The Reflections of Ambrosine: Chapter 2

Chapter 2

The Gurrage family have arrived. We saw carts and a carriage going to
meet them at the station. Their liveries are prune and scarlet, and
look so inharmonious, and they seem to have crests and coats of arms
on every possible thing. Young Mr. Gurrage is our landlord--but I
think I said that before.

On Sunday in church the party entered the Ledstone family pew. An
oldish woman with a huddled figure--how unlike grandmamma!--looking
about the class of a housekeeper; a girl of my age, with red hair and
white eye-lashes and a buff hat on; and a young man, dark, thick,
common-looking. He seemed kind to his mother, though, and arranged
a cushion for her. Their pew is at right angles to the one I sit
in, so I have a full view of them all the time. He has box-pleated
teeth--which seem quite unnecessary when dentists are so good now. No
one would have missed at least four of them if they had been pulled
out when he was a boy. His eyes are wishy-washy in spite of being
brown, and he looks as if he did not have enough sleep. They were all
three self-conscious and conscious of other people. Grandmamma says
in a public place, unless the exigencies of politeness require one to
come into personal contact with people, one ought never to be aware
that there is anything but tables and chairs about. I have not once in
my life seen her even glance around, and yet nothing escapes her hawk
eye. Coming out they passed me on the path to the church gate, and
Mrs. Gurrage stopped, and said:

"Good-mornin', me dear; you must be our new tenant at the cottage."

Her voice is the voice of quite a common person and has the broad
accent of some county--I don't know which.

I was so astonished at being called "me dear" by a stranger that for
half a second I almost forgot grandmamma's maxim of "let nothing in
life put you out of countenance." However, I did manage to say:

"Yes, I am Miss Athelstan."

Then the young man said, "I hope you find everything to your liking
there, and that my agent has made things comfortable."

"We are quite pleased with the cottage," I said.

"Well, don't stand on ceremony," the old woman continued. "Come up
and see us at The Hall whenever you like, me dear, and I'll be round
callin' on your grandma one of these days soon, but don't let that
stop her if she likes to look in at me first."

I thought of grandmamma "looking in" on this person, and I could
have laughed aloud; however, I managed to say, politely, that my
grandmother was an aged lady and somewhat rheumatic, and as we had not
a carriage I hoped Mrs. Gurrage would excuse her paying her respects
in person.

"Rheumatic, is she? Well, I have the very thing for the j'ints. My
still-room maid makes it under my own directions. I'll bring some when
I call. Good-day to you, me dear," and they bustled on into the arms
of the parson's family and other people who were waiting to give them
a gushing welcome at the gate.

Grandmamma laughed so when I told her about them!

Two days afterwards Mrs. Gurrage and Miss Hoad (the red-haired girl is
the niece) came to call.

Grandmamma was seated as usual in the old Louis XV. _berg�re_, which
is one of our household gods. It does not go with the other furniture
in the room, which is a "drawing-room suite" of black and gold,
upholstered with magenta, but we have covered that up as well as we
can with pieces of old brocade from grandmamma's stored treasures.

After the first greetings were over and Mrs. Gurrage had seated
herself in the other arm-chair, her knees pointing north and south,
she began about the rheumatism stuff for the "j'ints."

"I can see by yer hands ye're a great sufferer," she said.

"Alas! madam, one of the penalties of old age," grandmamma replied,
in her fine, thin voice.

Then Mrs. Gurrage explained just how the mixture was to be rubbed in,
and all about it. During this I had been trying to talk to Miss Hoad,
but she was so ill at ease and so taken up with looking round the
room that we soon lapsed into silence. Presently I heard Mrs. Gurrage
say--she also had been busy examining the room:

"Well, you have been good tenants, coverin' up the suite, but you've
no call to do it. You wouldn't be likely to soil it much, and I always
say when you let a house furnished, you can't expect it to continue
without wear and tear; so don't, please, bother to cover it with those
old things. Lor' bless me, it takes me back to see it! It was my first
suite after I married Mr. Gurrage, and we had a pretty place on Balham
Hill. We put it here because Augustus did not want anything the least
shabby up at The Hall, and I take it kind of you to have cared for it
so."

