Look Listen and Love

Chapter One 1904-2

“But I am hungry,” Lady Rothley said plaintively. “I am always hungry.”

“You eat far too much of those rich meals when you are out,” Tempera said firmly. “You must diet a little when you are at home – besides, it is more economical.”

Lady Rothley did not answer.

She was gobbling up her egg and thinking that she would spread the two pieces of toast that Tempera allowed her thickly with butter and add several spoonfuls of marmalade.

She liked eating, at the same time she wanted to keep her small waist as she knew it was one of her most distinctive attractions.

But it was difficult – very difficult – when everything tasted so delicious and the food at the parties where she was entertained was so superlative.

No Edwardian hostess could lag behind another when it came to hospitality.

A few minutes elapsed before Tempera came back from her father’s Study where the books of reference were kept. Most of them referred to Art, but he had a copy of Debrett because it had been important that when Tempera addressed letters to the distinguished noblemen who sought his advice she did it correctly.

As she entered her stepmother’s bedroom Lady Rothley looked up expectantly.

“Well?” she asked.

“He is thirty-nine,” Tempera replied, “has a house in London and one in Somerset, belongs to all the best clubs, and – ”

She paused for effect.

“ – a wife and five children!”

Lady Rothley gave a scream of annoyance.

“Every married man should have a brand on his forehead, or a chain around his wrist,” she said peevishly. Tempera laughed.

“Never mind, Belle-mère, perhaps he will get his wife to invite you to a smart party where you will meet some eligible bachelors.”

“But he was so charming,” Lady Rothley pouted. “I might have guessed, might I not, that there would be something wrong?”

“Like the man you met last week whom we learnt was practically bankrupt,” Tempera replied. “I had my suspicions about him when I saw that he belonged to only one not very important club.”

As Tempera set out towards the National Gallery, taking a horse-drawn omnibus to Trafalgar Square, she tried not to mind that the last memento of her father must be sacrificed on the altar of fashion.

She had kept back the Durer drawing because she loved it and also because as she had said when they sold his other picture,

“We must have something in reserve for a ‘rainy day.’”

She had been thinking as she spoke that either her stepmother or herself might become ill, that the roof might need repair, or, which would be a worse disaster, that Agnes would wish to retire.

They would never be able to acquire another servant so cheaply, Tempera was well aware of that.

Besides, because Agnes had been with her mother until she died, she was extremely fond of the old woman and could not imagine the small house in Curzon Street without her.

But Agnes was seventy-seven and the day was undoubtedly dawning when she would no longer be able to carry on keeping the majority of the rooms clean and cooking their frugal meals.

Tempera cooked when anything special was required but she had so much to do for her stepmother that she had little time for anything else.

Although a basic number of Lady Rothley’s gowns since she came out of mourning were bought from dressmakers, it was Tempera who trimmed her delightfully glamorous hats far more cheaply than a Milliner could.

It was Tempera who pressed, darned and cleaned, and Tempera who by the judicious use of new ribbons and added flowers or frills could make an old gown look like new.

When she returned home it was after six o’clock and she knew that the shops would be shut. She was therefore not surprised to find her stepmother lying on the sofa in the Drawing Room on the first floor.

She looked like a recumbent Venus and her eyes were closed. But when Tempera opened the door she raised her head and asked quickly,

“How much did you get?”

“Seventy-five pounds!” Tempera replied.

Lady Rothley gave a little cry of delight and sat up.

“Seventy-five pounds! That is wonderful!”

“We must not spend it all – we really must not, Belle-mère,” Tempera ventured.

She saw the expression on her stepmother’s face and said, “I was thinking on the way back that if we put twenty-five pounds aside for any emergency you could have the rest.”

“Well, I suppose fifty pounds is better than nothing!” Lady Rothley said grudgingly.

“I can trim the hats you had last summer so that no-one would ever recognise them,” Tempera said, “and I was thinking that if we put some new white lace on that gown you wore at Ascot it would look quite different, and the colour suits you so well.”

As she spoke she realised that her stepmother was not listening.

It was so unlike her when clothes were being discussed that she said quickly,

“What is it? There is something you have not told me.”

Lady Rothley looked uncomfortable, then said,

“The Duke expects me to bring a lady’s maid.”

Tempera was still for a moment. Then she sat down in a chair.

“Did he actually say so?”

“Of course! He said, ‘If you and your maid will be at Victoria Station at 10 o’clock on Friday morning, Colonel Anstruther will be there to look after you.’”

“Is that his Comptroller?” Tempera asked.

“Yes – a charming man. I have met him several times at Chevingham House. He is a gentleman, of course, and the Duke seems to rely on him in every way.”

They were evading the main issue and they both knew it. After a pregnant silence Tempera said,

“Is it absolutely – essential for you to take a lady’s maid?”

“How can I go without one?” Lady Rothley asked. “You know I cannot manage by myself, and all the other women guests will have one as a matter of course.”

“It is not going to be easy,” Tempera replied. “Apart from the expense I shall have to instruct her, and there is very little time.”

“I am sure you will be able to find someone good from the Domestic Agency in Mount Street,” Lady Rothley said confidently.

“You could not say that your maid was ill, or too old, like poor Agnes?” Tempera suggested. “Then perhaps Colonel Anstruther would find you a French maid, or one of the housemaids could look after you.”

