My mother was always trying to let me know that she loved me as much as she loved Carlotta. I was not sure about that, but I did know that I did not cause her the anxiety that Carlotta did.
I overheard my grandmother once say to my mother, “You’ll have no trouble with Damaris, at any rate.”
I knew they were comparing me with Carlotta.
Carlotta was constantly involved in some controversy. Exciting things happened about her and she was generally the centre of them all.
Not only was she beautiful but she was rich. She had charmed Robert Frinton, who had lived at Enderby Hall, and so completely had she done this that he left her his fortune. Then there was all the fuss about her elopement with someone called Beaumont Granville. I never saw him but there was a great deal of talk about him and his name was on everybody’s lips—even the servants’.
That was over a long time ago and now she was married to Benjamin Stevens—dear Benjie, whom we all loved so much, and my mother was particularly pleased as there was a little baby.
We had spent Christmas at Eyot Abbass and everything had circled round Carlotta then.
My mother insisted on staying until the baby—a little girl called Clarissa—was born and my father and I had come home.
“Now she has a baby,” my mother said, “Carlotta will settle down.”
“Settle down!” cried my grandfather with a chuckle. “That girl will never settle down. Mark my words, she’ll always be the centre of some storm.”
My grandfather had a specially warm spot for Carlotta. He never seemed to notice me. My mother said that he had not been like that with her. It made his affection for Carlotta even more remarkable.
My mother was coming home shortly. There was no longer any reason why she should stay away. She had seen her granddaughter safely into the world, and Eyot Abbass was Carlotta’s home now that she had married Benjie. She had more or less returned to the scene of her childhood, for her early years, when everyone thought she was Harriet’s daughter, had been spent at Eyot Abbass.
Yesterday one of the Stevens’s grooms had ridden over with letters. My mother would be setting out at the end of the week. The journey was not long. It usually meant two nights at an inn, and that was taking it slowly. The grooms managed it in two days and they were always trying to do it in record time.
It was a sparkling morning. March had just come in like a lion, as the saying goes, and we were hoping it would prove the old saying true by going out like a lamb. There was a feeling of spring in the air. The long winter was, over; the nights were getting shorter, and although there was not much warmth in the sun yet, it gave a promising radiance to the fields and hedgerows. I loved to ride out into the country; I loved to watch for the changing of the land. I had a great fondness for the animals too. Apart from my dogs and horses I loved the birds and all wild things. They came to me first and always seemed to understand that I would not dream of hurting them and above all wanted to help. I knew how to speak to them, how to soothe them. My father said it was a natural gift. I had tended rabbits and sparrows and once there was a redshank which I found on the marshes. He had a broken leg and I had set it for him. It was amazing how it healed.
I loved the country life; I knew that the time would come when I would go to London with my family and there would be balls and such things for me, the object being to find me a husband. I dreaded that; but there was one consolation, neither of my parents would force me into marriage if I didn’t want it; and their great desire was to see me happy.
In any case I was only thirteen and that was in the future. I remembered that Carlotta had not been much more when she had fallen in love with Beaumont Granville. But Carlotta was Carlotta.
“She was born with all the wiles some women take a lifetime to learn,” said my grandfather. “And then only get half of them.”
He spoke with approval. I quickly realised that I had been born with none of those wiles.
On this particular March morning I did not care. I saw that the rooks were busy making their nests and I saw some meadow-pipits, which we sometimes called tit-larks. They were a little like larks and could be mistaken for them by some who had not studied them as I had. I loved to see them on the ground, where they ran instead of hopped. I heard the cry of a redshank—a sort of whimper. I would not go near her because the nest would not be far off and it would throw her into panic if anyone approached her young.
I came past Enderby Hall. No one lived there, which was rather absurd, said my father. A big house like that, furnished, standing vacant just because Carlotta had some caprice to keep it so. The house had been left to her by Robert Frinton with the rest of his fortune, and at one time she had thought to sell it and suddenly and capriciously, said my father, had changed her mind.
I didn’t like Enderby very much. When we were young Carlotta had tried to frighten me there. She told me how when she was very small she had wandered in there and been lost. They had all been in a panic and finally she was discovered in a cupboard fast asleep. Robert Frinton had been so taken with her that he had called it Carlotta’s cupboard.
She enticed me into it and tried to lock me in but I had known what she might have in mind too and for once in my life had been too quick for her. “Silly!” she had said afterwards. “I wouldn’t have kept you there. I just wanted you to learn what it feels like to be shut up alone in a haunted house.” She had looked at me with that trace of malice she often showed. “Some people’s hair turns white overnight,” she said. “Some just die of fright. I wonder what you would look like with white hair? It might be better than no real colour at all.”
Yes, there had been times when Carlotta had been merciless. But I had never faltered in my admiration and I always sought her attention and was gratified to receive it even when it could result in ghoulish experiments such as she had planned for me in the cupboard in Enderby Hall.
I rode past, skirting the land which my father had bought and which had once belonged to Enderby. There was a wall about it now.
I came past Grasslands Manor, the home of the Willerbys, and young Thomas Willerby saw me and called to me.
I would have to go in. They expected it; and old Thomas loved to have callers. He was particularly fond of everyone from our family.
I took my horse to the stables and Thomas and I went into the house together.
Old Thomas was delighted to see me. I told him the news while he sent for wine and cakes, which I should have to take because he would be hurt if I didn’t. He loved to show his hospitality.
I told him my mother was returning home and he said how glad we must be and how happy to have an addition to the family.
I admitted I was longing for my mother’s return. She would have all the news of the baby and Carlotta to tell us.
He said: “I have some news too. I have bought a place near York.”
“Oh,” I said, “You really will be going then.”
“As you know, my dear, I have been shilly-shallying for a long time, but now I really have made up my mind.”