Aunt Martha had kept to her word. She never sought to redecorate Aunt Helen’s old bedroom, she did not try to prevail upon us to have all our meals served one hour earlier as she had the last time she lived with us; she made no trouble at all.
Indeed, there was something that was somehow sad about seeing a woman who formerly had such strength of personality reduced to the cautious peepings of a mouse.
But no matter how much Aunt Martha tried to please Mother, it was obvious Mother only tolerated her but did not like her, nor would she even sit and do needlepoint with her as had been their habit together once upon a time. The needle, the thread, the constant stitching—Mother now claimed that it all gave her a headache.
And so it fell to me to sit with Aunt Martha whenever she timidly asked me to, engaging in an activity that I myself found odious.
In truth, were it not for the needlepoint part of it, I would not have minded these tête-à-têtes so much. Not wanting to offend Mother, Aunt Martha was almost as obsequious with me, and it was good, as she had said, to have another grown woman in the house to ask about certain things.
In the time since Aunt Helen’s murder, Kit and I had continued in our friendship. More, we had continued, albeit cautiously, in our explorings of each other. It did not happen often, but occasionally we would meet in the tunnel where we could talk and kiss, sometimes a little … more. And when I was alone in my room at night, I saw his face.
When I was younger, I had not felt the difference in our ages very much—perhaps because I had insisted on viewing him as “that bored boy.” But now that I was sixteen and he was eighteen, with him very much focused on what he might do in the greater world, I did feel it. He really was a man now, while my family at times still infuriatingly regarded me as a girl. And, I must confess, the subject of love was on my mind.
I wanted to know how a person knew that was what they were feeling. Were a racing pulse and rapid heartbeat when in the presence of the object symptoms? I did not want to open myself up to ridicule. But I did want to know more about love, like, say, how you knew the object was the person you wanted to one day marry.
“Did you ever consider getting married, Aunt Martha?” I asked coyly as we stitched together.
When I was younger, I had taken Aunt Martha’s spinsterhood for granted—after all, when you are a child you do not question those kinds of things. Rather, you simply think, if you think about it at all, This is the way this is, because it had always been that way. But now that I was older, I did wonder because, frankly, it was odd for a woman from a family of wealth to have never been married.
“There once was a boy,” Aunt Martha said, not looking up as she stitched away.
This sounded promising. “Yes?” I encouraged, hoping that the eagerness, easily misinterpreted as nosiness, did not show in my voice.
“Oh, yes.” Reflective pause. “He was a very handsome boy.”
“What was his name?”
“Alfred.”
“And how old was he?”
“Eighteen.”
“And you were … ?”
She looked at me sharply. “You are not writing an article for the newspaper, are you?”
“Oh, no,” I said, cursing the blush that betrayed me when what I was trying to do was convey an air of innocence. “No, no, no.” I shrugged, still striving for nonchalance. “I was merely curious.”
Aunt Martha surprised me by laughing. “I was just teasing you, dear.” Aunt Martha teasing? This really was a new Aunt Martha! “It is only natural,” she said, commencing to stitch again, “for you to become curious about such things at your age. Yes, Alfred was eighteen and I was the same. I thought we were the perfect match. He did, as well.”
“Then what happened?” I asked, puzzled, no longer able to hide my great interest in this topic. I could not understand it. If they had loved each other, if they had been perfect together, why had they never married? Had he fallen ill? Had an accident? Went off to a war? Had he died somehow?
“My father said Alfred did not have enough money,” Aunt Martha said with the slightest of shrugs, as if it no longer mattered. “His family, you see, was not as wealthy as ours. Almost, but not quite. And my father did not approve of this.”
“But if you wanted to marry, how could he stop you?”
“How little you know, Lucy. My father,” she said, “refused to provide me with a dowry if I persisted in my intentions to marry the man I wanted to marry.”
“But I don’t understand! Why did you listen? You have already said that this …Alfred had money—why could you have not married without a dowry?”
“Because Alfred’s father would not permit him to. He said that, despite the fact that his family could afford me, if my own father would not endow me with a dowry, he could not possibly believe that I was worth anything.”
“That is awful! What did Alfred do?”
“Oh, he obeyed his father. His father threatened to disinherit him if he did not, so what choice did he have?”
It seemed to me that there was always a choice, in everything, unless someone was holding a knife to your throat, even if that choice was not an easy one.
But Aunt Martha did not see it this way.
“Our parents disapproved,” she said, “and we could not possibly disobey them.”
“How … tragic!” I said. “Did you ever see him again?”
“Oh, yes. When I still lived at home, I used to see him in the village all the time … him and his wife.”
So he had married while she had not.
She leaned closer, speaking in a conspiratorial voice. “But I had my revenge on my parents.”
“Oh? How is that?”
“After they sent Alfred away, they did want me to marry someone, almost anyone so long as that person had enough money. But no matter whom they brought before me, I shook my head no. I have stayed a spinster all these years, you see, to devil them. And, if I may say so, I have done a good job.”
Knowing what I knew, that they drove her equally crazy, I did not see that this was entirely true.
