Because he is a bully and I hate him, she found herself thinking as she looked at her father. And sooner or later I am going to have to deal with him for myself. So I shall deal with him first for Mama –
‘Go to your room!’ He was on his feet, his face empurpled now with fury. ‘How dare you speak so to me, you great stupid creature! I keep you here, eating your ugly head off at my expense, and will have the keeping of you till the day you die, no doubt, for no other one will take you off my hands, and you dare to speak so to me? Where is your gratitude, girl? At your age you should have your own establishment! Since you do not and are dependent upon my purse, then by God, you will mind your manners and behave yourself!’
‘I am well aware of my lack of an establishment, sir,’ she said, and reached behind her to hold on to the doorknob. Her legs were trembling so that she needed something to give her a sense of security. ‘I would perhaps be less of a trouble to you if I were to be allowed my own money. My Mama left me a small competence to which I am, I believe, fully entitled. Give it to me and I will gladly leave this house and live on my own.’
‘Mildred!’ Mama spoke for the first time, turning her white face towards her. ‘Be quiet, you stupid girl! I never heard such insolence in my life! How dare you! Tell your Papa you are sorry for your ill manners at once!’
‘I have no cause to apologize. I wished only to fetch your letter for you and –’
‘The letter does not matter,’ Maud said and looked appealingly at her husband. ‘Did I complain, Edward? Indeed I did not, and I would not wish you to think I had. I care nothing for the letter. I had nothing to do with any of this, I do assure you –’
He paid her no attention at all, still standing there at the table, his newspaper crumpled in his hand as he stared at his daughter.
‘What did you say?’ he said thickly.
‘I asked for my own money, Papa,’ she said. ‘I have a wish to live on my own. It is I believe worth about one hundred and fifty pounds a year. I could find a small set of rooms for that and –’
‘She’s gone mad,’ Edward Amberly said flatly, shifting his gaze for the first time to his wife. ‘D’you hear me, Maud? The girl has gone mad. It is a case of her excess blood running to her brain, and curdling there. I have heard it happens to spinster women, and now I can see it. Send for the physician and see to it she is dosed.’ And he threw down his paper and came stamping down the room towards the door. ‘Get out of the way, girl. I have to go to my office at once. I have no further time to waste on an old maid’s megrims.’ And he set one hand on her shoulder and pushed her aside so roughly that she almost stumbled and had to let go of the doorknob to steady herself against the far wall.
‘I wish to have my own money! –’ She said it again, even more loudly, knowing there was a note of pleading in her voice and hating herself for it, but he had opened the door and was gone out into the hall and she could see Freddy standing there, his master’s glossy top hat and heavy overcoat in one hand and his silver topped walking stick in the other, staring lumpishly at the wall in a manner that made it abundantly clear that he had listened to every word said in the morning room.
‘Send for the doctor, d’you hear me, Maud?’ Edward Amberly shouted as he shrugged on his coat and seized his hat and stick. ‘The girl’s run mad –’ And he went stumping out of the hall, leaving Freddy to close the door behind him.
‘At what time, madam, would it be convenient for Cook and me to come for our orders this morning?’ Freddy said smoothly as he came back into the morning room to stand deferentially behind Maud’s chair. ‘Shall it be as usual?’
‘What? Oh, yes, I suppose so. Oh, I have to see Nanny Chewson – let Miss Mildred deal with that – will you, Mildred? I am sure all will be well when your Papa returns – I do wish you wouldn’t provoke him so – it makes it all so difficult –’ And her voice trailed away as she pushed her chair back from the table and got to her feet. She looked even more pale now, and her forehead was gleaming with sweat. ‘I really must lie down for a while – I do have the most tiresome of sick headaches –’ And she went out of the room and towards the stairs, leaving Mildred standing against the wall in the morning room and Freddy just outside the door.
‘Mama, I do not wish to see any doctor!’ She went after her, not caring any longer that Freddy was standing there. ‘I will refuse! It is not an illness to wish to have one’s own money –’
Maud stood half way up the stairs, clutching the banister in one hand and she swivelled her eyes and looked down at Mildred and shook her head. ‘Oh, please, Mildred, don’t tease me so. I do feel very sick – I really cannot –’ And suddenly, she made a retching sound and turned and, stumbling a little, ran up the stairs, one hand over her mouth.
‘Three bottles she got through yesterday,’ Freddy said in a conversational tone and Mildred turned and saw him standing beside her, gazing up the stairs at Maud’s disappearing figure. ‘Three bottles o’ the master’s best sherry. Used to be one a day, and care took to hide the fact, but now it’s three and she much cares who knows!’
He shifted his gaze to Mildred’s face now, and grinned. ‘Mind you, so far, I’m the only one as does. And she pays me handsome to keep it that way. I don’t mind tellin’ you whatever it is she gives me to hold my tongue, on account of you’re the same as she is, really, ain’t you? Not booze, o’ course. Still enough of a lady not to be at the booze, though the way you’re going I don’t give it more’n a few months. You’ll be knocking ’em back with the best of ’em down the East End, you will. But there, it don’t really make no never mind what a person’s poison is does it? Slummers or sherry, it’s all the same.’ And again he laughed. ‘Money in my pocket.’
