by Benita Brown
Then, earlier this year, she had seen the London train disgorge a troupe of actors at the Central Station. She had stopped to watch them as the seemingly endless supply of bags and boxes and trunks was loaded on to a wagon. She observed the actors’ brilliant clothes, their exaggerated movements and the extravagant way they had of calling out to each other, and she was entranced. Ever since that day, Nella had been saving up to go to the Christmas show at the Palace.
But she also liked looking in the shop windows in the city centre, at the furnishings, the fabrics, and the fashions.
‘Constance, you would look lovely in that blue tulle!’ she had said once.
Constance smiled. ‘So would you.’
‘Me? Don’t be daft!’
‘But you would. We are about the same height, the same colouring—’
‘No, Constance, no, we’re not the same at all. You are bright - bright and beautiful - and I’m just faded, washed out and ugly as sin.’
‘You’re not ugly, Nella.’
‘Amman’t I?’
‘No. You have a sweet little face.’
‘And what about these little arms and these little legs? They’re not sweet and shapely like yours are. They’re more like sticks.’
‘Nella, stop it!’
‘And most of all, Constance, what about this twisted little back? If you dressed me in one of them fine dresses from Bainbridge’s window, I’d look like Mr Punch in the sideshow.’
After that day, she remembered, Constance had hurried them past any display of fashion in the shop windows. Nella would see her friend’s eyes linger regretfully on the new displays - the hats from Paris, the feather boas, the elegant parasols - and she longed to tell her that it didn’t matter. Nella wasn’t a bit envious of her friend’s beauty, and she would have longed to stop and dream of how lovely Constance would look in that cream muslin day dress or the turquoise satin evening gown with the black lace draped and trailing romantically. But Constance would hurry on, away from the shops and into the smart suburbs north of the city.
Here, Nella would observe a different kind of longing in her friend’s eyes. As Constance gazed at the substantial terraced houses and the spacious villas in Jesmond she would grow silent - but there was no need for speech. Nella could see, only too clearly, what kind of hunger it was that was consuming her friend.
One day they had paused at an open gateway. They could see a neat lawn, almost velvet smooth, bounded by flowering shrubs. It was a late summer evening and the scents of the flowers lingered in the lengthening shadows. They stood very still, savouring the fragrance, then Nella saw that Constance was looking at the house beyond.
As they watched, a lady walked towards a table placed near the window and lit an oil-lamp. The soft glow revealed a graceful drawing room, not solid and oppressive like the Sowerbys’, but light and airy, with small gilt-framed pictures on the walls. A gentleman appeared and the lady turned and placed a hand on his shoulder. They seemed to be smiling at one another as they drew closer. A moment later he broke away and drew the curtains.
Nella turned, grinning, to face her friend, and was frightened to see how very still Constance had become. Her eyes were wide and glittering in the dusk and she was clenching her fists tightly.
‘Constance ...’ Nella whispered.
‘Mm?’
‘Constance, was ... was your house like that?’
‘What do you mean?’
‘The house you had to leave. Was it like that?’
‘No, Nella.’ Her words, when they came, were like a sigh. ‘Not like that. My father’s house was much better than that.’
She turned abruptly and walked away. Nella scurried along behind her, not daring to question her further. They had never spoken of it again.
But Nella had thought about it often. From the moment she had first met Constance and her mother, she had known they were used to a much better life than the other poor souls who ended up in the workhouse. Agnes Bannerman never spoke of it. Never explained to anyone how she and her daughter had sunk so low but, although mother and daughter didn’t ever complain, Nella grew to believe that they had not accepted what fate had brought them to.
One night, as they were preparing for bed in the bleak dormitory, Nella had heard Mrs Bannerman murmur, ‘I’m so sorry, Constance. So sorry that it should come to this.’
Constance had flung herself in her mother’s arms. ‘We will go back there one day, Mama, we will!’ Nella had heard her say.
Her mother hadn’t replied. She’d simply held Constance tightly. But there had been tears shining in her eyes, and Nella, embarrassed, had turned away.
Well, Nella thought now, the poor lady was dead. But if there was such a place as heaven, she would surely be looking down this night and rejoicing that Constance was going to be married in the morning. She would be happy that her daughter was leaving this dreadful place that wasn’t very much better than the workhouse.
Nella yawned and burrowed further into the pillows and the mattress. At last weariness began to overcome the cold and her sense of grief and loss. Her pinched features relaxed into a smile as she drifted off to sleep. Constance may not be going to live in the kind of grand house she had lived in as a child, but at least she was going to have her very own little house, be her own mistress.
And nobody would ever order her around or treat her like a servant again ...
Chapter Four
‘Wait here. Do not attempt to enter the house. I will ask if Mr Elliot will see you.’
