Lissa

by Mira Stables

  He could not quite restrain a smile at this simplification of the moral code, but he passed long brown fingers over his mouth to conceal the traces of amusement. Not for worlds would he have this tender sprig of innocence see that he was laughing at her. “You seem to be remarkably worldly wise, for so young a creature,” he said politely. “How old are you, by the way? And who has so carefully instructed you in the—er—difference of royalty?”

  “I am turned sixteen—I think— And it was Mrs. Hetherston.”

  The very brevity of the replies prompted him to further questioning. Nanty had been told that she was just turned three when she first came to Stapleford. Mrs. Hetherston he knew. She was the Vicar’s wife, and it was she, Nanty being too tender hearted to do it herself, who had explained her equivocal position to the child, stressing the need for her to work hard at her lessons and equip herself as well as possible for her solitary battle with life. An indignant outburst some months later when the industrious pupil had made the accidental discovery that not all illegitimate children were poor and homeless, that some had even been ennobled, had produced the repressive reply that these matters were regarded differently when royalty was concerned—and a private admonition to the Vicar about allowing the child free access to a library where the less creditable pages of history were to be found.

  The Viscount studied this chance-met waif with increasing interest and enquired into the progress of her education under the kindly aegis of Mr. Hetherston. It proved to be startlingly solid. Naturally no time had been wasted on lady-like accomplishments, but the Vicar, finding his pupil intelligent and eager, had added a grounding in Latin and some knowledge of French to the more basic requirements of a sound English education. The child was probably better read than most of her well-born contemporaries. A new and better scheme was formulating in his mind. He fell silent, working it out in detail. The girl stood hesitating, wondering whether to go or stay. He had not dismissed her, but nothing more had been said about employing her to wait on Lady Mary. He had evidently accepted her profession of unsuitability. Unconsciously she sighed a little. The little sound roused Lord Stapleford from his thoughts and he got up, smiling at her kindly and studying her appearance with frank interest. Not pretty—and perhaps that was as well in her circumstances—but her eyes were remarkably fine and there was that indefinable look of race in the clean-cut features, while the slender hands and beautifully moulded arms proclaimed aloud that here was no peasant blood.

  “I have another proposition to put to you,” he said pleasantly. “I realise now that my first suggestion was hardly suitable, nor would it fully serve my purpose. This second notion is much better and I hope that you will consider it carefully. You must discuss it with your foster mother and with Mr. and Mrs. Hetherston before giving me your answer. It is that you should share Mary’s lessons—be in some sort her companion. No! Do not answer hastily. It is an important decision, and in fairness I must point out some of the difficulties that you would encounter. Mary’s governess, for instance, may not take kindly to your inclusion in the schoolroom world. I do not think she would treat you with the cruelty and spite that you seem to have encountered at your last post, but you may find her strict, even severe. You may have difficulty with some of the maids, if they share Miss Williams’s jealousy of your superior attainments. You would have to leave Mrs. Wayburn’s care and come here to live. And I must tell you frankly at the outset that your speech is not quite that of a cultured person. No need to blush, child,” as she hung her head. “It is only natural that you should have picked up the local brogue. But it will not do for Mary to be copying you. It is a matter that can easily be mended. But none of this will be easy for you. On the other hand you will be receiving both education and training in the ways of the polite world, and when the time comes that you wish to make a change I will do my best to help you to a suitable situation.”

  Not quite sure whether she was awake or dreaming and desperately self-conscious for the first time in her life, she stammered out some kind of inarticulate thanks.

  “And you still have not told me your name,” he reminded.

  There was a moment’s silence. Then she looked up at him solemnly, forgetting the new paralysing shyness in speaking of a matter that lay close to her heart. “When first I came to Nanty, she tells me, I said that my name was Lissa. She took that to be a shortened form of Elizabeth. I have always been called Lizzie, and I hate it. Do you think I could be Lissa again—if I come here to live, I mean,” and her eyes glowed at the exciting prospect and all the difficulties were forgotten.

  “I certainly share your preference for Lissa,” he agreed. “What about your second name. Since we are having a christening, shall we change that, too?”

