The House of Lyall (3 page)

Unfortunately, after running down the steps and going to the ticket office, she was told that trains from there ran north only, and she'd have to go to the station at the other side of Guild Street to get a train to the south. She trailed back up to the street level, turning left as the ticket man had directed her, but – although it was only a matter of crossing the street and going along a wee bit – by the time she reached the LNER station, she was confused and completely demoralized once again.

After taking a few faltering steps, she came to a trembling halt with tears streaming down her cheeks and her hands over her ears to blot out the cacophony around her. She stood thus for at least five minutes, nobody taking any notice of her until a gentle hand on her shoulder made her look up into the concerned face of a young man in a flat black hat and a priest's flowing robe.

‘Are you lost, my child?' he asked. ‘Where do you want to go?'

Marion couldn't answer that. She
was
lost, but not in the sense that he meant. ‘I've run away,' she whispered at last, compelled by his calling to tell him at least part of the truth. But not wanting him to be under any misapprehension, she added, ‘I'm not a Catholic.'

‘Priests help all God's creatures,' he smiled, ‘even if they are not Roman Catholics. What is your religion, my dear?'

‘I went to the parish church at hame.'

‘Can't I persuade you to go home again?' At her tearful, mute shake of the head, he took her by the arm. ‘If you have nowhere to stay, the Church of Scotland, like us, runs a place where young girls may have a bed for the night. Would you like me to show you where it is?'

They had just turned into Bridge Street when he said, ‘I haven't asked your name yet. Mine is Father Bernard.'

Marion wished that hers was more in keeping with the life she wanted to lead, and with a feeling of destroying all bridges behind her, she said, ‘My name's Mar … Marianne … Marianne Cheyne.' It wasn't such an awful lie. She had just changed one letter and added another two, but it sounded so much better. It was just a pity she hadn't thought of changing her last name as well.

‘Would you be looking for work, Marianne?'

‘I've been in service before.'

‘I wasn't suggesting you go into service. I know some ladies who run a children's wear shop in Holburn Street, and they have been speaking of taking on a smart young girl to help them. Would you manage that?'

‘I'm sure I could.'

‘I shall take you there first.' Father Bernard took her across the street and up a long flight of stone steps. ‘It's shorter this way than going by Union Street,' he smiled, as they made their breathless way to the top.

After passing a beautifully turreted granite building which she took to be a castle but which he told her was the main post office, he led her into a narrow street which eventually led them out on to Holburn Street, where the shop was.

While they walked, he told her a little about the ladies who ran it. ‘There are three unmarried sisters, but Miss Esther keeps house for Miss Emily and Miss Edith. They live in Strawberry Bank.'

‘What a lovely name for a house!' Marianne exclaimed.

‘Strawberry Bank is the name of the street,' he grinned. ‘Miss Esther, the youngest, seems quite happy to be the homemaker. Miss Edith, the brains behind the business, is the eldest, and Miss Emily, the middle one, is the quietest. They are dear ladies, all three.'

The sign above the shop window read ‘E. & E. Rennie, Children's Outfitters'. The two elderly ladies within raised their heads when the doorbell tinkled, their faces lighting up when they saw the priest. ‘Father Bernard!' they chorused. ‘How nice to see you.'

Marianne lost track of the order of events then, everything happened so quickly, but when she lay down that night in the attic room in the Rennies' cottage in Strawberry Bank, she had an assistant's job, she had two serviceable serge skirts and two plain blouses for work, and was also the proud possessor of a barathea skirt, and a cream silk blouse for Sundays … with a frill at the neck. These had been purchased for her by Miss Esther on Miss Edith's instructions after Marianne told them that she had run away from home without any clothes because her father's new wife made her life unbearable.

As the priest had said, they were dear ladies, all three. Miss Esther was inclined to twitter a bit, probably because she was on her own all day and was glad to have someone to talk to. She was plumper than the other two, the result of testing her cooking for seasoning, likely. Her rosy face was round, her full lips nearly always turned up in a smile. Her white hair was often rather untidy, except on Sundays, she said, when Miss Edith put in her hairpins for her so that they would not fall out in church. Miss Esther could be classed as happy-go-lucky, Marianne decided.

