‘I believe so. You had better ask Mrs Goodenough, our cook.’ Miss Lily’s voice was dry. ‘She will give you lessons, by the way. A lady needs to know how things are cooked, even if she never lifts a pan. Many a hostess has founded her reputation on secret recipes, as well as a cook who is loyal enough to keep them secret too. But please do not speak of recipes at the table.’
Another faux pas, then. She heaped some of the kedgeree onto her plate and sat down before she realised the butler was hovering, about to hold out her chair.
‘Tea or coffee, Miss Higgs?’
‘Tea. Thank you, Jones.’ She added milk and two sugars, heaped her fork with kedgeree, then remembered and unloaded most of it and put the remnant in her mouth. The spiciness startled her. She tried another mouthful, then a lump of fish, decided the dish was strange, but good, then looked up to find Miss Lily watching her.
And that was definitely a smile.
‘I’ve done something wrong again, haven’t I?’ she asked resignedly.
‘Several things, none of which I am smiling at. I am simply enjoying your appetite.’
‘Young ladies are not supposed to have appetites?’
Miss Lily laughed. ‘The fashionable ones, no. Ethereal is still the rule. But I think, my dear, that your … appetite will be seen simply as a charming foible. Which it is.’
Miss Lily spread marmalade on another tiny piece of toast. Behind her Jones accepted another rack of hot toast from a footman and placed it on the table, then stood back behind Miss Lily’s chair, in case she needed anything, like more coffee in her tiny china cup, or defending from a lion.
Sophie took another mouthful of kedgeree. Decidedly good. Buttery. She sipped her tea — hard not to drink half the cup at once. The walk had made her thirsty.
‘What were my mistakes, then?’
‘Just now?’ The smile was still there, Sophie saw with relief. ‘Guests don’t go wandering without the hostess’s permission. No, you do not ask permission, you just don’t wander.’
‘In case you find the master dallying with the kitchen maid in the orchard?’
Had she gone too far? But Miss Lily simply said, ‘Exactly. But if and when you do walk in a garden — secretly or by invitation from your hostess — you do not appear with leaf mould on your shoes, especially not if it is you who has been doing the dallying in the orchard. It takes only a few seconds to wipe your feet, to check for burrs. If you are unable to make yourself tidy, you go to your room, where your maid will have what is needed for a quick change and, under your guidance, remain discreet. If discretion is impossible, she will at any rate provide you with a change of clothes.
‘Your maid will already have found out downstairs what activities are planned for the rest of the day and will have chosen the most suitable clothes. A random choice of clothes — such as you are wearing — reflects badly on the maid, and on her employer. Either ring for your maid as soon as you wake, or ask her to lay your clothes out the night before.’
Miss Lily sipped what smelled like coffee. Horrible bitter stuff that had made Sophie’s heart pound despite her weariness last night. ‘Understood?’
‘Yes, Miss Lily. And I’m sorry,’ said Sophie quietly. ‘I had no idea how much I didn’t know. How much work I’d be for you.’
Miss Lily smiled above the rim of her coffee cup, the lips slightly too perfectly shaped. Lipstick? Surely Miss Lily didn’t paint? ‘I have never had to tutor in etiquette before. The girls who come here need quite different lessons. But I am enjoying this, my dear. Far more than I could ever have imagined.’ She smiled again at Sophie’s look of doubt. ‘Now, your second error …’
Sophie waited to see what other points of etiquette she had managed to contravene.
‘Wait for the count of four before you enter when a door is opened for you.’
She hadn’t expected that. ‘Why four?’
‘Four seconds gives enough time to build up a slight sense of expectation. Any more is wearisome for the door-opener. Thirdly, make sure that when you do enter, to that sense of expectation, there is something to satisfy it.’
‘How do I do that?’
‘You already did, though I suspect accidentally. You were smiling as you entered. A smile makes your audience wonder for what — or whom — you are smiling. You may also look lost — a useful expression. I advise you to master it, as well as lonely, sad and furious. Never bored. Never irritated or cross. If something irritates you, solve it or forget it.’ She stared at Sophie for long seconds. ‘Tell me, what have you found the most interesting event in the world this year?’
‘Coming to England, visiting here —’ Sophie stopped as her hostess waved her hand again.
