While Elizabeth ate her breakfast egg, she also considered Alicia. Sarah Webb’s idle remarks at the At Home had reminded her sharply that Alicia was past the usual age for confinement to the nursery. If the girl did not soon join the rest of the family for the main meal of the day, acquaintances would hear from the servant grapevine that Alicia was not being treated as the daughters of others were. It would confirm the rumour of her illegitimacy, and no doubt the story of Andrew Crossing and herself would be dug up again. She felt, with a sense of panic, that Andrew’s name must never suffer more besmirchment than had already been the case.
Then she asked herself why she should care about him – he had hurt her dreadfully. The answer came readily, ‘Simply because I love him – and always will.’ She leaned her head back against her pillows and closed her eyes in an agony of remembrance.
School fees were a different problem. She herself had managed to pay Miss Schreiber’s fees out of the allowance sent her each month by Andrew’s partner, who now administered her father’s Estate. She had not been consulted about the transfer and, when she inquired, young Mr Simpkins had explained that the firm was the Trustee, so any partner could attend to the administration. No doubt, Mr Crossing would explain to her the internal reorganization of the office on the death of their most senior partner. Mr Crossing never had explained, thought Elizabeth fretfully; the stupid idiot had never been near her since Alicia’s birth.
During the night, it had occurred to her that Sarah Webb might help with the Blackburne House fees, since she was Alicia’s godmother. Or Elizabeth’s elder sister, Clara, in West Kirby, might do it simply to spite Humphrey whom she detested. But Sarah at least knew the true story of Alicia, and she loved the child.
As Elizabeth nibbled her last piece of toast, she felt a guilty pang that she did not love Alicia. She was honest enough to admit that she resented her very existence. And to look at her was to see a small mirror of Andrew, which was of no use to a woman who longed passionately to feel his hands upon her, hear him whisper to her as he assuaged the mad sexual urge within her. If Alicia had not been conceived, they might have continued lovers indefinitely; she might have been expecting him that very afternoon. She put down her toast and began to cry.
Later on, she pulled herself together and, when Alicia came home for lunch, she sent for her in the morning-room and told her that Polly would dress her that evening and she should come down to dinner.
Alicia was thrilled. She said, ‘Oh, thank you, Mama,’ dipped a little curtsey and, without waiting to be dismissed ran out of the room and down the back stairs to tell Polly.
III
Humphrey Woodman sometimes thought that, to a large degree, he lost effective control of Elizabeth on the day that Alicia first came down for dinner.
Before banging the dinner gong in the hall, Polly carefully seated her little charge in the mahogany dining-chair which had been occupied by Edward whenever he was home. Alicia’s hair had been combed rigidly back from her face and plaited down her back. She wore a white cotton dress trimmed with lace and had a narrow blue ribbon tied round her waist. On her feet were her best white slippers; they pinched slightly because she was growing fast and they were becoming too small for her. Her hands were clasped tightly in her lap and her eager expression bespoke her excitement.
‘Now, you mind your manners,’ Polly instructed her, as she plaited her hair. ‘You don’t open your mouth till you’re spoke to, remember. Hold your knife and fork proper, like your Mama does.’
Bubbling with excitement, Alicia promised to be perfect.
Now, as Polly spoke down the blower to Mrs Tibbs in the basement and ordered the soup to be sent up in the dumb-waiter, Elizabeth entered. She cast a quick glance over Alicia and the table settings, and then sat down.
‘Remember, Alicia, to be quiet,’ she told the girl. ‘Mr Woodman dislikes chatterboxes.’ She wondered nervously what exactly Humphrey’s reaction would be to the girl’s presence.
Alicia smiled up at her mother and responded, ‘Yes, Mama.’ Then she added shyly, ‘You do look pretty in your dinner dress, Mama.’
While Polly leaned over to pick up the serviette by Alicia’s plate and spread it over the girl’s knees, Elizabeth acknowledged the compliment with a slight smile.
