Page 111 of The Fortunes of Ashmore Castle

And then an unwelcome thought arrived: was she to remain unmarried in order to be her mother’s attendant in Linda’s place? Was she marked out as the spinster daughter-at-home, meek fetcher and carrier and possibly useful ‘aunt’ to the new baby? When the summer ended and Mama was out of childbed, would she be allowed to go home?

I have to! I have to go! She thought of the school, her friends, and she longed fiercely to be back there. If she tries to keep me here I’ll run away, she thought. But as Rachel had before her, she realised deep down that without money she could not get from the depths of Germany back to England. She would not get further than the Usingerdorf railway station.

The train beat its hypnotic rhythm on the rails, swaying like a dancer as the suburbs of London were left behind and it picked up speed. The smiling countryside, fat and dark green with August, rolled by the windows. The air was warm inside the compartment and smelt of dusty upholstery; the sunlight slanted in, with a shadow-flick from each telegraph pole it passed.

Sebastian looked down at his wife and said, ‘Are you all right? You’re very quiet. You’re not nervous, are you?’

‘Of course I am.’ She gave him the smile that said, I know more about the world than you, even though you’re older and much more clever.

‘There’s no need. You saw the letter – it couldn’t have been nicer.’

When they got back to England, he had written from their hotel to say that he would like to bring his wife to Ashmore on their way home to Henley, provided they would be welcome, and had received a reply inviting them in warm and civil terms.

‘What people say in letters and what you see in their eyes is not always the same thing,’ Dory said. ‘I don’t doubt they’ll put a good face on it.’

He took her hand. ‘I promise you this, if you’re at all uncomfortable we won’t stay.’

But it’s your home, Dory thought. I can’t be the reason you have to stay away. She smiled. ‘You’re very kind to me.’

‘Don’t start that again,’ he said, with mock sternness. ‘I’m not kind – you’re the kind one, to marry an old man and make him happy.’

‘Don’t you start that again! You’re not an old man.’

‘I don’t feel it when I’m with you. Are you happy, my love?’

‘So very happy,’ she said. ‘It’s hard to get used to, after all those years. I keep catching myself out, thinking I ought to be worrying, and then realising I don’t have to any more.’

‘No shadows?’ he asked.

She knew he meant about his part in Jack Hubert’s death. It was a question he asked now and then because, loving her so much, he sensed, or perhaps just feared, that it still troubled her. ‘No shadows,’ she said, and then, to change the subject, ‘You’ll have to begin playing the piano again when we get home. You’ve hardly touched one in months. You’ll be getting out of practice.’

He noticed that she had called it ‘home’. ‘Would you like me to teach you to play?’

She hadn’t expected that. ‘Aren’t I too old to learn?’

‘Not a bit. It’s just a matter of practice. You’ll soon get the hang of it. Then we could play duets.’

‘We do already,’ she said, giving him the look that made him long for bedtime.

The carriage was waiting for them at the station, with two greys harnessed, John Manley and Joe Green on the box. The porters carried out their valises: just overnight things – their big trunks had been sent straight to Henley. Joe Green jumped down, opened the carriage door and put down the step. John Manley was exchanging a greeting with Sebastian. He said, ‘Welcome home, sir.’

‘The horses look well,’ Sebastian said.

‘Thank you, sir.’

Dory thought he was going to ignore her existence as an unfortunate mistake, but then he said, ‘If I might be permitted, sir, to offer my congratulations? And my felicitations to your good lady.’

‘Thank you, Manley,’ Sebastian said. He bent to murmur in her ear, ‘There, you see? Nothing to worry about.’

Dory thought, Coachman is one thing. He doesn’t work in the house. He barely knew me when I was a servant.

With Crooks occupying the forward seat, they could not talk on the ride up to the Castle. The carriage and horses were well known in the village, and several people stopped to look as it went past. Dory felt absurdly that she should wave, like Queen Alexandra. They crossed the river by the stone bridge, passed through the gateposts, and then John Manley chirruped to the horses and they threw their weight into the collar for the pull up the hill. Dory remembered when she had walked up there for the first time, carrying her suitcase, on her way to a new job. She had been passed by two grooms exercising carriage horses and they had ignored her, as grooms in high-up stables usually ignored lower servants. And now she was riding behind those same horses, and would be transported to the front door. Life was strange.

As they swung round in front of the house, she saw there was a reception line waiting for them: his lordship and her ladyship and Mr Richard on one side, and on the other Mr Afton, William and Ellen. Dory knew how great houses worked. The full line-up was only for the master or mistress coming home after an absence, or for royalty. The servants here now were only the ones required: Mr Afton to open the carriage door, William to carry the luggage, and Ellen because Dory had no lady’s maid of her own, and one would have been assigned to her. On their long honeymoon holiday, she’d had to get used to being attended by a maid, but a hotel chambermaid, especially one who spoke little English, was a much lower hurdle than an English housemaid with all the proper notions, let alone one she had sat down with in the servants’ hall at mealtimes.

But for now there was the family to navigate. Her ladyship came straight to Dory, offered her hand, and said, with a shy smile, ‘I’m so pleased to welcome you to Ashmore Castle.’

Don’t call her ‘my lady’. Don’t call her ‘my lady’. ‘Thank you,’ Dory managed to say.