The Impossible Ward by Dorothy Mack Page A

atwitter and giggled appreciatively at his wit in a manner more appropriate to a budding debutante than a maiden lady on the shady side of forty, but Marianne remained singularly unmoved by a really creditable performance, only speaking when directly addressed. She pleaded fatigue at the earliest possible moment and fell into bed in a state bordering on blank despair. She was intensely homesick and worried about leaving her grandfather and, despite his assurances that he was looking forward to devoting most of his time to a study of Egyptian history during the next months, was convinced that he would feel the gap in his life made by her absence much more keenly than he was admitting. They were very deeply attached to one another and he had had complete charge of her education for the past ten years. Consequently she had received the same type of instruction as his, former university scholars, and her mind was trained in the same manner. A day spent in the unnerving company of Miss Twistleton had served only to emphasize how sadly unfitted she was for the company of women. Her days were crammed full of practical problems concerning the running of the farm and her evenings spent in the erudite company of her grandfather and the rector. Until today she had never realized how subtly her life had changed following her grandmother’s death. In the past few years she had not even once experienced the pangs of guilt that had first assailed her whenever she thought of the exquisite embroidery work that her grandmother was noted for. She had been attempting to teach Marianne the skill with conspicuously little success at the time of her death, and Marianne had not picked up a needle in the intervening years. Her grandmother, being a thrifty Frenchwoman, had stressed homemaking skills, and Marianne was well able to order a household, but, she thought with unaccustomed self-pity, how little benefit such practical arts would be in the environment of wealth to which she was heading. For the first time ever it occurred to her that she had no feminine accomplishments at all. She had not once touched a pianoforte or a needle in ten years. As a very young child her drawings and attempts at watercolor painting had caused her grandmother to go off in fits of laughter. “You will never be the artist, chérie,” had been Grandmere’s judgment. “We must see to your musical education.” So while she lived, Marianne had been well taught and there was promise of future proficiency on the pianoforte. She had a pleasing voice too, but both skills had been abandoned when they moved to the farm following her grandmother’s demise. They had taken few possessions with them; her grandfather had been desolate at the loss of his wife and quite beyond thinking about music teachers and pianofortes at the time. Later, when they had settled into a comfortable routine on the farm, Marianne had been too thrilled by the freedom of outdoor living and the workings of the farm to regret the loss of her music. As her grandfather gradually became interested in taking over her education, she found herself completely happy with his program and his companionship.
    “I should have been born a male,” she mourned aloud, with sudden shattering conviction. “I have been educated as a boy would be, I’ve had the freedom of a boy—I am no kind of female at all.”
    It never occurred to her that, in all probability, if she had been a boy her life would have been very different, for her father would undoubtedly have taken over the upbringing of a male heir. She never thought of her father at all, for at this point in her unhappy musings she fell into a disturbed sleep in the unfamiliar, too soft bed.
    In the morning things seemed no better as she looked around the impersonal room with listless eyes, absently assessing its heavy solid appointments—anything to avoid dwelling on the prospect of another long day confined in a carriage with Miss Twistleton. A hasty glance