by Val Wood
“That’s enough,” my father said. “She deserves ’strap for not telling where she was going, but she doesn’t merit a leathering for getting a job. She’s done well there, going all ’way to Beverley by herself.”
Ma was silenced then, for although my da was a quiet man, once he had made a stand he always stuck to it, and that was when she said how lucky I was. I gave a bit of a smile inside then, for I knew that my mother would boast to all the folk she knew about her youngest daughter who had obtained a position of work in Beverley.
CHAPTER TWO
‘Da gave me sixpence for the journey the following day, but it wasn’t the same carrier as previously and he was rather morose and not inclined to talk. It was raining hard, so by the time we arrived in Beverley and I had walked to Mr Ingram’s house, I was cold, wet and hungry and beginning to think that perhaps I might have acted hastily in leaving a comfortable home. We were not rich by any means but neither were we poor. My older brothers and sisters, those who were still at home, made a contribution to the household pot and so we were able to pay our rent, buy coal and have at least one good meal on the table every day as well as gruel for breakfast. We were better off by far than a lot of people.
When I arrived at the house it was well past dinnertime, but the servants were just sitting down to their meal. Mary, who answered the door to me as she had done the day before, asked me in, told me to drop down my bag and wash my hands, then come and eat. “We eat after we’ve fed them upstairs,” she said, “so if they’ve not finished off all the meat, then we can have it.”
I dipped my knee to all of those sitting down at table for they all turned to look at me, and then they shuffled up on the bench to make room. “This is Jenny Graham, Mrs Judson,” said Cook to a grim-faced woman dressed in black who was sitting opposite her. “If she’s brought a satisfactory reference, she’ll replace ’girl who’s left.”
Mrs Judson looked at me without smiling, as did a bald-headed elderly man who was sitting at the head of the table. I wondered what he did for he seemed too old to work, and I discovered later that he didn’t do very much except look after the wine cellar and the silver, and wait on table, and that he had been with the family so long that he couldn’t be replaced. He was the butler and his name was Thompson, but we always called him Sir.
“Is she a Beverley girl?” Mrs Judson asked, and I was about to open my mouth to answer when I caught sight of Mary who shook her head and put her finger to her lips.
“No, Mrs Judson, she is not,” Cook replied. “But then I didn’t want a Beverley girl. If you have local girls they’re always wanting to run home on some errand or other, or else they attract followers, and I won’t have that. That’s why I prefer country girls, like Mary. They’re much more sensible, but then,” she gave a deep sigh, “beggars can’t be choosers.”
“And where are you from, girl?” Mr Thompson asked me directly, looking at me over his spectacles and down his mottled red nose.
“I’m from Hull, sir,” I said. “Born and bred.” I was going to give him my history, but on glancing at Mary again I decided against it. There was silence then whilst we ate and I had never in my life seen such a good dinner on the table. A leg of pork which was less than half eaten, a big dish of floury potatoes and a bowl of peas which were very sweet and tasty. When we’d finished all of that, we had a steamed treacle pudding with a hot sauce.
I would have liked to have a lie down after such a feast, but the cook called me to her as she sat in a comfortable chair and Mary and another girl cleared away the dirty dishes. I stood in front of her as she looked over my references and then she said, “Do all these people know you?”
“Yes, mum.” Well they did, all but the carrier. “They know me to be of good character,” I said, remembering that good character was what she had wanted.
“But they don’t say if you are any good around a kitchen,” she grumbled. “And call me Cook, if you please, or Mrs Feather.”
I decided that I couldn’t possibly call her Mrs Feather for she looked so unlike one, being very portly and solid in figure. “They wouldn’t know about that, Cook,” I replied. “You’d have to ask my ma.”
She humphed a bit and pondered, and then said, “I’ll try you out. See how you shape. Start with washing ’pans and dishes and then I’ll get Mary to tell you your duties and show you where you’ll sleep.”
