by Rose Lerner
“Thank you.” The vicar nodded, dismissing him. But he called out once more, just as John was at the threshold. “Toogood! The temperature of my dinner has increased remarkably since you came to work for me.”
“I’m glad to hear it, sir.”
“Thank you for your dedication to your work. That will be all.”
John was embarrassed by his rush of emotion, but tears pricked his eyes all the same. “You are very welcome, sir. Very welcome indeed.”
He shut the door behind him and leaned against it. It was foolish to be so affected by a simple compliment. It felt like relief, an intense relief belonging to something greater than the temperature of dinner. He headed for the kitchen to give Mrs. Khaleel the good news, but as he neared it, the side door opened and Sukey came in, a large pineapple cradled like a babe in one arm and mud caked on her boots. Stamping her feet on the mat did little to remove it.
And there the anger was, his father’s anger, hot and sure of itself. “There’s a boot scraper in the courtyard,” he said, trying not to sound short. “Scrubbing this floor is the one real task I’ve seen Thea undertake this week, and she was proud of it when it was done.” He’d even caught her smiling at the damp, smooth stonework.
“I used the scraper.”
Why did she argue instead of even looking at her boots? “I couldn’t tell.”
She raised her eyebrows. “It’s lovely to see you too.”
He took a deep breath, and then another, trying to calm his instinctive irritation. It receded obediently, like the sea at low tide—baring, to his surprise, a sad uncertainty that clung like seaweed to his ribcage. Ugh. Anger was a deal more pleasant. I was terribly lonely, and you took pity on me: it had seemed a flirtatious falsehood once.
Even at Tassell Hall, servants had not lost their places so easily as all that. What was he so afraid of?
“I’m sorry,” he said, wanting to take her in his arms and feel her warmth. “Please don’t be angry with me.”
“I thought you were angry with me.”
He shook his head.
She smiled at him, always more ready than he to let a grudge go. “I brought you these.” She held out a fistful of—of flowers, many-petaled and opulent, rose-pink and startling white. At first he could only be dazzled; after a moment he recognized hothouse camellias.
“Where did you get them?”
She hefted the pineapple. “Mrs. Khaleel sent me to Wheatcroft for this. His lordship showed me about. I’d never seen a pineapple growing. Did you know they grow one to a plant?” Her eyes shone. “It was the drollest thing I ever saw, a spray of leaves peeping out of a pot with a pineapple plumped atop them.”
As Tassell Hall had a pineapple stove, he had seen it many times. But he was overwhelmed by her charm. He could imagine how gratifying her pleasure and amazement must have been to the new Lord Wheatcroft, an enthusiastic hothouse gardener. She should have hurried home, of course, but Mr. Summers could hardly fault her for politeness to a peer of the realm.
There he went again, creating excuses and explanations for a calling to account that would never come. He had not been required to explain anything to Mr. Summers in all the time he’d worked here. It was Mr. Toogood senior before whom he had constantly had to defend himself and his friends.
He took the flowers she had brought him. She had thought of him. He felt again that foolish, disproportionate gratitude, throat closing and eyes stinging.
She removed her bonnet with her free hand. “They’re called camellias, his lordship said. The pink one is new to England and supposed to be very fine.”
John put the flowers to his nose, though he knew camellias had little scent. To hide his face, perhaps.
“Do you like them?” A hint of uncertainty crept into her voice, a mild plea for reassurance.
“Thank you.” That wasn’t enough. “I was feeling rather melancholy, and they cheered me.” There. That didn’t sound like the enormous confession it felt like, did it?
She smiled sunnily, going on tiptoe and turning her face up for a kiss. He picked her up and kissed her, breathing in the fresh air that clung to her. He set her down in a moment, knowing anyone might see them. “Thank you. I’ll put these in water. Please—don’t forget to clean the mud off your boots.”
Sadness was more unpleasant that anger, but it occurred to him that it might be easier soothed.
* * *
Sukey slipped into the kitchen. “Here’s your pineapple, ma’am.”
