was suggesting a very thinly veiled long-term separation. And all because, as he must have made clear, keeping her and the baby with him in India would be, in his book, too expensive.
To be told by your husband, when you are nineteen years old, pregnant, and far from home, that your company is not worth the cost of living together must be just about as emotionally devastating as it gets. It must also have been terrifying for Lilla. If Ernie left her and their baby alone with his family, what would become of her?
Lilla clearly realized that this was a problem she could no longer hide.
And when, on the other side of the world, Alice Eckford read a cry for help that must have brought tears of frustration to her eyes, she didn’t hesitate to act. She packed up the house, and, six weeks after sailing out of Shanghai, she arrived in England in a glittering caravan of silk and lace. With her came Andrew—who must have decided to take another year’s leave, now that Vivvy and Reggie were old enough to help run the firm in his absence—and their two teenage daughters, Edith and Dorothy, trailing behind.
As if trying to make her family as appealing as possible to Ernie’s, Alice rented a house in Bedford, a market town bursting with retired empire builders, civil servants, and army officers—and within visiting distance of both Papa and Mama in London and Laura in Cambridge. Then she filled it to overflowing with fine oriental furniture, spices, and endless gratuitous cakes, setting up an extravagant family camp that shouted out that money was not an issue.
And she made it clear that she intended to stay.
Chapter 5
“ POOR LITTLE LILY ”
BEDFORD, EARLY SUMMER 1902
I have been scrabbling through boxes and drawers, through albums and battered cardboard folders, looking for a photograph of the Eckfords’ drawing room in Bedford. I am sure that I have seen one somewhere. An almost wide-angled-lens view across a square room, taken from the corner opposite the door. Perhaps it is in one of the many dusty photograph albums that were lent by relations or that surfaced from the deep vaults of all those libraries and universities. As I turned the pages a little too eagerly, I may have glimpsed the picture almost subconsciously, and the image has imprinted itself on my mind.
It is a large, lightly decorated room. Instead of being draped with the dark velvets and brocades of a century ago—every curtain pelmet, stuffed cushion edge, and sofa skirt weighed down with heavy fringes and tassels—the Eckfords’ drawing room is light, fresh, modern. But then, that was Alice’s, and Lilla’s, style. The sofas and big armchairs are upholstered in pale fabrics. There are three or four dark wooden armchairs with cream, almost white, seats and backs. Great ferns, or palms, reach into the room from its corners, their long, thin, pointed leaves dangling down like fingers aching to stroke the shining objects that glitter around the room. Or the cheek of a passerby. And, in between the sofas and armchairs, there are maybe a dozen dark, thickly lacquered side tables. Standing against the calm palette of the walls are three-quarter-height painted Chinese cupboards with moonlike circles drawn around their strange brass locks. A couple of Japanese screens covered in figures telling epic tales of love and heartbreak, half concertinaed, frame the set. Their resined scent fills the room, seeping out from deep inside the wood, bringing years of memories with it.
In sharp contrast to the minimalism of the color scheme, every surface is crammed with photographs in thick silver frames, carved wooden figures and demigods. There are embroidered laces and linens—some so bright that they appear snatched from the seamstress’s hands, others so faded and thin that they look as though they would fall apart if taken out of their frames. Curving porcelain vases and bowls too fragile—the china almost transparent—to pick up but whose ridges rise and
To be told by your husband, when you are nineteen years old, pregnant, and far from home, that your company is not worth the cost of living together must be just about as emotionally devastating as it gets. It must also have been terrifying for Lilla. If Ernie left her and their baby alone with his family, what would become of her?
Lilla clearly realized that this was a problem she could no longer hide.
And when, on the other side of the world, Alice Eckford read a cry for help that must have brought tears of frustration to her eyes, she didn’t hesitate to act. She packed up the house, and, six weeks after sailing out of Shanghai, she arrived in England in a glittering caravan of silk and lace. With her came Andrew—who must have decided to take another year’s leave, now that Vivvy and Reggie were old enough to help run the firm in his absence—and their two teenage daughters, Edith and Dorothy, trailing behind.
As if trying to make her family as appealing as possible to Ernie’s, Alice rented a house in Bedford, a market town bursting with retired empire builders, civil servants, and army officers—and within visiting distance of both Papa and Mama in London and Laura in Cambridge. Then she filled it to overflowing with fine oriental furniture, spices, and endless gratuitous cakes, setting up an extravagant family camp that shouted out that money was not an issue.
And she made it clear that she intended to stay.
Chapter 5
“ POOR LITTLE LILY ”
BEDFORD, EARLY SUMMER 1902
I have been scrabbling through boxes and drawers, through albums and battered cardboard folders, looking for a photograph of the Eckfords’ drawing room in Bedford. I am sure that I have seen one somewhere. An almost wide-angled-lens view across a square room, taken from the corner opposite the door. Perhaps it is in one of the many dusty photograph albums that were lent by relations or that surfaced from the deep vaults of all those libraries and universities. As I turned the pages a little too eagerly, I may have glimpsed the picture almost subconsciously, and the image has imprinted itself on my mind.
It is a large, lightly decorated room. Instead of being draped with the dark velvets and brocades of a century ago—every curtain pelmet, stuffed cushion edge, and sofa skirt weighed down with heavy fringes and tassels—the Eckfords’ drawing room is light, fresh, modern. But then, that was Alice’s, and Lilla’s, style. The sofas and big armchairs are upholstered in pale fabrics. There are three or four dark wooden armchairs with cream, almost white, seats and backs. Great ferns, or palms, reach into the room from its corners, their long, thin, pointed leaves dangling down like fingers aching to stroke the shining objects that glitter around the room. Or the cheek of a passerby. And, in between the sofas and armchairs, there are maybe a dozen dark, thickly lacquered side tables. Standing against the calm palette of the walls are three-quarter-height painted Chinese cupboards with moonlike circles drawn around their strange brass locks. A couple of Japanese screens covered in figures telling epic tales of love and heartbreak, half concertinaed, frame the set. Their resined scent fills the room, seeping out from deep inside the wood, bringing years of memories with it.
In sharp contrast to the minimalism of the color scheme, every surface is crammed with photographs in thick silver frames, carved wooden figures and demigods. There are embroidered laces and linens—some so bright that they appear snatched from the seamstress’s hands, others so faded and thin that they look as though they would fall apart if taken out of their frames. Curving porcelain vases and bowls too fragile—the china almost transparent—to pick up but whose ridges rise and
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