A Stairs - Eva Ibbotson

But now the door of the centre booth was thrown open and there emerged - to the sound of imagined trumpets - the bride herself.

Muriel had chosen not white, but a rich brocade of ivory which better took up the colour of her creamy skin. Cleaving to her magnificent bosom, clinging till the last possible moment to her generously undulating hips, the dress fanned out dramatically into a six-foot train, embroidered with opalescent beads and glistening pailettes. Richly elaborate threadwork also spangled the bodice and, eschewing the simple white tulle so beloved of ordinary brides, Muriel had set her diamond tiara over a veil of glittering silver lace.

And seeing her, Madame Duparc and her staff broke into the expected applause, but half-heartedly for weddings were their business and Muriel, in her metallic splendour, looked more like some goddess descending from Valhalla than a bride.

A very small noise, like a cricket clearing its throat, caused them to turn their heads.

In the doorway leading from the other fitting room stood a tiny figure in rose pink satin - and pushed gently forward by Anna who then stood aside - the Honourable Olive, en grand tenue, began to walk across the deep pile of the dove grey carpet towards Muriel and her retinue.

And as they watched her the tired sewing women began to smile, remembering suddenly what it was all about. The sheer joy of a wedding: the sense of wonder and humility and awe… the newness of it and the hope … ail were there in this child, limping with a shining morning face towards the bride.

Holding in one reverent hand the flounces of her dress, clutching in the other the pearl-encrusted muff she had not been able to relinquish, Ollie advanced. Apart from a head-dress of fresh flowers for which Minna had begged, Ollie’s outfit was the same as the other bridesmaids’, but her radiance and delight had transfigured it. The pink ruffles nestled beguilingly against her throat; she listened with parted lips to the rustle of her skirt as if it were the sound of angel’s wings. One of the fitting girls, forgetting her place, had sent downstairs for rosebuds which by some alchemy blended, instead of clashing, with her flaming hair.

Now Ollie was close enough really to see Muriel and the blue eyes widened behind the round glasses. Ever since she had heard Muriel spoken of, Ollie had seen her as a fairy tale princess. Here in reality, she surpassed all Ollie’s dreams. Untroubled by considerations of suitability or good taste, Ollie gazed at the glittering, shimmering figure with its diamond crown. And forgetting about herself completely, she came to rest in front of Muriel, looked up adoringly, and said:

‘Oh! You do look beautiful ! ’

Muriel seemed not to have heard. Ever since Ollie had appeared in the doorway she had been staring in silent fascination at the child. Now she drew in her breath and as Anna, guided by some instinct, stepped forward and Tom Byrne entered to fetch the bridesmaids, she hissed, in a whisper which carried right across the room:

‘Why did no one tell me that the child was crippled!’

CHAPTER EIGHT

Ollie had heard. As though the words had been a physical blow, the colour drained from her face, she bent her bright head and the small hand which had been proudly holding up the flounces of her skirt dropped to her side. In shocked silence, Madame Duparc and the shopgirls stared at the woman who had done this deed.

Tom Byrne had checked his first steps towards his sister to control a rage so murderous that it terrified him. He wanted to shake Muriel till her teeth rattled, to press his fingers into her throat. Horrified to find these feelings in himself, he stood stock-still in the middle of the floor like a bewildered bull.

It was the Lady Lavinia, with her well-bred indifference, who saved the moment by suggesting an alteration to Muriel’s train and the fitting continued.

But when it was over and it came to carrying out the next part of the programme, Ollie quietly refused to co-operate. To the suggestion that she should now join the other bridesmaids for luncheon at the Ritz, the Honourable Olive gave a low-voiced but unalterable ‘No’. She wasn’t, she said, hungry and, clinging to Anna’s hand, she added that she thought she would like to go home.

‘I can’t take you home yet, love,’ said Tom desperately distressed - turning, with appeal in his nice brown eyes, to the Lady Lavinia Nettleford and Cynthia Smythe. Surely they would release him, let him attend to his sister? But in the eyes of Muriel’s adult bridesmaids there was only a desire, implacable as the urge of a wildebeest towards a water hole, for luncheon at the Ritz.

‘Well, really,’ said Muriel, ‘all that fuss just because I said—’

But even she did not repeat what she had said.

Anna now took charge. Her rage had been as instant and murderous as Tom’s, but it had been extinguished by an emotion even more intense: a deep pity for the man who had linked his life with a woman such as this. Now she rejected this too, bent only on helping Ollie.

‘Perhaps it would be nice if you came home with me and we made cinnamon toast and I showed you a little dog that has in his stomach the diamond that the Empress Elizabeth gave to Rastrelli and also a stuffed grandmother?’

Ollie, though she did not speak, indicated her approval by nodding into Anna’s skirts and Tom looked at her with gratitude.

But, in the event, they shared Lord Westerholme’s taxi. Arriving as planned to escort Muriel to lunch, Rupert was told that she preferred to stay behind and shop.

‘Oh?’

Muriel glanced up at him sharply. It had been her intention to punish her fiancé by depriving him of her company, for it seemed to her that in concealing Ollie’s handicap he had been deceitful and underhand. Now, too late, she saw her mistake. The flash of anger in Rupert’s eyes had only lasted a moment, but it had been unmistakable.

‘In that case I’ll get myself off to Aspell’s,’ he said, turning away. ‘I’ve got a taxi waiting. Does anyone want a lift?’

So it was arranged that Rupert would drop off Anna and Ollie, before proceeding to the queen’s jewellers to purchase Muriel’s bridal gift.

‘Who was that girl?’ asked the Lady Lavinia, looking after Anna as she led Ollie away. ‘The foreign one?’

Muriel shrugged. ‘Just one of the Mersham domestics. She seems to have forgotten her place and cadged a lift to town. A Russian refugee. Why do you ask?’

‘She reminds me of someone.’

‘Who?’

‘Actually, our new chauffeur. He’s a foreigner, too.’

And the Lady Lavinia sighed. For Sergei was rather more than a foreigner … To have the fur rug tucked round one’s knees by him, to have him hold open the car door and see him smile that devastating yet protective smile, to catch the warmth in those dark, long-lashed, gold-flecked eyes was to feel so cherished, so curiously excited, that it was best not to think of it. Not that she made an idiot of herself like her four sisters did, liking him to Rudolf Valentino, carrying on like kitchen maids. Sergei was, in fact, a great deal better-looking than Valentino - taller, stronger, in every way more manly -but that was neither here nor there. Whatever he had been in his native land, a chauffeur was a chauffeur. It was a good job she had given him the afternoon off. With Mama and the younger girls still in Northumberland, Hermione and Priscilla were quite capable of ordering him to take them on joyrides round the park.

But Tom Byrne was waiting — and with Cynthia docilely in attendance, Lavinia swept off to the powder room to prepare for the luncheon which she hoped would seal her fate.

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