  He had thought merely to set her at ease by a little friendly teasing and was unprepared for the reaction that his idle remark provoked. Her head went up proudly. “Indeed, no, my lord. Since Nanty was so good as to give me her own name, which was more than my parents did for me, I will keep it and strive to bring credit on it. How could I hurt her by seeming to despise it the moment my circumstances seem like to change for the better?”

  So the prim looking shy little thing had spirit enough when she was roused. And admirable instincts, too. Momentarily he was becoming more and more enamoured of his scheme. This girl would do Mary all the good in the world. He was almost prepared to back her against the formidable Miss Parminter, though he would be watchful to see that the youngster was not really oppressed. He would teach her to ride along with Mary, and there would have to be dancing lessons, too. Planning the polishing of this untried jewel that had fallen into his hands would add a piquancy to the quiet country days. He sent her off to find her foster mother, bidding her think carefully over all that he had said, but adding sincerely that he hoped her decision would be favourable. She dropped him a demure curtsey and walked sedately from the room, after which she gathered up her sober skirts and half ran, half danced upstairs to Mrs. Graham’s parlour where she burst in upon the astounded occupants and poured out her tale in such a bubble of excitement that the good ladies had much ado in making head or tail of it.

  Chapter Three

  Almost a month passed before Lissa Wayburn entered upon her new life at Stapleford Place. But the days were so charged with blissful preparation that they passed swiftly, even to her eager impatience. It was not without much thought and a number of misgivings, some openly expressed, others denied utterance, that her friends and well wishers were finally persuaded to permit her acceptance of her fantastic good fortune. They could foresee all the difficulties that the Viscount had mentioned and a good many more, not the least of these being the fear that the child would be given ideas above her station. The generous whim of a wealthy young man was not to be relied upon. They acquitted him of any evil intent towards his protegée, but he might easily weary of the whole business, perhaps return to Town and his former gay life and forget about the waif whose hopes and ambitions he had fostered by his brief inexplicable notice. Lord Stapleford had to spend a full hour closeted with the Vicar in his study before that good man was fully convinced that the scheme really was designed to be beneficial to both Lissa and Lady Mary. To his credit he placed them in that order. Lady Mary had a number of people to guard her welfare. He himself felt deeply responsible for Lizzie—and he must remember to call her Lissa.

  Having once made up his mind, Mr. Hetherston devoted his energies to correcting the child’s rustic accent, a process which she found painfully embarrassing. Her speech was so eager and fluent that it was sheer misery to be checked again and again to correct her pronunciation. The task was made all the more difficult by the fact that she was so very nearly correct. Nanty had always been particular about her speech, never permitting her to lapse into dialect, so that only the ear of a purist could detect the slightly broadened vowels, the slurred consonants and the lazy elisions. But the day did eventually dawn when suddenly she could hear the difference between her pronunciat
ion and the Vicar’s and from then on her progress was noticeable if erratic. There were times when Mr. Hetherston was hard put to it not to laugh at his earnest pupil’s comical mistakes, but he was sincerely fond of her and managed to dissemble his amusement.

  To make up for all this humiliation there were the clothes. The Viscount had decreed the provision of a wardrobe suitable to a young lady of good standing who was not yet ‘out’, and had given Mesdames Hetherston and Wayburn carte blanche in its choosing. He had some doubts about this, fearing that they would incline towards sparing his purse, but he could scarcely go shopping for the girl himself so he compromised by saying that a riding habit and several light dresses suitable for dancing lessons must be selected as well as more workaday clothes and leaving the choice to them. His fears might well have been realised, both ladies being of an economical nature, but fortunately there was one factor that he had left out of his reckoning. He was giving to two childless women the opportunity to dress a dream daughter at his expense. There could be no denying that the experience went to their heads, driving out customary frugality, but since they had both good sense and good taste they expressed their unusual extravagance in terms of cut and quality and the result was all that could have been wished. They began by buying day dresses in sober colours that would not easily soil but they both succumbed to the charm of a green polonaise with a green and white flowered underdress. That would be very suitable for going to church and for similar formal wear, they decided, and then indulged feminine instinct to the full in the selection of a simple yellow crepe saque and a dainty flowered muslin for dancing lessons. Mrs. Hetherston shook her head over the extravagance of buying two dresses when one would really have sufficed for a girl who had not yet done growing, but the Viscount had definitely said “several” which was really rather fortunate as she preferred the yellow crepe while Nanty had lost her heart to the muslin. The owner of all this new finery was too overcome to do more than acquiesce ecstatically in the decisions of her elders, which caused Mrs. Hetherston to pat her cheek approvingly and praise her pretty behaviour. Neither the Viscount nor his enthusiastic assistants expected the new clothes to make any great change in the child’s appearance. They were simply the proper wear for the part she was called upon to play.

