by Jean Plaidy
She re-sealed the letter and handed it back to bun.
“He will come,” he said confidently.
“He would not be able to stay away from you…” He went on: “Carolan, what shall you do today?”
“I shall find plenty to do. Remember I have never set foot in London before, and from what I have seen I find it most exciting-‘ “Do not go out, my child. Wait; I shall show you London. But do not go out unaccompanied. It is unfortunate that today I have urgent business, but that will not always be so. I shall take you to Ranelagh, my child. I will take you to hear the talk in the coffee-houses. We shall sit by the river and watch the barges go by. We shall go to the playhouse.”
“I think I am going to enjoy my stay in London, Father.”
“I intend that you shall, child. But for today, promise me this -stay in. The neighbourhood, as you have gathered, is not one in which a gentlewoman should walk alone nor, my dear, are many places in this big city. But give me your word that you will not venture out until I can accompany you.”
“Of course I give my word.”
“Why do you smile?”
“Because it is so good to have an anxious parent. No one bothered whether I went out or stayed in before.”
“London is different from the country.”
“Still, nobody ever cared before.”
“Millie will be here at nine, Carolan.”
“Millie?”
“Our little maid.”
“Ah! I wondered how the work was done. I could not quite imagine Mamma…”
They smiled together.
“No,” he said, “I should not care for your mother to soil her hands. So there is Millie.”
“She does not live here?”
“No, she lives at the end of the street. She comes in at nine o’clock and goes at four. We like it better that she should not spend the night here; we prefer to be alone. She is a little simple, poor Millie.”
“I see.”
“She will be here soon, and will open the shop.”
“But can she deal with customers?”
“There are few customers.”
She looked at him anxiously. That would account for the worry lines about his brow. He was finding it a terrible struggle to make ends meet. And no wonder! Not only was the shop in the wrong neighbourhood, but there was no one to attend to customers when he had to go out no one but a girl who was ‘simple’. How could he hope for a prosperous business!
He saw her thoughts and patted her hands.
“Do not frown, little daughter. I am doing very well; this is a fine business, and very soon I shall retire. It will be to a house in the country, a house which my daughter and her husband … and their children… will not be ashamed to visit.”
“Your daughter and her husband and their children would not be ashamed to visit you here,” retorted Carolan.
“I know. I know. But you wait, Carolan, and see the fine house in the country I shall have!”
“I am glad the business is prosperous, Father.”
“You need not worry your head about us, Carolan. Well, when Millie comes, the shop will be opened. You and your mother need not think about it. Listen! I think that is Millie’s step; I will go and let her in.”
Millie was a sandy-haired girl of about Carolan’s age. She had a pale face and closely set eyes; her skin was pock-marked, her mouth perpetually open; she seemed vacant.
“Millie,” said Darrell, ‘this is Miss Carolan, my daughter.”
Millie nodded, without looking at Carolan.
“And now,” said Darrell, “I must be going. Carolan, do not forget what I have said about going out alone.”
“I promise. I shall wait for you to accompany me. Father.”
She kissed him and went to the door of the shop with him. She stood there watching him; as he turned the corner he waved. Carolan went back into the shop. Millie had taken down the shutters now. but it was still gloomy. Strange, thought Carolan, if her father was doing such a prosperous business here. But when he had said that, he had not met her eyes; she had a feeling that things were not as glorious as he would have her believe. When she married Everard they would have her. father and mother to live with them; of perhaps they would give them a little cottage close by. Her father would be happy enough with a little garden in which to grow flowers and vegetables, she was sure. But in the meantime she would make things a little more Comfortable for them here. She went into the kitchen, where Millie was bending over the sink.
“Let us have a real clean-up today,” she said.
“This place is very dirty.” a Millie merely pushed a strand of hair out of her eyes by way of reply.
“Do you not think so?” demanded Carolan, a little irritated.
‘dunno.” said Millie.
“Well,” said Carolan tartly, ‘you can take it from me that it is! Those shelves are full of dust; the floor needs washing. When did you last wash it?”
“I dunno,” said Millie.
“Forget.”
Enthusiasm burned in Carolan’s eyes; she was a crusader; she was going to make this home of her parents fit to live in. They were like children, both of them; and Millie was worse than hopeless. Very slowly the girl was washing the breakfast dishes. There was nothing domesticated about Carolan; that had been Margaret’s forte. How she longed for Margaret’s advice now! She imagined Margaret’s dainty nose wrinkling up at the sight of this kitchen. The kitchen should be made so that even Margaret would approve!
“Good gracious!” she said.
“Do you take all the morning to wash a few dishes? Then it is no wonder that this place is so dirty.”
Millie regarded her from under bushy eyebrows.
“I am going to change all that,” Carolan continued.
“I will help with those dishes, then you can wash the floor and we can… arrange things.” Millie was a most irritating person. If she had been sullen or if she had burst into protests, Carolan would have found her attitude understandable; but the complaints seemed not to touch her at all. Slowly she went on with the dishes.