Grandmamma's face never changed; not the least twinkle came into her
eye--she is wonderful. I could hardly keep from gurgling with laughter
and was obliged to make quite an irritating rattle with the teaspoons.
Grandmamma frowned at that.

By the end of the visit we had been invited to view all the glories of
The Hall. (The place is called Ledstone Park; The Hall, apparently,
is Mrs. Gurrage's pet name for the house itself.) We would not find
anything old or shabby there, she assured us.

When they had gone grandmamma said to me, in a voice that always
causes my knees to shake, "Why did you not make a _r�v�rence_ to Mrs.
Gurrage, may I ask?"

"Oh, grandmamma," I said, "courtesy to that person! She would not
have understood in the least, and would only have thought it was the
village 'bob' to a superior."

"My child,"--grandmamma's voice can be terrible in its fine
distinctness--"my teaching has been of little avail if you have not
understood the point, that one has _not_ good manners for the effect
they produce--but for what is due to one's self. This person--who, I
admit, should have entered by the back door and stayed in the kitchen
with Hephzibah--happened to be our guest and is a woman of years--and
yet, because she displeased your senses you failed to remember that
you yourself are a gentlewoman. What she thought or thinks is of not
the smallest importance in the world, but let me ask you in future to
remember, at least, that you are my granddaughter."

A big lump came in my throat.

_I hate the Gurrages!_

The next day one of the old maids--a Miss Burton--arrived just as
we were having tea. She was full of excitement at the return of the
owners of Ledstone, and gave us a quantity of information about them
in spite of grandmamma's aloofness from all gossip. It appears, even
in the country in England, Mrs. Gurrage is considered quite an oddity,
but every one knows and accepts her, because she is so charitable and
gives hundreds to any scheme the great ladies start.

She was the daughter of a small publican in one of the southern
counties, Miss Burton said, and married Mr. Gurrage, then a commercial
traveller in carpets. (How does one travel in carpets?) Anyway,
whatever that is, he rose and became a partner, and finally amassed a
huge fortune, and when they were both quite old they got "Augustus."
He was "a puny, delicate boy," to quote Miss Burton again, and was not
sent to school--only to Cambridge later on. Perhaps that is what gives
him that look of his things fitting wrong, and his skin being puffy
and flabby, as if he had never been knocked about by other boys.
My friend of the knife, even with his coating of mud, looked quite
different.

Oh! I wonder if I shall ever know any people of one's own sort that
one has not to be polite to against the grain because one happens to
be one's self a lady. Perhaps there are numbers of nice people in this
neighborhood, but they naturally don't trouble about us in our tiny
cottage, and so we see practically nobody.

Just as Miss Burton was leaving Mr. Gurrage rode up. He tried to open
the gate with the end of his whip, but he could not, and would have
had to dismount only Miss Burton rushed forward to open it for him.
Then he got down and held the bridle over his arm and walked up the
little path.

"Send some one to hold my horse," he said to Hephzibah, who answered
his ring at the door. I could hear, as the window was a little open
and he has a loud voice.

"There is no one to send, sir," said Hephzibah, who, I am sure, felt
annoyed. Two laborers happened to be passing in the road, and he
got one of them to hold his horse, and so came in at last. He _is_
unattractive when you see him in a room; he seemed blustering and yet
ill at ease. But he did not thank us for keeping the suite clean! He
was awfully friendly, and asked us to make use of his garden, and, in
fact, anything we wanted. I hardly spoke at all.

