The Reluctant Governess

An ear-splitting grinding of the wheels of the carriage brought Victoria to the edge of her seat and she looked rather fearfully at her travelling companion. The woman smiled and indicated ahead, saying simply: ‘Reichstein, fräulein!’ in guttural tones.

Victoria heaved a sigh, and nodded her thanks, standing up to remove her suitcase from the rack. Then she looked through the carriage windows expectantly, realising with a sense of dismay that darkness had already fallen while she was wrapped in her uneasy thoughts.

The station, when they reached it, was little more than a shelter, a glimmer of light from an office window indicating the presence of other human beings. Victoria swung open the carriage door as soon as the train ground to a halt, and jumping down turned to lift out her case. Her heavier luggage had gone ahead, although looking about her at the deplorable conditions she doubted very much whether it could have arrived. Still, she thought philosophically, it was no use feeling doubtful now. She was here, and here she must stay, at least until she was dismissed or dismissed herself. If the child was as objectionable as the fact of the departed governesses led one to believe, it might be a short stay.

She crossed the platform, looking about her for some sign of life, but there seemed none, and certainly no one else had alighted from the train at Reichstein this evening. She felt a lingering desire to run back to the warmth and brightness of the railway carriage she had just left, but that would have been silly, as she was well aware. Even so, it did not take long for the cutting wind that blew off the glaciers above to chill her to the bone, and with resignation she made her way to the lighted office. As she drew near, a man in porter’s uniform emerged and brushed past her, obviously intent on seeing the train on its way, and although she tried to speak to him he either did not hear her or chose to ignore her.

She shrugged. A glance at her watch showed her that the train was an hour late in arriving, and surely anyone used to this god-forsaken spot would not expect her to arrive on time. She reached the office and smelt the delicious aroma of percolating coffee together with the scented warmth of burning pine logs in a huge grate. The office was empty, and she sighed, feeling resentful that the porter should have ignored her like that. In his position, she would have been more conscientious about her job. Surely the few passengers he did get were entitled to deferential service!

Beyond the environs of the station yard she could see more lights, probably those of the village. The pass had widened, spilling out to form a plateau from where she was sure the view would be magnificent on a clear day. But right now the snow was persisting, and she was cold and tired and no longer in the best of tempers. Heavens, she thought with a trace of self-pity, she hadn’t wanted to come here in the first place, had she? Had no one a care that she was wet and freezing to death in these temperatures?

Suddenly she heard a strange sound. It was a queer, clanking, grating sound and she couldn’t imagine what it might be. Even so, the sound was drawing nearer, so it might be someone from the schloss. She almost smiled, recalling old horror movies she had seen where such an entrance heralded the arrival of the monster! But her spirits were lifted and when the porter reappeared she handed him her ticket cheerfully. He took it silently, his expression uncompromising, and Victoria wrinkled her nose at him indifferently. Refusing to ask for shelter, she emerged from the station yard to look about her expectantly. The sound was much louder now, echoing in the cold frosty air, and she was unprepared for the flurry of flying snow that swept up into her face as a heavy station wagon drew into the yard along-side her. Blinded by the stinging particles, she stepped back suddenly, tripped over her standing suitcase, and landed in a heap in a thick drift of snow.

Immediately, an angry feeling of resentment welled up inside her again as she struggled to get hastily to her feet. A man leapt out of the station wagon and came swiftly round to her side, but by the time he reached her she was on her feet, a trembling mass of indignation.

‘Your pardon, fräulein,’ he said, in low attractive tones, that were less guttural than others she had heard, ‘but,’ he continued, ‘you would have been well advised to wait in the office!’

Victoria stiffened her shoulders, surveying him angrily in the light from the lantern hung above the station entrance. ‘I was not invited to wait in the office,’ she stated coldly, brushing down her coat and the trousers of her suit. ‘Perhaps you would have been well advised to be here in time to meet me!’ Her dark eyes challenged him. She had no intention of allowing this—this chauffeur to attempt to put her in her place. Even so, her gaze fell before the piercing brilliance of his, and a faint smile touched his lips.