Mrs. Khaleel looked up. “Oh, it’s not mine. It’s Mr. Summers’s contribution to the Twelfth Day dinner he’s going to later. You might bring it to him, if you please.”
Sukey nodded, hovering a moment, unsure if she ought to say anything or not. The cook looked calm enough, making cakes for the wassailers who would come tonight to howl Mr. Summers’s apple trees, but…she kept glancing out the window at the churchyard to see if anyone was approaching that way.
“He said he’d ask you again on Epiphany.”
Mrs. Khaleel pressed her lips together. “Maybe he’ll forget.”
They both knew Mr. Bearparke wouldn’t forget. But maybe he’d think better of asking where he’d already been told no. The cook glanced out the window and went still.
There he came, picking his way through the snow-covered graves. Seeing them, he stopped to make a snowball and throw it. It spattered the window, and Mrs. Khaleel’s mouth turned up, just a little.
“You’re sure you don’t want to tell him yes?”
She slipped her cakes into the oven. “I asked your husband to speak to Mr. Summers about him.” She wiped her hands on her apron. “He’ll hate me.”
How much had Mrs. Khaleel actually told John of what had passed between her and the curate? Sukey herself hadn’t breathed a word. But now she thought maybe she’d ought to have, so John would be prepared for whatever Mr. Bearparke was about to do.
“Let him in, will you?” The cook smoothed her hair into her cap.
“Do you want me to leave you alone?”
“Don’t you dare.”
But when Mr. Bearparke brushed past her with a cheery smile and said, “Would you be a good girl and ask Larry if he’ll see to my boots?” Sukey didn’t know how to refuse him. She was a servant and he was a gentleman.
She had to do something, though. And she was abruptly quite sure that John would know what that ought to be.
She found him exactly where he was meant to be at this hour—thank God for lists!—in the cellar, decanting the wine for dinner. “Mr. Bearparke is going to propose to her again,” she said urgently. “She told him no already, on Christmas morning. I’d ought to have told you, but she swore me to secrecy. He said he’d come back on Epiphany. He’s in the kitchen with her, and she asked me not to leave her alone but he sent me away—”
He nodded. “Thank you for telling me.” He took the stairs two at a time, straightened his waistcoat, and strode directly to Mr. Summers’s study and went in.
Sukey felt immensely reassured. But that still left Mrs. Khaleel alone in the kitchen. She wavered. Larry, at this hour, was pressing Mr. Summers’s evening clothes in his dressing room.
Sukey went back into the kitchen. “I couldn’t find him, sir,” she said loudly. “If you give me the boots, I’ll take them to him.”
Mr. Bearparke straightened from where he had stood very close to Mrs. Khaleel, leaning in to murmur to her in a way that looked half commanding and half pleading. He looked past Sukey to something behind her.
She turned to see the vicar standing in the doorway, John a respectful few paces farther back.
“And here I thought my curate came to my house to see me,” he said drily. “A word in my study, if it wouldn’t incommode you.”
Mr. Bearparke flushed a dull red, spine straightening. “Certainly, sir.”
Chapter Thirte
en
They all hovered around the kitchen door, wishing they could make out the low voices in the study. For once, John said not a word about idling. Time passed. Mrs. Khaleel pulled cakes from the oven and put another tray in and then, after more time had passed, broke a cake apart and handed it round.
“They might have spent a minute or two more in the oven, I think,” John said. “But the flavor is remarkable.”
The criticism ought to have annoyed Sukey, but it was such an ordinary thing to say that it reassured her instead. She thought it had the same effect on Mrs. Khaleel, who gave him a small, anxious smile.
Mr. Bearparke’s voice rose passionately. “But sir—”
The study door opened. “My key, if you please,” Mr. Summers said. “And you may consider yourself at liberty to look for another curacy. Should you wish to, that is.”
The blood drained from Mrs. Khaleel’s face. Mr. Bearparke drew a key from his pocket and handed it to the vicar with bowed head. Sukey couldn’t help feeling sorry for him. It was no fun getting the sack. “I am sorry to have disappointed you, sir. My intentions—”
The vicar raised his eyebrows. “Were honorable, yes, yes. I’m sorry too. You’re too clever a boy to make such a cake of yourself.”