The manservant looked down his nose at her. He was young and his sallow skin was at war with a rash of unsightly pimples. He was probably only an underfootman to be on duty as late as this, but his smart uniform and clean white gloves had given him a proper sense of the proprieties. He had decided immediately that this irregular late-night visitor should be allowed no further than the pillared porch.
He pushed the door until it was almost shut. Perhaps he’s hoping that I’ll go away, Constance thought. She heard his footsteps echo across a marble floor; then silence. She flushed as she remembered the look of suspicion on his face. She knew that she did not appear to be the class of person who should call at the front door of such a house. Her clothes were cheap and she was hot and dishevelled from her dash across the park.
While she waited she turned to gaze back down the wide gravelled drive. It had taken all her resolution to walk up and seize the bell pull. She had never been inside Matthew’s house and she suspected that even John was not welcomed here socially.
One day, when they had been walking together, John had brought her as far as the entrance. ‘There, look, Moorside Towers, that’s where Matthew lives.’
The tall wrought-iron gates were closed and they peered through the bars at the well-tended gardens and the neat box hedges which bordered the drive. The Elliots were hosting a weekend party at their country house in the Borders. Among the guests would be respectable land-owning families with eligible daughters; Matthew had been requested to attend.
‘Why don’t we walk up the drive and have a closer look?’ she asked.
‘Oh, I don’t think so.’ John coloured slightly.
‘But you are Matthew’s friend and the servants will recognize you; surely it will be all right?’
‘No, it would seem ill-bred to gawp like common folk.’
He smiled his gentle smile, as if to take the sting out of his words, but she was cut to the quick. John did not know it but he had reminded her of how far she had sunk since the days when she would have known how to behave properly.
And then she was forced to acknowledge something else: if her father had not died when he had, if her mother had not been evicted from Lodore House, she would almost certainly not be standing here with John. Nor would she even have met him.
She had realized, almost from that first day in the park, that Matthew and John were separated by social class. For example, John, although he was well spoken and respectable, had to work for a li
ving, whereas Matthew, since coming down from Oxford, seemed to do nothing at all. It had never occurred to her until the day John had remained so firmly outside the gates of Moorside Towers to wonder how the two young men had met or what formed the basis of their friendship.
She heard footsteps hurrying back across the hall and turned as Matthew flung open the door. ‘Constance, what has happened? Don’t say you have changed your mind? You haven’t come to tell me that the wedding is off, have you?’ His dark eyes were wide, his cheeks flushed, his voice unsteady as if he had been drinking.
Constance blanched. ‘No! Why should I?’
He stared at her and then frowned as if making the effort to collect his wits. When he spoke, his voice was steady. ‘But, come, what am I thinking of?’
He drew her in and closed the door behind them. They were alone in the brightly lit hall. Matthew was in evening clothes, but his tie had been loosened and the buttons of his white waistcoat were undone. A lock of his luxuriant dark hair hung over his brow and he raised a hand to push it back.
‘Forgive me, I was about to retire,’ he said, and then his eyes widened. ‘My God, what has happened to you?’
‘I have been thrown out. Dismissed without a reference!’ She tried to sound amused, to make a joke of it. ‘Mrs Sowerby said that as my duties there were over, I must leave at once!’
She made a theatrical gesture but Matthew did not respond with a smile. ‘Did she attack you?’
‘Attack me?’
‘Strike you?’
‘No, she was angry but she used no physical force to remove me.’
‘Then what is this?’ He placed long fingers gently under her chin and turned her face towards the light. ‘You have a mark on your cheek. Is it a bruise?’
‘No, it must be dirt; I fell down in the fog ... See - my clothes ...’ In the bright light Constance had noticed for the first time the stains on her coat and her voice began to falter. ‘As I told you, Mrs Sowerby said I must go and I thought...’
‘My poor Constance. What a thing to happen on your wedding eve. I’m glad that you thought of me and, of course, you must stay here. Come, give me your box. I’ll take you to my sister’s rooms; she will have everything you need.’
Constance followed him across the hall and, at the bottom of the richly carpeted stairs, he paused and touched a switch on the wall. Decorative wall lamps blazed into light; they curved up the length of the staircase, illumining the way ahead. The house was lit by electricity, just as her father’s had been.
At the end of an upper corridor, Matthew paused at an archway. A heavy curtain was looped back to one side to reveal a vestibule with several doors leading from it. They were all closed.
Matthew gestured towards one of them. ‘That is Rosemary’s room. She will be in bed now, but—’
‘Should we wake her?’
‘She would never forgive me if she missed an adventure! But, here,’ he opened another of the doors, ‘this is her bathroom. You are welcome to use it whilst I go and inform her that she has a guest.’
He led the way in. Constance stared at the tiled walls with mirrors and glass shelves holding bottles of bath salts, essences and perfumes. A rich Turkish carpet lay on the marble floor and thick white towels hung on brass rails. The room was warm so she guessed that the rails were heated. There was another door set in the wall opposite the bath, but Matthew crossed to the stained-glass window on the far wall and adjusted the heavy maroon tasselled curtains. Constance went over to the bath; it was encased in panelled mahogany.
