Elspeth is the wittier, and crueler; Morag is not so quick-witted but has a bulldog way of flaring up, incensed. It would seem at a glance that Elspeth would be stronger than Morag, as she appears to be more able-bodied, but in fact Morag is sturdier, heels flat on the ground.
Yet both behave in a very kindly way to their guest, and they seem to be genuinely concerned for her.
“Please come in here, Clare, and have a seat—you’ve been under a strain. We’ve had the tea things ready for some time . . .”
“That isn’t a very nice thing to say to a guest! ‘Ready for some time’—that’s rude.”
“I only meant—”
“—just ignore her, Clare; my sister so rarely has company, she has lost her manners.”
“—only meant the tea will be getting cold.”
“Then—we will reheat it . . .”
Like young children or dogs eager for affection, the great-aunts are competing for Clare’s attention, which is embarrassing to her. She has a vague idea that another person, a third great-aunt perhaps, a wraithlike figure, is somewhere close by, preparing to bring out the tea.
In a drawing room crowded with heavy antique furnishings, carpets and tapestries, Clare is urged to take a seat on a velvet settee that creaks slyly beneath her weight. The smell of mold is strong here, as well as an earthy, gritty odor she guesses might be rodent droppings, which she has smelled before in her life, in places not so very clean.
“We know you’re tired, dear Clare, and only want some privacy in your room, but—we have so much to talk about first!”
“How d’you know the girl wants privacy? She is famished, look at her! She wants her tea.”
“—high tea—”
“—except we only have Pepperidge Farm cookies, not hot buttered scones and clotted cream, every kind of jam and jelly, like they serve at the Ritz, but—”
“Oh, that Ritz! She wants you to ask, ‘Which Ritz?’ so she can say ‘the Ritz, on Piccadilly.’ You know—London.”
Elspeth speaks scornfully. When Morag protests, Elspeth says, with the air of one delivering the pièce de résistance, “And I don’t mean London, Connecticut.”
“New London, Connecticut—”
“Oh, just stop! She goes on and on about it! We were taken just once as girls by our father to high tea at the Ritz, and she never got over it—”
“—she never got over it—”
“—and d’you know what, Clare?—the tea was English Breakfast and wasn’t even steeped in the pot, it was tea bags.”
Clare laughs, uncertain why this is funny, if she is meant to laugh. It seems cruel to her that the taller, more attractive, younger-appearing Elspeth should speak with such scorn, intending to belittle her dwarflike sister who speaks so earnestly; also, there is something missing about Morag, one of her hands perhaps—Clare is sure she has seen a smooth-skinned stump . . . But when she dares to look more closely, Morag seems to have two hands of more than ordinary size, manly hands, with the broken nails of a laborer or a gardener.
“—so much to talk about, dear!—we have been waiting and waiting. Since our poor dear sister passed away last week, and we were informed of the shock of the will—”
“—not that we are badly shocked, oh no—”
“—no. Not at all badly shocked. We’d known that—”
“—our dear Maude had many ‘interests’—”
“—charities—”
“—St. Cuthbert’s—”
“—relatives scattered all over New England—”
“—quite a shock, but not a bad shock—”
“—dear Maude has left us this house—”
“—jointly, us and her son—Gerard—”
“—oh yes: Gerard—your bachelor uncle—”
“—she looked after us—and a few others in the family—”
“—our dear nephew Gerard, you will meet—”
“—we didn’t marry, as Maude did; she was very brave—”
“—she so grieved for your father, she could not—”
“—could not bear—”
“—even to think of—”
“—for years, to think of you.”
“Yet she was aware of you—”
“She was! We all were—except—”
“—the years flew by—”
“—flew by . . .”
Amid this exhausting chatter, an elaborate tarnished-silver tea tray is brought into the drawing room, set ceremoniously on a low table in front of Clare. A rattling of cups, spoons. Chipped but beautiful, fragile Wedgwood china, ornately patterned silver spoons just slightly tarnished. Whoever has brought in the tray isn’t visible to Clare, for her—his?—face has been obscured by a cloud of steam rising from the teapot.
“—I will pour. Here, Clare—”
“—your cup, Clare—”
“—your cup, we have selected carefully—”
“—rosebuds, dear Maude’s favorite—”
“—and this spoon!—actually it is a baby spoon—”
“—your spoon—”
Clare rubs at her eyes, tired from the long drive, and sees that the great-aunt who is stirring the tea is Elspeth, unless it is Morag . . . And who is the other person in the room? Clare glances nervously about; her strained eyes detect no one.
There follows an interlude of merciless chatter. Like sharp-beaked birds peck-peck-pecking at her. Of course, Clare thinks, her elderly great-aunts mean no harm; they mean well; they are lonely, perhaps, for company; they are excited to meet her, as she is excited to meet them.
Clare, a finicky eater, chronically underweight, has more appetite than she’d have imagined for lukewarm English Breakfast tea diluted with rancid-smelling cream. And Pepperidge Farm ginger cookies, not fresh, that crumble in her fingers, causing her mouth to water, they are so delicious . . .
“—(She is too thin, isn’t she!)”
“—(We will remedy that!)”
Curious, the great-aunts speak of Clare as if she isn’t in the room with them.
Her eyelids begin to droop. She is so very tired suddenly. With glittery eyes behind their polished bifocal glasses the great-aunts observe her closely.