A Dream from the Night

CHAPTER ONE 1898-2

But after Gerald’s death they found that not only did he owe a large amount of money because most Subalterns in India lived well above their means, but he had in a moment of mistaken generosity backed the bill of a brother Officer who was in trouble from his creditors.

It must have been one of those coincidences, Olinda thought, that happen so often in real life but which people expect only to happen in books.

The very week Gerald was killed on the frontier, his brother Officer, who had been sent on a special mission to Calcutta, died of cholera.

The bill that Gerald had guaranteed, thinking presumably that he would never be expected to pay it, was then brought to his mother by the firm it was owed to.

There was nothing Lady Selwyn could do but honour her son’s commitment and the only way she could pay off the bills he had left behind him was to mortgage three parts of her pension for the next five years.

It had left her and Olinda, they had thought, just enough money to struggle on at The Manor and pay the wages of old Hodges in the garden and Nanny in the house.

“We must be very economical,” Olinda had said, “but we will manage.”

It meant, of course, that there were no new gowns for her and no chance, as her mother had planned, of her staying in London when she became eighteen with one of their relatives for a month or so during the Season.

She did not mind that, but, as Lady Selwyn’s health grew progressively worse, the special food that the doctors ordered for her, together with her medicines, made it impossible to make ends meet.

The knowledge of their financial insecurity gave Olinda’s voice a firmness as she said now,

“I shall go to Kelvedon House, Mama. But you are not to worry about me and I promise you I shall work so quickly that I shall be back loaded with golden sovereigns almost before you realise that I have gone!”

It took a great many hours of persuasion to make Lady Selwyn understand that it was the only possible solution.

But finally Olinda had written back to Mr. James Lanceworth to say that she would arrive at Derby Station at five o’clock on Wednesday, May 30th.

When she was dressed for the journey and the gown in sapphire blue batiste that she had made herself was covered by a travelling cape of the same colour, she looked so attractive that Lady Selwyn had reached out her hands to say,

“You ought not to go alone, Olinda! Supposing some – gentleman makes himself – unpleasant to you?”

“I will travel in a compartment for ladies only, Mama,” Olinda said reassuringly. “And, as for the gentlemen at Kelvedon House, I am quite certain that they will be far too grand to look at a humble seamstress.”

“I have heard tales,” Lady Selwyn said in a low voice, “of Governesses being insulted in houses where they were working. Promise me that you will lock your bedroom door very carefully at night.”

“Of course, Mama, if you want me to do so. And, if I even see the shadow of a gentleman coming up the back stairs, I will lock myself in and scream for the Police.”

“I am not joking, Olinda!”

“I know, dearest Mama. You are just worrying yourself over your small wee chick who is going out into the world all by itself. But have you forgotten I am nineteen and not a silly schoolgirl?”

She smiled.

“I shall behave with the greatest propriety and I promise that if there is any difficulty or unpleasantness I will come home at once.”

“Do you swear you will do that?” Lady Selwyn insisted. “All the money in the world, Olinda, is not worth your being insulted or treated in a manner that would make your Papa angry with me for having let you go on this mad escapade.”

“You make it sound a frivolous and luxurious jaunt, Mama,” Olinda laughed. “I promise you that it is just going to be hard work, but I am determined it shall be very highly paid and that is what matters.”

She pushed forward her small chin a little as she spoke and for a moment Lady Selwyn was reminded of Gerald when he wished to get his own way.

As usual when she thought of her son the pain of his loss was there and she was silent as Olinda went on,

“Nanny will look after you, Mama, and I have told all our friends in the village that they must come in and see you. Mrs. Parsons will read to you and the Miss Twitlets will take it in turns to arrange the flowers from the garden in your bedroom and do any shopping you may require.”

She sighed.

“Everyone has been very kind. I expect when I return that I shall find you have not even missed me!”

“I shall miss you every minute of the day, my dearest,” Lady Selwyn said, “and I shall not feel happy until you are back here with me safe and sound.”

“And rich!” Olinda added as she bent down to kiss her mother.

She had, however, not felt quite so confident when she reached the Railway station and found what a crowd of people there were waiting to catch the train to London.

It would have been impossible to make her way by train across country, the only practicable route was to take an express to Derby from King’s Cross, although it meant leaving Huntingdon at a very early hour in the morning.

Lady Selwyn had talked so much about the misadventures or the troubles in which she might be involved that Olinda was relieved when she found herself safely in a Second Class compartment for ‘Ladies Only’ and the train left the great Metropolis for Derby.

It was then that the sense of adventure began to seep over her and for the first time she felt excited rather than apprehensive of what lay ahead of her.