Despite a feeling of fatigue which nowadays sometimes bothered him in the evening, Humphrey bowled into the room with the same small, purposeful step that at other times propelled him rapidly along Castle Street to the Exchange Flags, where, amid eddying groups of top-hatted businessmen, he searched for the right contacts, the right pieces of inside information, to promote his considerable investments.
On meeting the nervous, pale eyes of Alicia, he paused, disconcerted, and glanced at his wife. She clenched her teeth and stared coldly back at him. Through her teeth, she said firmly, ‘Alicia will have her evening meal with us, in future. She’s a big girl now; she has to learn how to behave as a grown-up should.’
At the sideboard, her back to the room, Polly stood, for a second, soup ladle poised over a dish, waiting for the outburst.
Faced with the anxious stare of a little girl he hardly knew and with a servant in the room, probably dying with curiosity and ready to run into the kitchen to relay anything he said, he was for once nonplussed. He sniffed, and with great dignity pulled out his chair and sat down. He shook out his huge linen table napkin as if it were a flag and placed it neatly across his knee. While he considered the situation, he bowed his head and muttered, ‘For what we are about to receive may the Lord make us truly thankful, Amen. Where’s the soup?’
‘Amen,’ responded Elizabeth and Alicia in quiet chorus, while Polly hastily slipped a bowl of soup in front of Elizabeth and another in front of Humphrey. She then brought a small helping for Alicia.
Painfully aware of the tension between her parents which she did not understand, Alicia carefully drank her tomato soup with a huge tablespoon. ‘God, don’t let me spill anything on the tablecloth or on my white frock,’ she prayed earnestly.
If Humphrey did not initiate a conversation, Elizabeth rarely did, except when visitors were present. Their verbal exchanges were usually limited to complaints by Humphrey or reports of household needs by Elizabeth. On that day, Humphrey never said a word, while, out of the corner of his eye, he watched the quiet child negotiate her way through the meal.
Dead spit of Crossing, he brooded, and was surprised to find that, though on the surface of his mind, he was irritated at Elizabeth’s temerity in bringing Alicia to the dining-room and the fact that she cost him money to maintain, his fury of earlier times had gone; he realized that he simply did not care; his life, his real life, had been transferred out of this house. He was content amid the swarm of businessmen on Exchange Flags, behind the Town Hall, or in the clubs and restaurants of the city.
He found physical comfort curled up in Mrs Jakes’ feather bed; he never felt a twinge of desire for Elizabeth – let her and her damned daughter rot, he thought savagely.
Occasionally, he glanced up from his plate to look at Alicia, and he noted that the girl would sometimes lift her eyes towards Polly, as if to inquire if she were doing everything properly, and the parlourmaid would give her the faintest smile of approbation.
He did not normally notice who was waiting on him, because he was so used to a pair of hands putting food in front of him; they were simply a necessary part of the furniture. Now, he idly examined Polly, as she deftly went about her work. She was quite old, at least thirty, he surmised, a trim-looking woman with a good waist, though beginning to show the heaviness of middle age. He recollected that he paid her three pounds a year plus uniform and keep, and she obviously got along well with Elizabeth. For a moment, he toyed maliciously with the idea of dismissing her, simply to annoy Elizabeth, and then decided it was not worth the rumpus which would probably ensue.
Although Alicia was used to being alone a lot, resigned to being quiet, she was not without pluck. The silence of the dining-room, however, was almost
unbearable and her disappointment very great. Promotion to the world of grown-ups had suggested something exciting. Instead, she had become acutely conscious of the animosity between Humphrey and Elizabeth. By the time Polly served the caramel pudding, she was so unnerved that she could hardly eat it and was grateful when Polly whipped her dish away.
At bedtime, soon afterwards, as Polly unbuttoned her dress for her and slipped it over her head, she asked tremulously, ‘Do I have to go down every day, Polly? I’d much rather be as before – or I could have my dinner in the kitchen with Mrs Tibbs, if it would save you trouble?’
Kneeling in front of her, the dress in her arms, Polly smiled at her, ‘Your Mam wants you to learn nice manners – to be a young lady, luv. That’s why she wants you down. Perhaps she’ll begin to take you out with her a bit, now you’re a big girl. That would be a bit of all right, wouldn’t it, now? You might get to know some other girls.’