She said nothing, standing there staring at him, her hands folded in front of her. She had to think, and she needed peace and quiet and time for that. She was losing control of her situation, that was the thing and she heard her mind whisper, ‘that’s the thing of it –’ and at once an image of Lizah lifted in her mind’s eye, his corrugated forehead and bulging dark eyes and grin as vivid as if he were there in front of her. And almost without knowing she was doing so, she allowed her face to relax into a wide smile, a happy and contented smile, and for the first time Freddy looked disconcerted.
‘I ain’t playin’ games, you know,’ he said sharply. ‘A bloke’s got to look after hisself and I’m good at doing it. So don’t you go thinking as I’m wind and water like the miller’s cat, because I ain’t. I mean what I say.’
‘I’m not sure what it is you are saying,’ she said coolly, for the first time feeling she had some control after all. He had been rattled by her response and that made her feel better.
‘I’m saying that unless you comes across with a sov or so each week, your dad’s going to know what happened last night. He’s going to know about you sneakin’ out of here to hang around with low company and creeping back in through the pantry window like a thief. And then he’ll know what’s what, and he won’t start saying as your brains are curdling for want of a bit of how’s your father, neither. He’ll know what you was doin’, you Berkeley Hunt, you –’
She tightened her lips, not knowing what the epithet meant, but hearing the sneer in it and guessing it to be as nasty a term as any to which he could lay his tongue. But she was not going to let him know that he was having any effect on her.
‘It really doesn’t matter to me in the least what you say,’ she said and again managed to smile, filling it with as much of her own sneer as she could. ‘It’s quite irrelevant. I shall be in the morning room to give Cook her orders at ten o’clock, tell her.’ And she turned and went upstairs, walking with as composed an air as she could muster, leaving him staring up after her, completely silent for once.
In her room she closed the door and bolted it and stood staring round. Jenny had made the bed while she had been at breakfast and emptied the slops and cleaned her wash stand and the room stood as it usually did, quiet and neat and empty o
f any real personality. She had never tried to make it any way a sanctum of her own, with her own decorations and pictures, knowing full well that to persuade her father to expend any money on her would be a waste of effort, and anyway not feeling any real need to do so. There had been a time, in her long ago girlhood, when she had kept scrapbooks and mementos and pressed flowers like other girls, but it had been many years since she had felt any desire to do anything like that.
And now she was glad. If this room had been in any sort a haven, marked with her own emotions and life, it would have been hard to leave it. As it was, she felt no sense of affection for it at all, any more than she did for any other aspect of her life here at Leinster Terrace, and went across the room to her wardrobe and opened it and stood looking at the contents.
There was not a great deal. She had always had a small dress allowance; even Edward Amberly expected to provide that for the females in his household, but she had never cared that it was a singularly niggardly one. She had not needed much in the way of clothes, for dressed up or not, she still looked what she was, plain and gawky, and anyway, where did she go? Her need for good clothes was very small, and so the same evening gowns had sufficed for many years. She reached forwards now and touched the green ribbed silk that hung on the end of the rail and then the blue spotted voile she wore in the summer. She could not recall how old they were, and the same applied to the sensible morning dresses and skirts and blouses that were arranged on the other hangers. None of it startling, all of it serviceable, and in good repair. What more could she ask?
She reached behind the green ribbed silk and brought out her small japanned box with the red flowers on it. The key she drew from the small chain she always wore around her neck, her only adornment, and slid it into the lock.
Her savings from her dress allowance and the few money presents she had received from her brothers for her birthday, when they had forgotten to buy her a gift as a memento, lay there in a small chamois leather bag and she took it out, and untied it, undoing the strings carefully and smoothing them as she went. It was important not to rush this moment, she felt obscurely. It was a significant one and as such to be savoured to its full.
Equally slowly she counted her money. There were eighteen sovereigns and three Bank of England notes, two for ten pounds and one for five pounds. A goodly sum to have saved from such small beginnings but not a great deal altogether, for what she had in mind. In addition she had twenty-seven shillings in her writing desk and a further two shillings and eleven pence in her reticule. She piled it all together on her lap, sitting on her bed with her box beside her and counted it.
Forty-four pounds, nine shillings and eleven pence. Not much on which to build a whole new life. But enough, she told herself sturdily, and swept it all into the little chamois bag and drew the strings tight before tucking it firmly into the pocket at the back of her skirt, where it hid itself beneath the folds and thumped against her legs as she moved. That was a comforting feeling, as though she was carrying all her future behind her, and her lips curved at that thought.
It was remarkable how calm and relaxed she felt. She should have been now as she had been when she had first gone down to the morning room for breakfast, taut and anxious and unsure of herself. Yesterday had been so incredible a day, so extraordinary a day, that her ability to walk so calmly through this one amazed her. But there it was; she felt much better than she would have thought possible.
