. So they made good time, and arrived in Bedford Square well before dinner.
Nan didn’t say what the surprise was and when Will arrived he didn’t know either. And when their father joined them he didn’t mention it at all.
But then just before eight o’clock, when Caroline was beginning to wonder if they were ever going in to dinner, another carriage drew up outside the door, and Nan got up and announced her intention of going downstairs herself to attend to it.
‘I shan’t be long,’ she said, grinning at them mischievously.
True to her word she was back within seconds. And following her into the room she brought three extraordinary strangers, an odd looking woman, an even odder looking man and a girl about the same age as Caroline.
All three of them were the most peculiar colour, a sort of brownish yellow, like faded curtains, and they wore the oddest clothes, most of them made of an off-white crinkled material that looked more like paper than cotton. The man had a jacket it was true but it was very old fashioned, being long, straight, unfitted and a very dull brown, like a servant’s. His breeches were so crumpled he looked as though he’d slept in them and his cravat was patterned and very badly folded, falling lop-sidedly under a craggy chin, a broken nose and a very seamy forehead. Nevertheless, despite his unprepossessing appearance, or perhaps because of it, he strutted into the room like a fighting cock, jerking his head from side to side as though he were sizing up his enemies. And it was such a misshaped skull, revealed by hair cut so short that it was little more than stubble, and the oddest coloured stubble at that, part grey, part white and part ginger. Caroline disliked him at once.
The woman was very thin and she didn’t seem to have very much hair either, for she wore a huge mob cap pulled low over her forehead. It was made of the same off-white material as her gown, which was high-waisted, straight-skirted, much turned and very old-fashioned. And her gloves were so ancient they were grey. She glided into the room after her husband, darting anxious glances at the company and making a nervous whinnying noise, like a horse. Caroline didn’t think much of her either.
But the girl was different. She too was very thin and dressed in the same kind of old fashioned gown made in the same grubby looking material, but she couldn’t help that, poor thing, and at least she’d made an effort. She had a new blue ribbon tied about her waist and another in her hair, which was thick and curly and the colour of copper coins, and although she was probably as nervous as her mother, her yellow face was calm and her brown eyes serene as still water. I could like her, Caroline thought, trying to catch her eye.
‘Come and meet my family,’ Nan said to the gentleman. ‘This is my son John and his son Will, and this gentleman, John my dear, is Mr Simon Callbeck, who is my nephew by marriage and your cousin. He’s been in India for thirty-five years and is back in London for the season. En’t that the most amazing thing? And this is Mrs Callbeck and their daughter Euphemia. And this is my granddaughter Caroline.’
It was a very difficult dinner party and not at all the sort of surprise that Caroline had hoped for. Mr and Mrs Callbeck were awful. Although they dressed like servants they talked about money and possessions all the time, and every possession they mentioned had to be bigger and better than anyone else’s. Their house in Calcutta was ‘a maharajah’s summer retreat, priceless,’ the quantity of jute they had sold over the years was ‘the biggest in the country,’ and they had a friend who had given his wife a ruby ‘as big as a hen’s egg, worth a king’s ransom.’
‘You will miss the life,’ Will observed drily.
‘No, no,’ Mr Callbeck said. ‘We’re goin’ straight back just as soon as the boys are settled. Ain’t we, Agnes?’
Mrs Callbeck agreed that yes, they were, they were indeed. But John was interested to hear that there were boys in the family too.
‘Oh yes,’ Mr Callbeck said. ‘Two fine boys, highly intelligent. Got them in to public school as easy as winkin’. Give ‘em an education, that’s what we say, don’t we, Agnes?’
‘Yes, yes, indeed.’
‘We’re sendin’ Pheemy to boardin’ school, in a week or two,’ Mr Callbeck said. ‘We’ve rented a new house in St John’s Wood, you know, just for the season, and we can’t have nippers under our feet all the time, eh? Makin’ a row and dirtyin’ the place and all that sort of thing.’
Then they are rich after all, Will thought. St John’s Wood was a prestigious address. Not quite up to the splendid style of Bedford Square, but certainly wealthy. And yet their clothes don’t fit them. How weird. But perhaps Indian tailors aren’t very good.
Caroline had been watching Euphemia all through this stupid conversation, annoyed by how totally the poor girl was being ignored. Neither of her parents bothered to include her in the conversation. They didn’t even look at her. It was as if she wasn’t there. And the poor girl went on dutifully eating her meal and keeping her eyes down and saying nothing.
