Hamsita

The dining-room, unsteadily illuminated by the demure candleflames in which pretty Hamsita took such daredevil delight, was quieter this evening because one of the usual partakers around the long glistening oval table had been put to rest that very morning.… after a long illness, true, but one that had not prevented the deceased from dining with the others until the very end. So, the movement of the carriage clock had it all its own way, deepening the silence by punctuating it.

Around the table tonight, there were still the same number of places laid. Two ancient dowager ladies, whose sister’s funeral they had all attended today, spooned their soup with only the slightest of tinkles. Father and mother sat at each end of the oval, both formally dressed for dinner, as had been their wont the length of their marriage. His heavy moustache showed signs of soup droplets flickering in the light. Her floral choker moved in and out with the neck muscles - her large brooch of a golden eagle looking more like an exotic insect in the rarefied glow. Hamsita sat opposite the two dowagers. She was at that awkward age when she was too old to be put to bed early after a nursery supper alone with her Nanny (who was still an inhabitant of the house) but, equally, too young to have a full-bodied frock or the attention of the others towards her attempts at sophisticated conversation. She, too, ate quietly, realising that, of all meals, this was the one where she was to be best behaved. Eating not only quietly, but uncharacteristically slowly. She almost felt herself to be a lady for the very first time - her face seemed a source of light greater than the candles. Nobody noticed her “coming-out”, not even Hamsita’s mother, for she was caught up in her own ditherings, picking at her food in the same way as her conscience.

With the scene set, there is nothing much to add. Photographs are like that, albeit this one owning an uncanny element of slow motion. No sound effects, other than perhaps a hint of a knock at the dining-room door. The two dowagers would perk up, eyes bowling...believing this to be their late sister returned from the dead. (But Hamsita knew, in her own mind, that it was the aged Nanny come for her scraps).

Published ‘Working Titles’ 1989