by Valerie Wood
‘Mr Hugo!’ She backed away as he lifted her nightshift. ‘I’m a good girl, sir. I’ve not –’.
‘I know that, Emily.’ His eyes gleamed. ‘Do you think I can’t tell?’
‘Your wife, sir – Miss Deborah.’ Tears began to fall as he pulled off her shift, exposing her nakedness.
‘Is a child,’ he muttered and bent his head towards her breasts, his hands roughly exploring her body. ‘Always will be. She’s no good to me. I need a real woman. One like you, Emily.’
‘But I’m not a woman, sir.’ She started to cry and he grinned and pushed her on to the bed.
‘Not yet, you’re not.’ He unfastened the buttons on his trousers and pulled out his shirt. ‘But you soon will be! Lie back,’ he said sharply as she tried to raise herself, then his tone changed to one of firm persuasion. ‘I’ve been waiting for this, Emily. You can’t begin to realize how happy you are about to make me.’
Chapter Fourteen
After he had left, she cried and cried as she scrubbed her aching body with a wet flannel in an effort to remove all vestiges of him.
He had said not a word as he dressed, and on reaching the door he suddenly turned and she thought for one terrifying moment that he was coming back to violate her yet again. But without even looking at her, he had taken some coins from his pocket and thrown them on to the table beside the bed.
She hadn’t slept again, neither did she get into the bed, but sat on the edge, gently rocking and weeping. As she had lain beneath his pounding, assaulting body, she had cried for her mother, and for her father, for her brother Joe, for Sam and Granny Edwards and for anyone who had shown her love or kindness in the past. But for the present, she grieved, there was no-one in the world who could help her. The face of Philip Linton flashed across her subconscious, but she had brushed the image away. He might have been kind and attentive once, but he would be no longer, not now, if ever he should discover that she was defiled.
A bitterness swept over her. I will be regarded as low and unchaste. No-one will believe that I was taken against my will.
As dawn was breaking she wrapped her shawl around her and crept downstairs to the kitchen to make herself a warm drink, and found Jane stoking up the oven fire. She looked up as Emily opened the door. ‘You look rough this morning, Em. Didn’t tha sleep?’
Emily shook her head, not trusting herself to speak.
‘Hey, Em. I’ve got summat to tell you now we’re on our own. Just let me get this black pig stoked up.’ She threw some sticks on to the dull flame and riddled the ash. ‘Do you remember I said I was set on marrying Brown? Well, he’s agreed at last.’
Emily tried to show some enthusiasm by nodding her head, whilst remembering Brown’s stolen kiss which had so repulsed her, and his significant words.
‘Although’, Jane whispered, ‘I had to give in to him in the end. It was ’onny way he’d promise.’
‘What do you mean?’ Emily whispered back.
Jane stared. ‘You know! A bit of hanky-panky. Onny it was more than hanky-panky, ’cos he’s got me pregnant.’
Emily felt sick. Pregnancy was the one thing she hadn’t thought of. ‘I’m so sorry. What – what will you do?’
‘Don’t be sorry.’ Jane laughed. ‘It wasn’t that bad and it was worth it. At least I’ll be able to get out of here. I shan’t tell ’Francises yet,’ she said conspiratorially. ‘Then they’ll give me a shilling or two when they ask me to leave. I’ll go to me ma’s until we get wed, then he’ll have to keep me.’
Emily filled a jug with hot water for Mrs Purnell’s bathing and made a pot of tea, putting two cups and saucers on the tray and carrying them upstairs to her own room. She drank a cup of tea, all the time listening for movement from her mistress’s room, but there was only the sound of snuffling and snoring.
A tap came at the door and she cautiously opened it. Mrs Brewer stood there. ‘I thought you’d be awake, Emily. We shall have breakfast shortly if you want to join us. I expect the family will sleep in this morning.’
‘I’m not hungry, Mrs Brewer, thank you,’ she said. ‘I’m just having a cup of tea and waiting for Mrs Purnell to wake.’
‘You look pale, Emily. Are you not well?’
‘I’ve started my flux, Mrs Brewer.’ Tears came into her eyes as she told the lie. ‘I’m sorry – I’m sorry.’ She pointed to the stained sheets.
‘Oh, don’t worry.’ Mrs Brewer nodded sympathetically. ‘They’ll boil. There’ll be plenty of washing to do when everybody’s gone. It’ll take a week!’
