Highgate Rise - Anne Perry [44]
The maid departed to inquire whether they would be received, and Grandmama bent herself stiffly to sit in one of the chairs, staring around at the room critically. The pictures here were gloomy landscapes, framed samplers with such mottoes as “Vanity, vanity, all is vanity,” in cross-stitch; “The price of a good woman is above rubies,” framed in wood; and “God sees all,” with an eye in satin and stem stitches.
Caroline pulled a face.
Charlotte imagined the two sisters as girls sitting on a sabbath afternoon in silence, carefully sewing such things, all fingers and thumbs, hating every moment of it, wondering how long until tea when Papa would read the Scriptures to them; they would answer dutifully, and then after prayers be released to go to bed.
Grandmama cleared her throat and looked with disfavor at an enormous glass case filled with stuffed and mounted birds.
The antimacassars were stitched in brown upon linen, and all a trifle crooked.
The parlormaid returned to say that the Misses Worlingham would be charmed to receive them, and accordingly they followed her back across the hall and into the cavernous withdrawing room hung with five chandeliers. Only two of these were lit, and the parquet wooden floors were strewn with an assortment of Oriental rugs of several different shades and designs, all a fraction paler where the pile had been worn with constant tread, from the door to the sofa and chairs, and to a distinct patch in front of the fire, as if someone had habitually stood there. Charlotte remembered with an odd mixture of anger and loss how her father had stood in front of the fire in winter, warming himself, oblivious of the fact that he was keeping it from everyone else. The late Bishop Worlingham, no doubt, had done the same. And his daughters would not have raised their voices to object, nor would his wife when she was alive. It brought a sharp flavor of youth, being at home with her parents and sisters, the callowness and the safety of those times, taken for granted then. She glanced at Caroline, but Caroline was watching Grandmama as she sailed up to the elder of the Misses Worlingham.
“My dear Miss Worlingham, I was so sorry to hear of your bereavement. I had to come and offer my condolences in person, rather than simply write a letter. You must feel quite dreadful.”
Celeste Worlingham, a woman in her late fifties with strong features, dark brown eyes and a face which in her youth must have been handsome rather than pretty, now looked both confused and curious. The marks of shock were visible in the strained lines around her mouth and the stiff carriage of her neck, but she had admirable composure, and would not give in to unseemly grief, at least not in public, and she considered this public. Obviously she did not recall even the barest acquaintance with any of her visitors, but a lifetime of good manners overrode all.
“Most kind of you, Mrs. Ellison. Of course Angeline and I are very grieved, but as Christians we learn to bear such loss with fortitude—and faith.”
“Naturally,” Grandmama agreed, a trifle perfunctorily. “May I introduce to you my daughter-in-law, Mrs. Caroline Ellison, and my granddaughter,