I loved seeing all their happy faces, all of them gathered together. Eating downstairs was so much more fun than eating up in the dining room. No one was scolding me to act like a lady. Everyone passed great bowls and platters of food around the table, helping themselves to as much as they liked. Jackson carved the beef Wellington, like he was the father of this little family. Mrs. Baddeley had made sure to make all of mine and Anita’s favorites.
“Oh, Mrs. Baddeley, you wonderful dear woman, you remembered how much I love your cheese straws!” Anita cried with delight. Mrs. Baddeley smiled between bites of beef Wellington.
“Oh yes, my dear. I have remembered all your favorites. And Miss Cruella’s as well.”
“I see that, Mrs. Baddeley,” I said, looking at the side table laden with lemon tarts, little cookies covered in powdered sugar, a rum and walnut cake, and a three-tiered cake covered in white icing. “And the pudding looks amazing. But I wonder if we will have room after eating all of this?” I scooped more roasted potatoes and carrots onto my plate.
“Oh, you haven’t seen the half of it. You haven’t even seen my surprise,” she said.
“There’s more?” Anita asked. “I can’t even imagine how that’s possible!”
Then I remembered. Their gifts! “I was so excited for our little party I forgot to present you with your gifts! Let me run upstairs and get them!”
“No, Miss Cruella.” Jackson put a gentle hand on my shoulder. “Sit. We still have pudding. Mrs. Baddeley has been working on your surprise all day. Besides, you are our gift this evening. We’re so happy to have you and Miss Anita with us.”
“Yes!” said Jean.
“Oh, please stay. You can give us our gifts later,” said Paulie.
“See, these people love you, Cruella,” Anita said under her breath. “Who else could get Jackson to wear a paper crown?”
“Well, Mrs. Baddeley, I think it’s time Paulie brings in your crowning Christmas achievement,” said Jackson, giving Mrs. Baddeley a little nudge and wink.
“Yes, Paulie. Go on. It’s on the silver tray sitting on the counter,” she said, adding, “Jean, go help her. And don’t go stumbling and ruining Miss Cruella’s surprise.” I laughed. Mrs. Baddeley wasn’t a terrible woman at all. If Jackson was the father of this family, surely Mrs. Baddeley was its mother.
“I’m sure they will do just fine, Mrs. Baddeley,” said Jackson.
And then it arrived. The largest, most magnificent jelly I had ever seen. It was raspberry, of course, and suspended within were cherries and tiny oranges. It didn’t seem possible to create such a large jelly without breaking it as it came out of the mold. She had decorated it beautifully, with thick whipped cream flowers. I felt like a little girl again. It was the most wonderful surprise of all. A strange feeling pricked at my eyes, and I realized they were wet with tears. And in that moment, I decided I liked jellies more than almost anything, because this dear woman had made them for me.
“Oh, Mrs. Baddeley. I love it. Thank you,” I said getting up and kissing her on the cheek. “I am so thankful to have you, and for spending this evening with all of you.” Mrs. Baddeley embraced me tightly. When I came away, I had flour on my dress. But this time, I didn’t care.
After dinner the servants talked Anita and me into staying for a glass of mulled wine, and to sing Christmas songs before we went upstairs. My heart felt full and my face was flushed. My ghosts weren’t ghosts. They were people, and they loved me. Anita was right. They were my family.
And then the bell rang.
We weren’t expecting guests. But Jackson quickly put on his jacket so he could go upstairs to see who it was. “It’s likely just children caroling, Miss Cruella. I won’t be more than a moment.”
“Oh, wouldn’t it be lovely if we all went up to give them a little something? The poor mites,” I said.
“Oh, yes!” said Paulie. “I know. Let’s give them some of the chocolates your mother sent us. It would be a nice treat for them.”
Mrs. Baddeley chimed in. “Jean, go get a basket from the kitchen. One of my wicker shopping baskets, and bring it here, along with a length of some wax paper. We can wrap up some of those cookies for them as well.”
