Song of Songs

  My eyes filled with tears as I whispered to him in song of the new joy which lay under my heart, and of how his dear image would soon smile up at me from the cradle beside my bed. I sang of the bliss of nursing his son at my breast – my joy, my delight. Then finally, with painful voice, I sang of his desertion – as he slept the sleep of death, and I, left alone, folded into myself, my whole world at an end.

  When I had finished I stood trembling and shaken beside the piano in Frau Gehring’s big empty studio. Elsa Gehring rose and came to me. ‘Good, little Grafin, good. But do not cry, your brave lover still lives, and who knows what the future will hold for you? And now it is time for you to laugh again – we will study the “Song of the Flea”!’

  At first I was indignant, but then I could not keep from laughing at the tale of the king who so loved his flea that he dressed him in silk and satin and made him a minister.

  The snows melted in the mountains and spring came to Munich in the emerald-green waters of the Iser. I would beg Fraulein to take me down to the Luitpold Bridge, and stand there fascinated by the wild abandon of the river as it rushed beneath me.

  Frau Gehring told me she would be teaching another English girl. She said firmly, ‘Your father is rich, Grafin,’ and I thought of Papa’s loud complaints that income tax was now so high he would be ruined – but then I remembered the coal mines, the slate quarries, the Girvan estates in north London and the endless carefully planned investment, and knew Elsa Gehring was right. ‘I make the rich pay dear, so that I can help the poor – I am a Social Democrat, you see, but do not tell the Kaiser!’ She laughed. ‘This girl I do not charge – she has saved every Pfennig she has earned to come to Munich. Madame Goldman recommends her highly – she lives in Manchester – do you know Manchester, Grafin Elena?’

  ‘Why yes – Hatton is quite near to Manchester, Frau Gehring.’

  ‘Good, good. When you leave Munich you will study with my friend Madame Goldman – we often sang together when we were younger; she is contralto, as is this girl, “Waltraute Jenkins” – is not that a good name for a contralto?’ I stared at Frau Gehring, disbelieving. ‘I do not tell a lie, Grafin, there, look.’ She held out a letter: it was signed in a strong clear hand: “Waltraute Gladys Jenkins”.

  ‘Pa really loves his Wagner, but they call me Wally at home,’ Miss Jenkins explained. She was tall and broad-shouldered, with a squashed snub nose and a wispy bun of mouse-coloured hair. Her toothy smile was engaging; her manner so open, that I took to her at once. Everybody liked Wally Jenkins; even Fraulein unbent a little when we met her at Frau Gehring’s studio. Wally was twenty-three and strode through Munich in her sturdy black boots with her shabby coat flapping as if she feared nothing. She stood in the pit through the longest of operas, refusing politely but firmly my offer that she accompany Fraulein and myself as our guest. ‘Thank you kindly, Lady Helena, but I prefer to be independent.’

  Wally had a deep, rich, contralto. Elsa Gehring taught us a little duet, and we sang it together at the students’ concert. I was grateful for her company as we waited in the wings, but once on stage my fears melted away. Frau Gehring had taught me well: I knew how to sing.

  *

  Mother insisted that I travelled back to London that summer in time for the Coronation. I watched her step gracefully down the staircase at Cadogan Place, swathed in cloth of gold, her coronet perched on her shining dark hair, Fisher holding up the heavy ermine-trimmed velvet behind her. Papa, resplendent in knee breeches and all his decorations, held out his arm, and the two coroneted heads ducked carefully into the gilded state coach, and drove off to the Abbey.

  This summer I did make the hot dusty journey out to the streets of west London to see Miss Ling. Her tired face lit up as the little maid-of-all-work ushered me into the stuffy back parlour. My maid slipped away to the kitchen, and for a moment I felt dreadfully shy, but Miss Ling’s interest in all the doings of our family was so familiar, so genuine, that the last two years slipped away, and I chatted to her as easily as ever.

