The Servant

by Maggie Richell-Davies

  ‘My mother died when I was ten,’ I say. ‘And my father, soon after my stepmother sent me to the poorhouse.’

  ‘Then we both know the pain of losing those we love.’ His eyes are fixed on me with what I see is compassion. ‘But you are a lesson to me. Despite being so young, it has not made you angry and bitter.’

  I do not know what to say. The morning has turned serious and dark.

  ‘I have made you sad,’ he says, shaking his head. ‘That was thoughtless of me. Let me set you a puzzle, instead. To distract that enquiring mind of yours.’

  ‘What kind of puzzle?’

  ‘My bull lost an eye as a young calf, in a dispute with a gatepost. It does not hinder him in his duties to my herd. In fact, the beast clearly thinks himself an exceedingly fine fellow.’ Farmer Graham clucks at his mare to walk towards the next house. ‘So, what I have named him? Think on it while you bake the morning bread. You can give me the answer tomorrow.’

  I stare at his retreating back. A bull with only one eye?

  ‘Wait,’ I call after him. This is too easy. ‘Cyclops! It must be.’

  He turns his head to look at me, his ready smile telling me my guess is right.

  Chapter Ten

  Dust and the crumbled remains of camphor balls in the bottom of the wardrobe in Master Charles’s room threaten to make me sneeze. It is stuffed with mildewed cloaks and black gowns that have rotted under the arms and should be given to the rag man. A heap of discarded waistcoats lie bundled at the bottom and I quickly discover the dove-grey velvet, pitted with moth holes, its ornate buttons black with tarnish.

  Then, as I tuck it under my arm to take downstairs and snip off the costly buttons with the mistress’s scissors, a flash of bright yellow flares at me from behind the dark garments. My curious hand quickly discovers the softness of silk and I draw out a magnificent gown, gathered into pin-tucks at the back of the neck to form a short train. Tiny satin-covered buttons adorn the sleeves. The fabric ripples under my fingers and has a strong, musky scent, like bruised flower petals. A creation fit for court, though the colour is bold and the neck looks shockingly low.

  Intrigued, I feel around in the bottom of the wardrobe to see what else lies buried there and under some youth’s breeches find three drawstring bags that my fingers tell me hold ladies’ slippers. When I pull the contents into the light, the footwear is exquisite: fashioned from satin and softest kid leather, beaded and embroidered. Much too fine to jeopardise in the street, even with pattens. If their owner ventured out, it must have been in a chair, carried straight from one grand entrance hall into another like a precious object that must not be sullied by contact with the common ground. There are stockings, too. Gossamer fine, embroidered with clock patterns that shimmer in the dim light.

  To whom can these showy things have belonged? They are not of the latest fashion and are, on examination, a little worn. But, not so long ago, they would have turned heads.

  There are no daughters of the house who might once have worn them. Indeed, the Chalkes are unusual in having only one living child. Their son who, if the maid next door is to be believed, fled to the Americas to get as far away from his parents as he could. Why would a son do such a thing?

  Then the bang of the front door makes me thrust everything but the waistcoat into the dim recesses of the wardrobe and hurry back to my domain in the kitchen and to scrubbing the master’s muddied breeches from last night.

  But my mind turns over yet another puzzle in the Chalke household. I am due to return to the bookseller’s later and feel a skip of anticipation at the prospect of seeing Jack. He is always eager to talk – and if I am lucky might let slip something about what Master Chalke does.

  Chapter Eleven

  Jack looks almost the gentleman this morning. No longer cleaning windows in shirt-sleeves, but wearing a blue broadcloth coat to serve in the shop. His shoe buckles look like silver and the lawn of that shirt will be soft as a moth’s wing.

  ‘Does Master Chalke no longer care to frequent our shop?’ he grins, as I walk through the door and hand him today’s package. Jack is so clearly a trusted member of the bookseller’s family that I do not feel the need to wait for Master Twyford.

  ‘He is indisposed.’ It is not my place to talk of his attack.

  ‘Well, I shan’t complain, when he sends such a pretty maid in his place.’

