Mary Ann and Miss Mozart (2 page)

“Mrs. Giffard!”

“Mrs. Neave.”

A woman of about her mother’s age had appeared. She was dressed in dark blue silk and looked, Mary Ann thought, rather severe compared to Mama in her striped yellow gown and little tilted straw hat. The two women nodded politely to each other.

“And Mary Ann,” said Mrs. Neave, turning to her. “Welcome to our school.”

Mary Ann made a small, nervous curtsy.

“You will take tea, Mrs. Giffard, before you return to the City?”

Her mother accepted, and Mrs. Neave called to the maid. “Tea, Jenny, in my office. And tell Mrs. Giffard’s man to take the young lady’s trunk to the rear entrance.”

Jenny disappeared into the back area of the building.

Nearby, in the hall, a door opened and several girls of about Mary Ann’s own age came out, carrying books. Mrs. Neave stopped one of them – a plump, saucy-looking girl with auburn curls.

“Sophia, this is Mary Ann Giffard. Mary Ann, Sophia Hammond.”

The girls nodded to each other, and Mary Ann felt Sophia’s eyes taking in every detail of her appearance.

“Sophia will take you around the school and show you where you are to sleep. But first: say goodbye to your mother.”

Mary Ann turned to her mother. She wished they did not have to say goodbye so publicly. Her mother’s eyes were pink, as if she was holding back tears, and Mary Ann felt her own eyes pricking. She submitted to a brief kiss, then stepped brusquely away.

“You’ll be home for Whitsun,” her mother said, as if to reassure herself. “Now, be sure I hear well of you. And write to us…”

“I will,” said Mary Ann, retreating, aware that Sophia was observing the exchange with interest.

When the other girl moved away Mary Ann was glad to follow her and leave the two women to discuss finance over their tea.

Sophia waved a hand at the room she had just left, and from which people were still coming out.

“The downstairs rooms are the main classrooms, and the dining room is here too.” She briefly opened a door across the hall, and Mary Ann saw two long tables. “That room at the back is the office, where your mother is taking tea. Let’s go upstairs. I’ll show you the music room.”

“Oh!” exclaimed Mary Ann. “A music room!”

“Do you like music?”

“I do. It’s quite my favourite occupation. I’m to have harpsichord and singing lessons.”

Sophia looked pleased. “I have music lessons too. Mrs. Corelli is our singing teacher and Mr. Ashton teaches harpsichord.”

She walked ahead of Mary Ann around the turn of the grand staircase, and Mary Ann thought what a big house this was, though rather dark and old-fashioned with its unpainted wood panelling.

“Most of the rooms on this floor are dormitories for the older girls,” said Sophia. “But over here is the music room.”

No one was in the room, so they were able to look around. There were shelves of books, music stands, flutes and other wind instruments, and a harpsichord.

“Do you have an instrument at home?” asked Sophia.

“A virginal. There is no space for anything bigger. But my sister and I both play.”

“Sometimes Mr. Ashton plays for us,” said Sophia. “He is a wonderful musician – and quite
divinely
handsome. Half the older girls are in love with him.” She sighed theatrically. “But he’s married, and quite old: twenty-eight at least.”

“My sister’s fiancé is twenty-eight,” said Mary Ann.

“Oh! Your sister is getting married! When?”

“Next year, or the one after.”

“And is she greatly in love?”

Mary Ann frowned. “I don’t think so. But Mother says love is not to be recommended and that girls may do better without it.”

“I shall insist on being in love when
I
marry,” said Sophia.

“I don’t think I want to marry at all,” said Mary Ann.

Sophia’s eyes opened wide. “But you would not wish to be a spinster?”

“I want to be a singer – at the opera.” Mary Ann did not often tell anyone this, for it was difficult to convey how strongly she wished it, but Sophia seemed to invite confidences. She added, “Of course my parents say it is not a respectable profession.”

“But you might catch the attention of a lord – and marry him! Several famous singers have. Think of that!”

She went on to ask Mary Ann about her family, and to talk about her own: her two younger brothers and baby sister; their house in Holborn; their spaniel.