‘Your own life is not necessarily important, Miss Higgs. Unless you think your visit here can change the world.’
Sophie tried to work out the most impressive possible answer. Something to do with the Balkans perhaps? Hadn’t Greece annexed some country, or had another country annexed Greece? Or was it Bulgaria?
Her hostess was still waiting. Sophie grabbed at the perfect response. ‘Stainless steel.’
Miss Lily looked startled. ‘I beg your pardon?’
‘Stainless steel. A man in America invented it, and one in Britain, and now they’re arguing about who found it first. But it’s going to change the world.’
‘What exactly is this stainless steel?’
‘It’s a new process for making iron tougher. Iron rusts, but stainless steel doesn’t. It’s, well, stainless.’
‘And why is that important? Less scrubbing for housemaids?’
‘No, not at all. Well, yes, perhaps. I wasn’t thinking about how it might work in a house. Saucepans, perhaps. But think of ships. I don’t suppose stainless-steel ships would last forever, but they’d last longer than iron ones. You could make machines you could rely on because parts wouldn’t wear through. Ploughs that wouldn’t need to be rubbed with fat after use.’ Sophie stopped, and flushed. ‘I’m talking like a factory owner’s daughter.’
‘Indeed. And not a topic for the breakfast table, but that is my fault, not yours. Breakfast is a time for small talk as the household gathers the strength to start the day. No, Miss Higgs, what you said is fascinating. I am not easily fascinated. I can see how this “stainless steel” may well change the world. As I told you yesterday, you can’t hide your background. If you try, and show you are ashamed of it, then you will be shamed. But speaking as you did now makes an advantage of it. Do you know what England’s greatest product is, Miss Higgs?’
She tried to think of Miss Thwaites’s lessons. ‘Potatoes? Apples!’
Miss Lily laughed. ‘Only one in five working men is a farmhand. But a third of the world’s goods is shipped in British ships. That is England’s real fortune, Miss Higgs. England can’t feed herself, hasn’t for years. We don’t just import our coffee and nutmeg and wine, but most of the wheat for our flour these days too. Our guns are made in Germany; our cotton in India; and at least half of our electric motorcars are shipped over from the United States, not made in factories here. But we do have coal, and iron. And we make ships and sail them. So yes, Miss Higgs, you may possibly have nailed exactly what will change the next twenty or fifty years. And it is an English invention, not a German one, for which we should be grateful.’
Sophie decided not to remind her hostess of the American who had also invented it, not that she could remember his name anyway.
‘You know, I was almost regretting my offer to your father until you arrived yesterday. You were not … what I expected.’ Miss Lily smiled. ‘I am very glad you have come, Miss Higgs. I think we may be of considerable use to each other. But we shall see.’
She dabbed her mouth with her napkin, crumpled it on the table, then stood up as Jones moved to pull back her chair. ‘This morning Madame Theron will arrive to instruct you in French conversation and to attend to the accent that I suspect will be your Miss Thwaites’s version of how French is spoken. It is not enoug
h to have a French accent. It must be the correct French accent. You will lunch with Madame. This afternoon Lord Buckmaster and Madame Ellery will attend to your wardrobe. I shall see you at dinner.’
Sophie stood too. ‘Thank you, Miss Lily. Lord Buckmaster — I’m sorry, I don’t understand. Surely a … a lord doesn’t sell clothes.’
‘I hope,’ said Miss Lily, ‘that you will not ask questions like that in public. Ask a friend in private, or your maid. He is a friend,’ she added more gently. ‘Some men enjoy fox hunting. Lord Buckmaster prefers to chase what he calls “the perfect look”. It is his hobby, if you like. Do you hunt, Miss Higgs?’
‘Foxes? I’ve shot a few,’ said Sophie.
Miss Lily laughed, another surprised and surprising peal of delight. ‘That answer will infuriate every person in every drawing room in England, for several quite different reasons. I almost wish I could be there to see it. Good morning, Miss Higgs.’
‘Good morning, Miss Lily,’ said Sophie, still wondering how she might be of use to the cousin of an earl. As an amusement, like the monkeys on the brocade? She sat back to finish her kedgeree as Jones filled her teacup again.
Madame Theron was small, black-eyed, her back still straight as she bent over her embroidery. Her voice pecked, pausing between each word so her accent could be absorbed, her pupil’s mistakes corrected.
