Read Online The Rose of Sebastopol by Katharine McMahon - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Katharine McMahon
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lightly tapped her toe as I went on sewing. “I can hardly believe that I am here. All these weeks, months, years this is what I’ve wanted more than anything else, to be in the same room as you again.”
“What do you mean? You can’t mean it.”
“Nobody else gives me this feeling. What is it? Completion. The sense of being in absolutely the right place with absolutely the right person.”
“But you had so many friends in the north. Your letters were full of parties and outings.”
“Nonsense. All shallow, save for a very few exceptional people. There was no-one to replace you. When I see you bent over your work like that I remember your little brown head when we were children, your hair dropping onto your hands, the way I could never find out what was going on inside you however hard I tried.”
“There was nothing to discover.”
“Oh, there was. Oh, Mariella.”
I stared into her blue eyes and recognized that her features were exquisitely spaced. It was as if some artist, Alfred Stevens perhaps, had made deft marks with his charcoal on the perfect oval of her face.
“Mariella. Am I sharing a room with you, like we did before?”
“We thought you’d prefer your own room.”
“But don’t you remember the fun we had? I was fully expecting that we’d be sleeping together again.”
“We have plenty of rooms and my bedroom is small. We thought, as you may be with us some time, you might like somewhere of your own.”
“I’ve had years on my own. You saw how vast and empty Stukeley was. I was always lonely there. Or is it that you don’t want to be with me?” Dismay and uncertainty lurked at the back of her eyes.
“I thought you would find me dull and our house too small.”
“Small. No. Not small at all. It’s a home, full of loved things, I can tell. And dull. You? You were never dull. Mariella, this last year has been like living in a dark tunnel with no glimmer of light at the end. And then when Stepfather was dying, Max and I thought of asking you to rescue us, and all of a sudden I was full of hope. I’ve held on to all your letters, and the memory of those weeks we had together, the only time in my life when I’ve had a proper friend of my own age dearer than a sister.” She embraced me so that we stood breast to breast, her cheek against mine. Even though I didn’t quite believe that she could feel so much for me, it felt wonderful to be held so tightly, so I put my hand on her shoulder and kissed her, just below the ear.
Seven
DER BY SHIRE, 1844
W hen Mother and I first arrived at Stukeley, neither of the stepbrothers was home. The older, Horatio, was just completing his first year at Oxford and the younger, Maximilian, was at boarding school in Malvern. “He’ll be back any minute though,” said Rosa. “You’ll see. He never stays anywhere for long.”
In the meantime she and I spent hours on our own. We had duties to our respective mothers, Aunt Isabella needed occasional nursing even then, and I was required to continue with my cursory education, but otherwise we were free. Rosa used to hook her arm through mine and lead me to one of her secret haunts: a box hedge, hollow inside like a green cave, a turret with a view over half of Derbyshire, and a dressing room attached to her bedroom, where we sat under the dangling hems of her frocks. She had an obsession with being hidden away in a confined space, which meant I soon knew her intimately: the way her hair sprang in an irrepressible curl on the right side of her forehead, the fact that one front tooth was fractionally longer than the other, the angle at which the stem of her throat rose from the loose neck of her gown. When she was excited it was her habit to weave the fabric of her skirt over and under her fingers, then pull them out and dig them back into the little tunnels they’d made, and I became familiar with the grassy scent of her clean breath.
“Why do you like hiding places so much?” I
“What do you mean? You can’t mean it.”
“Nobody else gives me this feeling. What is it? Completion. The sense of being in absolutely the right place with absolutely the right person.”
“But you had so many friends in the north. Your letters were full of parties and outings.”
“Nonsense. All shallow, save for a very few exceptional people. There was no-one to replace you. When I see you bent over your work like that I remember your little brown head when we were children, your hair dropping onto your hands, the way I could never find out what was going on inside you however hard I tried.”
“There was nothing to discover.”
“Oh, there was. Oh, Mariella.”
I stared into her blue eyes and recognized that her features were exquisitely spaced. It was as if some artist, Alfred Stevens perhaps, had made deft marks with his charcoal on the perfect oval of her face.
“Mariella. Am I sharing a room with you, like we did before?”
“We thought you’d prefer your own room.”
“But don’t you remember the fun we had? I was fully expecting that we’d be sleeping together again.”
“We have plenty of rooms and my bedroom is small. We thought, as you may be with us some time, you might like somewhere of your own.”
“I’ve had years on my own. You saw how vast and empty Stukeley was. I was always lonely there. Or is it that you don’t want to be with me?” Dismay and uncertainty lurked at the back of her eyes.
“I thought you would find me dull and our house too small.”
“Small. No. Not small at all. It’s a home, full of loved things, I can tell. And dull. You? You were never dull. Mariella, this last year has been like living in a dark tunnel with no glimmer of light at the end. And then when Stepfather was dying, Max and I thought of asking you to rescue us, and all of a sudden I was full of hope. I’ve held on to all your letters, and the memory of those weeks we had together, the only time in my life when I’ve had a proper friend of my own age dearer than a sister.” She embraced me so that we stood breast to breast, her cheek against mine. Even though I didn’t quite believe that she could feel so much for me, it felt wonderful to be held so tightly, so I put my hand on her shoulder and kissed her, just below the ear.
Seven
DER BY SHIRE, 1844
W hen Mother and I first arrived at Stukeley, neither of the stepbrothers was home. The older, Horatio, was just completing his first year at Oxford and the younger, Maximilian, was at boarding school in Malvern. “He’ll be back any minute though,” said Rosa. “You’ll see. He never stays anywhere for long.”
In the meantime she and I spent hours on our own. We had duties to our respective mothers, Aunt Isabella needed occasional nursing even then, and I was required to continue with my cursory education, but otherwise we were free. Rosa used to hook her arm through mine and lead me to one of her secret haunts: a box hedge, hollow inside like a green cave, a turret with a view over half of Derbyshire, and a dressing room attached to her bedroom, where we sat under the dangling hems of her frocks. She had an obsession with being hidden away in a confined space, which meant I soon knew her intimately: the way her hair sprang in an irrepressible curl on the right side of her forehead, the fact that one front tooth was fractionally longer than the other, the angle at which the stem of her throat rose from the loose neck of her gown. When she was excited it was her habit to weave the fabric of her skirt over and under her fingers, then pull them out and dig them back into the little tunnels they’d made, and I became familiar with the grassy scent of her clean breath.
“Why do you like hiding places so much?” I
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