So as soon as the cloth was removed and the meal completed and Nan had given the signal that the ladies were to withdraw, she rushed from her chair and took her new cousin by the hand. ‘Come on,’ she said. ‘We will sit behind the piano. We can talk there. I know just the place.’
Euphemia allowed herself to be led but her yellow face looked anxious. ‘Won’t she mind?’ she asked in a whisper. She pronounced the words rather carefully, with a slight hesitation before each one, as though she were speaking a foreign language.
‘Who?’
‘Your grandmother.’
‘No, course not. Why should she mind? She likes her guests to enjoy themselves.’
‘She is a very nice lady.’
‘Yes, she is. Come on.’
So they hid themselves away behind the piano while Nan entertained her whinnying guest. And Caroline discovered something that was even more extraordinary than the peculiar cut of the Callbeck attire. Until that afternoon Euphemia had never dined at the same table as her parents.
‘Never?’ Caroline said, her grey eyes wide with amazement.
‘No,’ Euphemia said calmly. ‘It is not done. Children are a nuisance. I stayed with my ayah most of the time.’ Seeing Caroline’s eyes widen further, Euphemia explained quickly, ‘I liked that. She was very kind to me. When I had a pain she used to stroke it away.’ And for the first time since her introduction her madonna face began to show emotion, yearning and sad, her brown eyes unfocussed, seeing that dear lost face such a long long way away. Oh ayah, dear ayah, how am I to live in this strange cold land without you? ‘She was very kind.’
Her beautiful, brooding sadness triggered Caroline’s sympathy into instant activity. ‘Tomorrow morning we are all going to see the new Queen proclaimed,’ she said. ‘At St James’ Palace, you know. Nan has seats for us. Shall you be there?’
The brown eyes misted back to the present. ‘I don’t think so,’ Euphemia said. ‘What a wonderful thing. You are lucky to be seeing such a thing.’
‘Why don’t you come with us?’ Caroline offered at once.
‘Could I?’
‘I don’t see why not. You could share my seat. You’re not very big. I will arrange it.’ The three men had finished their brandy and were walking into the drawing room, so there was a pause in the conversation. It was just the right moment. She jumped to her feet and was off at once to ask Nan.
‘If her parents are agreeable,’ Nan said, looking the question straight at them. She was delighted by the speed with which her impetuous granddaughter had taken Euphemia under her protection, for it was just what she had hoped for. With her connivance Mr Callbeck had already made arrangements for Euphemia’s board and education, and if everything went according to plan she and Caroline would soon be school friends. But nothing was to be explained yet.
To Caroline’s scorn and delight, the Callbecks hardly gave the matter any thought at all. They seemed pleased to be rid of their daughter. ‘There are so many things that need our attention,’ Mrs Callbeck said, ‘and all of them so very much easier without a child perpetually about our ankles. It is very kind of you, Mrs Easter.’
Early the next morning the Easter chaise took Caroline and Euphemia chattering down the Mall towards St James’ Palace.
It was a lovely summer’s day, pearly with sunshine. The Mall was already thronged with excited crowds and the park of St James was a green bower, the waters of the lake shimmering sky-blue and leaf-green, and the massed trees whispering most lusciously in the morning air. Six field guns were drawn up on the grass ready for the salute and manned by a troup of the Royal Household Artillery, resplendent in busbies and gold-frogged uniforms. It was very exciting.
The palace grounds were full of carriages arriving, wheeling about and departing, and as the Easter party took their places facing the palace, their friends walked across to greet them and pass the time of day. Euphemia had never seen so many fine clothes, all so well cut and so beautifully fitted and in such clearly printed colours. Caroline was dressed in the most delectable spotted muslin, embroidered with pink rosebuds and little blue flowers that she said were called forget-me-nots, which seemed a quite charming name, and her bonnet was trimmed with magnificent blue ribbons that exactly matched the blue trim on her parasol.
‘Pretty, ain’t it?’ she said to Euphemia, noticing her new friend’s admiration, and twirling the little sunshade for her inspection.
‘The fashion here is very fine,’ Euphemia said. ‘Your Nan looks grand enough to be the Queen.’
But at that moment the guns in the park began to fire the salute and a window opened in the middle of the first floor of the palace and there was the new Queen herself. Everybody stopped talking at once and looked upwards, straining their necks so as not to miss a thing.
‘But she’s tiny!’ Caroline whispered to Euphemia. ‘She’s not much bigger than you and me!’ And their new queen certainly looked very small, standing between the bulky figures of Lord Lansdowne and Lord Melbourne, the Prime Minister, both in full state dress with blue ribbands. Oh, very small and very pale. She was dressed in black except for a white tippet about her neck and white cuffs at her wrists and a border of white lace under her plain black bonnet. But she wore no veil and from where they sat they could see her little sad face quite clearly and the fair hair parted simply over her forehead. Oh, she was a dear little queen.