Victoria was infuriated by this response. Maybe it was because she had made such an ungainly entrance which was something she was unused to, while he was calm and assured and utterly unmoved by her impatience. He was attractive too, she acknowledged reluctantly; tall, and broad, and muscular with hair which she had thought at first was white but which she now realised was simply silvery fair. His brows and lashes were dark in comparison and the heavy lines that were etched beside his mouth added age and experience.

Shrugging, he bent and lifted her suitcase, and was about to turn away when she said: ‘Just a moment! What do you think you’re doing?’

The man straightened, his muscles rippling beneath the fur parka he was wearing. His eyes were narrowed now and he frowned.

‘You are Miss Victoria Monroe, are you not?’ he queried softly.

Victoria twisted the strap of her handbag. ‘And if I am?’

‘You are going to the Schloss von Reichstein. I am from there.’

Still Victoria hesitated. She had no doubt that he was indeed from the schloss as he said, but some streak of perversity would not allow her to admit it. Instead, she gave him a disdainful stare, and said: ‘How can I be certain of that?’

Just at that moment the porter appeared from the direction of his office, swinging his lantern, obviously disturbed by the sound of raised voices. He looked up at the man beside Victoria, and touched his cap with deference. ‘Es ist Sie, Herr Baron!’ he nodded politely, his attitude vastly different from the way he had treated Victoria, and while she experienced an awful feeling of dismay at his words, he went on in his own language, gesticulating at the weather as he conversed with her companion. Victoria’s cheeks burned. The Baron indeed! No chauffeur as she had vainly imagined, but her employer himself! Inwardly she was seething. Someone should have warned her that in Austria barons might be found meeting their employees off mountain trains! It simply wasn’t done! Her experience had given her an infinitely different impression of aristocrats. And anyway, if this man was her employer someone had been misled. He was thirty-eight—forty at the most, whereas her godmother had attended school with his cousin who was easily sixty!

As though allowing her time to recover her dignity the Baron continued to discourse with the station porter, and only when Victoria began to move her feet rather restlessly did he turn to her and say: ‘Perhaps you would get in the car, fräulein. Now that my—er—credentials have been shall we say vouched for?’

Victoria made no reply. She was half afraid even now that her unruly tongue might run away with her, and she was beginning to blame him for the position she was in. He should have introduced himself in the first place instead of allowing her to assume he was some kind of employee himself. And yet, she had to admit, their meeting had not been entirely conventional, and she had flared at him for being the cause of her accident. The Baron put her case in the back of the vehicle, and came round to climb in beside her, bidding the porter ‘Guten Abend.’ As well as the thick parka he was wearing thick trousers made of some kind of skin and knee-length leather boots. Only his head was bare and obviously he didn’t appear to feel the cold as she did. However, he handed her a rug from the back of the car to put over her knees, for which she was grateful. She tucked her hands inside the sleeves of her sheepskin coat and was glad of its warmth and weight.

The station wagon moved away and again she heard that grating sound. She glanced swiftly at him, wondering whether the vehicle was in need of repair, and as though gauging her thoughts he said: ‘Chains, fräulein! I am afraid our roads are impassable without them at this time of year.’

Victoria nodded, said: ‘Oh!’ and then turned her attention to her surroundings. The snow partially illuminated the village as they drove along the main street. The chalets with their sloping roofs and smoking chimneys gave an impression of warmth and comfort that was far removed from the misted windows of the train. They seemed to rise in tiers up the sloping pastures of the mountain, and the realisation that people lived and worked here was warming. A feeling of exhilaration replaced her earlier resentment and she felt she had been unnecessarily ungracious.

As though attempting to reconcile her behaviour, she ventured: ‘I—I really ought to apologise, Herr Baron. I was completely unaware of your identity, of course.’ A smile tugged at the corners of the mouth.

The Baron von Reichstein looked in her direction for an intent moment, then returning his attention to his driving, he said:

‘Do I understand that that is how you treat people who are not your employers, fräulein?’ in infuriatingly sardonic tones.

Victoria’s colour returned heatedly. ‘Of course not. I’m not a shrew!’

The Baron shrugged his broad shoulders. ‘Nevertheless, you are quick-tempered, fräulein. I somehow do not see you and Sophie becoming the best of friends.’

Victoria controlled her indignation. ‘Sophie?’ she queried, pleasantly. ‘That is your daughter?’

‘Correct.’