  But in spite of the confidence born of knowing that at least she would be suitably dressed, Lissa felt her spirits sink on the last night that she spent in her childhood home. All the new clothes were packed save for a snuff brown day dress and a tiny hat trimmed with a modest brown ribbon which was worn tilted over the right eyebrow. The carriage was to take her up at ten o’clock next morning and her new life would begin. She felt sick and shivery at the thought, and Nanty, seeing the restless movements and the sober little face suggested that she should take a warm bath in front of the kitchen fire and then wash her hair and practise dressing it in the new fashion. “For,” as she sensibly said, “you will feel strange to be going without your cap and your hair all loose about your shoulders, but that is the way that Lady Mary wears hers and his lordship wishes you to copy her appearance in this respect.”

  Not even Nanty was prepared for the startling change that the new fashion made in Lissa. Over the years the red-gold of the childish curls had deepened to a glorious copper colour, but since the hair had always been strained back from the thin little wedge of a face and tightly braided under the prim cap, no one had realised its beauty until now it hung about the girl’s shoulders in all its shining glory. No need for crimping tongs here. You could do anything with it—except suppress its suggestion of the deepest joys of living and loving. It was scandalous hair, thought Nanty uneasily, such as would put the wickedest thoughts into men’s heads, and yet the child was as good a girl as ever stepped. Magdalene hair, she said to herself, with some dim memory of legend. The deep waves swept back from the white brow and formed themselves into natural ringlets as their owner twisted them carelessly round her fingers, while delicate tendrils sprang back from her temples in tiny rings of new minted gold. Then Lissa looked up at her with the old, rueful grimace and said, “Still carrots, Nanty! Do you remember when I used to pray every night for it to go dark, and how cross you used to be? You said I should be content with what the good Lord had given me.” And then she giggled. “But at least I won’t use walnut juice! I can promise you that.” And Nanty’s sudden fears were calmed, for the child was still her own loving, innocent child.

  Nevertheless, even if she had done it deliberately, she could not have chosen better than the dark stuffs of the new dresses to set off that wonderful hair. It was with a sense of startled disbelief that Lord Stapleford received his new-fashioned protegée. In plain, beautifully cut brown dress and the tiny hat which had suddenly become saucy when perched on the coppery curls, she was quite a different creature from the thin plain little piece of their first meeting. Then he realised that she was almost paralysed with shyness. He complimented her with grave courtesy on her becoming appearance and assured her two anxious sponsors that they had perfectly understood his wishes and had carried them out to a nicety.

  There was a brief farewell to Mrs. Hetherston, a loving hug for Nanty and a reminder that it was not long till Thursday, when they would meet again, and then she was left to fight her dragons alone.

  At least Lady Mary could not be described as a dragon though there was an unexpected shyness between them, Lady Mary being startled at the change in Lissa’s appearance and Lissa tongue-tied because she had forgotten to ask Nanty how she should address the younger girl. Would it be more courteous to use the formal “your ladyship” of their previous acquaintance or was she supposed to use the more familiar “Lady Mary”? The Viscount had arranged that his sister should be delivered from the tyranny of lessons for this first morning and, sensing the awkwardness between the two, now suggested that Mary should show her new companion the room that had been allotted her and help her to unpack and settle in, feeling that the two would manage much better without his society. Lady Mary put out an impulsive hand to catch Lissa’s and her sallow little face lit up as she said, “Oh, yes! Do come and see. I hope you will like it. I asked Mrs. Graham to put you in the room next to mine. It’s not very big because Miss Parminter has the big one at the other side, but it’s a corner room and has a turret window.” She pulled at Lissa’s hand impatiently, scarcely allowing her time to drop a polite curtsey to Lord Stapleford who smiled at his animated little sister and felt rather more hopeful for the success of his scheme.