“Oh, this is so exciting,” I said to Anita. I felt like we were on an adventure as we headed upstairs with our basket of chocolates and cookies to give to the singing children. We all stood there assembled, ready to surprise them. “Okay, Jackson, open the door,” I said, feeling like I might burst from the pure joy of the evening. It was the happiest I had felt since Papa died.
Jackson opened the door, but it wasn’t children who were waiting.
It was Mama.
“Jackson! What is the meaning of this?” My mother was livid as she took in the sight of us with our lopsided paper hats, flushed faces, and joyous expressions. Then her eyes landed on me. I had never seen her so angry.
“Mama! We weren’t expecting you!”I said. Part of me was so happy to see her after all this time. Part of me, too, felt a sense of foreboding form in the pit of my stomach.
“Clearly! Look at yourselves! My goodness, Cruella, you’re a mess! What in heavens is going on? Explain yourself!”
“When we heard the bell upstairs we thought it was caroling children at the door,” I said, my shoulders falling at her anger and disapproval. “We thought it would be festive to bring them some sweets.”
“I don’t understand, Cruella! What were you doing downstairs?” She took in the flour all over my dress. The flour I hadn’t even cared about just minutes before. My mama was so angry at me; I couldn’t bring myself to tell her we had been down with the servants celebrating Christmas. “Cruella, answer me! Whose idea was this?”
Anita was the one who spoke up. “It was my idea, Lady De Vil,” she said in her soft, sweet voice. Anita was always braver than I gave her credit for.
You have to watch out for the quiet ones. Take some advice from me. The quiet, observant girls are the deadliest.
My mother just looked at Anita as if she didn’t know her, as if she hadn’t spoken, and directed her words at Jackson. “Jackson, send the staff downstairs.” I wanted to say I hadn’t had the chance to give the staff their gifts yet. I wanted to say that it was my idea. But I couldn’t make the words come out. It turned out I wasn’t as brave as Anita. “Cruella, I’d like to speak with you in the morning room. Anita, if you would please excuse us?” Anita looked over her shoulder at me as she went up the stairs. I could tell she felt bad, and she was worried for me. I flashed her a reassuring smile as I made my way into the morning room with my mama. But we both knew my smile was fake.
Mama was seething. “Clearly this girl is a horrible influence on you. Six months away, and I come home to see you looking like this? Look at the state of you. What are you wearing, Cruella? Why are you dressed like a common house girl? You aren’t even wearing the earrings your father gave you!”
It was true. I hadn’t dressed up. I was wearing one of my plainer dresses, something I would usually wear on outings in the park or woods. “Walking clothes,” my mother called them. I hadn’t wanted to dress up and be flashy. I’d wanted to fit in downstairs. And now I felt as if I didn’t belong in the morning room with my mama. My face felt warm, and I wondered if it was red.
“This is too much, Cruella. Too much. I sent you to that school to become a lady, not a common housemaid. Clearly Anita has been a bad influence on you! I should never have arranged for her to join you,” she said, pouring herself a glass of sherry and sitting on the leather couch in her usual spot.
“That’s not true, Mother!”
“Not true? Since when do you dress like this on Christmas Eve? I gave Mrs. Web explicit instructions on how this evening should go, and you defied my wishes. I don’t even know who you are.” Mrs. Web. Of course. She had tipped my mother off.
“She told you?”
“Of course she told me. She’s my head housekeeper. She is my eyes and ears when I am away. You are not to act th
e lady of the house with her, do you understand? She enforces my will when I’m not here to do it myself.”
“She’s a horrible woman, Mother. She wanted the servants to give up their holiday party. I couldn’t believe those were your wishes. What’s the harm in having a little party for the servants? You and Papa told me about the servants’ balls Grandmama used to have in the old days. What’s the difference between that and what we did tonight?”