"You _have_ made a snug little crib of it," he said, in such a
patronizing voice--how I dislike sentences like that; I don't know
whether or no they are slang (grandmamma says I use slang myself
sometimes!), but "a snug little crib" does not please me. He took off
his glove when I gave him some tea, and he has thick, common hands,
and he fidgeted and bounced up if I moved to take grandmamma her cup,
and said each time, "Allow me," and that is another sentence I do not
like. In fact, I think he is a horrid young man, and I wish he was not
our landlord. He actually squeezed my hand when he said good-bye. I
had no intention of doing more than to make a bow, but he thrust his
hand out so that I could not help it.

"_You'll_ find your way up to Ledstone, anyway, won't you?" he said,
with a sort of affectionate look.

Grandmamma found him insupportable, she told me when he was gone. She
even preferred the mother.

The following week I was sent up to The Hall with Roy and grandmamma's
card to return the visit. They were at home, unfortunately, and I had
to leave my dear companion lying on the steps to wait for me. Such a
fearful house! An enormous stained-glass window in the hall, the shape
of a church window, only not with saints and angels in it; more like
the pattern of a kaleidoscope that one peeps into with one eye, and
then bunches of roses and silly daisies in some of the panes, which,
I am sure, are unsuitable to a stained-glass window. There were
ugly negro figures from Venice, holding plates, in the passage, and
stuffed bears for lamps, and such a look of newness about everything!
I was taken along to Mrs. Gurrage's "budwar," as she called it. That
was a room to remember! It had a "suite" in it like the one at the
cottage, only with Louis XV. legs and Louis XVI. backs, and a general
expression of distortion, and all of the newest gilt-and-crimson
satin brocade. And under a glass case in the corner was the top of a
wedding-cake and a bunch of orange blossoms.

I was kept waiting about ten minutes, and then Mrs. Gurrage bustled
in, fastening her cuff. I can't put down all she said, but it was
one continual praise of "Gussie" and his wealth and the jewels he
had given her, and how disappointed he would be not to see me. Miss
Hoad poured out the tea and giggled twice. I think she must be what
Hephzibah calls "wanting." At last I got away. Roy barked with
pleasure as we started homeward.

We had not gone a hundred yards before we met Mr. Gurrage coming up
the drive. He insisted upon turning back and walking with me. He said
it was "beastly hard luck"--he has horrid phrases--his being out when
I came, and would I please not to walk so fast, as we should so soon
arrive at the cottage, and he wanted to talk to me. I simply pranced
on after that. I do not know why people should want to talk to one
when one does not want to talk to them. I was not agreeable, but he
did all the speaking. He told me he belonged to the Yeomanry and
they were "jolly fellows" and were going to give a ball soon at
Tilchester--the county town nearest here--and that I must let his
mother take me to it. It was to be a send-off to the detachment which
had volunteered for South Africa.

A ball! Oh! I should like to go to a ball. What could it feel like, I
wonder, to have on a white tulle dress and to dance all the evening.
Would grandmamma ever let me? Oh! it made my heart beat. But suddenly
a cold dash came--I could not go with a person like Mrs. Gurrage. I
would rather stay at home than that. When we got to the gate I said
good-bye and gave him two fingers, but he was not the least daunted,
and, seizing all my hand, said:

"Now, don't send me away; I want to come in and see your grandmother."

There was nothing left for me to do, and he followed me into the house
and into the drawing-room.

Grandmamma was sitting as usual in her chair. She does not have to
fluster in, buttoning her cuff, when people call.

"Mr. Gurrage wishes to see you, grandmamma," I said, as I kissed her
hand, and then I left them to take off my hat and I did not come down
again until I heard the front door shut.

"That is a terrible young man, Ambrosine," grandmamma said, when I did
return to the drawing-room. "How could you encourage him to walk back
with you?"

"Indeed, grandmamma, I did not wish him to come; he did not even ask
my leave; he just walked beside me."

"Well, well," grandmamma said, and she raised my face in her hands.
I was sitting on a low stool so as to get the last of the light for
my embroidery. She pushed the hair back from my forehead--I wear it
brushed up like Ambrosine Eustasie de Calincourt--and she looked
and looked into my eyes. If possible there was something pained and
wistful in her face. "My beautiful Ambrosine," she said, and that was
all. I felt I was blushing all over my cheeks. "Beautiful Ambrosine."
Then it must be true if grandmamma said it. I had often thought
so--perhaps--myself, but I was not sure if other people might think so
too.

