The Song of the Siren (23 page)

“Yes, she is,” said my grandmother. “She has that rare beauty which now and then appears. It is as though all the good fairies were at her christening. Your sister, Carlotta, has the same, Damaris.”

“Yes,” I agreed.

“We played Romeo and Juliet,” went on my grandmother, her eyes vague as she looked back into the past.

“We’ll content ourselves with charades,” said Elizabeth.

So we planned. And I was at Grasslands every day rehearsing under Elizabeth’s instructions.

Matt was no good as a performer and I loved him all the more for that. It put him in the same category as myself.

One day I was a little upset. I was in Elizabeth’s sewing room and as it was a warm day the window was wide open. I was on the

167window seat and Elizabeth was examining a dress which she was holding up.

The sound of voices floated up from below. I recognised that of Mary Rook.

“Well, it struck us as really strange like. He were so mad Now why should he want to keep everyone away so ... if it weren’t for what was there and what he do know to be there.”

My heart had begun to beat faster. I knew that Elizabeth was listening, although she was stroking the silk of the dress as though completely absorbed by it.

“Mark my words, there’s something there.”

“What do you think it be, Mary?”

“Well, I don’t rightly know. Jacob he thought it might be some sort of treasure, he did.”

I was very still. The impulse to move away came to me but I felt I had to listen to what they were saying.

“You see, them that used to live there ... they was took away suddenly. It were some plot. Well, Jacob says mayhap they hid “

something in that patch ... some treasure like and he do know it and j

wants it for himself.” j

“Treasure, Mary ... !” ‘

“Well, ‘tis something there, ain’t it? Must be. Why should he get so j

raving mad just because Jacob sets a trap. They be settin g traps all through the woods ... they don’t matter there. Is just a trap.”

“But there be this ghost up at the house. ...”

“You’re asking me. I tell you there’s something in that patch he don’t want people to know about. .. .”

They had moved away from the window.

Elizabeth laughed.

“Servants’ gossip,” she said. “I think this dress would do for you, my dear. I wore it in one of my young girl roles.”

We were all excited about the charades. It was to be a sort of tableau to describe words. We should do it in a most elaborate fashion and there were to be two teams competing against each other.

Elizabeth would be in charge of the teams, and when she selected them she put Matt and me together. Our words were “cloak and

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dagger” and we were to illustrate these historically. The cloak was to be represented by the scene from Queen Elizabeth’s reign when Raleigh spread his cloak for Elizabeth to walk on and I was to be Elizabeth, Matt, Raleigh. I was to be dressed in a most elaborate Elizabethan costume and Matt’s would be equally authentic.

“I have to choose parts according to what I had in my trunk,” Elizabeth explained.

After the scene with the cloak I was to make a few changes to my costume and become Mary Queen of Scots. Matt was Rizzio and we would then enact the scene by mime of that supper in Holyrood House when Rizzio was murdered. That would represent the dagger.

The other team were to do theirs first. We should watch that and guess. But first there was to be a buffet supper.

It had been one of the lovely September days-golden days. I think all days were golden to me at that time for I was becoming more and more certain that Matt loved me. He could not have stayed here all this time, been with me so often and pretended to enjoy my company. Oh no, there was something in this. I had an idea that if I had not been so young he would have spoken of his intentions by now.

That Elizabeth liked me, I was sure. She had taken to treating me as a daughter, so surely that was significant.

When I had arisen that morning the first thing I thought of was the party and the dress I would wear, which was most becoming. Elizabeth’s sewing woman had altered it to fit me and I could scarcely wait to play the part.

My mother said: “You’ve changed lately, Damaris. You’re growing up.”

“Well, it’s time I did,” I said. “You sound as though you don’t want me to.”

“Most mothers want to keep their children babies as long as possible.”

“And that,” I said, “is quite impossible.”

“A sad fact we all have to realise.” She put her arms about me and said: “Oh, Damaris, I do want you to be happy.”

“I am,” I said ecstatically. “I am.”