Miss Emily was indeed the quiet one, listening to what her sisters said when she was at home, yet able to keep up lengthy conversations with customers in the shop, or maybe it just seemed that way and it was the customers who did most of the talking. Not only was she the middle of the three in age, she was also middle in height, about two inches taller than Miss Esther, who was barely five feet, but shorter than Miss Edith, who was about five feet six. Miss Emily, although she had a pleasant heart-shaped face, was inclined to be rather prim and occasionally showed her displeasure by gripping in her mouth if anyone made a remark which she considered not in the best of taste. She was slim, but not too thin, and particular about her appearance, her black dresses immaculate and the soft, silvery coil of hair on the crown of her head with never one strand out of place. Miss Emily was … well, daintily quiet was the only description for her.

Miss Edith had the strongest personality. She had a long face with clean-cut features and sharp-blue eyes. Her hair, dragged back into a tight bun at the nape of her neck, was steel-grey, and her body was verging on the scraggy. Her words were clipped when she spoke, she gave the impression of being stern and forbidding at times, but Marianne soon got to know that it was just a veneer. Miss Edith was a sheep in wolves' clothing.

Marianne didn't feel that she had deceived the Rennies. They were pleased to have an assistant – they would have fitted her out with clothes for the shop anyway – and she would work hard to repay them. Best of all, she still had four pounds nineteen shillings plus a few coppers left of the five sovereigns. She had better hang on to that in case … well, just in case. But come what may, she wouldn't dream of stealing from her benefactors, or whatever the female version of that was.

She had been really lucky this time. God had given her a wee taste of what he could do to her if she ever stole again … but she wouldn't have to, would she? She'd been weak yesterday but she felt different now. She would work hard and make something of herself, do anything she had to, to make a success of her life – but she wouldn't do anything dishonest.

Chapter Two

Trade had been very brisk in the weeks leading up to Christmas, but the lull during the first three months of 1895 gave the Rennies and their assistant time to clean shelves and glass cases properly and arrange their replenished stocks to Miss Edith's satisfaction. It being found that Marianne had a penchant for setting out an eye-catching window display, she was allowed to carry out this important task at least once a week, more often if any of the items on show were removed and sold, which became a more regular occurrence as March came to an end and April brought sunshine along with its showers.

The shop was extremely busy on Saturdays, but as Marianne – this was how she always thought of herself now – decided one Saturday in early April, while she went to fetch another batch of white wool from the storeroom at the back, the premises were so tiny that even four customers filled the shop and six made it look crowded. There had been a steady stream all afternoon today, though those who had to wait to be served showed no impatience. In fact, the eyes of the young mothers or elderly grandmothers were usually caught by something other than what they had come to buy, which meant extra sales, and was it any wonder with the Rennie sisters being so obliging and polite, no matter what?

They darted about their little emporium like birds, from counter to shelves, or to drawers, or to stands, even to the window display, and didn't mind laying out dozens of items for someone to choose from, be they expensive christening robes (lovingly and beautifully stitched by Miss Esther), or the cheap woollen mittens and bootees knitted by Miss Emily in the evenings while Miss Edith wrote up the books.

Marianne could still scarcely believe her luck in being part of it. The Rennies had taken her completely under their collective wing; they had given her room and board as well as wages, and they were so clearly glad of the extra pair of hands in the shop that they never made her feel under any obligation to them. They had taught her by example how to deal patiently with members of the public bent on being difficult, although there were very few of them; how to remove – surreptitiously and with no change in gracious manner – sticky little fingers that were exploring the garments within their reach; how to suggest, without making it too obvious, that a pale green coat and hat set would suit ginger (this word was never mentioned, of course) hair much better than a bright scarlet.