Mr. Bearparke came and stood before Mrs. Khaleel, who held herself very straight and met his eyes. “You’ll regret this,” he said intently.
Sukey gasped. Beside her, John tensed. “Are you threatening my cook?” Mr. Summers demanded.
Mr. Bearparke looked aghast. “No! Good God, no. But, Nora, you’ll regret it. You’ll wish— Think.”
Sukey thought maybe the cook would have liked to speak. Her mouth opened and closed, her color came and went. But in the end she glanced at her watching master and said nothing.
Mr. Bearparke gave her a bitter look. “Well, if you’re content with your lot, there’s no more to be said.” He put his hat at its usual rakish angle on his head, shoved his hands in his pockets and slammed the kitchen-yard door behind him.
“Mrs. Khaleel, if I might have a word with you,” Mr. Summers said.
She nodded grimly. “Let me take my cakes out of the oven.”
“Sir,” John said quietly while she was doing it. “If I may—”
Mr. Summers sighed. “Have some faith, Toogood.”
Why should he? Sukey thought with instinctive anger, and was startled at herself. Mr. Summers had done all right so far. But employers always wanted you to trust them as a child trusted its father, blindly, when the truth was, some fathers couldn’t be trusted and servants were old enough to know that.
She trusted John, she realized with surprise. She didn’t just want him to take care of her; she knew he would, and she knew he would know how to. He’d take care of all of them. When had she become so sure?
She almost didn’t like being sure. It felt dangerous, like walking across a chasm on a plank bridge without looking down. It might seem sturdy, but you could fall easy enough.
John subsided, but he touched Mrs. Khaleel’s shoulder as she went past and nodded at her, not caring that Mr. Summers could see him. Sukey thought maybe, even, he wanted Mr. Summers to see, and know that he was on the cook’s side. That she was his, that she was all of theirs, and they’d stick together.
“I do believe I pay you to make yourselves useful,” the vicar said with an ironic glance round, and they dispersed—but not very far.
At last Mrs. Khaleel came out. She went into the kitchen, took up a warm cake, smeared a healthy dollop of pink icing over it, and brought it back into the study. Sukey, contriving to dust the clock, saw Mr. Summers smile sadly at her.
When she followed the cook back to the kitchen, John was waiting for them. “What did he say?” he asked quietly.
“He told Mr. Bearparke he couldn’t live here. Mr. Bearparke said his intentions towards me were honorable. Mr. Summers said it would be a dreadful match.” Mrs. Khaleel laughed a little. “It was not the most flattering of conversations. But Mr. Bearparke said I would make a fine wife for a missionary to India, and Mr. Summers said he’d thought he was training his replacement here in Lively St. Lemeston, and if Mr. Bearparke meant to go to India, then he’d better start training someone else. Mr. Summers said he thought I had a right to know. And then he told me to avoid undue intimacy with unreliable young men.”
Her mouth twisted, and she hugged herself. “I never wanted him to lose his place over me. I told him it was no good.”
“If you told him you did not love him, that ought to have been an end of the matter,” John said. “You have nothing to reproach yourself with.”
The cook looked between the two of them. “You make things sound so simple. Thank you.”
But she didn’t sound comforted, and Sukey knew why. She’d never told Mr. Bearparke she didn’t love him. “Here, let me help you with those cakes,” she said, bumping hips with her as she came to stand by the table.
Mrs. Khaleel bumped her back. Her mouth trembled. “They need to cool before we ice them. I have some things to attend to in the pantry.” And she fled.
“Should I go after her?” John asked, sounding unsure of himself.
There was a high, muffled sound from the pantry, and then another.
Sukey straightened. “I’ll go after her. You’ll only embarrass her. Go on.”
John leaned in to kiss her. “Thank you.” And Sukey felt, despite the seriousness of the moment, rather important and very motherly and not at all as if she was walking on a plank over nothingness.
