Miss Grimsleys Oxford Career (6 page)

“I will give you an Oxford answer, Miss Grimsley,” he said. “The answer to that question depends entirely upon where you are standing.”

“Well, then, sir, where are you standing now?” she persisted. “I really must know.”

He looked down at her, his expression hard to read. “I would say that from where I am standing right now, yes, and yes again, Miss Grimsley. Good day.”

And then he was gone, taking long strides down the hill toward the town. She thought he whistled as he hurried along.

Ellen watched him for a moment and then returned to the carriage. “I just met the strangest man,” she said to her aunt, who had been admiring the view from the other window. “A student, I think.”

Aunt Shreve turned and followed Ellen's gaze. “That fellow over there? He certainly has a broad set of shoulders to recommend him.”

“Aunt!”

“I may be a widow twenty years and my children grown, my dear, but I can admire,” Aunt Shreve replied. “Come, come, Ellen. You have had your look at Oxford. What do you think?”

“His ears are flat.”

Aunt Shreve stared at her in consternation and then burst into laughter. “My dear, I do not open bottles of Palais Royal for flat ears!”

“I am only teasing, Aunt,” Ellen replied. “I think Oxford is splendid. I also think that words do not describe it.” She leaned forward and touched her aunt on the knee. “Thank you, Aunt Shreve. Even if Papa only allows me to stay here until Horry's wedding, it will be enough.”

As they drove across the bridge, the clouds settled lower, resting on the highest spires as the honey-colored buildings turned gray again. When the cold rain began, Ellen wondered if the tall student had reached his chambers in time. Then she put him from her mind as the magnificence of Oxford surrounded her.

Gordon Grimsley, black-gowned and even handsomer than she remembered, paced in front of the fireplace in Miss Dignam's sitting room. Ellen shook the rain from her cloak and only had time to lay it aside before her brother grabbed her in a bear hug and kissed her soundly on both cheeks.

He had an appreciative audience. As he whirled her around and she shrieked in protest, Ellen made the observation that Gordon Grimsley rarely did anything without an audience.

The sitting room was occupied by young ladies who had all suspended whatever activity they were engaged in to watch—cards clutched tight in nerveless fingers; stitches dropped; pages unturned; words arrested in midsentence. As she stood in the circle of his arms, Ellen Grimsley noted that her brother had lost none of his effect on females, even the select females of Miss Dignam's Academy.

“Gordon, really,” she whispered. “You've never been so glad to see me before!”

He winked at her and nodded to a dry husk of a woman bearing down on them from the other side of the room. He spoke out of the side of his mouth. “I do not think she will suffer me much longer in her sitting room.”

“And no wonder,” Ellen whispered back. “Gordon, you are incorrigible.”

“Yes, thank the Almighty,” he agreed. He turned then and bowed to the lady approaching. The bow was so elegant that several of the young ladies sighed. Ellen put her hand to her mouth to smother her laughter. Trust Gordon to put his best foot forward.

“Ellen,” he was saying, “it gives me great pleasure to introduce to you Miss Dignam, your headmistress. Miss Dignam, this is my little sister, Ellen.”

Ellen grasped the woman's cool, dry hand, opened her mouth to speak, and then closed it when the woman only touched her hand and then hurried past her to embrace Aunt Shreve.

“Eugenia, how long has it been?” she exc1aimed, lips stretched tight over protruding teeth in what must be a smile.

The students in the room continued to gape. Gordon looked at them in amusement. “Perhaps they never knew a dragon to have friends,” he whispered to his sister.

While they watched the reunion, Gordon took his sister by the arm. “I have spoken a meal for the three of us at The Mitre.” He grinned. “Providing you can fork over the blunt.”

“Gordon, it is only just past the quarter. Are your pockets to let already?”

“Always,” he agreed cheerfully. “I was hoping you would be bringing some reinforcements from home.” He looked around to make sure that his aunt could not hear him. “I am planning to toddle over to London this weekend with a new friend of mine.”

“Gordon, that is a long way to go. What about your studies?”

He shrugged and flashed that lopsided grin of his that only made her more wary. “I'll get by.”

There wasn't time for a reply. In another moment, Aunt Shreve, her arm about Miss Dignam, had returned to her side. “Come, my dears,” she announced. “Miss Dignam has given us leave to go to—The Mitre, is it, Gordon? I promised to have you back here by nine o'clock, and indeed, Gordon has his own curfew.”

Again that careless shrug. Ellen frowned, dreading the uneasiness that was already stirring her stomach around.

“I am entirely at your service, ladies,” Gordon said as he made a final bow, to the accompaniment of an entire row of sighs from the students grouped on the sofa.

“Gordon, you are utterly shameless!” Ellen scolded as they bundled up against the drizzle and hurried along the street to Cornmarket. “I think you are a dreadful flirt.”

“I must second the notion,” Aunt Shreve agreed as they entered the inn and surrendered their cloaks to the serving girl. She smiled at her handsome nephew. “And I also must acknowledge that you received an unfair amount of the Grimsley charm.” She took him by the arm as they walked into a private parlor. “I would advise you not to waste it on your aunt and sister. We know you too well.”

The first course was ready as soon as they were seated. They ate in hungry silence and then Gordon pushed back his plate. “Sister, I could not believe my own eyes when I received that letter from Mama, telling me that you would be attending Miss Dignam's Academy. Have you let your brains leak out? If Papa offered me anything I wanted for two bottles of sherry, this place would be low on my list.”

He smiled at the waiter, who set the next course in front of him. “I can't imagine anyone comes up to Oxford without vast coercion, El.”

“You're a dunce, Gordon,” she said without missing a bite.