“Come upstairs,” she said. “I’ll show you our room. Your trunk should be there by now.”

They went up yet another flight to another panelled hall full of closed doors.

“Those rooms at the front are Mrs. Neave’s own apartment,” said Sophia, “and Mrs. Corelli has this room by the stairs. Our dormitory is here. It’s above the music room.”

She opened the door into a plain room with four beds, neatly made, a few chairs, and a washstand with jug, bowl and mirror. Mary Ann’s trunk was standing in front of the fireplace.

“Your clothes go in that cupboard by the door,” said Sophia. She eyed the trunk, and Mary Ann knew she wanted to be there when it was opened.

She saw that the bed in the far corner seemed to be hers; the others had chairs or shelves with small things – a prayer book, a handkerchief, a locket – on them.

“Who else sleeps here?” she asked.

“Lucy Stanley, over there.” Sophia indicated a bed set a little separate from the others, in the space behind the door. “And Phoebe Merrill, here, next to me. You may have the corner bed. We are the youngest girls in the school. Lucy and I are thirteen; we have been here since January. And Phoebe is twelve. She came a few weeks ago. How old are you?”

“Twelve,” said Mary Ann. “Thirteen in September.”

Sophia smiled. “We shall all be great friends, I’m sure. Phoebe – well, everyone likes Phoebe. And Lucy is our clever one; we are quite in awe of her.” She glanced again at Mary Ann’s trunk. “You should unpack soon or your clothes will be creased. I’ll show you where they go.”

She opened a cupboard beside the door, revealing shelves and a few hooks for hanging clothes. Most of the space was taken up by full-skirted gowns and petticoats.

“There are two hooks here,” said Sophia, “and these lower shelves. Cloaks and hats go in the other cupboard. Have you brought much?”

“No.”

Mary Ann lifted the lid of the trunk. Her night chemise lay on top and she removed it and laid it on her bed. Sophia watched as she took out two cotton gowns, several chemises, stays, and a gown of pale green silk with a yellow under-skirt – “for occasions,” she explained, wondering if there would be any.

Sophia stroked the silk admiringly and found a place for it in the cupboard. “You might wear that if we go to Ranelagh Gardens,” she said.

“Ranelagh? To the Pleasure Gardens?” Mary Ann could scarcely believe she might go
there
. She had heard all about Chelsea’s famous Ranelagh Gardens, where concerts were held on summer evenings in the Rotunda – “with a roof, so that it may be used even in bad weather”, her sister had said – and where the gentry came to mingle and be seen.

“Mrs. Neave likes to take some of her girls to a concert there each summer,” said Sophia.

“Oh! I should
so
love to go! Have you ever been there?”

“No. But the older girls tell me it is not to be missed.”

From far below came the sound of someone ringing a bell.

“Dinner!” said Sophia. “Also not to be missed. Come and meet the others.”

Chapter Two

Nymphs and Shepherds

The dining room was full of voices, movement, rustling skirts. Mary Ann felt eyes on her: the eyes of the teachers who had taken their places at the ends of each table, and those of passing girls. She felt nervous, and was glad of Sophia’s presence.

“Stand here,” said Sophia, “next to me.”

They were at the lower table, nearest the door and the kitchen entrance. A teacher stood at the end, and opposite Mary Ann and Sophia were two girls who Sophia introduced in a whisper: “Lucy and Phoebe.”

Both girls smiled. Phoebe was pretty, fair and small. Lucy, a taller, quiet-looking girl, had a shy manner.

A hush fell on the room, and Mrs. Neave, at the far end, spoke a grace. Mary Ann joined in the murmured “Amen”, and there was a scraping of chairs as they all sat down and the servants moved into the room carrying dishes.

Mary Ann scarcely noticed the food, except to watch that she did not eat too fast for good manners; or too slowly; or reach for things across the table. Several dishes passed by her because she was too shy to ask for them. The teacher at the end called back a dish of carp and told Mary Ann, “Try this. It’s good.”

Sophia turned to the teacher: “Mrs. Corelli, Mary Ann is to have singing lessons with you. She is quite in
love
with music and wishes to become an opera singer.”