“Millie!” said Carolan sharply, and caught the girl’s arm. Millie let out a cry and dropped the plate she was about to plunge into the water. The sleeve of her dress was so rotten with sweat and age that even Carolan’s light grasp had torn it, but it was not at the tear that Carolan stared, but at the weal on the flesh beneath it.
“Why…” gasped Carolan.
“Who did that?”
Millie looked at her arm, and then a faint expression crept into her face the first Carolan had seen there and it shocked her that it should be one of fear.
The father,” said Millie.
“Your father did that! You mean he beat you … and that’s why you are so slow? Are you in pain? Why didn’t you tell me … It ought to be dressed … you should have said so.”
Now Carolan’s irritation had melted before the warmth of her pity for Millie and the heat of her indignation towards Millie’s father.
Millie said: “S’nothing. He’s always doing it.”
“You call that nothing! Does it hurt? Of course it must hurt. It ought to be bathed; it’s very dirty.”
So, instead of cleaning out her parents’ house as she had intended, Carolan spent the morning washing and dressing Millie’s arm, making her hot chocolate to drink, and trying, without much success, to get the story of Millie’s life from her. All she discovered was that Millie lived with her family of ten or eleven Millie did not seem altogether sure of the number in one room at the end of Grape Street, and that Millie’s father drank too much gin with results of which this was a good example.
“When he attacks you,” said Carolan, ‘you should hit back. If he is as drunk as you say, he should not be so formidable.”
Millie only stared at Carolan with vacant eyes.
“You should not stay there!” said Carolan.
“Could you not get a job where you could live in?”
“I dunn
o,” said Millie.
Then you should find out.”
“How?” asked Millie surprisingly, but Carolan really had no suggestion to offer. She said: “I will think of something. And tell your father if he dares to hurt you again I… I…”
Millie waited expressionlessly, but when talking to her, Carolan had discovered that, if a sentence became too complicated to finish, it was possible to trail off without comment from Millie. She did this now, but she was determined nevertheless to add Millie to those people whom she must help during her stay in London.
The morning was speeding up, and Carolan did not notice until later that not once had the shop door bell rang.
At midday she carried a tray upstairs to her mother’s room.
“Come in!” said Kitty sleepily, and Carolan went in.
It was something of a shock, remembering Kitty’s room at Haredon. Then of course there had been Therese to fold up her things. Now, the dress Kitty had worn the previous night lay on the floor, and undergarments were strewn beside it. The room smelt musty.
Carolan said: “You are shutting out the sunshine; I’ll draw the curtains better than that.”
“Don’t open the window, darling,” said Kitty fearfully.
“I do not trust the morning sat.”
“Scarcely morning now, Mammal Did you not hear the clock strike twelve?”
“Did it? I am a lie-abed. And you have brought me a tray; that is nice. Much nicer than that foolish Millie’s bringing it!”
“A cup of chocolate to begin with,” said Carolan.
“Do you like that?”
“I adore chocolate, darling. Bring it here. Hand it to me, there’s a love … But first give me the mirror … Goodness gracious! I do look a sight, do I not?”
She looked old, thought Carolan, untidy; and she had put on so much weight. The lace of her bedgown was draggled, and there were chocolate stains on it. But the voluptuous bosom, showing through the lace, was white as ever. She looked the picture of indolence, the beauty who is ageing, who has fed too well on the sweets of life and shows signs of it in her face.
Kitty grimaced into her mirror.
“How do you find I look, darling? Have I aged much?”
“Scarcely at all, Mamma,” lied Carolan.
“You have put on flesh though.”
“Ah! But in the right places, as Therese used to say! What happened to Therese?”
“I do not know. She went.”
“And poor Sambo?”
“He went too.”
“And that beast, Jennifer?”
“She fell down the stairs one night… dead drunk.”
“Serve her right, the wicked creature! Carolan, there is one thing I always wanted to know. Did she beat you?”
“Sometimes.”
“You should have told me… Why did you not?”
“I do not know,” said Carolan, and thought of Millie and felt inadequate and suddenly humble.
“She will never beat you any more, Carolan. Give me my chocolate, child. I do not care for it cold.” She drank greedily.
“Ah! This is good! You make better chocolate than mad Millie does.”
“Mamma… you are not sorry you ran away?”
“Ran away from Haredon? My child, how can you ask? Of course not. I would follow your father to the end of the earth!”
There she sat leaning back on her pillows, carefree, thinking of nothing but that Carolan made better chocolate than Millie.
“But, Mamma, this is so different from Haredon!”
“I do not wish to return, nevertheless. Of course, I miss Therese. What a wonder she was! Certainly I miss her. But I hated the squire, darling. Your father is my true husband.”
“He is a dear,” said Carolan.
“You are fond of him already?”
“He is so gentle, so … everything that one would hope a father might be. But, Mamma, this place … is it … is it… a good business proposition?”
Kitty laughed.
“La, child! Do you expect me to understand what is and what is not a good business proposition? I was never clever enough; I leave that to your father.”
“He seemed to me a little worried.”