Victoria digested this. So this man was the Baron von Reichstein. Certainly he was much younger than Aunt Laurie had suspected or she would not have been so eager to pack her goddaughter off to his isolated schloss in the dead of winter.

In an effort to begin some sort of conversation, Victoria tied a scarf over her hair, put up her coat collar, and said: ‘Is it far to your—er—house?’

The Baron hesitated. ‘Not too far,’ he said at last. ‘However, pehaps I should warn you, it is not a house. It is a schloss, a castle, in fact!’ He glanced her way. ‘Are you a sturdy female, Miss Monroe? The Schloss von Reichstein is no place for greenhouse plants.’

Victoria compressed her lips. ‘Only for hardy annuals, perhaps?’ she muttered, almost under her breath, but he heard her, and a faint smile touched his lips.

‘Indeed, Miss Monroe. We are all hardy who live in these mountains.’

Victoria sighed. They were leaving the village behind now and the road was beginning to wind through forests of pine trees thickly laden with snow. It was very quiet, very still, and as the snow was no longer driving against the windscreen she could see stars beginning to twinkle in the dark sky over-head. Clouds were rolling back to the west and the chill wind which had gripped her in the station yard became a howling gale out on the bare mountain. The station wagon progressed steadily, grinding over the frozen surface that was lightly powdered with snow. Victoria wondered if sleighs were still used in these remote districts, or were they simply a tourist attraction? Somehow she couldn’t imagine the Baron von Reichstein driving a vehicle that jingled as he went.

When it became necessary to break the uneasy silence which had fallen, she said: ‘How old is your daughter, Herr Baron?’

‘Sophie is nine, almost ten,’ he replied. ‘Are you used to teaching children of that age?’

Victoria considered his question. ‘Well, I haven’t actually done any teaching before,’ she confessed at last. ‘However,’ she added, hastily, ‘I do have the qualifications. I simply haven’t used them before.’

There was another long silence and when she glanced across at him, half afraid of his reactions to this statement, she found he was shaking his head rather resignedly.

‘Is—is something wrong, Herr Baron?’ she asked, only remembering to add his title as an afterthought.

The Baron looked at her. ‘Nothing,’ he said, with emphasis. ‘It simply seems that Sophie is doomed to be educationally sub-normal!’

Victoria raised her eyebrows. ‘Whatever do you mean? She forgot his title in her indignation.

The Baron lifted his broad shoulders indolently. ‘You are the third governess she has had,’ he explained patiently. ‘The first was a woman of perhaps fifty years. Experienced with children but unable to stand the isolation, or so she said. She left without attaining her first month’s salary.’ He sighed. ‘The second was a girl like yourself. With three years of teaching two older children behind her she should have found Sophie an easy task. But no! Her nerves would not stand it, that was her excuse. She left also.’ He glanced her way sardonically. ‘And now there is you, fräulein. Your first teaching position. You admit that until now you have had no cause to work. From this one gathers you have been living a socially active existence. How do you imagine you will stand up to the rigours of life at Reichstein when two experienced governesses have failed?’

Victoria bit her lip. ‘From what you say, I gather the others left because of the isolation. I’m not afraid of isolation, Herr Baron.’

‘No?’ He looked sceptical. ‘Not even when this is your first teaching post? Do you not perhaps think you will require some kind of light relief after working all day with Sophie? We do not even have television at Reichstein, fräulein.’

Victoria gave him an irritated stare. ‘One would almost imagine you did not want a governess for Sophie,’ she commented, with daring.

The Baron frowned. ‘You do not know me very well yet, fräulein. One should never jump to conclusions.’

Victoria bent her head and said nothing, but the ready indignation was very near the surface when dealing with this man.

Presently they reached the summit of a steep incline and now Victoria could see a valley below them. Moonlight illuminated it eerily while on the far side of the valley, above the surging waters of an icy stream, stood a fairy-tale castle, its turrets silhouetted against the backcloth of dark pines. Victoria gasped, and the Baron’s attention was drawn to her once more.

‘Picturesque, is it not?’ he queried, half mockingly. ‘An enchanter’s castle!’ He put the car into a lower gear and began the steep slope down into the valley. ‘Unfortunately, no one should judge things, any more than people, by their outward appearance.’