“They’re at the lodge,” she said.
“How are you finding things here?” Annie said, after a few moments of awkward silence.
“It is very different from Cavendish.” Maud wasn’t sure how much she could trust Annie.
“I’m sure.” Annie leaned back against the chair. “It was quite a change for us to move from Ontario to this rough country. And the dirt!” She slapped at her skirt. “No matter how often I beat this skirt it never comes clean.”
Despite herself, Maud laughed. “True.” She wiped the dirt off her own light brown skirt. “But it is an adventure. Certainly bigger than Cavendish.”
“Possibly.” Annie picked an imaginary speck off her shirt. “But compared to Ontario, Prince Albert is a backwater. Mother says thank goodness for the church or there would be nothing but drunken men philandering about. And there’s also the school, of course.”
When Maud arrived, she had heard Mrs. McTaggart say something similar, but she would have never dreamed of repeating it! She was both impressed and surprised by Annie’s candor.
“We have a new teacher this year, Mr. Mustard,” Annie went on. “You know he’s a friend of Mary Ann’s—they went to school together—and is supposed to be well educated.”
Maud got that familiar creepy-crawling feeling down her back; it tended to happen every time her stepmother was mentioned. What lies had her stepmother told Mr. Mustard? It wasn’t an ideal situation in which to produce a good first impression.
“I’m hoping he’ll be better than the last teacher, who couldn’t control the boys at all,” Annie went on.
“I miss my old teacher, Miss Gordon. She could control a room with one look.”
“Our teachers in Ontario were the best-educated,” Annie said. “So this Mr. Mustard has much to live up to.”
Maud hid a smile. Annie did enjoy putting on airs.
“Do you want to walk over to school together?” Annie asked.
“Edie and I were planning on it,” Maud said. Normally this might be considered improper, walking to school with the hired help. But given Maud’s newfound friendship with Edie, she didn’t see the harm. “I know where I’m going. Father showed it to me on our drive around town.”
“That’s perfect then!” Annie said. “I’ll stop by early and we can all walk over together. I’m not sure how many girls are actually going to be there; some of them go to the convent school up the way, and others are home.”
“Father told me the girl next door goes to the convent school.”
“You mean Mrs. Kennedy’s niece Laura? Yes, she goes to the convent school, although she’s Presbyterian. Can you imagine? My parents would never allow that.” So some things in Prince Albert were the same as in Cavendish. “Her brother, Will, has been helping on his father’s ranch most of the summer, so I’m not sure he’ll be in school.”
He must be the redhead Maud had seen on the day she arrived.
“So, tomorrow?” Annie said, standing up. “I’ll pick you and Edie up.”
Maud wasn’t sure about being friends with Annie, but if Mrs. Montgomery had asked her stepsister to spy, it might be best to keep her close. Besides, while Annie did put on airs, she knew a lot about the people in town.
“All right,” Maud said. “I’ll see you tomorrow morning.”
—
That evening, after dinner, Father said he had some auctioneering business at Agnew’s store. While Katie slept, he left Maud and her stepmother alone for the first time. Maud had hoped to hide up in Southview with her letters and journal. She also had to write some new material for the fake one she was leaving for Mrs. Montgomery.
But clearly, Mrs. Montgomery had decided this would be a good opportunity to impart some of that “guidance” she had mentioned to Father. Perhaps this was part of how her stepmother planned to “handle her”?
“We haven’t had an opportunity to get to know one another, and I have something particular I would love to discuss with you, woman to woman,” she said, patting the spot beside her.
Mrs. Montgomery’s change in attitude surprised Maud, and she stopped in the doorway. Perhaps she was going to tell her that she was pregnant? So she sat down beside her stepmother on the burnt-yellow couch in the parlor.
“As your new mamma, I think it is important that we are able to discuss certain”—she paused—“delicate things.”
That would be lovely,” Maud said. Perhaps she had been wrong about her stepmother. Grandma was always saying one must never assume what is going on in a person’s head.
Mrs. Montgomery put her hand on Maud’s arm and stroked it briefly, but then—as if sparked by fire—pulled it away.
“Has anyone ever discussed your hair? Perhaps your grandmother?”
“My hair?” Maud’s hand instinctively came up to the bun sitting on top of her head. What did her hair have to do with her stepmother’s pregnancy?
“Yes, your hair.” Mrs. Montgomery twisted her hands together, as though she were tying a knot. “You do know you’re a little young to be wearing your hair up.”
She was almost sixteen! But she didn’t want to make an enemy of her stepmother, so she said, “Aunt Annie suggested I wear it up for traveling, and I got used to it being off my neck.”
“Just as I suspected,” Mrs. Montgomery said. “It isn’t appropriate for a girl of not-yet-sixteen to be wearing her hair up. Even my stepsister Annie—who is your age—wears her hair down with a bow.”
Maud wanted to say something to counter the argument, but it was true. Even in Cavendish, girls didn’t wear their hair up until they were sixteen.
Mrs. Montgomery fiddled with her thumb and forefinger. “It is rather embarrassing, but the truth is…you are going to laugh at me, I’m sure. It is so silly. I know there are only a few years between us—”
“I will be sixteen in November,” Maud said.
“Yes, but you see, I worry if people see you with your hair up, they’ll think me older than I am. You understand.”
Maud understood all too well. Mrs. Montgomery was a married woman in her twenties. And, even though she was hiding it right now, expecting! It would be hard to dismiss that statement of fact. The plain truth was that her stepmother didn’t want Maud to wear her hair down, not because of fashion or morality, but because of her own vanity. Maud clasped her hands tightly in her lap. But, if it would resolve the friction between them, she would acquiesce. She unclasped them and stood up.
“I’ll go and take care of it now.”
Mrs. Montgomery stood up as well and—almost too energetically—hugged her.
Up in Southview, Maud slowly pulled out the hairpins, her heavy hair falling down her back one strand at a time. Then she took a pair of scissors, parted her hair, and, after some very deep, defiant breathing, cut her hair into fringe bangs.
CHAPTER FIVE