Mary Olivier: a Life. Sinclair May

lower lip. He was letting himself gently up and down with the tips of his toes, and he was smiling, secretly, as if he had just thought of something that he couldn't tell Mamma. Whenever he looked at Mamma she put her hand up to her hair and patted it.

      Mamma had done her hair a new way. The brown plait stood up farther back on the edge of the sloping chignon. She wore her new lavender and white striped muslin. Lavender ribbon streamed from the pointed opening of her bodice. A black velvet ribbon was tied tight round her neck; a jet cross hung from it and a diamond star twinkled in the middle of the cross. She pushed out her mouth and drew it in again, like Roddy's rabbit, and the tip of her nose trembled as if it knew all the time what Papa was thinking.

      She was so soft and pretty that you could hardly bear it. Mark stood behind her chair and when Papa was not looking he kissed her. The behaviour of her mouth and nose gave you a delicious feeling that with Aunt Lavvy and Aunt Charlotte you wouldn't have to be so very good.

      The front door bell rang. Papa and Mamma looked at each other, as much as to say, "Now it's going to begin." And suddenly Mamma looked small and frightened. She took Mark's hand.

      "Emilius," she said, "what am I to say to Lavinia?"

      "You don't say anything," Papa said. "Mary can talk to Lavinia."

      Mary jumped up and down with excitement. She knew how it would be. In another minute Aunt Charlotte would come in, dressed in her black lace shawl and crinoline, and Aunt Lavvy would bring her Opinions. And something, something that you didn't know, would happen.

      III.

      Aunt Charlotte came in first with a tight, dancing run. You knew her by the long black curls on her shoulders. She was smiling as she smiled in the album. She bent her head as she bent it in the album, and her eyes looked up close under her black eyebrows and pointed at you. Pretty—pretty blue eyes, and something frightening that made you look at them. And something queer about her narrow jaw. It thrust itself forward, jerking up her smile.

      No black lace shawl and no crinoline. Aunt Charlotte wore a blue and black striped satin dress, bunched up behind, and a little hat perched on the top of her chignon and tied underneath it with blue ribbons.

      She had got in and was kissing everybody while Aunt Lavvy and Uncle

       Victor were fumbling with the hat stand in the hall.

      Aunt Lavvy came next. A long grey face. Black bands of hair parted on her broad forehead. Black eyebrows; blue eyes that stuck out wide, that didn't point at you. A grey bonnet, a grey dress, a little white shawl with a narrow fringe, drooping.

      She walked slowly—slowly, as if she were still thinking of something that was not in the room, as if she came into a quiet, empty room.

      You thought at first she was never going to kiss you, she was so tall and her face and eyes held themselves so still.

      Uncle Victor. Dark and white; smaller than Papa, smaller than Aunt Lavvy; thin in his loose frock-coat. His forehead and black eyebrows were twisted above his blue, beautiful eyes. He had a small dark brown moustache and a small dark brown beard, trimmed close and shaped prettily to a point. He looked like something, like somebody; like Dank when he was mournful, like Dank's dog, Tibby, when he hid from Papa. He said, "Well, Caroline. Well, Emilius."

      Aunt Charlotte gave out sharp cries of "Dear!" and "Darling!" and smothered them against your face in a sort of moan.

      When she came to Roddy she put up her hands.

      "Roddy—yellow hair. No. No. What have you done with the blue eyes and black hair, Emilius? That comes of letting your beard grow so long."

      Then they all went into the dining-room.

      It was like a birthday. There was to be real blancmange, and preserved ginger, and you drank raspberry vinegar out of the silver christening cups the aunts and uncles gave you when you were born. Uncle Victor had given Mary hers. She held it up and read her own name on it.

      MARY VICTORIA OLIVIER

       1863.

      They were all telling their names. Mary took them up and chanted them:

       "Mark Emilius Olivier; Daniel Olivier; Rodney Olivier; Victor Justus

       Olivier; Lavinia Mary Olivier; Charlotte Louisa Olivier." She liked the

       sound of them.

      She sat between Uncle Victor and Aunt Lavvy. Roddy was squeezed into the corner between Mamma and Mark. Aunt Charlotte sat opposite her between Mark and Daniel. She had to look at Aunt Charlotte's face. There were faint grey smears on it as if somebody had scribbled all over it with pencil.

      A remarkable conversation.

      "Aunt Lavvy! Aunt Lavvy! Have you brought your Opinions?"

      "No, my dear, they were not invited. So I left them at home."

      "I'm glad to hear it," Papa said.

      "Will you bring them next time?"

      "No. Not next time, nor any other time," Aunt Lavvy said, looking straight at Papa.

      "Did you shut them up in the stair cupboard?"

      "No, but I may have to some day."

      "Then," Mary said, "if there are any little ones, may I have one?"

      "May she, Emilius?"

      "Certainly not," Papa said. "She's got too many little opinions of her own."

      "What do you know about opinions?" Uncle Victor said.

      Mary was excited and happy. She had never been allowed to talk so much. She tried to eat her roast chicken in a business-like, grown-up manner, while she talked.

      "I've read about them," she said. "They are dear little animals with long furry tails, much bigger than Sarah's tail, and they climb up trees."

      "Oh, they climb up trees, do they?" Uncle Victor was very polite and attentive.

      "Yes. There's their picture in Bank's Natural History Book. Next to the Ornythrincus or Duck-billed Plat-i-pus. If they came into the house Mamma would be frightened. But I would not be frightened. I should stroke them."

      "Do you think," Uncle Victor said, still politely, "you quite know what you mean?"

      "I know," Daniel said, "she means opossums."

      "Yes," Mary said. "Opossums."

      "What are opinions?"

      "Opinions," Papa said, "are things that people put in other people's heads. Nasty, dangerous things, opinions."

      She thought: "That was why Mamma and Papa were frightened."

      "You won't put them into Mamma's head, will you, Aunt Lavvy?"

      Mamma said, "Get on with your dinner. Papa's only teasing."

      Aunt Lavvy's face flushed slowly, and she held her mouth tight, as if she were trying not to cry. Papa was teasing Aunt Lavvy.

      "How do you like that Ilford house, Charlotte?" Mamma asked suddenly.

      "It's the nicest little house you ever saw," Aunt Charlotte said. "But it's too far away. I'd rather have any ugly, poky old den that was next door. I want to see all I can of you and Emilius and Dan and little darling Mary. Before I go away."

      "You aren't thinking of going away when you've only just come?"

      "That's what Victor and Lavinia say. But you don't suppose I'm going to stay an old maid all my life to please Victor and Lavinia."

      "I haven't thought about it at all," Mamma said.

      "They have. I know what they're thinking. But it's all settled. I'm going to Marshall and Snelgrove's for my things. There's a silver-grey poplin in their window. If I decide on it, Caroline, you shall have my grey watered