Hidden Currents

by Rowena Summers

  ‘How terrible such a happening would be, Wilf. It might even have happened in July when Prince Albert arrived by train to launch the great ship!’

  He spoke more sharply now. ‘Don’t take what I’m saying as fact, Nora! I’m only repeating what folk surmise, but it benefits the out-of-workers. The bosses have to do all they can to let the public see that safety is of prime importance, and prevent any outcry. So they probably take on more navvies than they need. But it never happened, so there’s no point in playing guessing-games.’

  ‘All the same, such a disaster on the launch day would have thrown the whole city into confusion,’ Nora said.

  ‘Aye, and it would certainly have upset my sister’s applecart, if her dear Izzy had been involved as well,’ Wilf said, determined to change the conversation, and knowing that mention of Carrie would do it.

  ‘How does she fare? Does she like her new position?’

  Wilf shrugged. ‘I daresay. She comes to see Ma most afternoons, and seems cheerful enough.’

  ‘Is she still courting?’

  ‘I don’t know. I don’t ask,’ he said vaguely.

  Nora’s blue eyes flashed. ‘Sometimes, Wilf Stuckey, you can be the most infuriating of men!’

  ‘Why? I’m not interested in other folks’ courting, only my own,’ he said with a grin that disarmed her at once. ‘And by my reckoning, it’s time I did some.’

  Nora’s cheeks went a delicate pink. ‘It’s much too cold to sit in the park today, Wilf. Parker has our carriage at the mews nearby. He’s very discreet and we would be very cosy inside while he drove us about. We could ride around Clifton Downs for an hour or so before I had to return home. And I would so like a change from sitting on a damp stone seat in the park!’

  She had never suggested such a thing before, and she wasn’t sure how he would take it. The carriage belonged to her father, of course, and it signified just how much money the Woolleys had compared to the Stuckeys. And Wilf had such stuffy pride, just like all the lower classes.

  Nora bit her lip, hating herself for letting the phrase slip into her mind. But in her opinion, just because you had little money shouldn’t mean a person also had to have a lower class mentality. A person should be able to rise above all that, the way some of the unfortunate aristocrats did when they fell on hard times.

  In her safe little world, never having had to go without a single thing she desired in the whole of her pampered life, she found it easy to think so. And it was one of the few areas where she and Wilf were scratchy with one another.

  ‘All right,’ he said carelessly. ‘I can point out the mansion where our Carrie is living now. At least one of the Stuckeys has come up in the world, even if it’s only as far as the servants’ quarters.’

  And Nora knew he hadn’t been fooled at all by her carefully worded suggestion.

  But she forgot all about that as their driver helped her into the carriage. She leaned back against the velvet squabs, and felt Wilf’s arm slide around her. They were enclosed in their own little world as Parker clicked the horses into motion and Wilf felt the warm and instant response of his lady.

  * * *

  Carrie barely glanced at the fine carriage bowling along the Downs as she hurried towards the hill leading home. If the thought flitted through her mind that the drawn curtains of the carriage indicated some clandestine meeting, she could only feel envy for the lovers inside.

  Maybe it would be today … the thought whirled around in her head as her feet clattered on the cobbles. Maybe today John would have left a message about seeing her again … Maybe today … she had been at the Barclay mansion for a month now, and so far there had been no message at all. At first she had been bewildered, and then hurt, and finally angry. But the treacherous feelings in her heart wouldn’t let her stop thinking and hoping all the same.

  ‘I’m home, Ma,’ she called out, when she arrived at the house. She never wasted time in getting there, because the hour went by all too quickly before she had to report back to Cook again. But Cook was indulgent and prepared to overlook it if she was a few minutes late. Everyone knew by now that she was anxious about Ma, and how much she needed to reassure herself on Ma’s health by these afternoon visits home.

  Her heart leapt now, because the house was so quiet. It was never this silent, because one or other of them was always doing something or other. Pa with his carpentering, Wilf sometimes giving a hand, or cleaning out the chickens in the back yard, or Billy playing with his toys, or Ma, endlessly making rag rugs, or sewing, or washing, or cooking, or cleaning …

  ‘Ma, where are you?’ Carrie called out nervously. She went through the parlour and scullery into the yard, but there was only the washing billowing on the lines, and the two remaining scrawny chickens. The rest had been eaten. Once these two were gone, there’d be no more eggs either, save for those provided by the Barclay kitchen. God bless the Barclays, Carrie thought fervently.

