He loosens his grip on the package. It does not feel weighty, but words don’t need to be.
‘Take proper care of both errands and there might be a farthing for you when you get back.’
I would like a farthing. My three guineas will not be in my hand until next Lady Day and Mistress Chalke has said, with a vicious pinch to my arm to drive home her point, that she never pays servants half-way through their term. All I have left from Mistress Buttermere’s wages, after buying new boots for my growing feet, some dark blue cloth for a gown, and a fresh pair of stays, is one bright guinea and the shilling Mrs Lamb slipped into my hand as a parting gift.
Master Chalke slumps back in his chair. Soon he will shrug himself into a velvet coat and take himself off to Slaughters’ Coffee Shop in St Martin’s Lane. It has to be his work that must be kept secret. But why? Is he fearful someone might steal his ideas?
The neat parcel in my hand has been sealed with the master’s gold ring to keep it private. Before I leave the house, I examine the impression in the wax. A strange beast, rearing up to display sharp teeth, with a ragged staff in its paw. The same creature inlaid on a shield into the backs of the hall chairs. They resemble some Mistress Buttermere had from her husband’s old family house. An armorial, Mrs Lamb told me it was called. Reserved for lords and ladies.
I grab my shawl, not wishing to waste time. I have heard booksellers can have printing presses in their back rooms. Perhaps my new master is creating a masterpiece from the pages I carry.
Fifteen minutes later, as I turn into the square, I hear someone whistling merrily. The day is bright as a new penny and feels like a holiday, making me wish the booksellers further away, to prolong my outing. I have always loved to walk. It is a time to let my imagination soar. A pretence at being free. But remembering the chores awaiting me, I know I cannot dawdle.
The shop has small glass panes through which I get a tantalising glimpse of books and prints. The hanging sign shows the silhouette of a bewigged gentleman clutching a little girl’s hand while studying a book.
A young man is perched at the top of a ladder, cleaning the upstairs windows. The merry whistler. He looks to be making a proper job of it as I smell the sharpness of vinegar in the water in his bucket and hear the squeak of his cloth against the glass. He has unusually fair and wavy hair, restrained at his nape with a navy ribbon. His rolled-up shirt sleeves show muscles flexing in strong forearms.
Startling blue eyes smile down at me as I step towards the doorway.
‘Mind my water don’t splash your clean cap, little miss.’
I pause in my stride. He is right; there are dirty beads of moisture falling from above. My only other cap is soaking in the scullery.
‘Two minutes and I’ll have this finished.’ He eyes my parcel. ‘Or I could take that from you.’ He drapes the cloth over a rung and dries his hands on the backside of his breeches. ‘It will be safe with me.’
He has full lips, almost like a girl.
‘I must put this into Master Twyford’s own hand. It is from Master Chalke.’
‘One of his special deliveries?’ There is a glint in the youth’s eye as he retrieves his cloth, wrings it dry and wipes away the threat to my mob cap. Then he slides down his ladder, showing off I suspect, and bows me through into the shop.
‘I am Jack,’ he grins. ‘Master Twyford’s apprentice.’
We are surrounded by books, their spines gleaming with gold lettering. There is an intoxicating odour of leather.
I have never been in a bookseller’s before, never so close to such a hoard of unread words. The master’s books at home are locked in glass-fronted library cases and I am forbidden to linger near them when cleaning the otherwise ordinary-looking room. Always with Mistress Chalke’s malignant eye watching. But one of these days I intend to at least study their titles.
The apprentice takes a step towards me and there is a faint whiff of male sweat.
‘You have so many books,’ I say.
‘Hundreds. With more, upstairs.’ He winks at me in a way I do not quite like. ‘For our special customers.’
I cannot stop myself asking: ‘Do you have the Tales of the Arabian Nights?’
‘I believe so.’ He grins. ‘Though that doesn’t sound like Master Chalke’s preferred reading.’
‘It is not for him.’
‘For you?’ His eyebrows rise and I think of my meagre store of coins. One day I intend to have a book of my own. Perhaps after I am paid.
‘What is your cheapest book?’ There is no harm asking.