“I know,” she answered.

Then I started to tell her about my dress, which I must have

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described to her twenty times before, and she listened as though she was hearing it for the first time. She seemed reconciled. I hoped she was getting over that first unreasonable dislike of Matt.

It was warm when the sun rose and chased away the morning mists. The summer was nearly over. “In the autumn I shall have to go,” Matt had said.

The only sadness at that time was the thought that it could not last.

But before he goes he will speak to me, I thought. He must.

I was not quite fifteen. It was young but obviously not too young to be in love.

In the afternoon I went to Grasslands. I was going to wear the Elizabethan costume for the whole evening.

“We can’t get you all dressed up like that in five minutes,” said Elizabeth. “Besides, all those in the charades will wear their costumes.”

“It makes it like a fancy dress ball,” I said.

“Well, let us call it that,” she said.

She took great pleasure in dressing me, and how we laughed as she helped me to get into what was called the under propper, the purpose of which was to make my skirt stand out all round me. Then I put on-with Elizabeth’s help-the dress, which was magnificent in a way, though perhaps it would seem a little tawdry by daylight.

“It has been lying in a trunk for a long time,” said Elizabeth, “but it will look really fine in the light of the candles. No one will see where the velvet is scuffed and the jewels bits of glass. How slender you are. That is good. It makes it easier to wear.”

The skirt was rouched and festooned with bows of ribbon; it was lavishly sprinkled with brilliants which might look like diamonds in candlelight.

“You make a good queen,” said Elizabeth.

Then she frizzed my hair and made it stand up and stuffed false pieces into it to make it look abundant. “A pity you aren’t red haired,” she said. “Then everyone would recognise you at once as the Queen. Never mind, I believe she wore wigs of all colours, so this is one of her nights for brown.”

She put a circlet of brilliants in my hair and then when she added

170the lace ruff about my neck and stood back to admire her handiwork, she clasped her hands together.

“Why, I wouldn’t recognise you, Damaris,” she said.

It was true. I gasped as I looked at my reflection.

“Who would believe anyone could be so changed?”

“It’s a few deft touches here and there, my dear. We learn that in the theatre.”

When I saw Matt we stared at each other and burst into laughter. He too had become a different person.

He stood there before me in his yellow ruff and his bombasted breeches, which were so wide that it was impossible for him to walk easily. His doublet was embroidered; his hose gartered at the knee, displaying his well-shaped calves, and he wore a little velvet hat with a fine feather curling over the brim. Most important of all was the cloak-an elaborate affair to fit the occasion. It was velvet and decorated with shining red stones and massive glass imitation diamonds.

He looked different. I was glad to see him without his periwig and I thought it a pity that the fashion of wearing wigs prevailed in our times. He looked younger in spite of the elaborate costume and the fact that the cut of the breeches made him walk with a very stately gait.

He bowed to me solemnly.

“I do declare,” he said, “Your Majesty looks most forbidding.”

“It will be for the first time in my life,” I replied.

There was dancing before the supper. Elizabeth Pilkington was a great organiser and she knew how to arrange these affairs. She had asked exactly the right number of guests. Besides members of my family there were several who had come in from the neighbouring countryside.

Matt and I were together throughout the evening.

“No one else could dance with us,” he said. “I feel more than a little cumbersome.

How do you feel?”

“The same,” I said.

Everyone admired our costumes and said how they were looking forward to seeing the charades, which were to be the highlight of the evening.

I had never enjoyed a party so much before. This one I wanted to

I

171go on and on forever, although I was a little apprehensive about my performance in the charades.

“You’ll be wonderfull,” said Matt. “In any case it’s only a game.”

During the evening he said to me: “I’m getting very fond of you, Damaris.”

I was silent. My heart was beating fast. I had had a feeling that he would speak to me about our future on an occasion like this.

“Oh, Damaris,” he said, “it’s a pity you’re so young.”

“I don’t feel young. It’s only a matter of years....”

He laughed. “Well, that’s what it’s all about, isn’t it?”