‘You fill it like this.’ Matthew came up behind her, leaned over and touched the taps. ‘See, this one draws hot water and this one cold.’
‘I know what taps are.’
‘Oh, of course. I’m sure Dr Sowerby must have an up-to-date bathroom, but...’
‘But not for the use of the servants.’
‘Well, no.’
‘Of course, you are right, Matthew. There is a bathroom in the house at Rye Hill and that is only for the use of the family.’
‘Constance, please ...’
She ignored his conciliatory expression and carried on, ‘I was allowed to carry a tin bath up to my attic once a week and fill it with buckets of hot water - which I also had to carry up all those flights of stairs. My towels were those which were no longer fit for the Sowerbys to use, and the soap I had to buy myself, from my employers.’
‘Don’t be angry with me, Constance. I did not mean to belittle you.’
‘Matthew, I’m tired, and tomorrow ...’
‘Of course. Your wedding day. I’ll leave you now. Help yourself to anything you need. There should be spare robes and nightgowns in that cupboard. That other door leads directly to my sister’s room. When you are ready she will be waiting for you. I’ll see you when it is time to leave for church in the morning.’ He closed the door behind him.
She sighed. Her head was aching and she felt bruised both outside and in. She was tired and she longed for sleep but, even more, she longed to be clean again.
As the bath filled, steam rose and surrounded her. It seemed to carry with it a flowery scent. She found a wide-necked jar of pink crystals on the floor by the side of the bath. The stopper was lying beside it. Rosemary must have forgotten to return it to its shelf. She sniffed it. Attar of Roses; that had been her mother’s favourite.
Constance kneeled and scattered crystals liberally into the deep bath, stirring them round. She watched the colour bleed into the water; ribbons of red swirling round her hand. Abruptly she rose and pulled off her clothes.
‘Why, you have washed your hair. Come, Constance dear, you must sit by the fire and brush it dry.’
Rosemary Elliot had no sooner opened the door to Constance’s timid knock, than she took her by the hand and led her across to the hearth. Matthew’s sister was fifteen years old and, probably because of her sheltered upbringing, she was neither child nor woman. Constance, at eighteen, felt that she was much older, despite the mere three years that separated them.
Rosemary was almost as tall as her brother, and very slim. She had the same dark hair as Matthew - at the moment it hung almost to her waist in two long plaits - and the same dark colouring, but she had none of his dramatic good looks. A nose and chin that were too thin and pointed marred her oval face. And yet her eyes were like her brother’s, large and brown and deeply expressive.
She wore a soft pink flannel robe over a long nightdress with pretty broderie anglaise flounces, but her body looked like that of a lanky boy. However, she spoke with all the authority of a young woman of her class and upbringing.
‘Look, I have built up the fire. Sit on this ottoman and towel your hair for a moment. I will fetch you a brush and then I will go and pick up your clothes.’
Constance flushed. ‘Forgive me, I should not have left them lying there ... I’m tired - and a little confused ...’
‘Sit down, Constance. Matthew told me all about you and what has happened; no wonder you are confused!’
‘What did he tell you?’
‘My dear, don’t look so alarmed. There is no shame attached. Your employer threw you out of her house the night before your wedding, with no thought of what might happen to you. It is she who ought to be ashamed. Now, here is my hairbrush.’
No shame, Constance thought. What if I were to tell this confident girl what has really happened to me? Would she understand? Would she be horrified? Would she still want to help me or would she believe, as most of her class would, that I must be to blame?
‘Would you like a hot drink?’ Rosemary had come back into the room. ‘Warm milk and honey perhaps? I always find that soothing.’
‘Please don’t bother. It’s late, your - your household must be sleeping ...’
‘But it’s no bother. Beattie has been hovering like a mother hen ever since Matthew woke me. She has her own little kitchen in what used to be the nursery and she will be only too pleased to make the drinks herself.’
‘Bea
ttie?’
‘Miss Hannah Beattie, former nanny, kept on after I started school, out of sheer sentiment and now employed as my companion and to keep an eye on Matthew whilst our parents travel in foreign parts.’
Rosemary paused at the bedroom door, ‘I’ll give her your clothes, if you don’t mind. Some of them appear to be torn. She’ll sort through and see what can be done.’
She closed the door behind her. Rosemary was enjoying this ‘adventure’, Constance thought, and immediately she felt ashamed; the girl was good-hearted and generous. Constance could not imagine Annabel Sowerby putting herself out for someone she would consider to be one of the lower orders.
Constance stared into the flames. The nightdress she was wearing smelled of lavender and the flannel robe was soft and comforting. She had had one like this when she was a child, and there had been times when she had sat looking for pictures in the nursery fire and brushing her hair dry just as she was doing now.