She knocked on the pantry door. No reply. “May I come in?” Another high, muffled sound. Sukey opened the door. Mrs. Khaleel sat on the floor, her face pressed into her knees and her shoulders shaking. She had not even brought a candle.
Sukey shut the door behind her, feeling her way in the dark to lean her head on the cook’s shoulder. “I’m sorry.”
They sat like that a long time.
* * *
“I’m meeting Gil Plumtree, Lord Tassell’s valet, at Makepeace’s Coffeehouse,” John told Sukey on Saturday afternoon. Having heartily admired the man since childhood—indeed, “loved” would not be too strong a word—John was glad they had finally managed to arrange a meeting before the Tassells removed to London. “He’s—well, I suppose he’s a sort of uncle to me.”
He had never said so aloud before. He hoped if she met Plumtree, she would not repeat it. “Would you like to come along and make his acquaintance?”
Her fingers slowed as she tied her bonnet, hesitating. “I don’t think so,” she said at last. “I like having Saturday afternoons all to myself. Do you mind terribly?”
“Of course not,” he said, wishing it were true.
She kissed him on the cheek and hurried out the door. By the time he’d put on his hat and gloves and followed her out, she was halfway through the churchyard, and passed out of sight before he reached Market Square.
John went on to Makepeace’s.
“Johnny, my boy!” Plumtree enfolded him in a warm embrace redolent of pipe smoke. A beanpole in his youth, he had broadened in middle age into a mountain of a man, one of the few John knew who topped him by inches. His good-humored face with its large and crooked nose beamed down at John. “It’s wonderful to see you. Is it true what everyone says?” He made a show of peering over John’s shoulder. “I don’t see a Mrs. Toogood.”
“She cherishes her afternoons off.”
Plumtree sighed gustily. “A woman after my own heart. It’s for the best. A coffeehouse is no place for a woman.”
The servingwoman snorted as she set two steaming cups of coffee on the table. “Good Lord, you must be older than you look.” She was the proprietor’s daughter, a pretty black woman with her hair pulled into a cluster of curls at the crown of her head. John had been buying coffee from her for years, but today the playful slant of her eyes made him
think of Sukey.
Plumtree laughed. “Now, now, Miss Makepeace, I look ancient. But it’s kind of you to flatter a dotard.”
“Can I get you gentlemen anything else?”
“I believe I spied some darling little cakes when I came in? Are they new?”
Miss Makepeace smiled proudly. “You remember Peter. He’s apprenticed to a confectioner, and I finally talked Papa into selling some of their sweets here.”
“Peter? That grubby little infant?” Plumtree said with mock horror. “Good Lord, how old am I?”
John found he didn’t mind, after all, having Plumtree to himself. He felt comfortable in the way one could only be among people one had known all one’s life. Sipping his coffee, he listened contentedly to Plumtree and Miss Makepeace rattling on about cheesecakes and meringue. He hoped his wife, wherever she was, was enjoying her peace and quiet after a long week.
Cake and sandwiches were brought, and Plumtree steepled his fingers. “Now, my dear boy. Of course I wish you every joy. Tell me all about her.” He smiled mischievously. “I saw Maria make quite a scene.”
John covered his eyes. “Don’t remind me.”
“We’ll say no more about it. I’m only sorry you left early, for I was looking forward to seeing you. Are you quite mad for her? I hope you are, or you’ll be pining for London by Midsummer.”
John sighed. “You two would get on like a house afire. You have a similar irreverent ease.”
“Can’t keep up with her?” Plumtree said with a twinkle. “We old men—”
“That isn’t it,” John interrupted firmly. “But I—I never thought I would be a butler. I never wanted to give anyone orders.”
Plumtree laughed. “Pish tush, I never saw such a bossy child.”
John reflected unhappily that that was true. He had hoped to be a less bossy adult. He looked down at his coffee. Water had condensed on the table under the hot china cup, shimmering as he turned the cup between his hands. The oak was scarred with rings left by coffee cups past, and yet he fought an urge to take out his handkerchief.