We slept, Mary and I and a parlour maid called Polly who was a good deal older than us, in a room at the top of the house that was reached by narrow back stairs. There was a small window in the roof and if we stood on a chair we could see for miles. I loved to do that for there was a view of trees and meadows and birds flying about, and several times I saw a fox slinking alongside a hedge. In the far distance there were some hills that Mary said were the Wolds, which was where she came from. Oh, yes, and up there I could hear the church bells ringing, both the Minster’s and St Mary’s. The room had three small beds, a chest of drawers where we each had one drawer, and a washstand with a jug and bowl. There was a chamber pot under each bed and I was glad of that, for I wouldn’t have wanted to share with strangers. It’s different with family. At home we had one for the girls and one for the boys, but Ma and Da had their own.
So I looked around and thought that this was to be my home from now on, and I made myself as comfortable as possible.
The next morning I was to set to work proper. I was to rise first and rake the kitchen fire which was kept in all night. Then I had to set the table for the servants’ breakfast. Mary said she would get up with me on the first day and tell me what to do, but after that I must muddle along as best I could and she would have an extra half-hour in bed.
It wasn’t hard work, though I didn’t like scrubbing the floors. Cook never seemed to be satisfied and would poke about in all the corners looking for dirt. At home I only ever swept our floor with a besom, for my mother said it was a waste of water to wash it when there were always feet tramping in and out. What I did miss about home, though, was slipping out of the house when the work was done and the dinner prepared, and going to have a wander around the Market Place or a stroll down to the pier. I had had a sort of freedom, which I didn’t have at the Ingrams’ house. When one job was done there was another one waiting, and because I was the lowest of the low, I was at everyone’s beck and call.
I’d been there a month before I saw anybody from upstairs and that was because Mrs Judson, who had come down to the kitchen to have a glass of ale with Cook, realized that she had left a pair of Mrs Ingram’s gloves, which she was bringing down for cleaning, on the hall table.
“Slip up and get them, Jenny,” she said. “But don’t let anyone see you.”
Mary and Polly were elsewhere, otherwise she wouldn’t have asked me. I straightened my cap and smoothed down my apron. I was wearing my afternoon white one, not my morning grey, and hurried upstairs into the hall. I’d picked up the gloves and was just having a quick look round and admiring the polished floor and the perfume of the flowers, and the gilt mirror on the wall, for I hadn’t been up here before, when the front door suddenly opened. I hadn’t realized that Mr Ingram had his own key. I thought he rang the doorbell like everyone else and had it opened for him by Mary or Polly when they saw or heard the indicator jangling in the box in the kitchen.
“Door,” someone would shout and off they would dash up the stairs. Anyway, there he was and there I was, and I dipped my knee, murmured ‘sir’, and backed away to the kitchen stairs. I needn’t have worried though, for although he looked at me he didn’t see me, and it was then I realized that I was invisible. We all were, even Mary and Polly, who cleaned the rooms and laid the fires and changed the bed and table linen, and helped at table. Only Cook and Mrs Judson and Mr Thompson were seen by those upstairs.
Then one afternoon I heard the kitchen door sneck rattle and I went to open it. The door sticks sometimes. Polly was upstairs serving tea to Mrs Ingram and some of her friends who had called. Mary was out on an
errand and Cook was having a nap.
“Just a minute,” I called out, thinking it was Jem, the general lad who brings in the coal and does odd jobs. Him and me are about on a par for status, though he’s been there longer than me and takes delight in telling me so. “Hold your hat on, I’m coming.”
Imagine my surprise when I pulled the door open and a stranger stood there. He gave me a grin and said hello in a very familiar way and started to come in.
I put my hand up to stop him. “Hold on,” I said, though not impolitely. “Who are you? What’s your business?”
He stared at me for a moment, then he laughed. “And who are you? I haven’t seen you before.”
I lowered my hand then, for by his accent he wasn’t a servant, but I couldn’t understand why he was using the kitchen door. “I’m Jenny,” I said. “Kitchen maid.”
“Well, how de do, Jenny kitchen-maid.” He made a mock bow and took hold of my hand. “I am extremely pleased to meet you.”
I was quite nonplussed. He was older than me, tall and rather thin. He was handsome in an intense kind of way with dark eyes and curly hair, though I’ve always preferred fair males, being dark myself. But his eyes and manner were merry and he had a very winning smile.