Emily was starting to wash and dress when there was another tap on the door and she quickly pulled on her skirt and blouse and went to open it. Hugo, still in his night attire and robe, pushed open the door, forcing himself into the room.
‘No please, Mr Hugo,’ she pleaded. ‘Not again. Everyone is up – Mrs Brewer –’.
‘Has gone downstairs, I’ve just seen her. Come along Emily. Be a good girl like you were last night.’ He had a lascivious gleam in his eyes as he pushed her towards the bed. ‘I know it’s early, but I can’t wait.’
She didn’t cry. She simply lay there, her body inert, her mind blank, distancing herself from what was happening as he grunted and groaned above her. It didn’t take so long this time and as he rolled off her he complained, ‘I’m whacked, I’m going back to bed. Send me some breakfast up about eleven. Oh, yes, and send it up to Mrs Purnell too.’ He grinned and squeezed his hands around her breasts. ‘My dear little wife, I mean, not my mother.’
She was nervous and afraid once they were back in Mrs Purnell’s house and during the next few weeks she kept her bedroom door firmly locked. She slept little, for she was convinced that she heard Mr Hugo’s step outside her door and several times the doorknob turned. He caught her alone a few times as she went about her duties and holding her fast whispered to her to unlock her door at night. She shook her head and she saw the anger on his face.
Deborah constantly demanded her attention until Mrs Purnell grew exasperated and complained to Hugo. ‘Emily is my servant paid by me to attend me! You must find someone else for your wife. I am irritated beyond belief at hearing her calling, Emily, Emily, all over the house!’
Hugo sighed. ‘Why don’t we get you someone else and we’ll have Emily? It’s the only way to satisfy Deborah, she’s so used to having her own way.’ He tapped his fingers together and mused. ‘And then Emily could come with us to Italy.’ He grinned as Emily knocked and came into the room with a tray of coffee. ‘You’d like that wouldn’t you, Emily? To come to Italy with my wife and me?’
Emily turned pale and her mouth worked as she thought of a suitable reply. ‘I’m not a very good traveller, sir. I’d rather stay here.’
‘Would you?’ His manner was abrupt and his voice sharp. ‘Well, you’re not in a position to choose. If I decide you should go to Italy, then go you will or be given notice.’
Mrs Purnell flushed. ‘That will be all, Emily,’ and turned to Hugo as Emily scurried from the room. ‘Don’t you dare threaten my servants! I pay the staff in this house. When I am dead and buried you will do as you like, but not until then! You will not take Emily with you! I need her here and the sooner you take your whining wife out of the country the better!’
Hugo had taken his new wife to visit his friends and introduced her to the gaming clubs which he frequented, but he soon grew tired of hearing her squeals of laughter as she became more and more excitable as she watched the card games and demanded to play; Hugo’s friends, initially amused by her childish antics, would encourage her to dance or sing and plied her with wine, but then became bored with her and turned their backs, which made her even more confused and demanding. ‘For God’s sake, Purnell; take your wife home,’ someone shouted one night when Deborah had shrieked and giggled over a game of crib. ‘We can’t concentrate when she makes that racket. Is she a halfwit or what?’
There was a sudden silence and Deborah turned around, her eyebrows raised and her mouth half
open as she heard the insult. All eyes turned to Hugo, who was stretched out in an easy chair about to take a glass of wine from a serving girl. He took the glass and, reaching out, threw a coin down her neckline and moued a kiss. He took a sip of wine and, holding the glass high, carefully turned it this way and that, as if examining the clarity. ‘As a matter of fact, old boy, yes she is.’
Deborah let out an ear-piercing shriek and flung herself at Hugo, spilling the wine down his shirt and over her dress. ‘You are not allowed to say that! You’re not, you’re not! Papa won’t allow it.’
Hugo roared with laughter as he extricated himself from Deborah’s flailing hands and, grasping her tightly, coarsely remarked, ‘That is of no significance whatever my dear. Your darling papa isn’t here to stop me!’
‘No, you can’t come,’ he said to her on his next visit to his club. ‘You’ve not been good so you must stay at home with my mother.’ He grinned and said maliciously, ‘And if I hear you have misbehaved whilst I am out I shall take Emily instead next time.’