‘We have some poetry by Master Thomas Gray. At nine pence. About his cat, drowning when she tries to hook goldfish from a bowl. Not to everyone’s taste, but you may like it.’
The youth’s eyes are the colour of the sky. He is so polite that you would think I was a proper customer. Not just a maid on an errand.
‘Would you like to see it? There is no obligation to buy.’
‘I am here for my master.’ I straighten my back. ‘Not to buy books.’
The apprentice studies me with what feels like sympathy. Perhaps he has seen the hunger in my eyes.
‘Why not? If you fancy one, there are less expensive books to be found on the market stalls in Cheapside. Or pawn shops have second-hand volumes they would be glad to sell. Reading can be found to suit the most slender of purses.’
I will not seek such luxuries for myself, not yet at least, but enjoy the novelty of being spoken to as someone who might appreciate a book of poetry. What is more, from the way he sticks out his chest and stands tall, I see I am expected to be impressed by his looks. As if I might matter.
But all I feel is envy. That he is a young man, not a powerless girl. That he is apprenticed to a good trade and will likely have a shop like this of his own one day. Even that he is happy enough in his work to whistle. But most of all that he is here, every day, surrounded by books with their wonderful smells and crisp uncut pages, full of stories.
Our talk is interrupted by a ponderous creaking as a barrel of a man lumbers down the stairs into the shop. This must be Master Twyford. A protrusion of shirt and belly threaten to erupt from his broadcloth coat like a punctured bolster. I wouldn’t like the feeding of him.
‘Trifling with maidservants, Jack?’ His smile is indulgent. Then he notices the package in my hand and frowns. I am clearly not a customer about to part with guineas. ‘What is it, girl?’
‘I have brought this from Master Chalke, sir.’
‘It is about time.’ The fist that snatches the package is podgy from good living. ‘What is he thinking of, keeping me waiting?’
‘I am sorry, sir. I only know I was to bring it to you.’ I study my feet to hide surprise at his lack of respect.
Master Twyford grunts, suggesting he thinks the delay, if there is one, must be my fault. Perhaps he is related to my mistress.
‘Jack, fetch those proofs from my table upstairs.’
He stares at me while we wait, making me wonder if my cap is not straight.
Jack soon thunders down the stairs again, on legs younger and stronger than those of his master, and places another sealed packet in my hand. I suppose if I were a writer of books I, too, would treat the pages like something precious.
‘Thank you,’ I say, thinking what a pleasant way this is to earn a farthing.
Jack ushers me through the door into the street as Master Twyford labours back upstairs.
‘We will meet again, little miss,’ the apprentice says, pursing those fleshy lips and making a mock bow. Then he straightens to his full height and winks again, as if we are conspirators.
I almost skip back to the Chalke house, daring to imagine an alternative world, where I am not just a beast of burden. Invisible unless I do something wrong. Where people expect me to buy books of poetry. Where a young man with cornflower bright eyes treats me as an equal. Where there might be more in my future than ferrying stinking chamber pots to the necessary house.
Chapter Fiv
e
‘Best watch yourself.’ The voice behind me is coarse and low and I turn to see next door’s inquisitive maidservant at my elbow.
The market around us is a hubbub, but it is as if we are alone in the throng.
‘What do you mean?’ I draw my basket tight against my body as if she might snatch it from me. Her eyes are more curious than threatening, but the mistress was right about that nose. I look away from it, in case she catches me staring and takes offence. She seems a rough character.
‘’Aint you scared of that place?’ She sets down a wooden pail full of live eels. Cheap food for the servants’ hall, I suppose. ‘You should be.’
‘I must not gossip.’ My feet itch to run away from this woman with her eels. ‘The mistress forbids it.’
‘I bet she does.’ Her breath is hot in my face. The gravelly voice indignant. ‘I used to share a laugh with their last girl, when we had the chance. Until the silly bitch got taken by the constables.’
I study the silver bodies writhing in her pail, no more able to escape their fate than I am. I have thought of buying eels for Peg and myself, but hate the idea of slicing into living creatures.
