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Chapter 2
Three days later, Marta and Laura sat together in the coach en route to England. Laura seemed skittish as the coach embarked from the station in Vienna. She nearly glued her nose to the window to peer out and wave manically at her brother, who’d arrived with her to see her off. Marta had already bid adieu to her mother and father at their estate, which had left her little to do while Laura and her brother Max had carried on before the coach’s arrival.
It devastated her to admit that she wished for the sort of love Max and Laura had between them. Her mother hadn’t been able to have other children after her; there had been something wrong during the birth. Sometimes, Marta wondered if this was another reason that her mother demonised her. She wasn’t only her Austrian baby; she was further the only one she’d been allowed to have.
Throughout the journey to England, the train passed through Germany, with its rolling green hills and beautiful lakes and The Black Forest. As they cut through the border, Laura looked, aghast, and said, “There’s another country between Germany and England?”
At this, Marta laughed and said, “Of course! This is Belgium.”
“Belgium,” Laura murmured, rolling the name around on her tongue. “I can’t imagine a more beautiful word.”
“Nothing is more beautiful than the word Austria. We must remember that forever,” Marta affirmed.
But Laura didn’t seem as keen on keeping her roots close to her heart. Rather, throughout the coach ride, she threw herself completely into her English lessons: reciting various terms by heart as they ripped through Belgium and laughing at some of the other phrases Marta taught her, such as, “By the by,” and, “Wouldn’t you like to?” which, she said, sounded terribly ridiculous from a purely rhythmic perspective.
“You’ll take to England in no time at all,” Marta said, genuinely pleased at her ability to teach. It kept her mind off the love she left behind, off the mother who seemed to despise her, and off the future that stretched before her, one she felt she needed to carve out for herself.
Here on the coach, it was just her and Laura and various verbs and phrases and nouns, along with mounds of whatever coach food items they purchased, including various sweets and biscuits and little packets of cheese.
When they neared England itself, the clouds that had lived in Marta’s memory of England brewed up overhead, thick and formidable. On instinct, Laura reached for her jacket and flung it around her shoulders. Enormous raindrops splattered across the window, and Laura again lurched toward it to peer at the bright green flatlands, the fields that seemed almost moss-like, the trees that told a far different story than the ones back in Austria. They seemed oddly sinister.
“What was it like when you came here years ago?” Laura asked. Her voice was a bit strained, as though she suddenly wished to collect as much information about her surroundings as possible before the coach gave birth to them in this strange land.
“It was a family visit, mostly,” Marta said, her brow furrowed. “I met with my cousin Ewan, who is a few years older than I. I suppose now he’d be about twenty-four? So a good five years older than I. The previous time, I was twelve, and he was seventeen. I tried to keep up with him and his dear friend—oh, what was his name?—in the surrounding woods. But it was clear that I was an outsider. My Aunt Margaret scolded me and then scolded my mother. I remember distinctly she asked my mother if she really let me run about so wildly back in Austria. My mother looked stricken. Yet again, I’d disappointed her.”
“You mustn’t think of it like that,” Laura said. Her eyes glowed with innocence. “She really loves you. She must just imagine the sort of life she might have had if she’d remained in England and feel a bit regretful of it…”
“Regretful of me, her only daughter,” Marta said. Her lower lip bobbed around a bit. “Well, in any case. I won’t see her for quite some time, will I? Perhaps the next time she sees me, she’ll know me as a proper English lady. The sort of woman she’d be glad to call her daughter.”
**
At the coach station, Aunt Margaret, Uncle Everett, and Ewan greeted them. It took a long moment, truthfully, for Marta to recognise their faces. After all, it had been seven years since her last visit.
“Darling!” Aunt Margaret called, the moment she reached the trio. She was much shorter than Marta remembered, with stooped shoulders and several chins and wild, greying hair. Of course, as she was quite wealthy, she’d dressed excellently for this trek to the coach station. “You look every bit the Austrian girl your mother said she’d raised.”
Marta wasn’t entirely sure what sort of compliment that was, or if it could even be deemed as one. “Hello, Auntie,” she said, surprising herself with how thick her English accent was in this sort of company. “Uncle Everett. And you must be Ewan.” She flashed a large smile at her handsome, broad-shouldered cousin. “I suppose you don’t remember me.”
Ewan’s grin widened. There was a big gap between his two front teeth, one Marta didn’t remember from their youth. “Of course I remember you. Not everyone has a cousin from Austria. It’s made me quite the talk of the county.”
Aunt Margaret rolled her eyes. Her wrinkled hand clutched Marta’s wrist as she said, “He’s really wretched, Marta, I do hope you won’t be overwhelmed with annoyance. You’ll grow accustomed to him as the season goes on; I promise you.” She then gave a funny wink, which warmed Marta through her belly and up through her heart.
The good-natured greeting gave Marta a small morsel of hope. Her smile stretched wider. Suddenly, she remembered herself.
“Oh, of course. Allow me to introduce my dear friend and handmaid, Laura Arbinger. She’s been a marvellous help throughout the journey already.”
“Good afternoon!” Aunt Margaret said, her voice falling into a bit of a screech.
There was a strange pause. A look of emptiness folded over Laura’s face.
“I’m terribly sorry. She doesn’t speak much English yet,” Marta said.
“Oh! Good afternoon!” Laura said suddenly, in English. Then, she turned swiftly back towards Marta and muttered in quick German, “I’m terribly sorry. I thought I would recognise English much quicker, but their accents are bizarre, aren’t they? Much different than yours.”
“That’s so pleasant to hear! I haven’t heard the German language in many years,” Uncle Everett said. It was difficult to tell if his words were layered with sarcasm.
Laura gave Marta another confused look. Marta forced her smile and said, “It’s been a terribly long journey. Do you think we could…”
“Of course,” Aunt Margaret blurted. “Silly us. Here. We’ve brought one of our stable hands to collect your suitcases. Jeffrey!”