Mary Ann blushed and looked at her plate. She hadn’t expected her confidence to Sophia to be passed on so publicly. And whatever would Mrs. Corelli think? Would she be dismissive, like Mary Ann’s parents?

But Mrs. Corelli did not look surprised or disapproving. “I know Mary Ann is to have lessons,” she said, “and I shall hear her sing this afternoon, after our deportment lesson.”

But before Deportment came half an hour of French Conversation with Mrs. Neave.

“
Je ne comprends pas
,” whispered Sophia as they followed a group of older girls into the front classroom. “Our most useful phrase.”

“Here’s another,” said Lucy, pretending boredom: “
Le Français m’ennuie à mourir
.”

They laughed. But Lucy, it turned out, was excellent at French: Mrs. Neave’s best pupil. She could both speak and write the language well. Mary Ann’s French was limited to what she had learned at her day school, and she struggled to keep up. She was relieved that Phoebe also seemed to be having trouble.

Phoebe preferred their next lesson. The anxiety left her face as they returned to the dining room, where the central space had been cleared of furniture to make room for Deportment and Dancing with Mrs. Corelli.

Mrs. Corelli was a large woman who moved with surprising lightness and grace. She was dressed dramatically in an emerald green gown that Mary Ann much admired.

Mary Ann had thought learning how to stand up and sit down in a hooped skirt, how to curtsy, how to walk, would be boring, but Mrs. Corelli made it fun.

“Imagine, girls,” she said, “that you are out walking in the street, wearing a hooped skirt. If you bounce along, like this” – she began walking in a jaunty way, and they giggled – “your skirt will set up a rhythm of its own and you will not be able to control it, especially in a strong wind. And what if you sit down?”

She flumped onto a chair so that her skirt stuck up at the front, revealing striped stockings which Mary Ann suspected she had worn especially to make them laugh.

They promenaded around the room, careful to hold themselves erect, then practised sitting down and standing up, and taking a man’s arm – Mrs. Corelli acting the part of the man.

“Lightly, child!” she exclaimed, when it was Mary Ann’s turn. “Do not
clutch
.”

Mary Ann was embarrassed. It did not seem to her at all a comfortable way to walk, and she hoped no man would ever offer her his arm. She was relieved when they finished the lesson with a dance: a minuet. There was a harpsichord in the corner of the room, and Mrs. Corelli played, glancing up to watch them. The older girls took the man’s part, and Mary Ann found herself dancing with a tall girl named Emma whose limp hold made her own steps uncertain. She watched Phoebe, who looked as if she was born to dance.

“Oh, I love the minuet!” Phoebe exclaimed afterwards. “I can’t wait to be old enough to go to balls!”

There was now a break from lessons, and the girls, who all looked pink and hot, fanned themselves as they queued for lemonade. Mrs. Corelli took two glasses and summoned Mary Ann.

“We shall take these up to the music room and I’ll hear you sing.”

“Oh! Now?”

Mary Ann was alarmed. What would Mrs. Corelli think of her singing? And
what
would she ask her to sing? Perhaps something difficult.

But when they reached the music room Mrs. Corelli looked through a collection of songs and asked, “Now, what do you know? ‘Nymphs and Shepherds’? ‘On Greenland’s Coast’?”

“Oh, yes! Both. I mean – yes, I like ‘Nymphs and Shepherds’.”

“Good.”

She put the music on the stand and sat down at the harpsichord and began to play. Mary Ann came in on time, but tentatively. It was a while before she gained confidence and sang louder.

“
In this grove,

In this grove let’s sport and play,

Let’s sport and play…
”

She was enjoying herself now, and as she continued she almost forgot she was being tested.

“
Sacred to ease and happy love,

To music, to dancing and to poetry…
”

When she reached the end she saw that Mrs. Corelli was pleased.

“You have a lovely natural voice,” she said. “Soprano. I’m glad you are to have lessons. You will learn to control your breathing and to sing from
here –
” She put a hand on her midriff. “You will have lessons with me once a week and you will also join the choir. And I’m sure Mrs. Neave will want you to take part in our concert in September.”