by L. A. Meyer
"This ain't a bad rig," I says, pullin' the bottom of the weskit down over the waist of the skirt.
"It isn't exactly the highest style," says Annie with a bright smile, "but if Mistress wants to dress us up as milkmaids, well, it's her school."
"What do we do first?" I ask, as I sit back on the bed to pull on my stockings.
"First we bring up the water and fill the pitchers in the ladies' privy and set the table for their breakfast, and then we ring the bell to get them up and while they're getting dressed and ready we eat our breakfast, and then one of us plays the chimes to call them to their breakfast. Some of us help Peg cook the breakfast and some serve it, and some of us come up and clean the privy and make the beds. And that's just for starters." She pauses and comes around the bed. "And speaking of beds, we should make yours. If Mistress comes up and sees it unmade you'll catch it."
"Thanks for looking out for me, Annie. You've done that since the first day I got here and I won't forget it."
Annie and I creep down the stairs and we meet the others coming up the stairs with buckets of steaming water, and I see that Betsey has one in each hand so I reach over and take one of them and we all walk silently through the hall of sleeping girls to the privy. We dump the water out of the pitchers and fill them with warm water and gather up all the used towels and washrags and clean up the basins a bit and then heads back out. When we're all out of the dormitory, Rachel, the oldest of the serving girls, rings the bell hanging outside the door and I hear groans from the ladies within.
"That's my favorite thing to do in this place—wakin' up the little darlings," whispers Rachel. The first light of dawn is beginning to show in the windows and I can see Rachel's toothy white smile shining in the gloom.
We all go down the stairs into the kitchen where the veil of silence is suddenly lifted and everyone's talking and laughing and there's a great banging of pots and pans and hissing of steam and there's Peg standing at the stove working the spatula on a griddle of eggs and bacon and Peg turns 'round and points the spatula at me and says, "This here's Jacky and she'll be joinin' our merry band! Make her welcome!"
And they do. They all plop down at a long table and Annie pats the place next to her and I sit there, and Betsey goes to the stove and gets plates of eggs and bacon and toast and puts a plate before each of us, and the girl Rachel pours the tea and I figures that they take turns in this duty so that they'll all be served like ladies some of the time.
"That's Rachel, who's going to be married in the spring," says Annie, nodding toward Rachel who is now blushing 'cause some of the other girls have got off some rude comments at the mention of her upcoming marriage. She looks to be about eighteen. "And that's my sister, Betsey, there. And that's Abby and that's Sylvie."
All the girls nod and smile at the mention of their names. I, of course, already knew their names, but still I nod and smile at the mention of each. Annie's got hair that's close to mine in color but more curly, and her sister has the same, but while Annie's got a broad nose with a saddle of freckles on it and a generous mouth and wide-set brown eyes, Betsey's nose is sharp and her mouth is small and prim and her eyes are blue. They still look like sisters, though, and it's plain they have great affection for each other.
Abby's a round-faced girl with a large chest and a mop of red hair and the devil in her eye, and then there's Sylvie, small and dark and quiet, and very shy.
We dive into breakfast and it is very good. It is a strange thing, but no calamity ever seems to be big enough to put a dent in my appetite. As I'm tucking it away, I notice them all looking at me. With my teeth in a piece of toast I raise my eyebrows in question.
"Well, that's us," says Abby, "but what about you?"
"Oh," I say, and leave off packing it in for a bit. I dab my mouth with my napkin. "Well, I know you all saw that I got in a bit of trouble. I saw your faces pressed to the windows when I was brought back. You can't deny it."
They all look a bit sheepish at that, as they know it's true, but I says, "I don't blame you for it 'cause my face would've been pressed up there, too, if the situation was reversed. The truth of the matter is that I got arrested for singing and dancing in the street and the showing of my bare left knee in the performance of it, and I was taken to court and convicted, and Mistress didn't take it kindly at all and said that I'd brought disgrace to her school and I didn't belong upstairs and here I am." And, I say to myself, if you shun me, too, then I shall run out of this room and grab my seabag and be gone.
But they don't. They just laugh and giggle and say that there's got to be more than that to the story and let's have it, Jacky, but Peg up and says, "Let's finish up, girls, it's time to feed our ladies. There's plenty of time for tellin' lies later. Let's go. Annie, Betsey, and Rachel, to the serving. Let's get those trays loaded up. Jacky, Sylvie, and Abby, to the beds and privy. All back afterwards for the scrubbin' up."
That night, while I lay curled up in a ball under the covers on my bed, I thought long and hard about what I was going to do. I had thought about running away and maybe picking up some money playing in the taverns till I got enough to get back to England and Jaimy, but I saw yesterday just how far my pennywhistle took me, which was straight to jail, and besides I wouldn't have no place to stay and winter's coming on and Amy says winters are fierce around here. Or rather Miss Trevelyne says that. I must remember my place.
No, I must stay here for now, at least till spring, where I have warm lodging and some protection. I will go see Mr. Pickering as soon as I can to tell him that I want him to try really hard to get me my money back. Get it back before it is claimed by some man as my dowry. I shivered at that thought—I will run away if that happens.
