The Lorimer Line

by Anne Melville

  He spoke the last two words with distaste, as though he had been asked to sample a new dish prepared from suspicious ingredients. Still as active physically as he had been ten years earlier, he had nevertheless lost the ability -and indeed the wish - to take kindly to new ideas. It was the business of Government, in his opinion, to see that the affairs of the country were run for the maximum of profit and prestige, but with the minimum of interference with the private affairs of its citizens. To impose the obligation of leisure on a conscientious staff and to compel Lorimer’s Bank to close its doors on a day not determined by its chairman was an impertinence. However, the imposition was a law and must therefore be obeyed.

  As a sign of his acceptance he had last year for the first time invited the entire staff and board of directors of Lorimer’s, together with their families, to take tea in the gardens of Brinsley House on the afternoon of one of the unwanted holidays. On that first occasion it had been an innovation involving the anxious organization of food and entertainment and an apprehension of awkward social encounters. This year it would be merely a repetition, the development of a new tradition which would one day become an old tradition. Although John Junius had been

  grumbling about it for the past three weeks, he was in fact reconciled to the prospect.

  In theory, of course, his wife was in charge of the domestic arrangements for the afternoon. She could be expected to appear as the guests arrived, since the occasion was one which justified expenditure on new silks and ribbons, but it was realistic of John Junius to go over the arrangements in advance with his daughter. However much he might deplore Margaret’s stubbornness, he was bound to recognize that she was efficient as an organizer.

  Margaret was able to assure him that everything would be to his satisfaction. The only choice still to be made was whether the trestles should be set out in the house or the garden, and she had promised to give a decision not later than noon.

  ‘In the garden,’ said John Junius definitely. He could lock up his collection of jade animals in their glass cases, but the Indian and Persian screens which he also collected might be jostled or even fingered by a class of person not accustomed to such beautiful objects or aware of their value.

  ‘The ladies will be wearing their best bonnets,’ Margaret reminded him. ‘If there should be rain - ’

  ‘It will be a fine day,’ her father told her. ‘Surely you heard me mention the matter in prayers this morning? I have had occasion before to remark on your lack of concentration.’

  Margaret was tempted to defend herself by saying that she had heard the request, but without recognizing it to be a guarantee. However, she had been accused of pcrtness too often already, and there was a matter which troubled her more than the weather.

  ‘Will Mr Crankshaw be present this afternoon, with his family?’ she asked.

  ‘Naturally. All the directors have been invited. You can hardly expect Mr Crankshaw to absent himself in order that a foolish young woman shall be spared a moment of embarrassment which, I am bound to say, she richly deserves.’

  ‘Of course not, Papa.’ It was not the director of the bank whom she was reluctant to meet but his son, Walter. A year ago the two fathers had proposed a business arrangement which would have linked their wealthy families by marriage to the benefit of both. The Crankshaws owned the site of the new docks which were under construction at Portishead and which the Lorimer Line would need to use as its new ships, with their larger tonnage, found it impossible to come up the river to the Bristol docks. The details of the settlements to be made on the young people had already been agreed before Margaret was informed of the plan. She felt no responsibility for the feelings of Mr Crankshaw, but it must have been humiliating for Walter - who had agreed to the proposal with apparent enthusiasm - to be told that she had rejected it. She had not seen him since then.

  Both Margaret and her father had another matter which they wished to raise during this daily conference, but neither was anxious to appear too eager. It was John Junius, accustomed to taking the initiative, who spoke first.

  ‘That young woman who used to give you music lessons,’ he said. ‘Italian.’ He paused to allow Margaret to remind him of the name.

  ‘Luisa,’ she obliged. Her teacher was only five years older than herself and they had become friends. ‘Signorina Reni.’

  ‘Of course. My carriage happened to take me past her in the city on Friday. I had remembered her as a handsome young woman who dressed with some style, considering her circumstances. I was shocked to see that she had become shabby. And too thin. In fact, as though at any moment she might faint from lack of food.’

  ‘I am sorry to hear it, Papa. She left Bristol a year ago to nurse her sister. I was not aware that she had returned.’

  ‘Could you not send a message to her and suggest that she might come here this afternoon and accompany you in a few songs? Perhaps even join you in a duet. I remember that her voice was pleasing. It would give us the opportunity to make her a small present.’

  ‘At such short notice it would hardly be possible, Papa. If she has no suitable dress, she would not like to appear before company. Besides, we have not practised together. And I think it would not be proper for me to sing this afternoon.’

  ‘You have a beautiful voice,’ John Junius declared. Margaret flushed with pleasure at the compliment, not only because her father paid her so few, but because he himself in his younger days had possessed a fine voice and still retained his musical sensibility.

  Margaret knew well enough that nothing else about herself was beautiful. She was too small and her expression was too determined, even fierce. Her step was firm and bustling: she had never found it possible to languish in an elegant manner. Her complexion was freckled, and she had inherited the curly red hair which had made her father a striking figure when he was young. On a young man it was no doubt acceptable, but she felt it to be unseemly on herself. She plaited her hair as tightly as she could and coiled it round her ears; but its tight waves eluded her control and she could never give the proper impression of calm tidiness. She knew that her father, who loved beautiful things, who would sit for an hour staring at a detail painted on one of his screens or caressing some tiny jade animal within his cupped hands, had never been able to find in his own daughter anything for his eyes to admire. But it was true that her voice, although not strong, was clear and true.