“Worried! Indeed he is not! He is very happy here… with me … and I am happy. All those long years I waited for him, did I not? Waited and grieved, and he came for me as I knew he would… but the waiting was hard…”
Carolan smiled at her with tolerant affection. How fortunate to be able to believe just what you wanted to believe. Dear Mammal No wonder she had had so many lovers; she would make each feel that he was the best, the only one that mattered, while the others were mere episodes. And she would make that belief possible, because she herself believed it so sincerely.
Carolan tried again.
“Everything down there is in such a jumble, Mamma, so untidy. The shops I passed on my way here had wares displayed temptingly in their windows. Ours is not very attractive… not even very clean.”
Kitty leaned on a plump elbow and surveyed her daughter. She began to laugh.
“What a little wiseacre you have become, Miss Carolan. So solemn. It is no use trying to make me solemn, I warn you. I positively refuse to be. Why, what should I have been now, had I allowed trifles to worry me? Old. Haggard! With a million lines about my face!” She picked up the mirror and looked at her reflection smilingly.
“Whereas … I am … I refuse to tell you how old I am, Carolan! And you should be ashamed to ask me! When I think of all I’ve gone through … the weary waiting for your father… and then, after we came together again…”
“Yes.” said Carolan eagerly, seating herself on the bed, ‘afterwards, when you came together?”
“There was a terrible time I went through! Poverty! My child, you have no conception of what poverty I suffered. I… who had always previously been so free from want. Even when I was with Aunt Harriet and I can tell you I suffered in that hell-cat’s house, my dear even then I had enough to eat!”
“Mamma! Were you and my father starving, then?” Kitty was rocking to and fro on the bed in an agony of remembrance.
“It was terrible! Terrible! The filthy lodging-houses! The dreadful food…. and then no food at all. Your poor father used to say: “Kitty, it would have been better had you stayed at Haredon!” I answered: “Indeed not! My place is by your side, Darrell. No matter what I must suffer, that is where my place is!” ‘ Was it really true, wondered Carolan, or was she playing another part the faithful lover? No I There must be a modicum of truth in it.
“Did he do no work then, Mamma?”
“He worked for a merchant. He worked along the wharfside.” She shivered and covered her face with her hands. Then she removed them and smiled radiantly.
“But why do we talk of it? Now all is well.”
“Ah, Mamma! Are you sure all is well?”
“My child! Oh, my solemn little darling! Of course all is well. We have the shop now. Your father says the shop will make our fortunes, and your father was never a man to adorn a tale. He says that after a short stay here in this perfectly frightful neighbourhood … And let me tell you, Carolan, it is frightful, and you must always remember should I and your father forget to lock up the doors and lower windows every night…”
“There is so much I do not understand,” said Carolan.
“It is such a queer sort of shop… without any customers.”
“You must not worry your head over it, Carolan - I do not. I trust in your father. He has promised me a house in the country with servants to wait upon me, and he is not a man to make promises lightly, that much I know. Oh, Carolan, what a happy day when we leave this place! I can see the house I shall have … I can see it clearly …” Her manner changed suddenly. Now she was gracious, full of dignity, receiving her guests at the top of a wide staircase; and that image was more real to her than this tawdry room and her daughter, sitting there on the bed.
Kitty stopped dreaming abruptly a
nd said: “My dear, pass me that wrap, and I will have a little more of the bacon.”
She ate heartily.
“I am glad,” said Carolan, watching her, ‘that you do not regret leaving Haredon.”
Kitty laughed.
“That place! That beast there! Ah, how he tormented me! And should I be the one to pine for a country life? No! No! Now if I had a carriage… I cannot get about as I would, but your father will not get me a carriage; he says we cannot afford it. He has said we must save… save… so that we can leave this wretched business behind us. But when I get my own house, servants to wait on me … ah! Then you shall see. Perhaps I could get Therese … Dear Therese. With her lotions and concoctions, what she could do with me now. In the country I shall bloom again.” She smiled at her daughter appraisingly, a little complacently.
“You have charm yourself, my dear, but you will never be what I was. Your looks are modern. Looks are not what they were in my young days. Ah! We knew how to be beautiful then. But you have a look of me about you, Carolan. A pity your eyes are so green; blue would have been so much more appealing. And if your hair had been fair like mine … But you have my nose, darling, and my chin, and though not quite my mouth. You have a lot of me in you, Carolan.”
Carolan curtsied.
“Thank you kindly, Mamma.” She stooped and kissed her mother.
“I will leave you to dress now, and perhaps soon my father will be home, and he will take me walking.”
“Do not expect me too soon,” warned Kitty.
“I miss my dear Therese And darling, bring me hot water, please. I loathe cold, and I declare that if either your father or Millie did not bring me hot, I often could not resist the temptation not to wash at all.”
“You shall have hot water, Mamma.”
Thank you. I will wait for it. Ah, my darling, how good it is to have you home! If you could but know how deep was my longing to have you here during those years of separation!”
It was during the afternoon that the idea came to Carolan. Not a single customer had come into the shop. She had listened eagerly for the sound of the bell all the afternoon. Kitty sat in the parlour, idly turning the leaves of Madame D’Arblay’s Evelina, and talking now and then to Carolan. Millie was dusting the upstairs rooms.