He slammed down his fork. “Don't keep me in suspense, sister! Did or did not Papa say something to you about my joining that cavalry regiment?”

Ellen stared at her brother. “He did no such thing, Gordon, and you know it. I remember well the terms of the agreement he forged with you when you came up here only one month ago. You are to acquit yourself at Oxford for a year, through all the terms, and then he would think about it.”

Gordon picked up the fork again and dragged it around the food on his plate. “Think about it!” he burst out. “While he's thinking about it, the war will end in Spain and I will have missed all the fun!”

“It cannot be otherwise,” Ellen replied. “Now tell me what you have learned thus far at your college.”

He gave her a blank stare and continued picking over his food, his lips tight together and the frown line between his eyes deeply pronounced.

Aunt Shreve picked up the ball of conversation. “My dears, whenever I see you two together, I am struck by your resemblance to one another.”

Ellen smiled at her aunt and took a closer look at her elder brother. They had the same fair hair and blue eyes, but to her mind, there the resemblance stopped. She observed her brother in profile, admiring the regularity of his features, and wondering why they were so different in temperament, inclination, and goal.
I would give the world to walk these halls and quads, and Gordon cannot wait to leave it.

Her own pleasure in the meal dissolved. She ate what was put before her and wished herself elsewhere. Gordon, when he recovered from his sulks, kept up a witty conversation with Aunt Shreve that earned him a kiss on the cheek as he escorted them back to the school and a handful of guineas.

“Your mother thought you might be in need,” Aunt Shreve said. “She says that is all you will have until the quarter, so practice economy, my dear.”

Gordon grinned and kissed them good night. The bell in Magdalen Tower tolled, and then another and another. “I'll be in touch, Ellen,” he said as his lips brushed her cheek.

Aunt Shreve watched him go. “I worry for him,” was all she said as they opened the door and were greeted by Miss Dignam.

“I will show you to your room,” she said, handing Ellen a candlestick.

“One moment, Miss Dignam, if you please,” Ellen said. She set down the candle and reached in her reticule for the letter. “Miss Dignam, if you please, could I change these classes in embroidery and French for geography and perhaps geometry? I would like that, and I know that I can keep up.”

Miss Dignam blinked. “We do not offer such things here! We find that a little Italian and a little French, and watercolors or embroidery are enough. Geometry? Goodness, child, these subjects are not for females.”

“Do you mean I cannot study them here?”

“Precisely.” Miss Dignam permitted herself a smile. “If you continue with us next year, the older students study the improving poetry of John Donne. But only with their parents’ approval,” she emphasized, “and only if it does not excite them.”

“I had no idea,” Aunt Shreve said in a faint voice.

“Oh, yes, my dear Eugenia. We follow the same pattern with the modern composers such as Beethoven.” Miss Dignam gestured toward the stairs. “Come, my dear, you will have a strenuous day tomorrow. We have been studying the different shades of blue and green in watercolors, and you must attempt to catch up with us. I recommend that you retire.”

Ellen kissed her aunt good night and quietly climbed the stairs behind the headmistress. Miss Dignam opened a door and peered in.

“You are sharing chambers with Fanny Bland,” she whispered. “She is an unexceptional girl, and all that is proper. I believe you are already acquainted?”

Fanny made no sound. Ellen said good night to Miss Dignam, undressed in the dark, and crept into bed. The sheets were cold and stiff, as if Miss Dignam had added starch to the rinse water. Ellen huddled into a ball and ducked her head under the covers as the tears began to fall.

When she finished crying, she blew her nose quietly and tucked her hand under her cheek. “Things always look better in the morning,” she said, her voice soft.

As she drifted toward sleep, she thought again of the student on the hill. She had already forgotten his name, but she could not forget the independent way he strode down the hill.
You look so free
, she said to herself as she watched the shadows cross the window and the moon change.
I want to be free too.

Ellen was almost asleep when she heard the sound of pebbles hitting against the window. She did not move, imagining that the sound came from some other part of the hall. She closed her eyes.

The sound continued, little scourings of sound against the window. After debating with herself another moment, she rose silently from her bed and tiptoed to the window. She opened it and leaned out.

Gordon stood below, his hands cupped around his mouth. “I thought you were deaf, my dear.”

Ellen leaned her elbows on the windowsill. “What on earth do you want, Gordon? Don't you have a curfew?”

He laughed softly. “I can climb the wall, silly! We're leaving for London in the morning. Loan me three pounds. I know Mama must have sent you some money. Be a sweet thing, Ellen.”

She leaned farther out. “I dare not!” she called down to him.

“I'll win it back at faro,” he assured, his voice sharpening with that impatient edge that reminded her of Papa. “Don't be so missish, El.”

“Oh, very well,” she grumbled as she groped about on the dressing table. She counted out some coins and tossed them down to her brother one story below. He caught the money expertly and pocketed it. He bowed elaborately and walked backward down the deserted street, facing her.

“I'll win it back, and with interest, El. Don't you worry about a thing.”

Ellen stayed at the window until he was gone. She turned to her bed. The girl in the other bed was sitting up, watching her.

“Why, hello, Fanny,” Ellen said, smiling. “I'm sorry I woke you.”

Fanny rested herself on one elbow. She squinted into the gloom and then smiled, showing all her teeth. “I'm telling Miss Dignam in the morning.”

HANKS TO
G
ORDON'S LATE-NIGHT ENTREATY
and Fanny Bland's spite, Ellen spent her first morning at Miss Dignam's Select Female Academy sitting on a hard chair writing, “I will practice decorum as a virtue whilst I reside in Oxford,” one hundred times.