Lord Buckmaster was in his forties, perhaps, but made to appear younger by his laughter. Madame Ellery, a tall black shadow, was elegant only when you realised she was in the room, wielding a tape measure while Lord Buckmaster laughed and sketched and smoked innumerable cigarettes, wafting the smoke through his fingers as he inspected Sophie’s wardrobe, laid out for him in the library by Doris — minus all the embarrassing articles.
Sophie regarded Lord Buckmaster carefully. With the possible exception of Miss Lily, who was at least an honourable, he was the first English aristocrat she had met. But at first sight he could have been any of the men who worked in her father’s office: he wore the same dark grey trousers and waistcoat, the same gold watch chain, the same white shirt. It was only when you looked more closely that his clothes seemed to fit him rather than the other way around, as though he dominated both fabric and colour, and had an air of easy familiarity with whatever room or garment he was in.
He lifted a pair of gold glasses from his pocket — this at least was different from the attire of all the other men she’d met — stared at her for less than a second, then nodded. As though I am an insect on a pin beneath a magnifying glass, thought Sophie; he had yet to even say ‘Good day’ — nor would he do so.
‘So you are the latest lovely lady?’
‘I’m sorry? Lord Buckmaster,’ she added.
‘Call me Bucky. I see you are the latest acquisition. A colonial this time.’
Miss Lily isn’t even here to introduce him, she thought. In her world and, she suspected, in theirs, for a hostess not to present one guest to another was gross bad manners. But perhaps you didn’t owe an acquisition good manners?
He pulled out his watch. ‘Two hours and ten minutes till teatime. Lily has the most exquisite crumpets, don’t you think? No one’s crumpets are quite so butter-soaked as hers. And I am sure the source of her honey is England’s deepest secret. So, let us get to work. Lily is correct,’ he added, to her surprise. ‘You are quite lovely. A small colonial arrow among the waving English debutantes. Your season will be … interesting.’
Lily, not ‘Miss Lily’, thought Sophie, through her embarrassment. She had been told she was beautiful back home. She had not realised how she had assumed the compliment was as much due to her father’s wealth as to her own appearance.
Lord Buckmaster glanced down at the draped clothes, pounced, plucked and rejected, leaving only the two jumpers knitted by Miss Thwaites (‘Everyone, my dear, should have at least two garments made with love’) and heaping the rest in a pile that made Doris blush with pleasure. ‘For you, dear girl, or your sisters. Someone, I hope,’ with an eyebrow raised at Sophie, ‘who is long and slender and not made like an elf.’
‘What do elves wear, then?’ To her surprise Sophie was enjoying this. Buying clothes had merely filled in boredom.
Lord Buckmaster held up his glasses to inspect her again. ‘Wine, not water. These,’ he waved a hand at the discarded clothes, ‘are water. You need a light champagne or ivory. Not white: your skin is far too brown. Riesling for parties on the river. Ellie, darling, do you have any of that divine soft purple tweed left?’
Madame Ellery nodded, her mouth full of pins as she tucked a paper pattern around Sophie’s hips.
‘Perfect. Now, put your hands on your hips, dear girl.’ He nodded thoughtfully. ‘I thought so. You have a waist. No chemise styles, no boleros, no draped coats. You have a shape, my dear, and you need to show it, otherwise you are so small it will be ignored. Pleats, darts, above all waists, high or low; it makes no matter as long as they are there. Velvets — no, you are too young for velvets, but remember them when you are twenty-five; you will look divine in a champagne velvet that looks as if it reflects the sky. No satin. Ever. We want the watchers to see you, not their chandeliers reflected in the fabric. When you are small, my dear, you need to make every glance count,’ he added. ‘Fabrics that cling but seem to flow. And hats.’ He cocked his head. ‘No, you are entirely too small for hats. A few feathers, a bandeau, a sunshade if possible rather than a hat.’
‘Shoes?’ asked Sophie hesitantly.
He looked at her reproachfully. ‘Yes, you must wear shoes. Even elves wear shoes, at least in the best elf circles.’
‘But what sort of shoes?’
He waved his hands again, puffing more smoke towards her face. ‘Shoe type shoes. I am not interested in feet.’
