The Glass Virgin

by Catherine Cookson

  ‘I don’t want it applied to me, Sir, and what’s more I’ll see it isn’t.’

  Lagrange was aware of the stretched staring faces about him. They were amazed at the way the fellow was answering him. What he should do was to raise his crop at him and then send him packing, but Boston was waiting for just such a move. He had come in the yard yesterday and talked to the fellow. Quite openly he had asked him how he was getting on. Did he like his new job? Such attention from his betters was giving the man a bloated opinion of himself. He should be taken down a peg, yet if he were to do it ten to one that would be the end, and what he needed at present, and very badly, was a new interest, an interest that would be lucrative.

  He swung about, wielding his crop, shouting, ‘Get about your business, all of you, and let me hear or see no more of this.’ And like rats scurrying into holes they all dispersed, all except Manuel. He, too, went about his business, but his step was measured and his back was straight because the voice inside him was crying loudly, ‘Margee and her tales! Get out of this. Animals or no animals, you’ll never be your own man here. There’s something on the place. Go when the going’s good.’

  Three

  Miss Howard had toothache; Mrs Page and Alice had tried all the known cures but without avail. Alice had held the offending molar between a piece of zinc and a silver sixpence, a sure cure, but the dying nerve in Miss Howard’s tooth refused to be electrified. They had tried tincture of myrrh on cotton wool, creosote on cotton wool, but now as a last resort the poor young woman was sucking camphor.

  Being in such a state Rosina knew that the governess could not accompany her charge during her riding lesson; she was all for cancelling the lesson but the child was ready and would be greatly disappointed should she be deprived of it. What was more, Edmund had insisted that she should continue with her practice until she could gallop, so for the past two months, for five mornings a week, except when the weather was inclement, her daughter had gone riding with the groom, but after that first morning always accompanied by Howard.

  The groom had seemingly done what others before him couldn’t; he had eliminated the child’s fear of horses and brought her to the state where she could trot comfortably. She seemed to have great confidence in the man; she herself wasn’t sure whether she liked him or not. Of course that didn’t matter one way or the other as long as he carried out his duties, which apparently he did exceptionally well. She had noticed a slight difference in him from the other servants. She had wondered at the difference at first until she had realised that he was less subservient than the others, yet his manner could not call forth reprimand; a stiffening of one’s manner towards him, perhaps, but not reprimand.

  Annabella was looking at her expectantly, and so she said to her, ‘Go along then.’

  ‘Oh, thank you, Mama.’ Annabella reached up and kissed the pale cheek, then turned away on the point of a run, but remembering that ladies never run, she brought her step to a walk, and, holding the loop of her skirt over one wrist and her riding crop in the other hand, she walked sedately from her mama’s boudoir all the way to the stable yard, where Manuel was waiting for her.

  Manuel was very sorry to hear that Miss Howard had toothache and he said the only sure cure for toothache was to tie a piece of string round the tooth and attach a smoothing iron to the other end of the string and get somebody to throw it against the wall. The remedy caused her to hunch her shoulders upwards but at the same time made her want to laugh because she knew that Manuel was making a joke. He was very amusing was Manuel, she had never met anyone like him in all her life, but he was only amusing, she had found, when they were alone together, walking or trotting round the fields. He never said amusing things in front of Miss Howard; he acted very properly in front of Miss Howard, and her governess seemed to think highly of him.

  This morning, when they reached the gate, Manuel did not dismount and open it, but he sat looking at it for a moment before saying, ‘There’s no real room in that field, the animals are tired of it. Like people, they want a change. Would you like to go out on to the fells?’

  ‘Out on to the fells, Manuel?’ Her eyes had sprung wide in surprise. Her mama or papa had never said she could ride out on to the fells. In fact, she never went outside the gates unless it was in the carriage. But if Manuel thought it was all right, then it must be all right.