I will look around for other employment or other opportunities that might present themselves. Who knows? Something might turn up before spring.
I will stay here and I will endure my shame. They will not see me cry. I will not whine and I will not complain. I know there is much to be learned downstairs and I will learn it and I know I will profit by it. I will continue with my former studies as best I can.
I will stay here and I will be the best chambermaid that I can be.
PART II
Chapter 12
Peg was right. It ain't so bad downstairs. Oh, the first couple of days was horrible with me in an agony of humiliation and all my former classmates staring at me, some with pity, some with delight. But I got through it.
The good Peg kept me close to her for a while so's I could get used to things as they were now. I mainly made beds and cleaned the privy and hauled the chamber pots out to the cesspool in back, and that was rough till I learned to hold my breath when I was opening the cesspool hatch and pouring in the pots. The first time I did it I almost fainted with the stench, but I learned how to do it. There's a science to everything.
But there had to come a time when I had to go up and face things upstairs, and one day when Abby was out sick Peg says, "Dinner served by Betsey, Sylvie, and Jacky. Show her how to do it."
But I already know: Serve from the right, take from the left.
We stride briskly into the dining hall, pushing our carts of steaming food. I can feel their eyes on me and I put on my mask of stony indifference, which I'm sure fools no one, and I pick up a tray of sliced meat and head directly for Amy's table, where, sure enough, she is sitting alone. I come up to her right side and present the platter.
She glowers up at me. She seems thinner and more pale than last I saw her and she says, "This is not fair."
"Please, Miss. Take some. You must eat."
"No," she says, and tosses her fork in her plate. "It is not fair."
I don't know what to say to this. I straighten up and take my tray to another table where Martha and Dolley are sitting with some others, and I serve Martha and she gives me a smile and a wink and I wait on Dolley, who gives my arm a pat and tells me everything's gonna work out fine someday, and it warms me so to see them being so kind that I start to get misty
, but then it's on to Clarissa's table and I ain't misty no more. Betsey tries to get to Clarissa first 'cause all the girls know how things lie between Clarissa and me, but Clarissa waves her away.
"I prefer the offerings on that platter," says Clarissa, looking at me in her lazy way, her enjoyment at my disgrace plain upon her face, her Look saying it all.
I keep my eyes on my platter and bring it up on her right side. Clarissa takes up the tongs and picks up a piece of meat but lets it slip before it gets to her plate such that it falls on my foot. I look down to see the meat slide to the floor and the gravy from it slip down into my shoe.
"Oh," says Clarissa, "how clumsy of you. You really must hold the tray steady. I'm sure you'll clean that up immediately, won't you?"
"Yes, Miss," I say, and I'm wantin' to dump the whole tray over her head but I'm sure I'd be taken back to court for assaulting a real lady with a tray of meat if I did, giving Wiggins the excuse he needs to lay his rod upon my back, so I don't. What I do is take my tray back to the cart and take a napkin and go back to the table and kneel down and clean up the mess. Then I go back to the cart and take a tray of vegetables and resume serving.
It's bad, but not so bad that I can't stand it.
Later, when we're back in the kitchen, I'm put in a chair and a cup of tea is put in my hand and my shoe is taken off and cleaned and a wet cloth is put to my stocking to clean off the gravy and Rachel says, "Don't you worry, Tacky, that one's gonna get it some day, and I hope I'm there to see it!"
"From the amount of curses you all have already laid on that one's head, well, one of them's bound to take, sooner or later," says Peg, which gets a laugh from all, even me.
Peg fusses over me a bit and then says, "Go over and feed some apples to that nag you love so much. Be back in time to help with supper."
Good, good Peg, I thinks. Bless you for giving me this bit of time. You miss very little in this world that you rule so kindly.
Over at the stables I put an apple in the palm of my hand and Gretchen takes it oh-so-gentle and I bury my face in her silken mane and it soothes and gentles my mind. I stay there like that for a long time.
After a while I hear Henry come into the stall and I lift my head to see that he has brought in a saddle, which he throws on Gretchen's back.
"Here, Miss, take her for a ride. Just walk about the fields a bit. It will make you feel better, I know it will." He cinches her up and hands me the reins.
I take them from him and place my hand on his and say, "Thank you, Henry. But now you must call me Jacky, for I am no longer a lady." I put my foot in the stirrup and climb aboard.
"All right, Jacky. I will call you that if you want, but you will always be a lady to me, no matter what."
"But why?" I say. "I sure ain't acted like one."
"It's for how you treated a stableboy when you were one of The Ladies, is why," he says, and he leads Gretchen and me out into the light.
***
J. Faber
General Delivery
U.S. Post Office
Boston, Massachusetts, USA
October 5, 1803
James Emerson Fletcher
Number 9 Brattle Lane
London, England
Dearest Jaimy:
With my own hand I now release you from the vow of marriage which you honored me with when we were both children on HMS Dolphin, as I have been busted down to serving girl and will never be a fine lady as you wished me to be, a lady worthy to stand by your side.