‘Everyone thinks them Chalkes are a queer pair.’ The maid clears her throat and spits noisily into the gutter. ‘There are gentlemen glad enough of Master Chalke’s company. When it suits them. But nobody wants to know her. Even the son made off, as soon as he was old enough. Boy could not get far enough away, if you ask me.’ She hawks and spits again. ‘The raddled old bitch casts out servants like shit through a goose. Susan might have been a giddy trollop, but she didn’t deserve to be hauled-off to Bridewell. Screeching she had done nothing wrong. But ’tweren’t no use. She was took away, all the same.’
I stare at my feet. If the mistress knew about this I would be instantly dismissed. Yet the long-nosed maid’s accusations fix me to the spot. Isn’t this what I suspect? That the Chalke house is not as it should be?
‘Susan weren’t no thief,’ the maid insists. ‘But, after the stupid chit threatened to blab about the pair of them, they said she’d taken their spoons. A wicked lie!’ Her voice squeaks with indignation, making a passing housewife pause, mid-stride, to stare. ‘Branded with a ‘T’, for thief, she was. On the fleshy part of her thumb. Then shipped to the Americas as an indentured servant.’
She leans in, closer, and I smell dog on her. The family keep a brace of yapping King Charles spaniels who I suspect sleep in the kitchens.
‘Because she knew too much.’
My fingers are so tight around the handle of the basket that I feel the pattern imprinted in my flesh. I should get away from this woman. She is clearly a troublemaker. Someone to be avoided. Yet she could explain things I do not understand so I cannot hold back the question:
‘Knew too much? About what?’
She shakes her head and mutters, right in my ear. ‘That I won’t say. But I knows what I knows.’
I recoil as she wipes at a gob of snot with the back of her wrist. Then she hoicks the pail back over her brawny forearm and leans in, for a final warning. ‘But if I was you, I would scarper. Smartish. While that pretty pink and white skin is still unmarked.’
Chapter Six
Mrs Lamb’s round face is the deep pink of a squashed strawberry. A straggle of grey hair has escaped her frilled cap. Her apron of fine Holland linen, though white as a boil-wash can make it, looks limp.
Packing straw clings to my boots and the kitchen is stacked with corded boxes.
‘I should not have come,’ I say.
‘Nay, Hannah.’ She flops into a chair and eases off her shoes. ‘I have been worried about you. How are you getting on?’
I breathe in the familiar scents of the Buttermere kitchen. Traces of the morning’s bread, spiced with cinnamon from something baked for the upstairs table. Beeswax polish from the dresser. Rosewater from shifts airing by the hearth.
‘Mistress Chalke is no lady. Her language reminds me of that groom Major Harper brought with him last summer. The one Mistress Buttermere made him send away.’
Mrs Lamb wrinkles her nose, no doubt remembering the man and his colourful oaths.
‘When I was young, Hannah,’ she says, ‘I was sent as maid to an aristocratic house near Winchester. My employer was master of the local hunt and he and his wife rode out every day in the season.’ She shakes her head, disapproving. ‘Both of them swore like troopers.’
‘This is different. The woman is vulgar and coarse. And I am convinced she dyes that hair. It is black as a lump of coal. At her age.’
‘Even the finest gentleman can marry a woman he shouldn’t,’ Mrs Lamb shrugs. ‘A governess. A shopkeeper’s daughter. Even an actress. Perhaps that is why Master Chalke was disinherited. For making an unsuitable alliance.’
I grunt. Unconvinced she was any of those things.
‘She never washes. Her armpits smell. And her house was a disgrace, though at least I have persuaded the skinflint to buy mouse traps.’ I look around expectantly. ‘Where is Puss?’
‘Next door.’ Mrs Lamb smiles. ‘Little Sophy wanted her.’
I am pleased that Puss has found a good home. Sir Christopher is an old-fashioned man, said to be harsh as a wire brush to law breakers when he sits on the bench, but in thrall to five small daughters.
‘They have oil paintings on the walls and fine silver on their table, yet every penny is turned over before it is spent.’
Mrs Lamb wriggles her toes and sighs. ‘As I told you, your master is from a noble family, but his older brother got the inheritance. There will not be the money Chalke grew up with. But at least they are feeding you. You have filled-out since I saw you last.’