“All the difference in the world! That was a grand estate, Cruella, a world of its own. With old traditions that went back too many generations to count. We live in the city. Dining in the kitchen with servants just isn’t done. What if the other ladies hear about this? What if Anita tells her guardian’s daughters? This kind of news travels through society. We’d be a laughingstock.”
She didn’t give me a moment to reply or try to defend myself. “I have made a decision, Cruella. I don’t want you going back to that school. I think it’s time for you to come out into society. We need to find you a husband at once! Someone who will take you in hand and curb this attitude of yours.”
I couldn’t believe she was saying this. “What attitude?” I asked.
“You don’t think I hear what you have been up to at school? Your threats to the headmistress and your constant snotty attitude, haughtiness with the other students in your avid devotion and defense of Anita? Alienating you from all the proper young women I sent you there to meet. This has to stop! I don’t want you seeing that girl anymore, do you understand?”
And for the first time ever, I stood up to my mother.
“Anita is my best friend!”
“She is not your friend! She is little better than a servant. And I will not have her influencing you in this way!”
“The party was my idea, Mother, not Anita’s.”
But my mother didn’t believe me.
“Don’t lie to me, Cruella! And don’t argue with me. I am taking you out of school, and you won’t be seeing that Anita any longer.”
“You can’t keep me from seeing Anita, Mother, you can’t! And please let me finish school. I was so looking forward to going back.”
“It’s not possible, Cruella, not after your embarrassing yourself and our family by defending that common girl! And now I come home to find her here. And from what I hear from Mrs. Web, she was practically living here all summer before you left for school?”
“Miss Pricket said you didn’t mind. You were away! I had no one!”
“Miss Pricket didn’t tell me. That woman was always overindulgent with you. Giving you whatever you wanted behind my back. Insisting I see you in the afternoons before I went out. Insisting she take you gifts for your birthday, sneaking that Anita into the house when I wasn’t here. I was planning to dismiss her myself, but it seems you beat me to it.”
“Well, I regret that now,” I said. And I did. I saw now how it was Miss Pricket who had looked out for me. Who was responsible for all my happy moments growing up. And suddenly, all of Miss Pricket’s sad looks made sense.
“I want Anita to leave first thing in the morning, Cruella. I won’t have her in my house another night. Having her here gives me the most disturbing feeling. Like something predatory is circling my house.”
“Mother, please! What can I do to make this up to you? What can I do to make you let Anita stay?” But there wasn’t anything I could say or do. She had set her mind and heart against Anita, and it was breaking mine.
“Cruella, it’s bad enough Anita has practically been living here, but for you to actually dine downstairs with the servants. For goodness’ sake, we don’t have those sorts of—”
“People, Mother. Those sorts of people,” I said. I realized then that I had been just as guilty as my mother had. All my life, I’d thought of them as ghosts or in-betweens, when really, they were people just like me. They were my family. Maybe even more so than the one I was born into. And here she was forbidding me from seeing my only friend, and trying to make me distance myself from the only people who had really ever cared for me, besides Papa.
“They’re not people, Cruella. Not like you and me! And I won’t have you socializing with them. It was one thing when you were a little girl, but you’re a lady now! And I won’t have Anita influencing you any longer! You’re seventeen, and will be almost eighteen after the season. Old enough to marry. The sooner we get you a household of your own and a husband to rule you, all the better. And that’s the end of it!”
I didn’t return to school after the break, and Mother had made it impossible for me to see Anita. She was away at school while I was back in London, attending every ball and social event my mother could throw at me. It was a nightmare.
I was paraded around like a peacock, decked out in feathers and glittering jewels, and made to endure an endless parade of tedious young men. Looking back, I feel I should have found a way to enjoy myself more. But I resented my mother for keeping me away from Anita. I was brokenhearted, and I made my mother pay for it at every opportunity.
Before she had come home on Christmas Eve I had been longing to mend my relationship with her. Now, here she was devoting all her time to me, buying me the most beautiful clothes and finally giving me the attention I craved, but it felt so wrong. I fought her on it every step of the way.