  Papa had become very friendly with a businessman called Benson. Alice said to me, ‘He’s never averse to the nouveaux riches. Especially when they are rich,’ she added tartly. The Bensons certainly were rich. Alice and Hugh had been to stay with them at their place in Surrey: ‘Quite palatial, Hellie - totally vulgar, of course, but personally I’ve nothing against gold taps when the water that comes out of them is piping hot. And do you know, they have six bathrooms, just fancy that! With two more just for the servants. And when we were there just after Christmas the whole house was warm! Mother sniped at Lucy Benson and told her how unhealthy central heating was, but I notice she’s been sending for catalogues ever since. Don’t get too optimistic, though, she’ll never install radiators at Hatton, she’s far too mean. That’s one of the reasons why the Girvans are “anciens riches” – that and Papa’s unfashionable obsession with making even more money.’

  I said, ‘But Papa insists that this new Liberal Budget will ruin him – I’m sure he means it, he looks quite drawn.’

  Alice snorted. ‘Wait till you want to get married, Helena, and he has to discuss settlements – then you’ll see how drawn he can look when he tries! Hugh told me he got his handkerchief out at one point: he thought Papa was going to break down and sob in the middle of the library. Still, he did cough up in the end, thank goodness – it’s bad enough as it is, having to live in London all the year round.’ She looked discontentedly round her pretty drawing room. ‘I do wish Hugh could get some nice fat briefs.’

  Mother told me Mr Benson had been very useful to Papa, and I must entertain Pansy Benson, who was just a year younger than I was. ‘It’s time you made a girlfriend, Helena, you spend far too much of your time with your brothers.’ Pansy – how could I make a friend of a girl called Pansy! I decided to be very cool.

  But it was impossible to dislike Pansy Benson. She was sweet and silly and kind, and she gazed at me in awe when Mother told her I was studying music and singing in Munich. ‘How brave – I could never go abroad without Mumsy. Oh, you must sing for us, Lady Helena. Do say you will.’

  I took her off to the music room and sang my aria, while her eyes went wider and wider in admiration. ‘You must meet Lance, Lance is so musical.’ Lance was her only brother; she adored him. But she told me that she thought my brother the handsomest, cleverest, bravest man in the whole world – after Lance, of course. ‘But’ – blushing – ‘Lord Muirkirk is so different.’

  Guy came into the drawing room soon after, and Pansy’s round blue eyes followed his every move. He came over to speak to us, and she blushed and stammered inarticulately; I felt a wave of fellow feeling. Guy treated her like a child, but Pansy did not seem to mind; she gazed at him adoringly, even when he was obviously flirting with Eileen Fox. I decided Pansy was like the girl in the second part of “Frauen Liebe und Leben”, who looked so humbly at her loved one that she could promise to bless his chosen bride many thousand times. But I hoped Eileen would not be Guy’s bride: she was not half nice enough for him.

  Pansy’s brother Lance arrived. He had the long serious face of a scholar, and he was an excellent pianist; he was soon acting as my accompanist. Plump, kindly Mrs Benson asked me to sing every evening; Mother smiled with her mouth and agreed. The other guests drifted in and out of the music room, but Lance and I were happy with the Steinway. He was exactly the same age as I was: we would both be eighteen in September. He wanted to visit Germany or Austria to study music now he had left school, but Mr Benson was insisting that he go on to Sandhurst. He said to me quietly one day, ‘I don’t want to be a soldier, Lady Helena, but Father is adamant.’ He gave a wry, self-deprecating smile. ‘If I’m not brave enough to stand up to my own father – how will I ever lead a charge against the enemy?’ He turned his attention back to the piano. ‘I don’t think my cadenza was quite right in this piece – will you listen and correct me?’

  Then suddenly everyone was talking about an international crisis –
over Morocco, of all places. We British were very angry with the Germans – the Chancellor of the Exchequer made a speech at the Mansion House – I knew it was serious because Papa actually had a good word to say for Mr Lloyd George. ‘Time these Germans were put in their place – who do they think they are, trying to compete with the British Navy?’

  The twins became very excited and talked of war. I told them not to be so silly. ‘We’d never fight against Germany – besides, you would have to shoot Franzl – you wouldn’t want that, would you?’

  Eddie put down the billiard cue he was aiming at the stuffed stag’s head and said that girls just did not understand.

  I went back to Munich as usual at the beginning of August. Nobody seemed at all interested in Morocco; instead the whole town was abuzz with the story of how Herr Mottle had collapsed in the middle of conducting a performance of Tristan, and on his very deathbed had married Fraulein Fassbender, the famous soprano. ‘How sad,’ ‘Such a terrible loss,’ ‘Ah, he was dedicated to Wagner – it was as he would have wished.’ I slipped easily back into Fraulein’s steady routine as if I had never been away.