‘I suppose it would be nice.’ She sounded so forlorn that Polly put her arms round the skinny child and hugged her to her.
But the remorseless dinner hour came round every day; Alicia found herself unable to eat much and Polly began to worry that she was losing weight. The maid wondered if she should point this out to Elizabeth. She talked it over with Mrs Tibbs and Fanny. They decided unanimously that they should not intrude on the delicate balance between husband and wife. Instead, Mrs Tibbs made a little bedtime supper for the girl and invited her to come down to the kitchen and sit by the fire to eat it. This hour in the warmth of the kitchen became the highlight of Alicia’s day and she gained weight and joined gaily in the spirited repartee between the three servants.
Very lonely herself, Elizabeth began to call the child to the morning-room for half an hour or so after dinner. Though still handsome, Elizabeth had lost her vivacity and Alicia found these sessions boring. Her mother did not take her out with her, because she rarely went out herself; to entertain or to be entertained seemed increasingly tiring, and tradesmen were only too happy to send their errand boys with an assortment of goods on approval, from which she could choose; there was no need to go shopping.
The presence of Alicia in the morning-room provided a little undemanding company. She was also useful. She helped to wind knitting wool and sorted out Elizabeth’s cottons and embroidery silks. And, increasingly, when the Reverend Clarence Browning and Florence called, she minded any offspring which Florence might have decided to bring with her.
Her hair hanging in untidy wisps round her face, her hands reddened in a most unladylike way, Florence had for years been much too harassed by her unruly family and the calls made on her as a Vicar’s wife, to pay much attention to her half-sister, about whose birth Clarence had told her a most shocking story.
When Alicia had been small, she had been sometimes sent to stay with Florence for a few days; but Alicia had dreaded the visits. Her eldest nephew, Frank, was a big, heavily-built boy who, as he grew older, bullied his siblings ruthlessly. He had once pinned a terrified Alicia in a corner of the garden wall and demanded that she lift up her petticoats and dress, so that he could see what she was like underneath. She had instinctively fought him off, and the encounter had been mercifully interrupted by one of his younger brothers in pursuit of a ball. After that, though he stalked her from time to time, she had made sure she always stayed close to his sisters. Fortunately for Alicia, as time went on, it became increasingly expensive for Elizabeth to hire a carriage to take her to the Vicarage, so she had not been to her sister’s house for at least a year before Edward came on a leave long delayed by tribal uprisings near the Khyber Pass.
IV
On the day after her first essay into the dining-room, Polly told her on the way to school, ‘Your Mama says Mr Edward’s comin’ home on leave tomorrer. Let’s ask him to take you down town, to see the Punch and Judy show on the Quadrant.’
Alicia looked up, and asked in sudden hope, ‘Do you think he would?’
‘Oh, aye, he will. Don’t ask ’im the first day, ’cos he’ll be tired after the voyage.’ I’ll make sure he does take you, me darlin’, she promised herself.
Edward did not dock in time to have dinner with his family the following evening. He did, however, come up to the nursery before Alicia went to bed, to see his little sister and Polly.
Despite his tanned face, he looked ill. Periodic bouts of malaria had taken their toll, and his sideburns were flecked with grey. His face lit up, however, when he entered the nursery. He swung Alicia up into his arms and told her that, in the three years since he had seen her, she had become a young lady. While Polly watched gravely, she put her arms round his neck and giggled delightedly. He looked over Alicia’s head at her nanny, and Polly knew, with joy, that her time would come. She was so lucky, she thought, that Fanny and Mrs Tibbs slept in the basement. Only when young Master Charles was sleeping in his room on the nursery floor, did she and Edward have to be really careful.
Edward produced an ivory goddess from his pocket for Alicia and it was carefully installed on the mantelpiece, next to a paperweight which Charles had given her the previous Christmas.
Polly looked down at her little charge, as the child chatted animatedly with Edward, and was glad of the affection between the two. Alicia was not nearly so close to Charles – Master Charles had always struck Polly as someone who tolerated his family, but did not really belong to it, perhaps because he had been sent to boarding school so young. But Edward was grateful for love.