* * * * *

It is six weeks now since the Gurrages returned, and constantly, oh!
but constantly has that young man come across my path. I think I grow
to dislike him more as time goes on. He is so persistent and thick of
ideas, and he _always_ does things in the wrong place. I feel afraid
to go for my walks, as he seems to be loitering about. I sneak out
of the back door and choose the most secluded lanes, but it does not
matter; he somehow turns up. Certainly three times a week do I have to
put up with his company in one way or another. It is a perfect insult
to think of such a person as an admirer, and I annihilated Hephzibah,
who had the impertinence to suggest such a thing to me when she
was brushing my hair a few days ago. The ball is coming off, but
grandmamma has not seemed very well lately. It is nothing much, just
a bluish look round her mouth, but I fear perhaps she will not be
fit to go. When the invitation came--brought down by Mrs. Gurrage
in person--grandmamma said she never allowed me to go out without
herself, but she would be very pleased to take me. I was perfectly
thunderstruck when I heard her say it. She--grandmamma--going out at
night! It was so good of her, and when I thanked her afterwards, all
she said was, "I seldom do things without a reason, Ambrosine."

Oh, the delight in getting my dress! We hired the fly from the Crown
and Sceptre and Hephzibah drove with me into Tilchester with a list of
things to get, written out by grandmamma--these were only the small
etceteras; the dress itself is to come from Paris! I was frightened
almost at the dreadful expense, but grandmamma would hear nothing from
me. "My granddaughter does not go to her first ball arrayed like a
_provinciale_," she told me. I do not know what it is to be, she did
not consult me, but I feel all jumping with excitement when I think
of it. Only four days more before the ball, and the box from Paris is
coming to-morrow.

The Gurrages are to have a large party--some cousins and friends. I
am sure they will not be interesting. They asked us to dine and go on
with them, but grandmamma said that would be too fatiguing for her,
and we are going straight from the cottage, I do not quite know what
has happened. A few days ago, after lunch, grandmamma had a kind of
fainting fit. It frightened me terribly, and the under-servant ran for
the doctor. She had revived when he came, and she sent me out of the
room at once, and saw him alone without even Hephzibah. He stayed a
very long time, and when he came down he looked at me strangely and
said:

"Your grandmother is all right now and you can go to her. I think she
wishes to send a telegram, which I will take."

He then asked to see Hephzibah, and I ran quickly to grandmamma. She
was sitting perfectly upright as usual, and, except for the slight
bluish look round her mouth, seemed quite herself. She made me get
her the foreign telegram forms, and wrote a long telegram, thinking
between the words, but never altering one. She folded it and told me
to get some money from Hephzibah and take it to the doctor. Her eyes
looked prouder than ever, but her hand shook a little. A vague feeling
of fear came over me which has never left me since. Even when I am
excited thinking of my dress, I seem to feel some shadow in the
background.

Yesterday grandmamma received a telegram and told me we might expect
the Marquis de Rochermont by the usual train in the evening, and at
six he arrived. He greeted me with even extra courtesy and made me
compliment. I cannot understand it all--he has never before come so
early in the year (this is May). What can it mean? Grandmamma sent
me out of the room directly, and we did not have dinner until eight
o'clock. I could hear their voices from my room, and they seemed
talking very earnestly, and not so gayly as usual.

At dinner the Marquis, for the first time, addressed his conversation
to me. He prefers to speak in English--to show what a linguist he
is, I suppose. He made me many compliments, and said how very like I
was growing to my ancestress, Ambrosine Eustasie de Calincourt, and
he told me again the old story of the guillotine. Grandmamma seemed
watching me.

"Ambrosine is a true daughter of the race," she said. "I think I could
promise you that under the same circumstances she would behave in the
same manner."

How proud I felt!

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