Of course, great aunt Ida had in her drawing room, not merely a chaise, but a Turkish cozy corner. A miserable, dusty old thing no one was allowed to actually use. But, she was an imposing woman, smelling faintly of camphor and mothballs, and when her late husband had sailed back from abroad, he had presented it to her in all its indignant festoons, and its placement was a matter of pride.
When questioned on the provenance of that infernal spider-house, dear Ida would adopt a distant gaze, looking through everyone and at no one, absent-mindedly straighten the doilies, and say in a low, haunted voice, “Wentworth was well-traveled, you know. Simply one of his grander gestures” before rapping her bony knuckles on the table and intoning sharply on the merits of choosing a husband of good breeding.
We all supposed she had loved Great Uncle Wentworth, in her own way. Every year, on the anniversary of his death, she would retrieve his battered old steamer trunk from the attic, taking first his wedding ring and polishing it, and then washing and pressing his suit while humming Nearer My God to Thee, before lovingly returning the items to the trunk, and trunk to attic.
None of us ever found out why she selected that hymn.
None of us dared to ask.
Be First to Comment