‘I get enough. But there is an old cripple working there. So thin, you can almost see through her.’
‘The scrub-woman?’
‘Peg is not strong enough for rough work and gets beaten because of it. I am trying to put flesh on her, but it is impossible. The larder is checked every night in case I help myself. Even the eggs are counted.’
‘A pity, because what your Peg needs is a fresh hen’s egg beaten in milk. Every morning.’
‘I will tell Mistress Chalke.’ My lip curls. ‘I expect she will volunteer some of the master’s best Madeira to go with it.’
‘Well, help yourself from our stores. We cannot take half of what is in that pantry.’ Mrs Lamb leans forward. ‘But tell me about the girl you are replacing? Was she really turned off for lewd behaviour?’ Faded hazel eyes gleam at the prospect of spicy gossip.
‘The maid next door says Susan was transported to the Americas. Not for lewd behaviour. For theft. She reckons that the Chalkes lied about her taking their silver.’
‘Lied? Why would they do that? It is easy enough, more’s the pity, to send a servant packing with no character if she does not suit.’
Mrs Lamb rests a plump hand on mine. ‘It could be malicious gossip. Whatever the truth, they will appreciate someone like you all the more. But tell me about your master.’
‘He is a proper gentleman. The mistress moans that he spends too much time at the coffee house, but what man wouldn’t, shackled to such a wife?’ I lean forward. ‘I think he is writing a book.’
‘If he is a lover of words,’ Mrs Lamb smiles, ‘you are in the right place.’
‘But everything is locked away and I am not allowed near.’
I think back to how I was allowed into the Buttermere library. Dipping not only into books by Fielding and Swift, but old periodicals belonging to Mistress Buttermere’s late husband. One wet Sunday, I devoured a Gentleman’s Magazine of 1759 with an account of strange bodies, buried for centuries in ash, dug up somewhere in Italy. It said they were preserved where they fell when a great volcano erupted.
‘At least he is not mean. Yesterday he paid six shillings for four bottles of port. And they are already empty.’
‘Gentlemen can be over-partial to their wine.’ Mrs Lamb’s brow wrinkles. ‘Let’s hope he is not a drunkard.�
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‘Oh, no. It is for his friends. They shut themselves in his book room and it sounds as if he reads to them. I am sure I could help with his work, for I have a good secretary’s hand.’
‘Hannah, from what you say about the dirt, a maid is what that house needs.’ She purses her lips. ‘Remember what I told you: never draw unnecessary attention to yourself. Concentrate on pleasing your mistress.’
My basket is on the table and I grasp the handle with a sigh, thinking what an impossibility that is. ‘Then, may I take food for Peg?’
‘Aye. The mistress would not begrudge you.’
I step into the pantry and take a deep breath. Each smell is a memory. Of cutting lavender from the back courtyard and bunching it with string to hang from the ceiling beams to dry. Of boiling vinegar when we pickled the cucumbers. Of hot fruit and sugar seething on the hob after Mistress Buttermere’s daughter brought plums from Yorkshire last summer.
There is a bustle behind me. It is Mrs Lamb, smelling faintly of the dried rose petals she sprinkles in the press holding Mistress Buttermere’s clothes. It is no secret some find their way among her own under linen.
‘Is your crippled woman truly starving?’
‘She can barely drag herself about.’
We both know how it will end if she loses her work. The poorhouse or the gutter. It could be us one day. Peg is at the bottom of society. I am one rung higher. Mrs Lamb two. And I know from experience how much easier it is to fall than to rise.
‘Then take some eggs for the poor soul.’ The housekeeper clucks disapproval. ‘Does your mistress not care what the neighbours say? Letting one of her servants starve?’
‘The old misery is hard as brimstone.’ I pause, wanting to share my bubbling fears. ‘Something bad happened between Peg and the Mistress. In the past. I am convinced of it.’
‘Come, Hannah. Curb that imagination before it brings you trouble. Your mistress has given employment to an old cripple. How many ladies would have the charity to do that? She cannot be all bad. Can she?’
I nod my head, reluctant. What she says is true. Peg would otherwise be begging for scraps.
The Servant Page 3