And she knew why she did. It was not because of any affection she might have for Lizah, nor because of his wild talk of marriage the night before. That was now all as dreamlike as the incredible experience that had gone before it. She refused now even to think about what Lizah had said, or what promises he might make. All she knew was that the plan that had jumped full fledged into her mind when she had opened her mouth in the morning room and demanded of her father her own small inheritance was all that now mattered to her.
She had decided then and there that whether he gave her the money or not, she was going to leave this house. Whether Freddy told tales about her or not, she was not going to remain here. No matter what happened, she was going to take hold of her own life and live it, for good or ill, on her own and not be beholden to, or concerned about, anyone else. She had had enough of being second to everybody, and often third or fourth. She would be first, central, the only one from now on.
She was going to accept Jessie Mendel’s offer of a rented room in her house. She would go there and live with her and then, in due course, find herself paid employment. And there she would set about making her ridiculous fantasy of her own flat and her flower shop occupation come true.
Mildred Amberly, she told herself, Mildred Amberly, you are going to escape. Really escape.
16
‘Well, I don’t like it,’ Lizah said again. ‘That’s the thing of it. I just don’t like it.’
‘I was not concerned with whether you would or would not when I decided to do it,’ Mildred said equably. ‘It was my own decision, after all.’
‘But why? I told you we was to get married, that they’d come round to the idea and we’d get married, eventual. Why go off half cocked like this and run out? It’s all so –’
‘I told you why. Freddy –’
He seemed to swell in front of her eyes. ‘That lump o’ villainy! I’ll have his blood for that. I’ll go round there and I’ll sort him out so he can’t ever think of –’
‘I’ve already told you, Lizah, that if you do anything of the sort I shall never speak to you again. And I mean it. The man is dreadful but that does not give you any right to attack him. It is much better simply to walk away from him. And anyway, it was not just because of him. There are other things – living there – it is all so –’ And she shrugged her shoulders, unable to put into words how she had felt that morning and how inevitable her action had been.
Remembering now she marvelled at how calm and collected she had been all day She had gone downstairs and interviewed Cook to give her her daily orders – and even took the trouble to suggest that she cooked the meat a little longer tonight in order to avoid sending it to table as tough as last night’s beef had been, although Cook’s scowl showed what a waste of trouble that was – and then had gone about her normal day’s activities as though nothing at all out of the ordinary was going on.
She did the flowers and helped Nanny Chewson prepare the little boys for their morning walk and then sat with Mama and stroked her aching brow until at last she had said she felt a little better, and then spent the afternoon sewing in the morning room as usual. But shortly before the tea tray was brought into the drawing room at half past four o’clock she slipped away to her room and, moving carefully and quietly, had packed her few clothes in a large Gladstone bag and then, at the time when she knew all the servants were safely ensconced in the kitchen taking their own tea, had fetched it downstairs and taken it out of the house and down into the area, to hide it behind the coal cellar door.
And there it had remained while she took tea with Mama and then helped put the little boys to bed and finally ate dinner with Mama and Claude and Basil at seven o’clock. Even if Papa had been there, she had thought as she sat and pretended to eat the execrable soup Cook had sent up, she would have been as comfortable, but she could not deny she was glad he was not. He had sent a message to say he was dining at his club tonight and the rest of the family clearly felt much happier in consequence. Certainly Claude and Basil were cheerful enough and talked to her and Mama a good deal instead of eating in surly silence as they usually did; and she had for a little while watched them and thought – perhaps after tonight I shall never see them again. Perhaps they will refuse ever to speak to me? But though that was a melancholy thought it did not at all distress her. She was going, at whatever cost. That was all that mattered.
And then the boys had made their excuses and left and Mama had drifted away to her bed and she had gone up to her room and sat there, waiting till the clocks struck the quarter
before nine. And then had put on her pelisse, as offhandedly as if she were doing no more than going to the corner to post a letter, and gone downstairs and out of the house. She did not look back at any point except when she had closed the front door behind her; and then she took her door key and slipped it through the letter box. No turning back, now.
Her Gladstone bag was where she had left it, quite undisturbed, and she had picked it up and looked over her shoulder through the brightly lit window into the kitchen. Cook was sitting by the fire, her skirts pulled back to her knees and her boots up on the fender, her head thrown back on her rocking chair and fast asleep, and beside her Jane and Jenny and Mary sat and whispered to each other while at the table she could see Freddy with a black beer bottle beside him and a racing paper spread out in front of him, and for one mad moment considered rapping on the glass and waving a farewell. But then she smiled at herself, and went quickly up the area steps and along Leinster Terrace to their usual meeting place, to stand and wait for him, her bag at her feet and her hands tucked into the sleeves of her pelisse for warmth.
Now they sat facing each other at a small marble-topped table at a restaurant in Oxford Street, the Gladstone bag beneath the table between them as he tried to decide what to do next. He had brought her here to talk because she had ruined the evening, he had told her with an air of grievance. He had planned to take her to the Britannia tonight for the show and then to have a supper at the Warsaw restaurant in Brick Lane.
Jubilee (Book 1 of The Poppy Chronicles) Page 17