  Papa told Eddie and Robbie they were old enough now to come by themselves to Munich, so for the third Christmas we went to the theatre and frequented the cafés and skated on the frozen meadows. I begged them for news of Stavey’s uncle – they told me he had run down to Windsor on the previous Fourth, with Lady Staveley, Stavey’s mother – he had asked after me – but it was hopeless; they could not remember the exact words he had used. They said Stavey thought a lot of him, and he had been no end of a swell in South Africa; he hunted in the Shires every year, was a good sort – and that was all.

  I shed tears when the time came in March for me to say goodbye to Munich. I clung to Franzl, and Gretchen, who had maided me; I embraced Frau Reinmar and kissed all the old ladies of the pension; Elsa Gehring hugged me and told me not to forget to practise every day, and even Fraulein unbent to kiss my cheeks before she waved me off from the Central Station.

  As we sat back in our compartment at Dover, Fisher said, ‘You’ll be looking forward to your first Season now, my lady.’ It was a statement, not a question, but suddenly I was not sure. For a moment I longed to return to the safe enclosed world of Munich. Once I was Out there would be no going back: my girlhood was over. But then I thought of Lord Gerald, and excitement rippled through me.

  Chapter Three

  Mother planned my first Season like a general planning a campaign. She made it very clear that she saw herself in the role of an experienced commander saddled with a particularly inadequate subaltern - but she was determined to do her duty. She escorted me to corsetiere and dressmaker in an attempt to remedy the deficiencies of my figure. ‘I had hoped that eating all those German Kuchen would make some difference to your bosom, Helena - and your neck seems longer than ever: perhaps all that singing has stretched it.’

  She engaged a smart French maid for me, who wrestled with my hair: ‘Miladi, feefty ’airpins – ’ow is eet possible? But eet is so slippery!’ I cringed. Liliane volubly urged assistance to my complexion: ‘Miladi is so pale – a leetle rouge?’

  My mother pursed her lips, then regretfully shook her head. ‘I think not for a debutante, Liliane. We will just have to bear with it.’ I stood, flushed and humiliated, as my mother bemoaned yet again the unfortunate tilt of my nose. ‘And the Girvan mouth, Helena, far too full in a young girl – and those eyebrows!’ She shuddered. Liliane eagerly seized a pair of tweezers and advanced purposefully, but my mother restrained her. ‘No, thinner eyebrows would only draw attention to the size of her mouth. Their shape is not too unsatisfactory, just do the best you can.’ She stood up and swept out of my bedroom.

  After she had gone Liliane said, tentatively, ‘Miladi has long thick eyelashes, and beeg dark eyes – this is good.’ I blinked to hold back the tears from flooding my “beeg dark eyes” as the pale oval in the mirror blurred.

  My presentation day arrived. I drove with Mother to the Palace, the three ridiculous ostrich feathers bobbing on my hair, swathed in white satin from head to toe. I was rigid with fear; the whole occasion was like a nightmare and I committed the ultimate sin and touched the royal hand with my nose. Afterwards I sat on a spindly gold chair as the other debutantes made their curtseys, longing desperately for the water closet – the long dressing and the three-hour wait had been too much for me; now my belly ached.

  When I got back to Cadogan Place I found that Liliane had thrown away my girl’s corset. Standing imprisoned in my rigid boned stays I shed tears for the loss of that threadbare old bodice, of my swinging pigtails, of my short free skirts. Liliane shook out my evening frock and I stood like a dressmaker’s dummy while she buttoned and hooked and tied; then pushed me down on to a chair and began the endless back-combing needed to make my too-fine hair hold its shape.

  A hairpin fell into my soup that night; I looked desperately round to see if Mother had noticed, but with a flick of a napkin and the flicker of an eyelid the footman retrieved it; I glanced back at him gratefully. Then I sat on at the table, tongue-tied and embarrassed between two elegant young men who tossed the odd comment towards my plate before turning back to the cleverer, wittier women on their other sides. Mother spoke to me angrily afterwards: ‘Why do you have to look so sullen, Helena, whenever you’re in company? Young men won’t dance with sulky girls.’