“Not a French maid!” Lady Rothley gave a little scream. “You know how bad my French is. I would never be able to make her understand and besides I should feel so embarrassed arriving with a pile of luggage and no-one to look after it.”

“Very well,” Tempera said, “but it means one gown less, you realise that?”

Lady Rothley pouted.

“I cannot do with less than I have ordered already. I am sure Dottie Barnard will be in the parry, and I have told you how smart she is with a new gown to wear every night, and jewels which eclipse the chandeliers.”

“But Sir William is one of the richest men in England,” Tempera replied in a cold voice.

“Which is why he is so friendly with the King and all those Rothschilds.” Lady Rothley said. “Oh, Tempera, if only we had some money!”

“If you marry the Duke you will have all you require and a great deal more besides,” Tempera answered.

“Then I refuse – absolutely refuse – to go to the South of France looking like a beggar-maid, although Heaven knows, Tempera, I do not want some stuffy, supercilious maid complaining she has to darn my clothes because they are falling into rags.”

Lady Rothley threw herself back against the cushions on the sofa with a little sound of exasperation.

“The trouble is, Tempera, I want so many new things, and it is only because of you that I have managed to hold together those I have.”

“I know, but we must try to find an understanding maid who is skilful with her needle.”

“She is certain to grumble and complain,” Lady Rothley groaned. “Like that poisonous woman just before your father died. ‘Really, my Lady, your underclothes look like a jig-saw puzzle!’ she used to say. How I disliked her!”

Tempera laughed.

“She did not stay long, and it was only when she had gone that we found all your things that she refused to mend bundled into the back of a drawer.”

“For goodness sake, do not get me anyone like her!” Lady Rothley pleaded. “And there was that other horror – what was her name?”

“I think you must mean Arnold,” Tempera replied.

“That is right – Arnold! She was always having her tea whenever I wanted her and refused to appear until the ‘sacred cup’ was finished.”

Tempera laughed again,

“I see I shall have to find a maid with no partiality for tea.”

“They all have that,” Lady Rothley said. “It is the ‘drug of the Servants’ Hall’, but when I said so to your father he replied it was preferable to gin! I did not think it was much of an answer.”

“I expect Papa was thinking of how much gin was consumed by servants in the 18th century,” Tempera replied, “and of course in all the big houses they still drink an enormous amount of beer.”

“The servants can drink champagne for all I care, as long as they are there to wait on me, but I am dreading the thought of this lady’s maid.”

Tempera did not answer.

She was taking off the plain hat which she had worn to go to the National Gallery and smoothing down the waves of her dark auburn hair.

She was very slim and graceful, but she looked very different from the fashionable women with whom her stepmother associated.

As if to accentuate the difference, instead of her hair being swept up in waves across the front, she drew it back from her forehead into a bun at the back of her head.

Only when she was busy did small tendrils curl round her face to soften the severity of the style which was reminiscent of the Madonna’s painted by the Early Italian Masters.

Tempera, hardly seeing her reflection in the mirror, pushed aside a few curls, thinking of her stepmother and the problem of finding a lady’s maid who would suit her.

Only Tempera realised in what bad repair were so many of her stepmother’s underclothes and she had to darn and darn her stockings, rather than throw them away as any other Lady of Fashion would have done.

The same thoughts must have been running through Lady Rothley’s head because suddenly with a little groan she said from the sofa,

“Oh, Tempera, if only you could come with me.”

“I wish I could,” Tempera answered. “I would give anything to see the South of France. Papa often described it to me and once he actually stayed at Lord Salisbury’s Villa at Beaulieu and visited the Villa Victoria, which belongs to Miss Alice Rothschild. He said it was packed – absolutely packed – with treasures. You must go there, Belle-mère.”

“I am not interested in treasures,” Lady Rothley replied, “only in the Duke, and I hope I shall know the right things to say to him.”

“He is very interested in paintings,” Tempera said. “He has a magnificent collection at Chevingham House, as you must have seen, and some fabulous Old Masters in the country. Papa often spoke of the Chevingham Collection.”

“If the Duke talks about them, what am I to answer?” Lady Rothley asked crossly. “You know I can never remember the names of all those tiresome painters. I get muddled between Raphael and Rubens. What is more, they all look the same to me.”

“Then say nothing,” Tempera begged. “When Papa lectured to students he told them that all he wanted them to do was ‘to look and listen.’ That is what you have to do, Belle-mère, just look and listen.”

She smilled and her voice softened as she added, “You will look so beautiful doing it that there will really be no need for you to say anything.”

“It is sometimes impossible not to,” Lady Rothley replied, “and when they say to me, ‘I know, of course, you like the style of Petronella, or Pepiana, or Popakatapettle’, or some such outlandish name, you will not be there to tell me who he really is.”

She paused, and there was an alert look in her eyes.

“Tempera! Why not come with me?”

“What do you – mean?” Tempera enquired.

“I mean who is to know – who would ever know? No one has ever seen you. You have never been anywhere and it would be everything to have you with me, to look after me and help me.”

Tempera was very still. Then she said,

“Are you suggesting, Belle-mère, that I come with you as your lady’s maid?”

“Why not?” Lady Rothley asked. “I am sure the lady’s maids are well looked after. I know Arnold would have had plenty to say if she were not!”

Tempera did not reply and after a moment Lady Rothley said,