  Manuel himself knew that if he had asked leave to take her out on to the fells it would have been refused, by the mistress anyway, but, as it was, no-one had said he shouldn’t take her out into the open country. He, like the horses, was feeling hemmed in. He wasn’t grumbling at the job, it was all right, at least for the time being, but in a way it was restricting. There were days when he wanted to pick up his bundle and go; it was only the thought of the animals that kept him. Unlike the rest of the staff he didn’t take his half-day a week or use his one day a month. Harris had been dumbfounded when he had asked if he could save his leave and have it all together. He had given no reason for the strange request for he couldn’t say at the end of a month he would have three full days in which to drink and ease his body. What could a man do with half a day which didn’t begin until two o’clock in the afternoon and with five miles to walk into the town? He could drink or leave it alone, but when he drank he did it like he did other things, thoroughly, and sometimes he didn’t come to himself for three days. Harris had hummed and hahed until he had said, ‘Well, if you can’t decide I’ll ask himself,’ but fearing to have his authority diluted had himself granted the request. It was another thing that added to Manuel’s strangeness in the eyes of the staff.

  ‘Come on,’ he said, ‘we’ll be little devils, Miss, eh?’

  Manuel said the strangest things.

  They went on through the wood, then along the field path where the men were working, and they all touched their forelocks to her and she inclined her head and smiled at them, then they rode until they came to the drystone wall that marked the boundary of the estate, and to a part where the wall was crumbling, and they went over this and on to the fells.

  Sitting straight, she looked about her and there came to her a most odd thought. The air on this side of the wall seemed to be different, sharper, and there was a wind that lifted her hair back from her neck and attempted to blow her hat off.

  Manuel, looking at her, thought, It’s now or never, and so, quickly, he said, ‘See that tree over there. I’ll race you to it. Remember what I told you now, sit tight. Up, Sandy! Up, Chester!’

  She had no time for apprehension, the horse was away and she with it. Like lightning flickering before her eyes fear passed through her, and then it was gone and she knew a great ecstatic feeling of exhilaration, not only because she was galloping but because she was ahead of Manuel. When she shouted she couldn’t believe it was her voice; ladies didn’t shout. She reached the tree first and when Manuel came abreast and pulled Chester to a halt she leant forward on to Sandy’s neck and laughed and laughed. Then, seeming to remember who she was, and whom she was with, she straightened her body and, looking at Manuel who was sitting smiling broadly at her, she said, ‘You . . . you didn’t let me win, did you, Manuel?’

  ‘Let you win, Miss? Good gracious! It took me all me time to keep on his tail. Let you win? Not on me life . . . How did you like it?’

  ‘Oh . . . oh, Manuel, it was wonderful. And . . . and you know something? I’m not afraid any more; I’ll never be afraid of horses again.’

  ‘Well, this is a day to remember, ’tis indeed.’

  ‘Shall we have another one?’

  ‘No, not yet. I’d walk them a bit. Let’s go down by the river, they could do with a drink.’

  Even the river looked different. It rushed along quicker here than it did in the park; it tumbled over the rocks and curved and twisted as if it was having a game at evading you.

  After the horses had drunk, they continued
along the bank; then, passing an outcrop of rock, they turned into the grassy, marshy dell at the far side of which a woman was stooping over some long stalks. She lifted her head and looked towards them, and when they came up to her Manuel said, ‘Hello there,’ and she replied, ‘Hello.’ She looked from one to the other, then said, ‘I would mind where you’re goin’, there’s a bit of bog over there. I’d keep close to the bank for a while.’

  ‘Thanks.’ He nodded at her. Then bending from the horse, he said on a high note, ‘Don’t tell me that’s flax you’re picking?’

  ‘Flax? Lint we call it; I’m after the seeds.’

  ‘I had the idea it never grew outside Ireland.’

  ‘Well, that’s as may be but this bit comes up year after year, never more, never less. It’s sheltered here and damp, perhaps that’s why.’

  ‘There’s not enough, surely, to make any linen.’

  ‘No, perhaps not,’ she said on a laugh, ‘but then I wasn’t wantin’ it for linen. I use the seeds for medicine, for poultices. Can’t be beaten for poultices.’ She looked again from him to the young girl, then added, ‘You’re out of your way.’