  I ignore his nonsense. From the way his mouth turns up at the corners Jack enjoys making girls blush. Perhaps there is not enough work for him.

  I watch him break the seal and open the package. Will it be the latest chapter of an adventure? Tales of pirates? Of long-dead kings? Doomed lovers?

  There is a slender volume inside, wrapped in a sheaf of closely written pages.

  ‘Is your master so busy with his pen that he returns our volumes?’ Jack frowns at the book, his fingers obscuring its title.

  ‘I expect he is particular about what he adds to his collection. He will not want to waste good guineas on poor writing.’

  Jack turns enquiring eyes from the package to me. ‘Does he show you what he reads? Or writes?’

  ‘Of course not. Why would he?’

  ‘He might. If he thought you would appreciate it.’ There is a gleam in Jack’s eye that I do not quite like. Mrs Lamb was right about young men being saucy around girls.

  ‘The master expects me to dust his books, not read them.’

  ‘Yet we discussed the poetry of Master Gray. Remember?’

  ‘I do like to read.’ There is no harm or shame in that, though I would not want him to think I am pretending to be above my station. ‘But I am as likely to buy books as order a silk gown.’

  ‘Clothe you in silk and those looks of yours would turn the head of any man who sees you.’

  I feel myself flush. ‘I am not here for foolish talk, Master Jack.’

  ‘Call me Jack.’ The full lips twitch, as if I amuse him, which I clearly do. ‘And it is the simple truth.’

  I stare at my feet and instruct myself not to fidget like a simpleton.

  ‘It is hardly my fault you look the way you do,’ he says, close to my ear, presumably concerned his uncle might overhear.

  ‘I must not linger.’ I edge away, remembering the chores back at the house. In addition to everything else, I have yet to finish rubbing the tarnish off those buttons before sewing them on the waistcoat. ‘Is there anything to take back for Master Chalke?’

  ‘There is, indeed.’ Pulling a key from his breeches pocket he unlocks a drawer in one of the cabinets and removes a purse. There is a clink as he places it in my palm and closes my fingers around its weight. ‘Tell your master this settles his account. Keep it safe. There is gold in there.’

  I tuck the purse deep in my pocket, under my apron. This is surely proof

  of Master Chalke being a published writer. Much about the man unnerves me, especially that squinting eye of his, but I recall Mrs Lamb talking of Dr Johnson visiting their house when old Master Buttermere was still alive. And of the odd gestures and tics that he had. Perhaps the result of long hours bent over a desk. I long to question Jack, but decide not to sink to the level of the gossipy maid next door.

  ‘What is that noise?’ I ask instead. A heavy rhythmic thumping is audible through the door at the back of the shop leading to the yard. It reminds me of my father’s loom.

  ‘The apprentice is running off penny pamphlets for my uncle.’

  So, they do have a printing press. Presumably it will soon produce my master’s book.

  ‘But are you not the apprentice?’

  ‘I am, but there is another.’ Jack holds up hands that are soft and cared for. ‘Since I prefer not to have ink-stained hands, or a back twisted from using a machine, we acquired a poorhouse lad for the dirty work of the business. For next to nothing.’

  His words make me think of Davy, a wizened mite abandoned at the door of our poorhouse in a nest of lice-ridden rags. Always under-sized, he had been apprenticed to a chimney s
weep at seven years of age. Also for next to nothing.

  The old women in the laundry said later he got stuck in a chimney somewhere in Temple Bar. Another boy was sent up after him, to pull on his legs, but could not shift him. By the time a bricklayer was fetched to break a hole into the flue, with the sweep grumbling at the expense, Davy was dead from suffocation.

  Jack kicks the door to the courtyard shut. Clearly the youth out there is nothing to him.

  ‘My own apprenticeship is quite different, for Master Twyford is my mother’s brother. He is easy-going and encourages me to read, believing a bookseller should be knowledgeable about what he sells.’

  My envy returns. A life surrounded by books, where he is urged to spend his time reading. No wonder he whistles.

  ‘We will see one another often, Hannah. Master Chalke is partial to our special editions and he and my uncle have other dealings. We can talk about books whenever you come to the shop.’

