The Ugly Sister Read Free Page B

with both Anna Maria and Samuel and we had a gay and noisy time; but it was soon after then, after they had all left, that Aunt Anna had an unusually bad turn and was confined to her bed for three weeks. Slade said she was convinced her two dead children were alive and were coming to see her next week. Whist appointments had to be cancelled. Mary, the younger daughter, who had still not gone away to school, was in constant attendance: she continued to have a governess, though now nineteen.
    From this point on it became known in the house that Aunt Anna had gone ‘a bit maggoty’ – Cook’s phrase. For two or three weeks she would be quite normal, playing whist with all the usual determination; then the fancy would take her, and she would be caught wandering about the house looking for Clive and David. Sally Fetch at length explained to me what Cook had told her: Aunt Anna had been childless for six years after they were married; then she had miscarried at five months with twin boys. Of course they had not been christened, but Aunt Anna had given them names in her own mind, and often now referred to them as if they were midshipmen at sea. It was a sign of an onset of one of her turns when she started looking for them.
    A nurse was engaged, and between the three of them, her daughter Mary, Elsie Whattle, her personal maid, and the new nurse, Mrs Avery, she was well cared for in her bad times. As the years passed her periods of full lucidity became less frequent: she sniffed more frequently, smoked more cheroots and played whist ever more eccentrically, so that her partners, who did not like to say this to her face, began to invent reasons of temporary illness not to come, just as I invented them not to go out.
    Yet there was much pleasure in growing up in such a home, especially in the summer. Apart from the property itself with its orchards, beehives and willow gardens, there were gorgeous walks all round the promontory. A beach called Cellars which was only a half mile from the house was a favourite for picnics: it was a sandy cove, at one end of which when the tide was out you could search for and sometimes find cowrie shells. Apart from two fish cellars, a large hut was the only building on it, and this was used to store or repair our boats. We sailed in the estuary and landed wherever the fancy took us. We bathed and swam in the sharp sea, laughing and squealing with delight. We walked often as far as Portscatho and down to Porth Beach, which also belonged to the Sprys. We rode ponies and got sunburnt and climbed the rocks and ran down steep slopes and grew up healthy and full of the joy of life.
    Even in the winter we were able to be much out of doors, coming home drenched in spray or rain or making the most of the fitful sunshine.
    Sometimes Uncle Davey would have a shooting party, for duck or pheasant, or he would go out on his own, when we could follow and join in the excitement. Or he and two or three of the farmers would course hares, and make bets on the outcome. Or if he was in a very good mood he would take us fishing.
    Uncle Davey, I presently learned from Fetch, had a mistress, whom he kept at the new house of Killiganoon he had bought for her. Her name was Betsy Slocombe, and she was a farmer’s daughter from Manaccan-in-Meneage. The Admiral did not care ever to upset his wife by bringing his lady to Place, nor did he want to have her among his relatives or children at his Truro house. So she lived in comfortable isolation between the two main houses, with five servants to tend her. Uncle Davey seemed to divide his time more or less equally between Plymouth and Killiganoon, with odd forays to Place to see his wife and two children, and spare weeks at Tregolls.
II
    I F THERE was a shadow over our childhood – apart from my personal disfigurement – it was the bulky presence of Slade. Without there being very much substance to the apprehension, his mere presence cast a threat. Nobody