After all it would be thrilling to see Kelvedon House because it was, as she had thought, one of the most important houses in England.

She had found a whole article about it in a back number of The Illustrated London News.

Kelvedon House, she discovered, had been built in the reign of Queen Elizabeth on the site of a Monastery.

The house had been erected in three stages, first by building on to what remained after the suppression of the monasteries by Henry VIII in 1536.

Then some years later it had been enlarged and made resplendent by the first Earl of Kelvedon who was Chamberlain to Queen Elizabeth.

Finally it had been completed and became even more magnificent at the end of the sixteenth century.

‘It sounds very wonderful,’ Olinda had said to herself as she looked at the drawing of the house that ornamented the centre of the article.

Then she went on to read of the consequence of its owner. He was, she discovered, sixty-five, but he still held great posts at Court and was constantly in waiting on Queen Victoria.

A long account of his importance in the County followed and at the end of the article it stated that he had married Lady Rosaline Alward, daughter of the Duke of Hull, and had as issue one son.

Olinda turned to the front page of The Illustrated London News and found that it was five years old.

‘That means’ she thought, ‘that the Earl must now be dead since the letter came from the Dowager Countess of Kelvedon.’

She had put the magazine away and did not mention the present Earl, feeling that it might make Lady Selwyn more apprehensive than she already was.

She could not help wondering, however, how old the son might be. It seemed likely that he was about forty and therefore would not constitute the sort of danger her mother feared.

‘Poor Mama,’ Olinda thought. ‘She still thinks that we are moving in smart Society. She does not understand that poverty makes quite sure that one’s station in life is a very low one.’

As she packed for the journey, it had not been a matter of choosing which clothes she should take with her but of taking everything she had.

They were all simple plain dresses she had made herself and she thought perhaps that if Kelvedon House was as grand as it had looked in the article it was a good thing that she would be confined to the back quarters.

There she would not encounter the fashionable ladies or the dashing gentlemen who would be entertained in the State apartments.

At the same time she knew that that was where she would actually be working.

There had been a reference made to Queen Elizabeth’s bedroom and the great bed she had slept in.

There was another room that was known of as the ‘Duchesse de Mazarin’s Room’ for it was here, the article said, that Charles II’s mistress, Hortense de Mazarin had slept.

Because she had greatly enjoyed her visit, she had given her host and hostess magnificent French hangings for the bed, which were still intact.

Olinda had brought with her a work-case filled with embroidery silks, but she was quite certain that she would require a great deal more.

She only hoped that the Dowager Countess would be prepared to pay for them because they were expensive and she had very little money left.

She had taken with her only the minimum amount that she required for the journey and enough to tip the maids who would look after her.

She was sure that they would only be under-housemaids who would not expect much.

At the same time it meant that she could not leave much for her mother and she had already arranged with Nanny that the moment she received any remuneration for her embroidery she would despatch it home immediately.

‘It’s an adventure!’ Olinda told herself as the train gathered speed and she looked out onto the countryside bathed in sun. ‘I am glad I am visiting Kelvedon in the summer. The gardens will be beautiful and there will be so much to tell Mama about them and, of course, about the house also.’

Her father had taught her a great deal about pictures and furniture.

He had never had enough money to be a collector of beautiful things, but that did not prevent him from having an appreciative knowledge of them.

He had travelled to Italy and he had described to Olinda in detail the masterpieces he had seen in the Vatican and in the great Palaces and museums of Rome.

Because his daughter had listened to him attentively, he had bought her books in which she could read of such national treasures and even when she had been small he had taken her round some of the museums in London.

‘I wish Papa could be with me now,’ Olinda thought.

Although he had been dead since she was fifteen, she still missed him because he had brought so much interest into her life besides imparting to her a desire for knowledge, which in the last years when her mother was so ill, she had had little chance to develop.

Occasionally she would go into Huntingdon on the carrier and come back with a book she longed to read and on which she had expended her money rather than buy material for a gown or a new hat.

Fortunately the Vicar had quite a considerable library.

Although the books were mostly old-fashioned and out of date, Olinda could borrow them as she wished and found quite a lot to interest her.

‘But I am ignorant, very ignorant,’ she told herself. ‘What would Papa say if he knew what little chance I have of becoming better informed?’

There was no answer to this, except that now for the first time she would have a chance of seeing a house that was part of history and could learn about its contents.

‘It’s exciting,’ Olinda told herself again and again during the long journey and, when finally she stepped out at Derby Station, it was like walking into a new world.

There was a smart liveried footman wearing white breeches and highly polished boots raising a top hat from his head as he came to meet her.