It was all very exciting to Marianne, but the most exciting thing that had happened to her was meeting Andrew. When the three sisters had been in such a state of chirping nervousness about the nephew who was coming for Christmas dinner, she had known he was someone really special. Miss Esther had told her he was the son of their darling brother Edward, who had gone to live in Edinburgh many years before.

‘Sadly,' she had continued, ‘he died not long after his only child was born, and Annette, his wife, was so afraid that anything would happen to Andrew that she hardly let him out of her sight. We didn't see him at all when he was a child, but we met him at her funeral, and again … oh, it must have been last August, when he came to tell us he had been accepted for Aberdeen University and would be starting there at the beginning of October. He can't really have had time to settle down, yet he's coming to visit us already. He's a dear boy.'

Believing that anyone under fifty would be a boy to Miss Esther, Marianne had paid little heed to this, but Andrew had definitely been under fifty, more than thirty years under, and his clear grey eyes had lit up when they fell on her. Marianne, not long fifteen, had felt deeply flattered by the warmth of his smile when Miss Edith introduced them, and the strength of his handclasp had made her heart speed up in a fluttery manner for the very first time in her life.

Concentrating on every word spoken in case she missed any relevant information about him, she'd learned that he was eighteen, a first-year law student. By dint of an arch question asked by one of his aunts, Marianne had even got to know that as yet he had no lady-friend, and the knowing look exchanged by Miss Esther and Miss Emily had not escaped her; they were planning some matchmaking in a year or two, with her as the lucky girl.

Andrew had turned down his aunts' frequent invitations to Sunday tea by saying he hoped they would understand that he had to study every minute he could, but he did promise to take an afternoon and evening off at Easter, which was why, at five to one on the afternoon of Easter Sunday, Marianne was sitting decorously on the edge of the sofa so as to make a good impression. At the other end sat Miss Esther, strands of fluffy white already escaping from the chignon Miss Edith wanted her to adopt but which wouldn't stay pinned, her blue eyes expectant, cheeks flushed, hands
fidgeting ever so slightly against the dark blue crepe of her Sunday dress. Still persisting in tasting what she cooked, Miss Esther's girth had gradually increased, and Marianne couldn't help thinking that she would soon be a proper roly-poly … though that was a bit unkind.

The other two sisters were occupying the armchairs by the fireside, consciously or not staking their claim as bread-winners to the best seats, but while Miss Emily – a faint wave at the front of her immaculate silver coiffure – nervously crossed and uncrossed her black-stockinged legs under cover of her skirt, Miss Edith appeared to be in perfect control of her emotions. She had hidden the deep hollow at her neck with a stand-up collar, but she could do nothing to camouflage the hollows in her cheeks, which made her long narrow nose appear even longer and more pointed: Children with vivid imaginations would see her as a witch, Marianne reflected, especially in that black bombazine dress which did nothing for her. It fell straight from shoulder to hips, her bust, if she had one, lost under heavy tucks of material.

A barely discernible tic at her jawline, however, showed that she was not as composed as she looked, and Marianne couldn't help but pity all three sisters. The nervousness, the preparations for the elaborate meal and the production of best china and tablecloth, and all because there would be an unaccustomed male presence in the house – a young man who likely had to eat off unmatched china in his room at the varsity. Still, as he had proved the last time he was here, Andrew Rennie was a perfect gentleman who wouldn't spoil his aunts' pleasure by telling them so.

He arrived at one o'clock exactly, making Marianne suspect that he had waited outside so as not to be early. That was the kind of boy he was, she mused, wondering if gaining his degree and then training to become a solicitor would make him rich enough for her to consider as a future husband. She liked the way his brown hair waved at the front, and his neat, rather gingery moustache; she loved his grey eyes and the strong lines of his face. He was a good bit taller than she was, at least seven inches more than her five feet three, and very handsome. She wouldn't mind marrying him … but she wasn't going to jump at the first boy she met. There was plenty of time yet, and who knew, she might come across somebody with more money than Andrew could ever earn. In any case, once he was soliciting, or whatever solicitors did, he wouldn't want to tie himself to a country quine with little education.