‘But she is a servant,’ Deborah gasped. ‘You can’t take her.’
He looked in the mirror as he fastened a silk stock around his neck. ‘But she is a very pretty servant is she not, Deborah? Don’t you think?’
She gazed blankly at him through the mirror. ‘Is she prettier than me?’
‘Oh much prettier. Quite beautiful. I’m very fond of Emily.’
Deborah stared at him with venom in her eyes, then turned her back and stalked to her room, banging the door behind her.
‘Do not leave your wife with me!’ Mrs Purnell stated flatly a week later. ‘I cannot cope with her. My friends do not wish her to visit as she is too disruptive. Do please make arrangements to travel to Italy as soon as you can. I am an old woman, Hugo,’ she pleaded. ‘I need peace and quiet and my own friends around me. Not a demanding, wilful child.’ She looked him in the eyes. ‘Either that or you find a house of your own.’
Hugo sighed. ‘All right, Mother. I’ll take her away. I don’t suppose you’ll relent and let me take Emily with us?’
‘No.’ She was emphatic. ‘You must find another maid. Besides, Deborah seems to be most vindictive towards Emily just now. I can’t think why, when she was so fond of her before.’
Emily sat on her bed and wept after they had watched Hugo and his wife and their new maid drive away on their journey to Italy. Such relief. Such a burden lifted. No more worrying over Hugo trying to get in to her room, nor the pain of being the butt of Deborah’s temper, for no matter how Emily tried to please her, it seemed she could do nothing right and it wasn’t just Deborah’s ill temper, Emily had felt the hard slap of her hand too.
It was now March and she prayed they would stay away all of the summer, although she had overheard Hugo tell his mother that they wouldn’t stay in Florence during the hottest part of the year, but would perhaps visit the Italian lakes before beginning their journey home.
Later in the day she walked down Whitefriargate towards the Market Place on an errand for Mrs Purnell. The day was cold, though bright; it brought roses to her cheeks and she suddenly felt a freedom which she hadn’t felt in weeks.
‘Good day, Emily.’ She stopped and turned and looked up at the man in uniform who touched his hat.
‘Mr Linton!’ That same face which had appeared during Hugo Purnell’s rape of her body, suddenly brought back the terrifying ordeal. Shame flooded over her and she felt the blood drain from her face and a sensation of nausea.
A small frown wrinkled his brow. ‘Are you well?’ he asked. ‘Still with Mrs Purnell?’
‘Yes,’ she whispered, ‘for the moment.’
‘Ah, you’re thinking of changing positions? I heard’, he said, when she didn’t immediately answer, ‘that Hugo Purnell has recently married?’
‘Yes, sir. Mrs Hugo Purnell was formerly Miss Deborah Francis.’
‘And are the happy couple away?’
‘Yes, sir. They left today for Italy.’ Her voice became lower and flatter as misery overcame her. Could he tell that she was not the person she had been?
‘I am leaving the area too,’ he said. ‘My final examinations are over and I have a commission to join my ship.’ He swallowed and ran a finger inside his collar. ‘I, erm, I shall be away for perhaps a year or possibly longer. I – I do hope that if you decide to leave the Purnells you will leave a forwarding address.’ He looked down at his feet. ‘It would be nice to meet you again for a chat, Emily.’
She felt incredibly sad. She had harboured no impractical intent towards him, their worlds were too far apart for that, but to be able to speak to him sometimes, to pass the time of day, would have been such a joy. ‘It would not be possible, Mr Linton,’ she said softly. ‘Circumstances would not allow it.’ She blinked her eyes as emotion swept over her. ‘Good day to you, sir. I wish you well in your life.’
He touched his hat again as she started to move away, puzzlement in his eyes. ‘And I you, Emily.’ He caught hold of her arm. ‘My grandmother taught me that anything in life is possible, that I should never think that it isn’t.’
‘I’m sure that she was very wise, sir.’ Her voice showed that she was not convinced. She dipped her knee. ‘Goodbye, Mr Linton.’
Chapter Fifteen
‘Get a move on, Emily. What’s the matter with you, girl?’ Mrs Purnell was impatient as Emily fumbled with the laces on her mistress’s stays and stammered out her apologies.