“Was that the only reason?” I asked. “You have refused to get married, all your life, merely to devil your parents?”
“No, that is not the only reason.”
“Well, then?” I persisted.
She settled back into the sofa.
“I never again,” she said, “found someone to love.”
• Twenty-eight •
The Carsons’ home had at last been rebuilt, but Mrs. Carson would never live in it again. On the day they were to move back, Mrs. Carson had taken the unprecedented step—for her—of suddenly dying. In the aftermath, Mr. Carson declared himself to be tired of London, placing the house on the market and returning to reside in the country permanently.
When you are very young, you imagine that no one you know will ever die, and that death, when it occurs, happens to other people in books and in far-off places. But once that first significant death occurs, as it had for me with Aunt Helen, you realize that more people will follow until everyone you know has died or you have died yourself.
I cannot say that Mrs. Carson’s passing brought a tear to my eye, as it did to Aunt Martha’s, but I marked it off in my mind as a further shrinking of my already small world, one less person to know.
It was good, then, that Mrs. Carson’s passing also heralded an increase: a family with the last name of Clarence purchased the Carsons’ rebuilt house in the next street. It was a large family, consisting of the usual mother and father, in addition to which were four daughters—Dora, Flora, Ivy, and Julia, all younger than me—and a fifth sister, Minerva, seventeen, her age placing her directly between Kit and me.
Minerva Clarence was a tall colt of a girl with flaxen hair streaming down her shapely back, her eyes the color of violets in shade. Indeed, we were so dissimilar in appearance that the first time I stood next to her I felt myself dwarfed, like a common building forced to coexist side by side with a toweringly
beautiful church spire.
I had never really felt compelled to compare myself to any other girl before, did not like the experience, wondered if what I felt was something akin to what Aunt Helen had when first standing beside Mother.
Mother and I had called on the Clarences in order to welcome them to the neighborhood. Mother later said we should have written, notifying them of our intentions first, for when we arrived the house was in chaos.
“I do not wish to have a bath today!” Dora, the youngest at four, was shrieking.
“But you have to,” Flora, two years older, said, “elsewise you will stink up our bedroom.”
“It is Wednesday,” Ivy, the eight-year-old, said. “You always take your bath on Wednesdays.”
“It is not Wednesday yet!” Dora said. “It is still Tuesday!”
“It is not Tuesday or Wednesday,” ten-year-old Julia said. “It is already Thursday, which is why you stink so much.”
It was in fact Wednesday, something the others could not persuade tiny Dora of as they chased her around the parlor. I could see where the child did need a bath, should have had one the day before, because her honey-colored hair was so straggly it looked like there might be twigs settling in to form a nest, her grimy hands leaving prints on the furniture she grabbed on to as she raced to avoid capture, her rosy cheeks stippled with various bits of dried food.
“I really should have had five boys instead of five girls,” Mrs. Clarence said as though she’d had some choice in the matter, causing me to wonder if she truly understood how procreation worked. “Boys are so much more civilized.” But she laughed when she said it, as though oblivious that her household was any different from anyone else’s.
“What profession does your husband pursue?” Mother asked politely.
“Oh? Do you mean Gerald?” Mrs. Clarence asked, as though there might be someone else to whom Mother was referring. “He is a judge.”
As I sought to keep the teacup that was balanced in my lap from spilling when Dora leaped over the back of the sofa from behind me, Minerva made her first entrance.
She was like an angel.
“Dora, you little urchin,” she said, her syllables tinkling like good-natured Christmas bells, “what are you playing at now?” She stopped at the sight of her mother’s visitors. “Oh, hello,” she said to me, blushing when she realized she had failed to greet Mother first. With an embarrassed curtsy, she did so, before turning back to me.
This was the part where I made the mistake of standing, sitting right back down again when I saw how she towered over me. Already I sensed that she was not someone I wanted to find myself compared to by others, not ever.
“It will be so nice to have you close by,” Minerva said in a sunny voice, once it was explained who we were and where we lived. “The place we used to live, there weren’t any girls even close to my age.” She smiled ruefully at her four young sisters. “Only these lot.”
“What day is it, Minerva?” Dora asked. In the few minutes since Minerva had entered, Flora, Ivy, and Julia had succeeded in wrestling Dora to the ground, where they now sat on various parts of her body. “Julia says that it is Thursday, but I am fairly certain we have not finished with Tuesday yet.”
“It is Wednesday,” Minerva authoritatively announced, as though she’d been personally responsible for ordering the days of the week. Then she laughingly unearthed Dora’s body from beneath the others, tickling the younger girl’s stomach until she laughed before throwing her over her shoulder like a sack of wheat. “If you do not take your bath this very second, I shall declare it Wednesday every day from now on, and I don’t think you will like that.”
“Oh, no! Not that!” Dora shrieked as Flora, Ivy, and Julia crowded after them as though wanting to make certain that the grimy little thing wound up in the tub. “Not that! Never that!”
But I could tell Dora didn’t mind. I could tell that, once Minerva came into the picture, she was happy to do anything her oldest sister wanted her to do, so long as they could be together.