  ‘I would like that, though I have read too few.’

  The blue eyes study me. ‘What do you do with your free afternoons?’

  I stare down at my ugly boots. Mistress Buttermere was strict. I never went out alone and my ventures from that house were to the market, to her favourite milliner’s, or to squirm on a hard pew hoping the Sunday sermon might end before Doomsday. And Mistress Chalke is even more severe.

  ‘Would you not like to be shown something of the town?’

  From my garret in the Chalke house I can see church spires and the roofs of houses, some grand-looking, stretching into the distance. I am consumed by curiosity about the city around me, yet conscious that Jack’s interest might risk my position. The last thing I need is a young man paying me attention. Employers are wary of their maids having followers. It usually leads to trouble.

  ‘Mistress Chalke would not approve.’ I gaze into eyes that look innocently friendly. I can still feel another bruise on my arm where she pinched me yesterday for gazing out of the window at a youth singing for pennies in the street.

  ‘Need your mistress know?’ Jack’s face remains open and smiling. ‘I mean no harm, little maid. You would be perfectly safe with me.’

  I do not know what to think. With nobody to concern themselves with my safety, I must shift for myself. Whatever Susan did, whether it was to steal or to dally with men, it cost her dear.

  ‘Come,’ Jack says. ‘Do you like oysters?’

  ‘I do.’ I plan to buy some for Peg and myself. They are cheap.

  ‘There are stalls selling them in Vauxhall Gardens. Would you not like to see fashionable London, parading its finery? There is free music.’ He grins again. ‘Dashing officers in scarlet regimentals.’

  My life is so narrow that he sees I am tempted. ‘Think, Hannah. We could meet on your afternoon off. As if by accident. Who could know it was otherwise?’

  My mouth opens, to say I will have nothing to do with such a deception, yet on my first free Sunday afternoon I visited Mrs Lamb. When the next comes, I plan to explore the streets and squares near the house. I love walking and one day would like to go and look at the Thames. From my garret I can glimpse the masts of ships and when the wind is from the south smell the ripeness of the great river. Those vessels will have sailed back and forth from distant lands like giant white-winged shuttlecocks. While I rarely venture ten minutes from the area steps.

  ‘Perhaps,’ I say, lured by the prospect of being with a young man who spends his life surrounded by books. And telling myself I am not influenced by his looks. ‘Let me think on it.’

  Mistress Chalke has forbidden followers. Yet Jack is right. I could easily meet him by chance. He is a respectable young man with whom I have become acquainted while going about my master’s business. It would be only polite to speak to him.

  When I go to the door, Jack opens it for me and ushers me out. As we pause under the creaking sign, with its pretty child beside what looks like her doting grandfather, he takes my wrist, turns my hand over and drops the suggestion of a kiss onto my palm. Then he ducks back into the shop without a word, leaving me in the street. Astonished and disturbed.

  Chapter Twelve

  I am trying not to daydream of Jack and that disturbing kiss when the slam of the front door and a commotion on the stairs tell me there are visitors. More gentlemen. Several, from the clump of riding boots and the rumble of deep voices in the normally silent house. They must have come in with Master Chalke and have brought from the rain-washed street an air of damp wool, horse sweat and male bodies. Clods of mud and horse shit will need to be brushed off the carpet later after they have dried.

  Almost immediately comes the impatient jingle of the bell, but I am ready. Visitors always need tending to and at least I am now allowed into the book room to serve them. Probably, I suspect, because of the lie I told the master last week.

  There had been visitors that day, too, and after they departed, I remembered the need to clear away the wine glasses. The mistress was out, for once, so I tapped on the book room door and peeped around it. Master Chalke was hunched over a pile of crumpled papers. A hawk with a disembowelled pigeon.

  ‘May I clear away, Master?’

  Why did he look ill at ease? In his own house? About his own business?

  ‘If you must. But be quick.’

  As I removed the decanter and glasses he leaned back in his chair, eyes half-closed, squinting at the beams of the ceiling as if he had forgotten my presence. He has a noble-looking face and I wondered if Thomas might know about his writing. The farmer is well-read, after all. When I get a chance, I will ask him.