“Where’s Cook,’ he asked, “and Mrs Judson?” He peered over my shoulder and with that I moved on one side to let him in, realizing that he wasn’t a stranger to the house.
“Cook’s asleep,” I said. “I think Mrs Judson’s upstairs.”
“Good,” he said. “So I can sneak in.”
“Sneak in?” I was quite perturbed. “Sneak in upstairs?”
He nodded and started to take off his jacket, which I noticed had green marks on the sleeves. “I’ve been on the Westwood, larking around with some of the local lads. I’ve got rather muddy and Mama will not be very pleased if she sees me like this. Is there anything to eat, Jenny kitchen-maid?”
“But – who are you – sir?” I added. “Do you live here?”
He nodded. “I’m mostly away at school, but now I’m home for the holidays. Christopher Ingram – Christy, everybody calls me, except my father, of course. He always call me Christopher.”
“I beg your pardon, Mr Christopher,” I apologized. “I didn’t know. Nobody said anything about a son.” But then, I thought, why would they? I wasn’t supposed to know about anything that went on upstairs, though I did know that there was a daughter, Julia, and she had a governess, Miss James, who never came downstairs.
Just then Polly came into the kitchen with an empty tray in her hand. She nodded to him and murmured, “Afternoon, Master Christy.” It was more of a mutter than a murmur, for she was rather a sour puss was Polly and rarely smiled.
“Good afternoon to you too, Polly. I was just asking Jenny kitchen-maid if there was anything to eat, cake or something.” He looked at the cake that Polly was taking out of a tin. “That looks scrumptious.”
“It’s for upstairs, Master Christy,’ she said grumpily. “But I’ll cut you a slice.” Which she did, then put the rest onto a china plate with a pretty linen doily underneath. She cut up a slab of ginger parkin and put that on another plate, made a fresh pot of tea, put them all on the tray and went back upstairs.
“Very jolly our Polly, isn’t she?” Master Christy spoke with his mouth full of cake. “Jolly Polly.”
I smiled, for that was one thing that Polly was not. She was as dour as could be and I reckoned that one day she would end up being a housekeeper just like Mrs Judson, for they were both stamped from the same mould.
He asked me where I was from and how long I had been working there and expressed surprise that I had come all the way from Hull to work in Beverley. “Beverley’s a fine town,” he said. “I shall set up here when I have finished school. I have friends here already, but not the kind that my parents would approve of if they knew. Butchers’ sons, innkeepers’ sons, farriers’ lads, you know. Young fellows who live on barges down at the beck.”
They sounded very respectable to me, and I told him so, forgetting that I wasn’t supposed to have an opinion and should speak only when spoken to.
“Not suitable for me, according to my parents,” he said, licking his fingers and dabbing them on the plate to catch the last of the cake crumbs. “Only gentry, or bankers and lawyers. They don’t know that I come down here either.” He gave me a wink. “They didn’t mind when I was little, but they don’t know I still come to be spoiled by Cook.” He then gave a wicked grin. “Will you spoil me, Jenny kitchen-maid?”
I gazed at him very solemnly as I considered, but I knew immediately what the answer would be. Yes, of course I would.
CHAPTER THREE
‘I saw Christy quite often during that summer. He would come into the kitchen unannounced and Cook would feed him with whatever she had. A piece of apple pie or a slice of cake; he liked his sweet things, did Master Christy. He was always asking me to take a walk on the Westwood. But of course I couldn’t. For one thing I wasn’t due for any free time, and for another if we had been seen together I would have lost my job. I kept telling him this but he only answered, “But no-one knows you, Jenny kitchen-maid, and it wouldn’t do any harm.”
I came to the conclusion that he was lonely when he was at home. His sister Julia was too young for his company and the young working lads of his own age he was friendly with were not able to take time off. But there came a day when I was sent on an errand to the shops in Saturday Market. It was sunny and warm and I must admit that I was dawdling, enjoying the sheer pleasure of being outdoors and not confined to the heat of the kitchen. I’d stopped to look in a draper’s window to admire a length of muslin, when I became aware of a reflection in the glass of someone standing behind me.