He patted my hand and then changed the subject.

“Thank heaven,” he said, “that we don’t have to speak lines. I should never remember them. I’m afraid I have not inherited my mother’s talent.”

“Your mother should have been Elizabeth. She would have done it beautifully.”

“No, she was anxious for you to do it. Besides, she’s busy being the hostess.”

I was sure that he had been on the point of making some proposal. Oh, how I wished he had!

We should have to wait awhile, of course. Everyone would say I was too young for marriage. I would have to wait until I was nearly sixteen. That was more than a year.

Well, that did not seem so bad. I would be Matt’s betrothed. If I only knew that we were to be married in a given time I could wait and be happy.

He took me into supper and I did not notice what I ate. I was too excited. The wine was cool and refreshing and I was nervously awaiting my appearance as the Queen.

Then the moment came.

Elizabeth announced that the guests were now going to see the charades and the audience must guess the words we were acting.

We had taken supper in two of the rooms which led from the hall and it was in the hall itself that the performances would take place.

There was a dais at one end, which was very useful, and a curtain had been drawn across it.

The first of the charades went off very well. Then it was our turn. Behind the curtain Matt and I waited. It would be drawn back and I

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would be standing at one side of the dais in all my finery and Matt would be at the other. We had two attendants each-all dressed in Elizabethan costume.

There was a round of applause and we went into action. I tried to assume a Queen’s regal manners and Matt was most courtly as the gallant Walter Raleigh.

This was a short scene. The next one would be longer. I looked across at Matt. He smiled at me. He took off his hat and made a deep bow. Then I stepped forward and looked down at the ground and tried to assume an expression of distaste as Elizabeth had taught me. I shrank back and Matt took off his cloak, spread it on the floor and I walked over it.

I looked at him fondly. He bowed. Left the cloak where it was. I put my arm through his and the curtain fell.

There was loud applause.

The curtain was drawn back.

“Take a bow ... together,” said Elizabeth from the side of the stage.

So we just stood there, rather embarrassed, while they applauded.

The curtain was dropped and a small table was put on the dais. 1 had donned a headdress of black trimmed with pearls which came to a peak in the centre of my forehead. I had put a black cloak over my finery and was seated at the table. Matt had discarded his hat and wore a wig of dark curls. It was amazing how that transformed him.

He was seated at my feet and the others who had been our attendants in the spreading of the cloak incident were seated beside me at the table.

Matt had a lute on which he was strumming and he was looking up at me with an adoration which I found most affecting.

We remained thus for some time. Then those who had been Raleigh’s attendants and were now transformed into Rizzio’s enemies came onto the dais from the other side.

They dashed at Matt. One of them held high a dagger, which he pretended to plunge into Matt’s heart.

He looked so fierce that for a moment I was really frightened.

Then Matt rolled over realistically and the curtain fell.

The audience applauded wildly. The curtain was drawn back and Matt stood up.

173”Take a bow,” whispered Elizabeth.

So we stood in front of the dais hand in hand and then there was a sudden bark. Everyone turned round. Belle had come into the hall.

She bounded up to the dais, evidently highly pleased with herself. Then we saw that she carried something in her mouth. She laid it almost reverently at Matt’s feet.

“Whatever is it?” cried Elizabeth coming forward. She was about to pick it up when she drew back.

My father had come forward. He knelt. Belle watched, head on one side, tail wagging with delight.

“It looks like an old shoe,” said my father, and I noticed that he had grown rather pale.

“It is an old shoe,” said Elizabeth. “Where did you find that, Belle?”

I lay in my bed thinking about the evening. It had been such fun. I was sure Matt had been going to say something to me ... something about our future. But he didn’t, and from the moment when Belle had come in the atmosphere had changed.

Elizabeth had sent for one of the servants to take the shoe away. It was too filthy for us to touch. It was unfortunate that it should be Mary Rook who came. She brought an ash pan and a little broom. Then she curtsied and went out with it, Belle following her.