  Nevertheless she felt bound to press her objection.

  ‘Most of the bank staff are strangers to me, Papa,’ she said. ‘We have hired musicians to entertain them after tea. If I were to join that entertainment, it would be to make myself a public performer.’

  ‘If you have nothing prepared, that’s the end of it,’ said her father. His displeasure was clear in his voice. Margaret had a favour to beg and could see the need to change his mood before she introduced the new subject.

  ‘I shall invite Luisa to luncheon tomorrow,’ she said. ‘At least she may enjoy a good meal to start with, while I discover what the trouble is. And then I shall ask her to practise with me. When we are ready, we will sing together for you and Mama and your friends one evening after dinner. You know that I am always ready to do that. The opportunity to make her a present can easily be arranged.’

  Her father nodded his approval.

  ‘The thought does you credit,’ he said, as though he had forgotten that the thought was in the first place his own. He nodded at his daughter to dismiss her. But Margaret’s own request was as urgent as his.

  ‘I would like your permission, Papa, to engage a lady’s maid for myself.’

  ‘What’s wrong with Marie-Claire?’

  ‘She is Mama’s maid. She thinks it wrong that she should be expected to wait on more than one mistress.’

  ‘Lazy good-for-nothing,’ growled John Junius, but Margaret persisted as tactfully as she could.

  ‘Mama’s state of health makes it necessary for a great deal to be done for her. I think that Marie-Claire’s time is in f
act fully occupied.’

  ‘I recall that we have discussed this subject before, in a contrary direction. Your mother said that she could not spare Marie-Claire for you any longer, and you were most definite that you did not require a personal maid.’

  ‘I realize now that I was wrong,’ said Margaret, knowing that the admission would please her father. He grunted a sort of approval.

  ‘No more Frenchies, though. I absolutely forbid it. Two in one house, jabbering together all day long, idle themselves and setting a bad example to the other servants, definitely not!’ John Junius had been a boy in the years when Napoleon Bonaparte was the Bogeyman whose name was used to frighten children into sleep or obedience. The war had been over for sixty years, but Margaret knew that her father had never learned to like the French.

  ‘I quite agree, Papa,’ she said tactfully. ‘What I suggest is that I should employ a young girl to be trained to my own taste. Marie-Claire could be asked to instruct her at first in such matters as sewing and ironing. She would not expect, of course, to be paid the salary of a lady’s maid until she had acquired the necessary skills.’

  Margaret was never sure whether a consideration of this kind was more likely to persuade her father or irritate him. John Junius Lorimer was probably the richest of Bristol’s rich citizens. He kept not one carriage but two and lived in the grandest mansion in the whole of Clifton. Whenever a subscription list was raised for a purpose which he thought worthy, it was a point of pride that the name of Lorimer should be at its head. His collection of Eastern art was rumoured to be priceless. It had already been promised to the city on his death, with money enough to build a public gallery in which the precious objects could be displayed and admired by the public without charge. And yet Margaret was forced almost every day to listen to her mother’s complaints that she was unable to take her proper place in Bristol society because of her husband’s meanness in such matters as dress and jewellery. Without taking sides in parental disputes, Margaret was tempted on such an occasion as this to use the bait of economy for her own purpose.

  ‘You talk as though you have the girl already.’ John Junius spoke suspiciously.

  ‘Naturally I have not engaged her, Papa. But it is true that I have a young girl in mind. I have known her since she was nine years old. Her family was one of those I used to visit in Peel Street.’ It was necessary to hurry over this part of the story. Only with extreme difficulty had Margaret been able to persuade her father that the visiting of sick families in the slums of Bristol was neither dangerous nor unseemly. ‘Her father died in the cholera epidemic. Her mother has been ill for some years. When the Froome flooded in November she lived with Betty for five weeks in a room whose floor was under two feet of water. Now she too has died. Betty has been taken to the workhouse.’

  ‘Where she will be well looked after.’

  ‘Where she will be neglected and corrupted,’ said Margaret firmly.

  Her father received this statement in silence. As a hardworking citizen he was bound to assert that the workhouse conferred more benefit than they deserved on those who were unable to support themselves. As a humane man he knew that what Margaret said was true.

  ‘If you wish merely to find a better home for the child, I can nominate her for the orphanage at Ashley Down,’ he said. ‘Mr Wright has reason enough to know of my interest in his work there.’

  Margaret shook her head.

  ‘Thank you, Papa, but her twelfth birthday is approaching and she is ready to work. I have been told of the situation proposed for her, and I am horrified by its conditions. She is an intelligent girl, cheerful and clean, and she deserves better.’

  ‘She is fortunate to have employment offered to her by those who have her interests at heart.’

  ‘She would be more fortunate to have it offered to her by myself,’ said Margaret.

  She had judged her time well. John Junius had had enough of domestic matters.