  ‘Not so far,’ he replied; ‘we’re from the Hall, back yonder, Redford.’

  ‘Oh aye. Aye. Why, yes.’ Her voice spiralled. ‘And this is the young miss?’ She nodded her head at Annabella, but didn’t dip her knee.

  Annabella looked back at her and smiled. She was an old woman, but not as old as Alice. Her face was very wrinkled, but kindly looking. When she said to her now, ‘It’s a rare and a beautiful day, we only gets like this in September,’ she answered politely, ‘Yes, it is a beautiful day.’

  As Manuel asked, ‘You live hereabouts?’ Annabella had the idea that he wanted to stay and talk with the woman. He had obviously never met her before, yet he spoke like one would to an acquaintance, if not a friend.

  ‘Just along the bank there and through the copse. It’s warm. Would you like a drink? I’ve got some herb beer; it’s nice and sharp, been standing for four days or so.’

  ‘That’s kind of you.’ He now turned and glanced at Annabella, saying, ‘You’d like a drink, wouldn’t you?’

  She stared at him for a moment. Yes, she’d like a drink, but her mama wouldn’t be at all pleased if she knew she’d accepted a drink from this old lady, and what was more she’d be very displeased that Manuel had allowed such a thing to happen. But her mama lived within the walls, whereas she was outside the walls and in another world. She smiled at him and said quickly, ‘Yes, please.’

  Without further ado the old woman went before them along the river bank, through a small copse, then up a broad grass path in a garden that apparently had no boundary, and to a flat, roughly paved piece of ground with a small stone house in its middle.

  ‘If you’d like to step down and rest your bones you can be seated there.’ The woman pointed to a wooden form against the stone wall, and Manuel said, ‘Thanks, Mother.’

  The use of the word mother to this strange person brought Annabella’s eyes wide; then Manuel was lifting her from the saddle. He hadn’t lifted her like this since the first morning they had ridden together.

  When they were seated on the wooden form he looked at her and said, ‘Now isn’t this grand?’ and she answered, ‘Yes, Manuel.’ And in a way it was grand, grand and exciting; nothing like this had ever happened to her before.

  When the old woman came out of the cottage with two frothing mugs of liquid and handed her one, she thanked her, then sipped at her beer and just prevented her face from wrinkling in distaste. It was sharp and bitter.

  ‘It’s good, isn’t it?’ Manuel had half emptied his mug in one go, and she gulped and smiled as she lied, ‘Yes, it’s very nice.’

  The woman was now looking at Manuel. ‘You’re not from these parts?’

  ‘No, Mother; I’m from Ireland, across the water you know, but I’m Spanish by birth.’

  ‘Yes, I would have said so.’

  Manuel smiled in evident pleasure, and the old woman smiled back at him. ‘Can I fill that again for you?’

  ‘Do, and thanks.’ He handed her the mug, and then the woman, looking at Annabella with her head on one side, asked, ‘And you, missie?’

  ‘No. No, thank you; I have sufficient. It’s . . . it’s very nice.’

  ‘I’m glad you like it.’

  After Manuel had finished his second mug he rose to his feet, saying, ‘I’m much obliged to you, Mother,’ and nodded slowly down at her, and she replied, ‘Oh, that’s all right; you’re welcome any time . . . What do they call you?’

  ‘Manuel . . . Manuel Mendoza.’

  ‘Ho-ho! that sounds Spanish enough, if you like. Me husband was a seagoing man. Dead this ten years. He used to talk to me about foreign places. I got the feel of the words.’

  ‘And your name, Mother?’

  ‘Amy Stretford.’

  As he continued to look at her, she said, ‘Don’t be a stranger; if you’re passin’ this way any time drop in. I can always wet your whistle with something.’

  ‘I’ll keep you to that, see if I don’t.’

  Annabella gazed at them in some bewilderment. Their conversation was very intriguing – like listening to characters coming alive from a book; in a way, the old woman was like Manuel in that she was different. Manuel was like no servant in the house, he neither talked nor acted like them and, of course, he didn’t talk or act like a gentleman, like her father, or Uncle James or Mr Rosier, or Mr Boston . . . or Stephen. These were the sum total of her male acquaintances, and her mind touching on Stephen, she thought, Oh, I wish he were here; he would have enjoyed it so. She knew that Stephen liked odd situations because he would relate to her what happened on his journeys to and from school.