I corresponded with Anita several times a week, each of us keeping each other up to date on our daily lives and counting the days until she would be home again. Anita’s letters back were always so cheerful. She was, of course, doing well in school, and she was pleasantly surprised that she liked the new girl who had taken my place in her room. I hated the idea of Anita spending time with her new roommate, taking our walks, having our conversations, and reading our book of fairy tales. I wanted her back home where she belonged.
After I was presented at court, the endless balls and glittering social events began.
My mother was just itching for me to accept one of the various proposals I had received from my many suitors. I was a catch, as they say. Titled, and soon to be in possession of an obscene amount of money. Over the course of the season my mother invited a legion of young gentlemen over for dinner, sometimes inviting them to stay for the weekend if they were visiting London from somewhere out of town. Socialite mercenary mothers went to great lengths to find their daughters suitable husbands, and she was relentless.
Every morning it was the same. She’d come into the dining room and tell me what our schedule was for the day—that is, if we didn’t have a visitor we were entertaining. “Good morning, Cruella!” her voice would ring out, and I knew I was in for a matchmaking onslaught.
“Good morning, Mother.” She would grab her coffee and sit down with it at the table with her diary.
“I miss the days when you called me your mama.”
I would roll my eyes and say something like, “Well, as you say, I am a lady now. I’m simply speaking like one.” She would pretend she didn’t hear me and list off our daily events from her diary.
One particular morning, we happened to have a visitor staying with us. He hadn’t made his way to the dining room yet.
“Jackson, is Lord Silverton awake?” Mother asked as Jackson and Jean placed a selection of pastries, fresh fruit, and eggs on the serving table.
“Yes, Lady De Vil, he will be down shortly.” Jackson put the newspaper at the place reserved for him. “I thought Lord Silverton would like to read the paper.”
I smiled at Jackson. “Yes, perhaps he can take a look at the train schedule. I’m sure he’s eager to get back home.”
My mother set her cup of coffee down with an annoyed thump. “Cruella. He’s a very fine young man.”
“Yes, Mother, I am sure he is. But he is also incredibly boring.”
“Cruella, it is the lady’s job to keep the conversation moving. If you’re bored then you’re not doing your job correctly.” She took a pile of invitations from a silver tray Jackson presented to her.
“Oh, I ask him questions, and he’s all too
happy to talk about himself. I just don’t want to listen to another of his tedious stories, Mother. I can only listen to so many tales of horses, fox hunting, and shooting quail. We have nothing in common,” I said, sipping my coffee and deciding if I wanted to eat anything. I felt queasy at the thought of enduring another conversation with Lord Silverton. Oh, he was handsome enough, I suppose. All golden and fair, with delicate features, blue eyes and all that. Perfect and boring, like vanilla ice cream.
“Your father and I had nothing in common, and look at us,” she said, giving me the side-eye over her coffee cup.
“Well, I’d be happy to find a man like Papa if I had a mind to marry,” I said. “But as far as Lord Boredington goes, there isn’t enough money in all the world that would make me want to marry him.” I couldn’t help laughing at my own joke. Someone had to laugh, because my mother didn’t seem to find it amusing in the least.
“Of course you’re going to marry, Cruella. And do stop making up insulting names for people.”
“Yes, Mother.” But she couldn’t sway me.
I had set myself against the idea of marriage long before. It had become quite clear to me that I hated being told what to do. I wanted to be independent. “No man worth his salt will be willing to let his children take his wife’s name, Mother,” I said.
“Well, my dear Cruella, if you find a rich enough husband like Lord Silverton then you won’t have to worry about that.” I couldn’t believe she was suggesting I go against my papa’s wishes.
“I made a promise to Papa. That’s the end of it, Mother. If I ever do get married, and I doubt I ever will, I will not take his name.” Mother closed her diary and tapped it with her pen.
“Well, Cruella, the Queen didn’t take her husband’s name, and look how that’s turned out. Do you want to live your life resented by your husband?”
I laughed.
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