‘I can deliver by next Wednesday,’ said Madame Ellery. They were the first words she had spoken.
‘Perfect. Well …’ Lord Buckmaster looked Sophie up and down once more as Jones quietly opened the door. ‘No doubt we shall meet again, if you are to be one of Miss Lily’s lovely ladies. And no doubt when we do, you will look quite, quite different.’ He bowed. ‘Good afternoon, Miss Higgs.’
He followed Madame Ellery out of the library and Jones closed the door behind them. Off to crumpets, thought Sophie. And that cherry cake perhaps, and meringues, a private meal, as so many meals in large households were private. Lord Buckmaster’s presence lingered in the library, though perhaps it was just the cigarette smoke. No man had ever smoked in front of Sophie before.
She felt again a breeze of loss that she was left out of what would no doubt be fascinating conversation in the drawing room. They’d talk of people she didn’t know, she supposed, and matters like ‘the Balkans’, which she would begin to read about in the papers, starting today. But there was also a sense that all Lord Buckmaster had told her was right: she had been recreated, and she liked it.
She grinned at Doris. ‘If you don’t mind, I’d better borrow some of the clothes back, unless I’m going to be stark naked till next Wednesday.’
‘Miss!’ Doris blushed. Suddenly she didn’t look like a rabbit at all, and not just because rabbits didn’t blush. ‘You’ve still got your knickers,’ she added. ‘We could dip them in champagne, and all.’
Silence filled the library for a moment. It was impudence from a maid. It could also, Sophie realised, be the first offering of real friendship.
‘Does Miss Lily drink champagne?’
‘Yes, miss.’
Sophie wrinkled her nose. ‘Better not pinch any, then. Lord Buckmaster is right,’ she added. ‘You’ll look far better in those clothes than I do. Your dark hair is glorious.’
Doris blushed again. ‘Thank you, miss.’ She touched a hobble skirt reverently. ‘This is beautiful, if you don’t mind my saying so, miss. Couldn’t take my eyes off it when I saw you in it yesterday. I’ll keep it for Sundays.’ Another tentative smile. ‘Can’t step out to do my work other days, not in a tight skirt like that.’ She began to ga
ther the heaped clothes.
Sophie looked at her consideringly. ‘Do you like kedgeree, Doris?’
Doris looked up, surprised. ‘Yes, miss.’
So servants here gleaned leftover food as well as clothes.
‘By the way,’ she added casually, ‘what is Miss Lily’s surname?’
Doris’s face grew carefully blank. ‘She is Miss Lily, miss.’
Discretion was a servant’s duty. It would be unkind to press Doris further, despite Sophie’s growing curiosity. She pulled the bell. ‘Tea,’ she said to the footman who appeared promptly. ‘In my room, please. Is there any cherry cake? And would you mind bringing two cups?’
Chapter 14
The days consume themselves as you get older. One needs to have a purpose or they vanish. Only our deeds and our children live on beyond the grave. And without children … well then, one must rest on one’s deeds.
Miss Lily, 1913
Autumn leaves blew yellow, orange and red onto the grass. They lay in a planned wild beauty, vanishing before they could turn brown, gardeners raking them away before any others except the housemaids were up. Bees hummed, audible through the open windows.
The house felt strangely isolated. There were no visitors, except for those presumably hired, or who had possibly volunteered, to refine the raw colonial ore into the gem of an upper-class debutante.
A middle-aged man who could either be a neighbour or a dancing master took Sophie through her paces like a horse while a phonograph scratched out waltzes, mazurkas, two-steps; he corrected her posture and the position of her hands. ‘They are not bananas. You do not dance with feet alone; the positions of the back, the head, the hands, they are all as important as the feet.’ He, too, then vanished to the small sitting room to take tea with Miss Lily.
French conversation continued each morning. Somehow by concentrating on speaking French with Madame’s accent Sophie found her everyday accent changing too, her words sharper, clearer — not so much acquiring an English accent as losing the colonial slurring. This, it appeared, was all that Miss Lily desired, for she made no more references to Sophie’s pronunciation. An Australian heiress would be expected to be Australian. A few words pronounced differently might be charming; to either ape an English accent or revel in the broad vowels of an Australian one would not.
Miss Lily’s Lovely Ladies Page 11