  Had he been privileged to hear the exchanges between the two once the bedroom door was safely closed behind them, his confidence would have been complete. Within five minutes they were both chattering away like magpies, Lissa exclaiming in delight over the turret room which made her feel, she said, like a princess in a medieval romance, and Mary instantly exclaiming that she looked exactly like one, a remark which could hardly fail to please. The business of unpacking took an unconscionably long time, there were so many things to be explained and discussed, so many delightful plans to be made. Lissa even summoned courage to lay the problem of correct address before the person most concerned. Mary looked wistful. “I wish you could call me Mary,” she said slowly. “Then I could almost believe you were my sister. But I don’t think Miss Parminter would allow it. She is a great stickler for proper form. It will have to be Lady Mary when she is there, but we can do as we like when we are alone.”

  In answer to Lissa’s anxious questions she said that Miss Parminter was strict but fair. One had to work hard but she could make the lessons interesting. The schoolroom maid, Janet, was Mrs. Graham’s niece and was a dear. “Though I don’t like Kate, who waits on us when Janet has her day off. She’s sulky. But that won’t be for ages yet,” she ended cheerfully and suggested that they had better go to the schoolroom to find Miss Parminter or she would be sending to enquire why they were so long.

  The governess greeted Lissa with cool civility and, like everyone else, glanced thoughtfully at the riot of copper cur
ls, so that Lissa put up a nervous hand to smooth them back. She asked one or two questions as to the point the girl had reached in her studies and seemed reasonably satisfied with the answers, then went on to strike dismay into her heart by saying, “In the matter of your speech I must ask you to be particularly careful until time and assiduous practice have polished away its rusticity. Lord Stapleford has announced his intention of attending to this matter himself, since he esteems it of great importance. You are to spend half an hour each evening in reading aloud to him and in recounting the events of your day. I need hardly point out to you that you are a very privileged young person and must show your gratitude by diligent application to your studies.”

  Lissa stammered out something disjointed but breathless with gratitude, and shook in her shoes. It had been bad enough when the Vicar had pounced on every tiny fault, but the prospect that now faced her was appalling. Heartily she wished herself back in her comfortable obscurity.

  “Tonight, however,” went on Miss Parminter, “his lordship has arranged that you shall both dine with him and dinner has been set forward especially so that you may do so. No doubt he wishes to satisfy himself that your manners are not such as to disgust the polite world. On that head,” she added in a more kindly tone, “I believe you need not be anxious. Some small points may stand in need of correction, but I am assured that you have been very well brought up by your foster mother. You may go now. A luncheon will be served to you in the schoolroom in half an hour’s time and your riding lesson will be at three o’clock. Be sure that you do not keep his lordship waiting.”

  Getting into a riding habit was still a complicated business for Lissa despite some previous practice, but with Mary’s help and a good deal of giggling the pair of them were ready in good time. And the lesson itself was sheer joy to the tyro, even though she was only permitted to make friends with the pony and then to sit on his back while her tutor walked him gently round the stable yard. The Viscount was delighted to see how his sister—with more than a month’s equestrian tuition to her credit—seemed to shed all her own nervousness when trying to help Lissa, pushing away the pony’s inquisitive nose when he snuffed at her breast almost absently instead of flinching away as she would have done only yesterday. As for Lissa, quite fearless where animals were concerned, she only wished the lesson might go on longer, though his lordship warned her, with some amusement, that even as it was she would probably feel stiff and sore tomorrow. With childish memories of stolen rides on the farm horses, Lissa knew all about that but felt it was well worth it, especially when she received a brief commendation, the Viscount being good enough to say that in spite of her advanced age she might yet make a horsewoman, since at least she didn’t use the reins as a balancing pole or saw at the pony’s mouth.