  ‘The engagement of servants is a matter for your mother, not for me,’ he said. ‘Do whatever she thinks is best.’ They both knew that, though there were still formalities to be observed, the matter was now settled.

  Margaret went straight to her mother’s boudoir. A fire was burning there as usual, although it was May. Georgiana complained incessantly of the dampness of the Bristol climate and exposed herself to it as little as possible. She was almost thirty years younger than her husband, but ever since the stillbirth of her last baby, eight years earlier, she had retreated from her marriage – as from every other form of exertion — into the shelter of this one stifling room.

  As well as being over-heated, the boudoir was over-furnished. It was impossible to move anywhere without brushing against some small side-table laden with ornaments or silver-framed family photographs. The day-bed and the chairs were covered in plush and protected by tasselled antimacassars, and the heavy curtains were never fully drawn back. The smell of Georgiana’s pug dog and of her latest meal or hot drink always lingered to make the room stuffy. Margaret could hardly bear to remain in it for long. She had been brought up in a house which had been built and furnished in a classical style a hundred years earlier and little changed since then, and liked its uncluttered spaciousness. She did not begrudge her mother this private island of clutter, of course, but she spent as little time in it as possible.

  The doctor was just leaving the boudoir as Margaret arrived. Dr Scott had brought all Georgiana’s three surviving children into the world, as well as the four who had failed to reach their first birthday, and since then his weekly visits had brought him near to being a friend of the family. Through his wife he was well-connected, and had recently inherited from his father-in-law a legacy which John Junius’s interest had helped him to invest to advantage in Lorimer’s Bank. His new prosperity had enabled him to move to the growing suburb of Clifton, in which so many of his wealthiest patients lived. His only regret at this time of his life was that his son, Charles, on qualifying as a doctor, had taken a permanent appointment on the staff of a London hospital instead of returning to join his father’s practice.

  However, Dr Scott had no intention of retiring for a good many years, so there was time enough for the situation to change. He was in a cheerful mood as he greeted Margaret and asked for her co-operation in ensuring that in the afternoon Mrs Lorimer did not go straight from her overheated room to the garden.

  Georgiana too was in good spirits, less petulant than usual. Although the afternoon’s party was to be of such a humble kind, it would provide her with the chance to show herself as a hostess. She agreed without argument that Betty Hurst should be engaged and trained as a lady’s maid, and then spent half an hour quizzing Margaret about which costume she intended to wear for the afternoon. It would be too cool for lace, Georgiana said; safer to wear the brown dress which had a velvet jacket. Margaret listened politely to her mother’s opinions without allowing them to change her own plans. She was shown Georgiana’s new buckles of cut steel and admired them dutifully, although in her heart she considered such small details of costume to be worth no more time than was needed to buy them. When the arrival of the chairs which had been hired to set around the garden was announced, she took the opportunity to escape.

  Supervising the arrangements could have occupied her for the whole morning. But the household servants were well trained. Margaret had already explained the day’s requirements, and they would work with more responsibility if she did not oversee them directly. It was as much to remove herself from the temptation to interfere as to implement her father’s wishes without delay that she asked for the victoria to be ready for her at eleven.

  First she went to her music teacher’s old lodgings and was there able to discover Luisa’s new address. This was in a respectable area, although not a prosperous one. Margaret was admitted at once and shown to a small room on its upper floor. Like her father, she was shocked by Luisa’s emaciated appearance, but concealed her horror by a close embrace.

  ‘You shou
ld have told me you were returned,’ she said when Luisa had recovered from her surprise at the visit. ‘I am here only to insist that you come to Brinsley House tomorrow for luncheon. I shall expect to hear all your news then. And news of your sister.’

  ‘My sister?’

  ‘Have you not been nursing her?’ asked Margaret.

  ‘Oh yes. That was my reason for leaving Bristol. She recovered quickly, but afterwards I was myself ill.’

  Luisa’s cheeks flushed briefly as she spoke, but at once returned to the unhealthy pallor which Margaret had observed when she first arrived. The skin had tightened over her high cheekbones and her eyes seemed to have sunk into sockets darkened by tiredness. It was difficult to remember how vivacious she had been at their last meeting, and how strikingly good-looking.

  Once Margaret had obtained Luisa’s agreement to come the next day, she turned to leave, feeling that she ought not to prolong an unexpected visit. But her attention was caught by the sound of a cough coming from a dark corner of the room - a sound so small and faint that perhaps only a woman who loved babies as much as Margaret did would have noticed it. She stopped and turned back.

  For a moment the two young women stared at each other. Luisa met Margaret’s gaze steadily. Then she stepped aside, allowing her visitor to go further into the room.

  Looking down into the wooden cradle which stood against the wall, Margaret was amazed. The sleeping baby was very young, but her peaceful face was in an extraordinary way mature. It was impossible to doubt that she was a girl, and one of exceptional beauty. Already all the features of her oval face were perfectly formed.

  ‘She’s lovely,’ whispered Margaret. ‘Luisa, you should have told me of your marriage.’

  Luisa did not reply and Margaret, startled, looked again into her steady eyes.