Story:- Miss Bracegirdle Does Her Duty

Miss Bracegirdle Does Her Duty
‘T his is the room , madame.’
‘Ah, thank you …thank you.’
‘Does it appear satisfactory to madame ?’
‘Oh, yes, thank you
…quite.’
‘Does madame require anything further?’
‘Er—if not too late, may I have a hot bath?’
‘Parfaitement, madame. The bathroom is at the end
of the passage on the left. I will go and prepare it for
madame.’
‘There is one thing more…I have had a very long
journey. I am very tired. Will you please see that I am not
disturbed in the morning until I ring.’
‘Certainly, madame.’
Millicent Bracegirdle was speaking the truth—she was
tired. In the sleepy cathedral town of Easingstoke, from
which she came, it was customary for everyone to speak
the truth. It was customary, moreover, for everyone to lead
simple, self-denying lives—to give up their time to good
works and elevating thoughts. One had only to glance at
little Miss Bracegirdle to see that in her was epitomized
all the virtues and ideals of Easingstoke. Indeed, it was
the pursuit of duty which had brought her to the Hôtel
de l’Ouest at Bordeaux on this summer’s night. She had
travelled from Easingstoke to London, then without a
break to Dover, crossed that horrid stretch of sea to Calais,
entrained for Paris, where she of necessity had to spend
four hours—a terrifying experience—and then had come
on to Bordeaux, arriving at midnight. The reason of this
journey being that someone had to come to Bordeaux to meet her young sister-in-law, who was arriving the next
day from South America. The sister-in-law was married
to a missionary in Paraguay, but the climate not agreeing
with her, she was returning to England. Her dear brother,
the dean, would have come himself, but the claims on his
time were so extensive, the parishioners would miss him
so…it was clearly Millicent’s duty to go.
She had never been out of England before, and she had
a horror of travel, and an ingrained distrust of foreigners.
She spoke a little French—sufficient for the purposes of
travel and for obtaining any modest necessities, but not
sufficient for carrying on any kind of conversation. She
did not deplore this latter fact, for she was of opinion
that French people were not the kind of people that one
would naturally want to have conversation with; broadly
speaking, they were not quite ‘nice’, in spite of their
ingratiating manners.
The dear dean had given her endless advice, warning
her earnestly not to enter into conversation with strangers,
to obtain all information from the police, railway
officials—in fact, anyone in an official uniform. He deeply
regretted to say that he was afraid that France was not a
country for a woman to travel about in alone. There were
loose, bad people about, always on the lookout…He really
thought perhaps he ought not to let her go. It was only
by the utmost persuasion, in which she rather exaggerated
her knowledge of the French language and character, her
courage, and indifference to discomfort, that she managed
to carry the day.
She unpacked her valise, placed her things about the
room, tried to thrust back the little stabs of homesickness
as she visualized her darling room at the deanery. How
strange and hard and unfriendly seemed these foreign
hotel bedrooms—heavy and depressing, no chintz and
lavender and photographs of…all the dear family, the
dean, the nephews and nieces, the interior of the cathedral
during harvest festival, no samplers and needlework or coloured reproductions of the paintings by Marcus Stone.
Oh dear, how foolish she was! What did she expect?
She disrobed and donned a dressing gown; then, armed
with a sponge-bag and towel, she crept timidly down the
passage to the bathroom, after closing her bedroom door
and turning out the light. The gay bathroom cheered her.
She wallowed luxuriously in the hot water, regarding
her slim legs with quiet satisfaction. And for the first
time since leaving home there came to her a pleasant
moment—a sense of enjoyment in her adventure. After
all, it was rather an adventure, and her life had been
peculiarly devoid of it. What queer lives some people
must live, travelling about, having experiences! How old
was she ? Not really old—not by any means. Forty-two?
Forty-three ? She had shut herself up so. She hardly ever
regarded the potentialities of age. As the world went,
she was a well-preserved woman for her age. A life of
self-abnegation, simple living, healthy walking and fresh
air had kept her younger than these hurrying, pampered
city people.
Love ? yes, once when she was a young girl…he
was a schoolmaster, a most estimable kind gentleman.
They were never engaged—not actually, but it was a
kind of understood thing. For three years it went on,
this pleasant understanding and friendship. He was so
gentle, so distinguished and considerate. She would have
been happy to have continued in this strain forever.
But there was something lacking. Stephen had curious
restless lapses. From the physical aspect of marriage she
shrunk—yes, even with Stephen, who was gentleness and
kindness itself. And then one day…one day he went
away—vanished, and never returned. They told her he had
married one of the country girls—a girl who used to work
in Mrs Forbes’ dairy—not a very nice girl, she feared, one
of these fast, pretty, foolish women. Heigho ! well, she had
lived that down, destructive as the blow appeared at the
time. One lives everything down in time. There is always
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Tam-David
- Jan 1, 2021 at 3:07 pmInteresting article