“Good day, Jenny kitchen-maid,” came a whispered voice. “That colour would suit you very well.”
I turned and looked up to see the smiling face of Master Christy. “Good afternoon, sir.” I dipped my knee. “Yes, that colour green is a favourite of mine.”
“I’d buy it for you if I had any money,” he said. “But alas, my father keeps me very short of allowance.”
“It wouldn’t be proper, anyway, Master Christy,” I said very primly, though I couldn’t help but smile at the notion. “My ma would be very shocked and so would yours.”
“Then if I can’t buy you a pretty thing, come for a walk with me.”
“I can’t do that,” I said, though I felt I would dearly like to.
“Yes, you can.” He pulled on my arm. “Please do, Jenny. I’m so very bored.”
Well it just so happened that I hadn’t been able to make the purchase for Mrs Judson. She required a set of buttons in a particular size and colour. I had tried several haberdashers where I had drawn a blank and was about to enquire at the draper’s, and I reckoned that if I went for a very short walk, then I could say that I had spent the time trailing all round Beverley in the quest for the buttons.
“All right,” I said. “But no more than half an hour.”
His face lit up at my words and I thought that even if I got into trouble, it would be worth it just to see the look of pleasure on his face. We sped off, cutting down a passageway at the side of the Green Dragon inn across Lairgate and up Newbegin which was said to be one of the oldest streets in Beverley, and headed for the pastureland of the Westwood.
I hadn’t been there before and I was delighted with the rolling dips and valleys, the lush green grass, the trees and bushes, and we ran up and down those little valleys as if we were children, although of course we were not; but for a short time we could pretend that childhood had returned and that I was not a servant girl and he my master’s son.
“This is where I come to meet my friends,” he said, lying down on the grass and putting his arms behind his head. “The friends I can’t take home to meet my parents.”
I sat down beside him and took off my bonnet, which had become askew as we had chased about. I shook my hair free, smoothed it and started to pin it back
again.
“What pretty hair, Jenny kitchen-maid.” He fingered my straight brown locks. “So thick and glossy.”
I shrugged away from him and bent my head as I felt a flush coming to my cheeks. I pinned up my hair and put on my bonnet, my eyes averted, yet I saw the slow smile on his lips. “I must get back,” I murmured. “I shall be missed.”
“Yes.” He jumped to his feet. “Come on then. I’ll walk you back. I’m so glad you came.”
I looked up at him. “So am I, Master Christy, but I mustn’t do it again.”
“Why not? Where’s the harm in it?”
I knew the harm of it. I would become too fond of him and that just wouldn’t do. And besides, his parents might forgive him for having local lads for friends, but they wouldn’t tolerate a friendship with a servant girl.
“I’ll get into trouble,” I said evasively. “If anyone found out, I mean.”
He sighed and nodded. “I wouldn’t want that, Jenny. But it’s a pity. I would like us to be friends.”
“We can still be friends,” I said. “We must just make sure that no-one else knows.”
And so that is how it was over the next two years. We would exchange conversation in the kitchen when others were there, for he still came down whenever he was home from school, and sometimes we would accidentally meet when I was on my afternoon off. Except that it wasn’t an accident, for if I wasn’t in the kitchen he would enquire where I was and maybe where Mary was too, just to deflect suspicion. This he told me, for he would come and look for me. He knew where I went in Beverley for I followed the same route on my time off and walked to the Westwood in the area of Fishwick’s mill.
“Hello, Jenny kitchen-maid,” he would call and I would smile and greet him in return. “Hello, Mr Christy,” for he was now too grown to be called Master Christy. At nearly eighteen he was tall, and already had a neat beard and sideburns, for as I said before he was quite dark, and it must have been a chore for him to use the blade every day. Sometimes our hands would touch involuntarily as we acknowledged one another. Well, that is what friends do, isn’t it? Men shake hands and ladies extend theirs. I’ve seen them do it when I’ve been upstairs. Yes, I do go upstairs now; at least I did before being locked up in here. I joined Polly as an upstairs maid when Mary was promoted to Mrs Ingram’s personal maid.