4th July, 1912.
Dear Frances,
I know you are on a boat right now and I wish I was there with you because something awful has happened. In fact, it’s so terrible I can barely bring myself to write about it. Don’t worry, no one has died or been horribly ill or been arrested (no one I know, anyway). But it is still pretty dreadful.
GRACE IS STAYING IN NORA’S HOUSE.
FOR AT LEAST TWO WHOLE WEEKS.
Remember when Harry had to come home from our cousins in Louth because one of them had scarlet fever? Well, Grace’s brother goes to boarding school in Louth and clearly there is some sort of terrible scarlet fever epidemic up there because he (the brother) arrived home for the holidays this morning and promptly came down with it as soon as he walked in the door, as far as I can tell. And Grace had been away visiting an aunt for the day and her parents had to telephone the aunt (so it turns out the Molyneauxs did have a phone after all, I always thought that was just Grace showing off) and tell her that Grace couldn’t come home.
But the aunt can’t look after Grace all summer so she has to stay with her other relatives and that means the Cantwells! And she will have to SHARE NORA’S ROOM.
Nora ran around to my house as soon as she could after hearing this terrible news. When Maggie showed her in I thought someone had died, she looked so pale and sick and miserable.
‘What’s happened?’ I said. I remembered that her brother George had been due to come home from his school in Westmeath that morning. Maybe there had been an awful train crash. ‘It’s not George, is it?’
‘Oh no,’ said Nora. ‘He’s fine. He’s at home now, being fed with cakes. And it’s all very well for him,’ she said, looking as if she were going to burst into tears, ‘because his summer hasn’t been completely ruined!’
And then she told me about Grace.
I feel so sorry for her. It’s bad enough for me sharing a room with Julia, but Julia’s all right really. At least, she is when she’s not going on about how I don’t say my prayers for long enough. Imagine how awful Grace will be. And what makes it worse is that the room only has one bed and Nora’s parents have got hold of a camp bed (how, I don’t know. Nora thinks it might have been used by her journalist uncle when he wrote about the war in South Africa), and Grace and Nora will have to take turns to sleep in it! Nora rightly pointed out that she shouldn’t have to give up her bed to Grace but Mrs. Cantwell didn’t agree.
‘She told me I should have more sympathy for a poor girl who couldn’t go home for weeks,’ said Nora in a disgusted voice. ‘And that she thought it would be nice for me and Grace to spend some proper cousinly time together. She went on about how sad it was that we weren’t friends.’
‘What did you say?’ I said.
‘I told her that it wasn’t sad at all,’ said Nora. ‘Neither me nor Grace particularly wants to be friends, so why should my mother care? But she started going on about how we’d regret it when we’re older and that relatives are very important and it was all very boring.’
‘Maybe George will have to look after her,’ I said. ‘After all, she’s his cousin too.’
But Nora shook her head.
‘I asked Mother about that,’ she said. ‘And she said she couldn’t expect George to look after a girl.’
We shared a sorrowful look.
‘No chance of getting your mother to come to the next IWFL meeting, then,’ I said. ‘What’s Grace like with George? Is she awful to him too?’
Nora made a face.
‘She only sees him in the holidays, of course, but I think she considers him one of the grown-ups,’ she said. ‘Even though he isn’t. So she’s all nicey-nice to him. And that means I’ll be the only one in the house who sees her true colours. Imagine.’
It truly was a horrid prospect.
‘Well, you can come over to my house whenever you like,’ I said. I patted her on the arm because that’s what you’re meant to do when you’re comforting people, but it didn’t cheer Nora up.
‘I’m not sure I’ll be able to,’ she said gloomily. ‘Mother keeps going on about what a wonderful opportunity this is for me and Grace to become great pals. She’s going to organise lots of outings and things for us.’
‘Oh dear,’ I said.
‘It’s just because she and Aunt Alice have always been awfully close,’ said Nora. Aunt Alice is Grace’s mother, and she and Nora’s mother are sisters. ‘She can’t understand why I don’t want to be friends with Aunt Alice’s daughter. Especially when,’ and here Nora did a not-very-accurate impersonation of her mother’s voice – “Grace is such a wee darling”.’ Nora’s mother is from Belfast and she sometimes says things are ‘wee’ when she means ‘little’.
As I have said before, grown-ups always think Grace is wonderful. But maybe having Grace under her roof for weeks will change Mrs. Cantwell’s mind. Grace is staying with the other aunt overnight and is arriving in Nora’s house tomorrow. So as I write this letter, poor Nora is being forced to get her room ready for Grace, which means putting practically half of her clothes in the attic so there’s room for Grace’s things, as well as making up the stupid camp bed, which is full of springs that keep pinching her fingers and which almost collapsed when she sat on it earlier.
I mentioned the dreadfulness of all this to my family this evening, but, worryingly, my parents didn’t feel very sorry for Nora at all. I thought they were a bit more tender-hearted than that, but apparently not.
‘When I was at school I had to share a dormitory with five other boys,’ said Father. ‘We all have to muddle along with people we don’t like.’
Mother agreed.
‘I’m sure it will be good for both of them,’ said Mother. She looked at her four offspring. ‘Sometimes I think you modern children are terribly spoiled.’
Spoiled! When I spend half of my time trimming hats and learning French verbs and sharing a room with Julia. Maybe Harry and Phyllis and Julia are spoiled (well, Harry definitely is), but I’m certainly not.
Anyway, I will of course keep a record of how Nora gets on with her unwelcome guest. I hope you are having lots of fun on the boat. Thanks awfully for sending me your American itinerary – I have marked all the places you’re going to go in my atlas and put the dates next to each one so I will be able to imagine you in each location. I believe there are a lot of dangerous wild beasts in America so I hope you are being careful – I don’t want you to get eaten by a bear or a wild cat or a possum or anything.
Best love and votes for women,
Mollie
P.S.
Later
I mentioned the wild beasts of America to Phyllis before I went to bed and when I told her I hoped you wouldn’t get eaten by a possum she laughed and laughed and said a possum was a little animal about the size of a big rabbit or a very small dog.
‘Some dogs are dangerous,’ I protested. ‘And savage. Just think of the Menace.’
As I am sure you remember, the Menace is a dreadful little woolly dog belonging to Mother’s friend Mrs. Sheffield. His real name is Barnaby, but he is one of nature’s menaces, hence his nickname. I must admit he’s never actually bitten anyone, as far as I know. But he always looks as if he wants to and he barks a LOT.
‘Well, I can assure you that Frances is in no danger of being eaten by a possum,’ said Phyllis, in a very patronising and annoying way. She did, however, deign to admit that bears really are dangerous, but when I showed her your itinerary she laughed again in a superior fashion and said it was very unlikely you would meet one in New York or Boston.
‘But what about the bits in between?’ I asked. But she told me that you will presumably be travelling by train rather than roaming on foot through the woods and she had never heard of a bear getting on a train, which is a good point. Still, you’re going to be in the countryside at some stage. Do keep your eyes open for bears and lions and things.