‘Not so tight. Not so tight, I can’t breathe. I’m not eighteen you know! I just want a nice shape about my waist, that’s all.’ Mrs Purnell was very plump, but she was still very fashion conscious and liked to wear the latest styles. ‘You’re putting on weight, Emily, your skirt is far too tight. You’ll have to let it out.’ She shook her head in admonishment. ‘I can’t afford to be buying you a new outfit. Not until next year at any rate.’
Emily flushed and didn’t say that she had already released the seams on her skirt. She was aware of the thickening around her waist and the fullness of her breasts, and of the lethargy which stole over her from time to time and she was very worried. She looked at herself in the hall mirror when no-one else was about, turning this way and that, trying to detect by her shape, whether or not her worries were real or imaginary.
She had had a bout of sickness for a few weeks, but then so had the kitchen staff and they had blamed it on some tainted meat. The weather had been warm throughout the spring and food had gone off much more quickly than was usual, and now at the beginning of summer the weather was even hotter and stickier, and it seemed that there was no air circulating in the narrow streets of the town, which were always crowded with people.
‘Call for a cab,’ Mrs Purnell said when her dressing was complete. ‘You can ride with me to Mrs Marshall’s and then walk back. I won’t need you any more until this evening, so you might as well be useful here as wait around chatting to the Marshall servants.’
Which was a pity, thought Emily, for I would like to see Ginny and have a talk to her. She had no confidantes here at Mrs Purnell’s house and she felt as if she needed a friend.
But Ginny was just about to go on an errand for Mrs Marshall when they arrived, and so she waited for Emily to settle her mistress and take instructions on what time to come back for her. ‘Mrs Marshall is going to Scarborough in July,’ she said as they stepped out together. ‘I expect she’ll be asking Mrs Purnell to go with her again.’
‘Will you be going, Ginny?’ Emily asked. ‘I hope Mrs Purnell takes me. I’d love to breathe in some sea air. It’s so hot and smelly here.’
Ginny agreed. The stench of the whale blubber and seed oil hung over the town. It clung to curtains and fabric and no-one could open windows or doors for fear of letting the odour into their houses. ‘Mrs Marshall might take her housekeeper and one of the other maids this time. She gives everyone a turn.’ She gave a wry smile. ‘We are supposed to think of it as a privilege and a holiday.’
It was like a holiday f
or me, Emily thought, though I have never been on one to know. But it was the best time of my life. She smiled as she reminisced over dancing with Philip Linton at the Spa and the soft words that he had whispered.
They walked briskly from Albion Street, where Mrs Marshall lived, and as they crossed over the Junction Bridge towards Whitefriargate, avoiding the crush of wagons and carts which were being driven towards the Market Place, Emily suddenly felt dizzy and nauseous. ‘I’m sorry, Ginny, I’ll have to stop. I don’t feel well.’ She leant against a bollard and bent over. ‘You go on.’
‘No, I’ll wait.’ Ginny looked down anxiously. ‘What’s made you sick? Is it the stink? You should be used to it by now.’
‘I don’t know. Probably. No. It’s not.’ She looked at Ginny apprehensively.
‘You’ve been caught! You’re expecting!’ Ginny’s eyes flickered over her face. ‘I didn’t know you was courtin’.’
Emily shook her head and wiped the corner of her mouth with a square of hemmed cotton. ‘I’m not,’ she whispered.
Ginny stared at her, her face expressionless. ‘You’ve been raped! Who by?’
‘Hugo Purnell.’ She could hardly bring herself to say his name.
‘God rot him,’ Ginny hissed. ‘You know he’ll deny it. You’ll be given notice just like ’other lass.’
‘Which other lass?’ Emily stared back at her. ‘At Mrs Purnell’s?’ A vague memory stirred of Mrs Purnell telling her that the previous maid had to leave because she was in trouble.
‘Ask Mrs Anderson.’ Ginny put her arm about her. ‘She knows.’
‘I daren’t,’ Emily stammered. ‘I’m afraid of telling her what’s happened. If I’m given notice, what will I do? Where will I go? Who’ll employ me?’
Ginny shook her head. ‘No-one will employ you without a reference and especially not if you’re pregnant. When did it happen?’
‘In February,’ she whispered. ‘His wedding night.’
‘Scum,’ Ginny muttered between her teeth. ‘Viper! But it’s too late to do anything. This is a pretty pickle, Emily, and no mistake.’