  ‘Tell me, Hannah.’ His gaze dropped to my face. ‘Can you read?’

  Startled by the question, I almost said: I can read as well as you can. But did not. Why? Because he wouldn’t leave his papers around if he knew I could understand them.

  ‘I recognise my name,’ I faltered. ‘And know how to write it down.’

  He nodded, content. I do not expect Mistress Buttermere thought to mention the avid reading I was permitted in her library, or my early schooling from my mother. It was my industry with a scrubbing brush that mattered.

  But now I am glad, because the lie means I am allowed in the book room.

  Master Chalke stands outside the door, fingers drumming on the banisters.

  ‘What can I fetch you, sir?’

  ‘Bring the Madeira that came yesterday.’ He holds out the key to the cupboard, its black ribbon gleaming. ‘And do not keep my guests waiting.’

  ‘I will not, sir.’

  I fly down the stairs, unlock the wine cupboard and pour the wine into a suitably elegant decanter. Then I select fine-stemmed glasses and return as quickly as I can without risking the fragile cargo clinking on my tray.

  It would make a welcome change to have lady visitors. But no gossipy females arrive to whisper the latest scandal. I think of the tea parties Mistress Buttermere loved: chattering society women, silk garments overflowing their chairs, often accompanied by tiny dogs on fancy ribbons. Talk of new fashions. Of whose daughter had caught a prospective husband with connections and wealth. Of the latest productions at the playhouses. Of whether the Queen might be increasing again.

  I would love to create treats for tea parties, for there are instructions for macaroons in Mrs Lamb’s recipe book. Something she had from Sir Christopher’s fancy French cook. But Mistress Chalke has no friends, apart from one ugly old woman with a strange almost flat face who I can tell is no more a lady by birth than she is.

  The kitchen door bursts open.

  ‘Wait. Leave that.’

  ‘Ma’am?’

  ‘Take off your cap. I want to look at that hair of yours.’

  Reluctant, puzzled, I put down my tray and do as I am bid.

  She watches, twitching with impatience as I unbraid my locks and let them fall around my shoulders.

  ‘Do you curl it, to make it so unruly? Put it in rags at night?’

  ‘No, ma’am.’ I am barely allowed time to wash i
t, never mind play the lady’s maid with my appearance.

  ‘Then you must keep it better hidden. I will not have you flaunting curls in front of visitors. Not at this stage, anyway. Put this on, instead.’

  The cap she thrusts at me is shapeless and inexpertly stitched from threadbare cotton. Smelling of someone else’s greasy hair.

  I hate the thing. And hate her for making me wear it.

  ‘That is better. Now get yourself upstairs and keep those cat’s eyes of yours decently lowered.’

  There are four gentlemen in the room who mutter to one another, low-voiced, yet self-important, as I serve them. They sprawl in the chairs and stare at me as if I were a freak at a country fair. The youngest, a scrawny stick in a mulberry coat, his face pitted with smallpox scars, nudges his companion with a sharp elbow. The neighbour, with the bulbous nose and red-rimmed eyes of someone who guzzles more than a bottle of wine a day, laughs as if they are enjoying a secret joke. Their hands reach impatiently for the glasses, though it is obvious they have been drinking deep before coming here.

  My mother would have called their manners rude, but gentlemen are habituated to doing as they please. It might be different if there were a lady in the room, though perhaps not much. Gentlemen are a rule unto themselves.

  One of them fumbles a gold box from his pocket and takes a pinch of snuff from it with a tiny golden spoon, using it to sprinkle the powdery substance along the back of his hand. Then he sighs and lowers his head reverently, as if over a prayer book. He inhales deeply, up one nostril, then the other, closing his eyes in contentment before letting out an explosive sneeze. Tiny particles fly into the air, like ground pepper.

  ‘Ah…!’ He gasps with pleasure: ‘Excellent!’ Then he trumpets his nose into a lawn handkerchief and falls back into his chair.

  I consider snuff-taking outlandish and pity the maidservant in his household who will have to get those black fragments from fabric too fragile to rub.