Page 116 of The Fortunes of Ashmore Castle

‘A boy,’ Linda said, at the same time as the doctor squeezed past her and addressed the prince in their own language. Paul put his own immediate, anxious question in German, and Linda answered it in English for the girls’ sake. ‘She’s very tired, but she’ll be all right.’

The doctor’s exposition went on for a lot longer, and Alice asked, ‘What’s he saying? I can’t catch it. He looks serious. Is Mama really all right?’

Linda fidgeted. ‘It was a long labour and it went hard with her, at her age. She will be all right, but it will take time. And he says she must never have another. Well, I don’t suppose she’d want another anyway, after that. It’s a good job she got a boy.’

The prince was looking more bemused than delighted as he listened to the doctor, but gradually realisation seemed to spread over his face. ‘Ich habe einen Sohn,’ he said in wonder. He shook the doctor’s hand. The doctor said a lot more, and went out of the room.

‘I must get back,’ Linda said ‘He’s going to make sure Mother’s fit to be seen by the prince, but she won’t see either of you just yet, so you needn’t wait. Why don’t you go out for a walk or something?’ And she hurried away to secure her place.

The prince stared after her for a few minutes, then seemed to remember the girls, came over and shook their hands in turn. ‘A son,’ he said, with a smile that looked slightly shocked. ‘I have a son.’ He rummaged through his brain for more English words. ‘You have ein Bruder – a little brother. You will be happy for that, I think?’

Then distractedly he walked out of the room. Alice and Rachel looked at each other.

‘Our brother,’ Rachel said. ‘It feels very queer.’

Alice thought, Giles, Richard – and a little Usingen baby. ‘It does,’ she agreed.

The priest came up to the house that evening to baptise the baby. It was done privately with only the parents present. Miss Kettel explained to the girls that it was a precautionary exercise: it was done as early as possible so that if the baby should not survive it would still go to Heaven – a full christening in church would follow at a later date.

‘Heinrich Adelbert Leopold von Usingen,’ Rachel marvelled. ‘What a lot of names for one small baby.’

‘Linda said he’ll probably get called Heinz. Or Heiko,’ Alice said. ‘Germans love pet names.’

Linda had also told them that Heinrich meant ‘master of the house’. ‘The prince thought it was appropriate for his heir. He’s waited so long for one,’ she added. ‘He’s terribly excited.’

The next day there was a grand celebration party, starting in the afternoon with much eating and drinking, and going on through the evening with music and dancing. The baby was brought down several times to be shown to the guests, though the mother was still in confinement. Alice and Rachel had not seen her, and were told not to expect to for some days. They did, however, get to see the fabled Cousin Pippi, the Landgrave Philip of Plotzkau-Zeitz, who came in the evening with another crowd of well-wishers and, as soon as the music struck up, invited Linda to dance.

Alice had expected an old man, perhaps a foolish or ugly one. The fact that he was a widower had suggested the first to her; the second was her rather guilty supposition, given that Linda was without dowry or beauty. But Cousin Pippi turned out to be only about fifty and was perfectly presentable. What alchemy had gone on Alice couldn’t imagine, but there seemed no doubt that Pippi was trying to fix his interest with Linda. Watching them dance, Alice thought that Linda looked different when she was twirling with him: his attentions seemed to have softened her sharp edges. She looked almost pretty. It was sad, Alice thought, that poor Gerald Cordwell had had to die for Linda to be happy. She wondered whether it was the years of financial anxiety that had made her so disagreeable before, and whether, had Cordwell been rich, she might have been a nicer person.

Among the guests were an English MP, Sir Jocelyn Farocean, with two of his sons, Jervis and Bentham, who had been staying with the Pfaffenheims, Usingen’s nearest neighbours, on their way home from a summer tour of Italy. Alice had not expected to be dancing at all, unless it was to do a duty circuit with some elderly gentleman, so she was pleased, after Jervis had hurried to claim Rachel’s hand, to be asked by Bentham.

He was not entirely clear what the party was in celebration of, and asked politely to be enlightened. ‘We only arrived last night and, to be fair, my German is not as good as my Italian.’

Alice told him about her baby brother, and mentioned his names.

‘Golly, that’s a mouthful!’ her partner exclaimed. He was not as tall as his brother, and was stockier, and while Jervis was out-of-the-common handsome, Bentham was only pleasant-looking. But she thought she had the better deal: he was easy company and inclined to chat. Rachel and Jervis seemed too painfully aware of the need to impress each other. ‘Parents really ought to be fined when they give their children challenging names,’ Bentham went on. ‘It’s not they who suffer for it!’

‘Is yours challenging?’ Alice asked.

‘I don’t mind the Bentham part so much. Everyone calls me “Ben” anyway. Named after Jeremy Bentham, of course, and he was a pretty decent old cove, after all. Not someone to be ashamed of. It could have been much worse.’

‘How so?’ Alice asked.

‘Well, Jervis was named after Johnny Jervis – Admiral St Vincent, you know? – and there’s no way to shorten it except “Jarvey”. Who wants to be called a cab-driver?’ Alice laughed, and he looked pleased to have amused her. ‘And I have another brother named after Admiral Cornwallis, who gets called “Corny”.’

‘Two admirals?’ Alice queried.

‘Well, the pater made his fortune in shipping, so the sea is rather on his mind, y’know. Apparently I was going to be named after Cuthbert Collingwood, only Mama objected that it should be her turn to choose. She was very keen on utilitarianism, so the Royal Navy was given a rest. Good thing, too. Our surname is enough to be going on with. No-one who only sees it written down knows how to pronounce it. I had a master at school who called me “Farrow-seen”. I tried to tell him different and he gave me a very beady look. Not wise to correct a beak. They don’t like it, y’know. So I had to leave it go, and was “Farrow-seen” to him for the whole five years. It grated. Don’t know why it is, but one gets sensitive about one’s handle.’

‘Far Ocean,’ Alice said, tasting the name. ‘I get it now. Very appropriate for a shipping family.’

‘Which came first, the chicken or the egg?’ Bentham said. ‘I imagine if your name was Butcher you’d be hard pressed to go in for haberdashery. It’d confuse people no end.’

‘My surname is Tallant, and I haven’t any.’

‘I’m sure that’s not true. You are an excellent dancer, for one thing. And good at conversation, which is unusual in a girl.’

‘That doesn’t sound like a compliment.’