  The old lady, she noticed, did not extend the invitation to herself; but, of course, she wouldn’t. Being a sensible old lady she would know her place. And yet she felt a sort of regret that she hadn’t been included in the invitation. She thanked her once more for the drink, then they mounted again and they went down the broad grass drive to the river bank, and from there Manuel turned and waved to the old woman as if he knew she would be standing watching them. And she herself succumbing, as her mama would have said, to an impulse, also waved her hand at the old woman, not only once or twice, but a third time.

  ‘You enjoyed that?’ Manuel spoke to her over his shoulder as they went through the copse, and she replied quite loudly, ‘Oh yes. Yes, Manuel.’ And then she added, ‘I’ll have something to tell Stephen when I see him.’

  He stopped and waited until she came abreast; then, his face straight, he said, ‘It’ll be wiser if you don’t tell Mr Stephen, if you don’t tell anybody, because we won’t be able to do this very often with Miss Howard coming along . . . you understand?’

  Yes, she understood. She understood that this was an adventure. She had known from the minute they had come through the gate it was an adventure and that no-one must know about it, not even Stephen. But Stephen would never carry tales; she said so. ‘I really could tell Stephen, Manuel,’ she said, ‘because we have secrets.’ She nodded twice with her head to give emphasis to this statement, and he nodded back at her, saying, ‘Oh well, perhaps then, perhaps.’

  She sat looking at him. He had very, very black eyes, and his mouth was nice, at least when he was smiling. He was, she supposed, a very handsome man, but of course he wasn’t as beautiful as Stephen. But then he was older. She said to him, ‘I won’t tell Stephen, Manuel; I won’t tell anyone.’

  ‘Good for you.’

  She noticed once again that he rarely gave her her title when they were alone. She should inform her mama of this but of course she wouldn’t, she would never do anything to cause trouble for Manuel, because he was so nice; no-one among the servants had been so kind to her as Manuel; he could really
be her friend, yes, he could really be her friend. She would have loved to say to him, ‘You can be my friend, Manuel,’ but, of course, she must never do that. But she could tell him her secrets just as if he was her friend openly. She leant from the saddle now and said to him, ‘Do you think Stephen is pretty, Manuel?’

  She watched a spasm pass over his face. His eyes stretched wide, his lips came firmly together, but he did not smile as he said, ‘Indeed, I do; he’s the most pretty young man I’ve ever seen.’ He had only seen the boy once; that was when they had driven to Durham.

  ‘You really think so, Manuel?’

  ‘I’ve said it. I do.’

  ‘I’m going to tell you a secret, Manuel.’

  ‘Well, it’ll be safe with me.’

  ‘Manuel.’ She paused for a number of seconds. ‘Mr Stephen and I are going to be married.’

  He sat up straight in the saddle. His eyebrows now came down into a frown, his lips stretched wide showing his even blunt white teeth; then composing his features again, he asked quietly, ‘Does . . . does Mr Stephen know of this?’

  She shook her head. ‘Not yet. Well, at least we don’t talk about it; he may know inside, you know what I mean?’

  ‘Indeed, indeed I do.’ His voice held the most solemn tones. ‘When is this going to happen?’ he asked.

  ‘Oh!’ She wagged her head just the slightest and gathered the reins into her hands. ‘When I’m sixteen, perhaps seventeen. Yes, seventeen.’ She nodded sharply now. ‘Seventeen at the latest.’

  He, too, nodded his head as he said, ‘Well I wish you both every happiness and the largest family in the county, ten children, no less, because children make for happiness.’

  ‘Thank you, Manuel.’

  They rode on side by side in silence now until, pulling her horse abruptly to a stop, she turned her face towards him and firmly said, ‘I wasn’t going to say this, Manuel, but I feel I must. I think you are my friend and I would like to be yours.’