For myself, I was not sure how I felt at the prospect of this Minerva living so close by.
“I do not know what I would do without Minerva to help out with the children,” Mrs. Clarence despaired to Mother, and even I could see that she’d be lost without her, as she clearly had no idea how to rule her own family. “Nor do I know how we will ever find five husbands for our daughters,” Mrs. Clarence further despaired. “At least in your case, you only have to find a husband for one.”
. . . . .
When the Clarences returned the courtesy, calling on us the following Wednesday, we already had other visitors: Victoria and Kit Tyler. And, of course, Aunt Martha. Aunt Martha’s cane could always be heard thumping its way into the parlor whenever anyone came to call.
Unlike the other day, the younger Clarences were now all neat as pins, even Dora, with every hair in place, and with solemn faces as though they were about to be baptized.
“Now remember what I said, girls,” I heard Minerva whisper as everyone took seats, “no speaking unless spoken to and do not take anything unless it is offered to you.”
This last proved a problem for Dora when, having enjoyed the first fairy cake she was offered, she reached for a second.
“Dora!” Minerva admonished. “Put that back right this second!”
“Oh, it is quite all right,” Aunt Martha said, nudging the plate toward Dora in an uncharacteristic move; usually, Aunt Martha liked to keep the fairy cakes close to herself. “It is good to see a girl with appetite. Why, around here, no one ever seems to eat very much except for my brother.”
And yourself, I thought uncharitably.
“But it is good of you to mind the manners of your little sisters,” Aunt Martha went on. “So many young people these days—all they do is think about themselves.”
“Oh, Minerva is always thinking of the well-being of others,” Mrs. Clarence said. “One day, she will no doubt make some lucky man a wonderful wife.”
Minerva did not look embarrassed, as I would have done at such obvious pushing on a mother’s part. Rather, she continued with her ministrations to her four sisters as though she did not mind being talked about in the slightest.
“Lucy, fetch me my needlepoint,” Aunt Martha said. “My fingers feel so stiff today and that always seems to help them.”
“Oh, what a pretty piece that is!” Minerva observed when I had brought the required object.
“Do you do needlepoint?” Aunt Martha asked.
“My stitches are not as fine as yours.” Minerva blushed. “But I do love it.”
It was all I could do not to roll my eyes. From the look on Mother’s face, she was tempted as well.
“Here,” Aunt Martha offered, holding out the canvas and needle. “Why don’t you try a few stitches?”
“Oh, I couldn’t, Miss Sexton,” Minerva said, only accepting the items when it became apparent that resistance was futile.
And so the next five minutes passed, the room in a complete state of hushed silence as the others watched Minerva stitch away.
“You stitch beautifully,” Aunt Martha observed at last. “Your mother is right: a girl with your accomplishments, you will make some lucky man a fine wife.”
Minerva blushed again, prettily.
I glanced at Kit to see what he was making of all this nonsense, but I could not catch his eye.
“I say,” he said, “I don’t think I’ve ever quite understood the charms of needlepoint before, but this is beautiful. It makes me wish I could ply a needle.”
I was disgusted. It was one thing for Kit to be polite to the new neighbors, but this was really taking things too far.
“Come on, Kit,” I said. “Why don’t we play a game of chess while the others continue doing …this?”
“But that would be rude,” he said. “And besides, I am enjoying watching Miss Clarence stitch.”
Miss Clarence.
“Fine.” It was hard not to grit my tee
th when I said it. “Then I shall get my sketchbook.”
And so, as the others sat in a circle around Minerva, watching her work as though it were the most fascinating thing that had ever happened in the history of the world, I sat in my corner drawing the object of their attention.
. . . . .
“She seems like such a fine girl, does she not?” Kit said, at last joining me. “She is so sweet. And the way she looks out for her younger sisters, it makes me wish I came from a bigger family.”
I did not say anything.
“Is something troubling you?” he asked, as though suddenly seeing me for the first time. “You are not yourself today.”
“I am not the only one,” I muttered under my breath.
“Come again?”
So many people did not seem themselves to me all of a sudden, and that included Kit and myself. I was not used to seeing him pay attentions to another girl, and so raptly, was not used to feeling such strong stirrings of jealousy within my heart.
But I could not tell him any of that, so instead I settled for:
“Does it ever strike you that Mother is not as Mother used to be, before Aunt Helen died?”
Kit shrugged. “I suppose that is to be expected, is it not? She has suffered an enormous loss, been witness to the most violent of crimes. I cannot see how that could not change a person.”
“I suppose,” I reluctantly conceded. “But sometimes, it is as though she is not even herself.”
“How do you mean?” he asked, then he laughed. “Who else could she be?”
I merely shook my head. To this, I had no answer.
Kit waited patiently, as though he knew I was not finished with this subject yet. Of all the people in the world, Kit knew me so well.
“And then there is the way she is with others,” I went on, “the way she is with my father now—not to mention the way he looks at her sometimes, as though he does not know her anymore or is made uncomfortable by her somehow. Even the way she is with me! Sometimes, when she looks at me, I do not know how to describe it, but it is not the way I’ve ever seen her look at me before.”
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