In response to a request whispered to him by Polly in the small hours of the morning, Edward declared his intention of going downtown to see the Punch and Judy Show and invited Alicia to accompany him, and to have ice cream and lemonade in Fuller’s Tea Rooms, afterwards. A thrilled Alicia acceptd the invitation.
The ladies taking afternoon tea in Fuller’s glanced surreptitiously at the straight-backed, rather distinguished-looking dark man in civilian clothes that were too loose-fitting to be smart, and at the ash-blonde little girl in a plain white linen dress and untrimmed straw hat. ‘A singular combination of colouring for a father and daughter,’ murmured one elegant woman to her friend.
Edward and Alicia were blithely unaware of the watching eyes; they were both enjoying themselves, two shy, diffident people who could relate to each other.
As he watched Alicia mop up her strawberry ice, Edward thought about Polly. He could barely understand why he had felt so happy to slide, once more, into Polly’s narrow bed. She was, after all, only a maid and no longer very good-looking. But she was totally unlike the girls of the Herring Fleet, as they were called, who came out to India each winter in the hope of finding a husband. Each year he looked at these young, hopeful products of ladies’ seminaries, and swore that he could not afford to marry. But he knew that the real reason was Polly. Polly gave everything and asked nothing and, had she been of the same class, he knew that he would have married her long ago, and somehow juggled successfully with his finances. But even in a modest Foot Regiment, she would be ostracized by the other officers’ wives because she was not a gentlewoman; marriage was out of the question.
Troubled about what might happen to her, he had, the previous night, fished around in his net purse and had given her a sovereign.
She had flushed, and had handed the gold coin back to him. ‘You don’t need to pay me,’ she told him as she quivered against him and nuzzled into his neck, before kissing him goodbye behind her bedroom door.
He embraced her tightly and refused to take the money back. ‘It’s not a payment, my dear. It’s a keepsake for a rainy day, because I dare not bring you a present; if Mother spotted anything unusual in your room, she’d dismiss you – and then what would we do?’ He smiled down at her, the candlelight catching the harsh outlines of his face. ‘You can put this away safely somewhere, because it’s small. Servants – I mean, people – normally have savings for their old age.’ He stroked her black hair tumbling down her back. ‘I’m going to add to it – and you never know, you might be gla
d of it.’
So she accepted the gift and hid it in an old black and white cardboard pill-box at the back of the ancient chest of drawers in her bedroom.
Edward remained in England for a year, teaching modern tactics at Aldershot Military Camp. He had frequent leave, and Alicia became actively aware of a close relationship between her brother and her nanny, which she did not understand. She had taken their friendship for granted; after all, they both loved her – it was, to her, natural that they should be friends. It seemed to her, however, to be one of those many things which nobody ever mentioned, so she never brought the matter up. Throughout her life, there had been a close conspiracy between her and Polly against ‘Them, downstairs’; she added the sound of soft footfalls, voices and a creaking bed next door, to her list of secrets, though, as she grew older, she wondered sometimes why Edward visited Polly only at night.
To Polly, it was a wonderful year. She lived in a mixed state of joy at having her lover so often with her and fear of having a child. As a defence against pregnancy, she used a wad of cottonwool, soaked in vinegar, tucked inside her, something she had learned from Great-aunt Kitty.
The single sovereign grew into a small pile, as Edward sought to give her a nest egg.
Chapter Eleven
I
On the evening on which Edward had returned from India, Alicia had taken her skipping rope into the garden. She was surprised to find Billy, Polly’s brother, kneeling by Mr Bittle, the gardener, helping to weed a flowerbed. She had always regarded herself as Mr Bittle’s assistant, and she approached the two bent figures with a sudden feeling of jealousy.
Billy scrambled to his feet and touched his forelock respectfully. Mr Bittle half turned to look up at her.
‘Evenin’, Miss Alicia,’ he greeted her, his toothless mouth spread in a grin.
‘Good evening, Mr Bittle. Good evening, Billy,’ Alicia replied, a little frostily. ‘What are you doing here, Billy?’
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