Then the Garter King at Arms rode into the courtyard on a splendid grey followed by heralds and pursuivants in their brightly quartered robes of office, and the cobbles were suddenly hidden by a blaze of red and gold and purple. There were eight officers of arms on horseback carrying massive silver maces, the Sergeant Trumpeter with his mace and collar, massed trumpeters and drummers, the Knights Marshal and his men, and last and most importantly the Duke of Norfolk whose function it was, as Earl Marshal of England, to read the proclamation.
The great crowd listened in a silence only broken by the snort of horses and the occasional rattle of accoutrements while the historic words echoed round and round the courtyard. But when the final phrase was spoken, they broke into such a cheer that they made the horses shift with alarm.
And the Queen smiled at them and waved her little white hand, and so the deed was done.
‘Wasn’t that thrilling!’ Caroline said. ‘Are you staying to lunch?’
‘Of course,’ Nan said, ‘we can’t send you home unfed, can we, Euphemia?’
In fact they didn’t send her home until it was nearly time for bed. And by then she had taken lunch and dinner with them and Caroline had assumed full charge of her. During dinner Nan started them talking about schools. Will entertained them with tales of his life at King Edward’s school, and Caroline had described her dear Mrs Flowerdew and the drawing afternoons.
‘But then you are to go to school too, are you not?’ she asked Euphemia. ‘So you will see all this for yourself.’
‘Yes,’ Euphemia said, but she didn’t sound at all enthusiastic.
‘Don’t you want to go to school?’ Nan asked.
The answer was resigned. ‘If my father wishes it.’
‘Do you wish it?’ Caroline said. ‘Oh you must, surely. There is such a lot to do at school and so many people. Think how dull it would be at home all by yourself.’ She’d quite forgotten how passionately she’d opposed her own schooling.
Euphemia was careful not to say anything that might appear critical of her father. ‘If it is to be, it will be,’ she said.
‘If it is to be, then why shouldn’t it be at Mrs Flowerdew’s?’ Caroline said, seeing the solution at once. ‘If your father means to send you to a boarding school anyway, he might as well send you to Mrs Flowerdew’s. You’d like that, I can tell you.’
Euphemia was so overwhelmed by the way she was being taken over by this energetic cousin of hers that she didn’t know what to say. After the vivid colour of her life in Calcutta, and the muddled gentleness of it, all those dusty orange sunsets, and the river full of bobbing black heads and flowing arms religiously sluicing themselves with water, and the roads stained red with betel juice, and her dear ayah with her gap-toothed smile and her tender eyes, now here in this bustling, purposeful city she felt as though she was being dragged along behind a team of horses. It would be nice to go to school with Caroline, that was true, but everything was happening too quickly. In just twenty-four hours her life seemed to have changed entirely. ‘I … that is …’ she said.
But Caroline was explaining her plan to her grandmother.
‘Well now,’ Nan said, grinning at them both. ‘How would it be if I told you it was already arranged?’ How well this was working out!
‘Truly?’ Caroline said, clapping her hands together.
‘Truly. I gave Mrs Flowerdew’s brochure to Euphemia’s father some time ago. She is already entered there.’
Rapturous hugging and squeals of delight.
‘And as she’s to attend the same school, I daresay I could prevail upon Mr Callbeck to let her board with us, if you’d like that.’
Could there be any doubt?
So Euphemia came to stay with her cousin and was prepared for school. They had a marvellous time. First they went out with Bessie and bought material for a wardrobe of English clothes for Euphemia, and then they went to the pleasure gardens, and the theatre, and for a boat trip along the Thames as far as Richmond, and on the afternoon of the third day they discovered to their delight that they were both about to celebrate their birthdays, and that wonder of wonders, Euphemia’s twelfth birthday was on 27 June, the day before Caroline’s eleventh.
‘You are a year and a day older than me,’ Caroline said. ‘It’s like the fair stories. It is always a year and a day in fairy stories. We must have two parties, mustn’t we Bessie, one on each day.’
So they had two parties, and they went back to Mrs Flower-dew’s Seminary together and by the end of that summer they were as close as sisters, and Euphemia said she’d never felt so happy in all her life. When her parents took ship for India in the autumn, she hardly noticed them go.
‘Very satisfactory,’ Nan said to John. ‘A companion of her own age was just what your Caroline needed.’