Free The Twelve Rooms of the Nile by Enid Shomer Page B

of St. James’s Palace and wandering with Fanny through the shining aisles of the best shops. Her dearest relative, WEN’s little sister, Aunt Mai, was to be married to Sam, Fanny’s baby brother. Flo watched Aunt Mai join hands with Uncle Sam, swear her undying love, and kiss him, too long and too hard, with everyone looking on. I blushed, Flo had confided in print. She nearly cried when the young couple drove off in their coach. That, she informed Lavie, was marriage. People went away. She was never going to do it, never leave the people she loved.
    The people she loved . . . She closed her eyes. Who did not, it turned out, love her as she wished them to. Instead, they had plans for her based not on her talents and desires but on what they wanted and what was proper.
    The familiar feeling of loneliness, of incipient hopelessness, gripped her—a queasiness in the chest she knew too well. Lavie held that story, too—of the first time she had known despair.
    It began with unexpected criticism from Fanny soon after she began the diary. Florence was bright, her mother conceded, there was no disputing that; she conquered her academics with ease, and charmed people with engaging conversation. But she was unkind to Parthe. Flo could scarcely believe Fanny thought such a thing! Was it Flo’s fault if Parthe were duller, shyer, and less able-bodied? If she was more inclined to doodle on her sketch pad than declaim memorized passages in Father’s library? Invariably, docile Parthe cried in frustration while Flo remained dry-eyed. She knew that the gifts and talents with which she’d been blessed (and Parthe, alas, had not) could not be shared by force of will, presuming Flo even had the will to do so. Which she did not.
    Not believing that she was a troublemaker, Flo latched on to the flattery instead of the censure in Fanny’s critique. She had social graces! She was a brilliant conversationalist with a sunny disposition. Buoyed by this praise, a few days later she had written a letter to her Aunt Anne without clearing it first with Fanny. Her mother flew into a tantrum. “I hope you have got safe to your journey’s end,” Florence had written. “And I do hope you saw the eclipse of the moon on theday you went. Papa says that you were blind boobies if you did not watch it for a whole hour, as we did.”
    The next week Fanny began to inquire about an addition to the household staff.
    • • •
    Flo’s right foot was numb, she realized. She changed position.
    It had taken years for her to grasp what Fanny had intended in hiring Miss Christie, that she had another motive beyond educating her girls: to rein Florence in, to instill in her humility and doubt where there had been too many high spirits, too much confidence, a native arrogance that made her impertinent. But at the time, Flo had been excited at the prospect of a governess. She had imagined long romps through the woods and parklands, and hours spent pasting album pages with pressed flowers and leaves, bird feathers and butterflies. She would ride her pony more than ever under Miss Christie’s supervision. Miss Christie would teach her chess, so that eventually she could play with WEN.
    Before Miss Christie arrived, Fanny warned the girls not to speak unless spoken to, under any conditions. “That is intended for you, Florence,” she had added. “I want no outbursts. If you think of something to say, I want you to turn your tongue in your mouth seven times before you speak.” Flo had felt her face redden to be singled out for reprimand.
    When the girls were called to the sitting room where Miss Christie and Fanny had taken tea, Flo was immediately hopeful. For one thing, Miss Christie looked too young to be a grown-up. Though she had overheard Fanny tell WEN that Miss Christie was almost twenty-one, she could have passed for fourteen. Flo liked her looks, too. She was tall in comparison to Fanny, neatly got up in a navy gabardine bodice and skirt, with blue