  I told myself I did not want to dance with “young men”, only with one man – I did not care about the others. But I did care when the surge of the crowd carried me back partnerless into the ballroom at the beginning of a dance. Mother had berated me before she left for the card room: ‘Why can’t you be more welcoming, Helena, smile – and when you’re dancing you must talk to your partner. Goodness knows, I don’t expect you to be witty, but at least say something.’

  But I could never think of anything. In Munich we had talked of practical matters – the food, the weather, the singers at the opera – it had been so simple there; and besides I could always shelter behind Fraulein. Now I stood alone and defenceless at the entrance to the brightly lit ballroom, watching the be-frilled dresses swirl past, each happy, girlish face smiling up at the man who held her. I turned and almost ran down the corridor to the cloakroom.

  It was Alice, arriving late, who found me still hiding there. She shook her head. ‘Oh Hellie, you really are feeble! Well, come along with me now and I’ll lend you Hugh – I don’t want him cramping my style all evening.’

  Alice thrust me at Hugh, with, ‘Here’s a wallflower for you,’ then glided past. He stared wistfully after her, before pulling his shoulders back and turning to me with a smile. ‘Would you like to dance, Helena?’ I gulped a ‘Thank you’.

  As we danced sedately round the room Alice flashed past in the arms of a broad bronzed man with side whiskers; she was talking animatedly, gazing up into his eyes. Hugh said abruptly, ‘Alice is seeing a lot of Danesford these days.’ I did not reply. At last he heaved a sigh, looked down at me and said, ‘I tell you what, Hellie, I’ll take you round and introduce you to some nice young men – how about that?’ He smiled at me warmly and I felt a rush of affection for dear, solid Hugh.

  Dances got a little easier after that. Hugh must have spoken to Guy; my brother turned up rather shamefacedly in several ballrooms with a covey of fellow officers in tow.

  Through the long hot Season I longed for a glimpse of Lord Gerald Prescott. My eyes searched the crowded rooms, and any sleek fair head would set my heart thumping. Then, one evening, he did appear. I was dancing with Lance Benson when I saw him; as soon as the music stopped I steered Lance up to the other end of the room and dived into the throng next to Lord Gerald. But he politely stepped to one side without even looking at me, and I was mortified. I snapped at Lance when he asked for another dance, and went dismally in to supper.

  I was pushing a strawberry ice round my plate when a voice said, ‘It is Lady Helena, isn’t it?’ I turned so quickly my ice slipped dangerousl
y; blue eyes were smiling at me and I felt as if I were drowning. He murmured a few words about going down to Eton, to see his nephew, and said my brothers were well – then the band struck up again. I gazed wistfully up at him and he suddenly smiled, saying, ‘You look just like your twins when they’re standing outside the sock-shop wondering if they can afford strawberries and cream – would you care to dance?’

  I breathed, ‘Oh, please,’ and put my hand on his arm. As we moved away I glimpsed Lance’s dismayed face – I had promised him the dance after supper – but I fixed my gaze firmly ahead and walked on.

  It was a waltz. Lord Gerald danced stiffly but correctly. ‘Do you reverse?’ I nodded and we executed a decorous turn. He made the conventional remarks about the heat and the pleasant flowers, then lapsed into silence. I searched desperately for something to say, but my mind was a blank. I could not believe that it was his arm round my waist and his gloved hand holding mine.

  When the music stopped he bowed politely. ‘May I escort you back to your Mama?’

  ‘No – she’s in the card room – she won’t want to be interrupted – please just leave me here.’

  He raised his eyebrows a fraction, then smiled. ‘I see I’m being old-fashioned. You youngsters hardly need chaperons these days. You know, it’s so long since I last danced, I had to concentrate on the steps rather hard. I’m so glad you didn’t keep chattering, or I should have been quite distracted. Thank you for your understanding – goodnight, Lady Helena.’

  I gazed after him in a daze of wonder. My hero, I had actually danced with my god-like hero, and he had thanked me for being understanding!

  A hand touched my elbow. ‘I thought that was to be our dance, Lady Helena.’ It was Lance Benson’s reproachful voice.

  I started. ‘Oh, I am sorry – but I…’