Without going too much into the sordid details of my fall, it is enough to say that my wanton ways have got me in deep trouble again, and although I am still a good girl and am still promised to you, I am in deep disgrace.
I shall remain promised to you until such time as I receive a letter from you saying that you don't want me anymore.
Please write to me, either way. It seems like it's been a long, long time, Jaimy.
All my love,
Jacky
Chapter 13
It is on the second Sunday after my fall from grace that the word comes down from above that I must go back to the church for more of the Preacher's counseling and guidance. Damn, and I just got out of that place, I thinks, what with him going on and on about sin and stuff as usual and looking at me when he says it, me now standing in the back, apart from the ladies.
We were preparing the noon meal when I was summoned, and I put aside the tray of steamed greens I was making up and wipe my hands, heave a heavy sigh, and head out. The other girls give me looks of sympathy as I go, but Betsey, strangely, looks at me with real alarm in her eyes, and says don't... but lets it drop there and sits down and worries her hands in her lap. Don't what? I wonders as I cross the space between the church and the school, going past the graveyard and the unmarked grave.
I open the door and go in and again he is standing tall and severe up at his podium, his white collar tabs glowing in the half darkness of the place. He points to the aisle in front of him and I go there and kneel and put my hands up in a prayerful attitude as I did on my last visit to this place.
"We have now seen where your wanton ways have gotten you, haven't we, girl?"
"Yes, Sir, we have."
"And have you prayed for forgiveness, girl?"
"Yes, Sir, I have." Anything to get me out of here.
"I think it is plain to you now that the Devil is indeed in you, girl, is he not?"
"I hope he is not, Sir." Get ready, my poor knees, for yet more pain. "And I do not believe he is, Sir." I look up at him when I say this and hold his gaze. I am growing heartily sick of all this.
"What? You dance wildly in the streets, showing your limbs before decent people and expect us to believe that?" He takes a deep breath and pulls himself up to his full height. The light inside the church is gloomy, with dust motes floating about in the weak light that comes through the high windows. "You end up in jail and there carouse with whores and other low types the whole night long and you say the fiend is not in you, has not taken possession of you entirely?"
"It was not that way at all, Sir," I say, wearily, and settle back onto my haunches. Sounds to me like the Preacher has been talking to somebody from the jail to know so much about my night there. Prolly that Wiggins. I drop my hands from the prayerful attitude and fold them in my lap. How much more can they do to me?
"Liar!" he shouts, coming around the lectern and pointing his finger at me. "Liar! Strumpet! Minion of Satan!" He is working himself up to a fine froth and I'm starting to get scared. It is now that I notice he has a long rod in his hand. "You will put your hands back up in a proper supplicating posture and you will beg on your bended knees the good Lord's forgiveness for your transgressions against his holy teachings!"
I do not do it. I say instead, "I do not recall the good Lord saying anything about singing and dancing, 'cept maybe that thing about makin' a joyful noise unto the Lord, which is what I was doin' when I was arrested. I was makin' joyful noises unto some of his own creatures, to bring them some cheer, I was, and there was no harm in it, Sir, not a bit."
He is astounded. His mouth works up and his eyes stare at me in disbelief and I swear a line of spittle comes out the side of it and runs down his chin. I get to my feet, as I have had enough of this.
"What! No shame? No contrition? You are possessed! You will prostrate yourself!" he shouts, letting loose a cloud of spit droplets in the air. "Prepare to have the Devil beaten out of you!"
He raises his rod and comes toward me. I back off a few steps and says, "No, Sir. I will not be beaten by you. I have been beaten by Mistress Pimm, but I suppose that goes with being in a school, but I will not be beaten by you, not in a church." I pause for breath, for my heart is poundin' and my chest is startin' to heave. "I go to a church for solace and consolation and to be in company with my friends in the presence of God and to think about my place in His universe, not to be beaten and shamed!"
I'm in a fine froth myself by now and I don't know where I
'm gettin' the cheek to speak up like this but I push on, the words just pourin' out o' me.
"I spent almost two years in the Royal Navy, and I was not flogged once, Sir, not once!" I pull myself up and throw my head back. "I ain't apprenticed to you, and I ain't a member of your household. You think that 'cause I ain't a lady no more that you can beat on me if you want, but you're wrong, Sir, as I am a freeborn English woman and I will not be struck by you!"
I've been walking backwards this whole time and I'm about to turn to go out the door when he rushes up to me and grabs me by the arm and lifts the rod again, shouting something about a Jezebel right into my face, but I shouts back at him, "You let go of me, Preacher! If you hit me I'll put the police on you, I will! I know where they are and how things work down at the courthouse and ... and ... and I got me a lawyer, too! So let go of me!"
With that I jerk my arm from his grasp and bolt out the door, leavin' the amazed Preacher alone in the gloom of his church.
I rush back into the warmth and safety of the kitchen and put my back to the door and stand there pantin', tryin' to calm myself down. Through the fog of my fear and anger I hear Betsey say, "See, Peg, seel It's happening again!" and "Shush, you don't know, you must be quiet, hush your mouth now!" from Peg.