  She turned and ran up the stairs, but there was no-one in the house at all. It was strange not to find Ma here, but at least she wasn’t lying prostrate somewhere. As she let out her breath in a sigh of relief Carrie realised how tight with fear she had been until that moment. And then she heard a door bang downstairs, and she ran down again to see Ma come wearily inside and sit down heavily.

  ‘I’m sorry, duck, but there was no time to get word to you, and our Billy’s running an errand for your Pa, or I’d have sent him to tell you not to come today.’

  ‘What’s happened, Ma?’ She was even more alarmed at the whiteness of Ma’s face, and the way she pressed her side where the baby lay. ‘Is it summat to do with Pa?’

  He hadn’t done much to help the family coffers lately, but it was only a temporary thing, she thought loyally. For all that, he was the family’s pivot, and without Pa …

  Ma shook her head quickly. ‘It’s nothing to do with us, but she came to us for help, so naturally we gave it.’

  ‘Who did, Ma?’

  May looked a little vacant, then took a deep breath, wincing as the pain in her side stabbed at her.

  ‘I’m all at sixes and sevens, Carrie. It was your friend, Elsie. She came here all of a tizzy this morning, saying her granpa had died in the night. He’d fallen out of bed, and he was still stiff with the rigor and she couldn’t move him. She was nearly out of her wits, poor thing.’

  ‘Oh!’ Carrie hadn’t expected this, even though it had seemed likely for years that the old man would go at any minute. But such folk seemed to go on for ever.

  ‘Poor Elsie. How was she when you left, Ma?’

  ‘Still all of a shake. Pa’s gone down there with a rough-made coffin he thinks will fit, and I said Elsie could stop here a day or two if she liked. She said no, as long as the coffin’s all right, and her granpa’s got out of the cottage. She can’t abide the thought of sleeping in the house tonight with him still there.’

  ‘But she’d be all alone,’ Carrie said, horrified.

  Ma shrugged. ‘’Tis what she wanted, girl, and the dead can’t hurt you none when they’m gone.’

  A thought struck Carrie. ‘Ma, you didn’t — you didn’t lay him out, did you?’

  That disgusting old man, who couldn’t help being smelly and disgusting, but who had always revolted her. And with her Ma in her condition …

  ‘Somebody had to do it, and they couldn’t pay for doctors’ fees. Besides, there was no need. I’m still capable of doing what’s needed,’ she said briskly.

  Carrie felt a surge of admiration for her, even while she was sure now that she could smell Granpa Miller on her mother, and she edged away as discreetly as she could.

  ‘I’ll make you some strong tea, Ma,’ she said, excusing herself. ‘Where will they take him when Pa’s done?’

  ‘Billy’s gone for the corpse carrier. He’ll take him to the store-house until the burying tomorrow.’

  Carrie was thankful her Ma couldn’t see how she shuddered at that moment. The store-house was what they called the wooden
structure near the church where the coffins of the poor were housed until the ground could be dug for burial. Everyone knew that coffins placed in the store-house belonged to those who relied on the parishioners’ charity for their last resting-place. Poor Elsie.

  ‘What time will the burial be, Ma?’

  ‘Twelve noon as usual.’

  Of course. The usual time for paupers’ plantings.

  ‘I shall beg an extra hour off from Miss Helen to attend,’ she said huskily. ‘Elsie will want me to be there.’

  ‘Don’t go risking your position for the likes of that one,’ Ma was sharper now. ‘She’ll rebound soon enough.’

  It was so unlike Ma to be uncharitable at such a time, that Carrie went back to the parlour while the kettle was still halfway to boiling. She surprised Ma by catching sight of the suffering on her pinched face as she clutched at her belly. She ran to her side, all thoughts of Elsie fleeing from her mind.

  ‘Ma, you’re ill! Shall I go for Doctor Flowers?’

  She shook her head decisively. ‘It’s nobbut a stitch from hurrying too much. It’ll pass soon enough. Don’t fuss me, for pity’s sake.’

  Even though she was rebuffed, Carrie knew her mother well enough to know that the sharper she got, the more pain she was in, and the more angry she got at her own weakness.

  ‘I’ll get the tea then,’ she said instead, and went back to the scullery to prepare it with shaking hands, hardly noticing how the boiling water spat and scalded her.

  ‘Where’s our Wilf today?’ she asked, once her mother had got some colour back in her cheeks.

  Ma sniffed. ‘Who knows where he gets to nowadays? He’s talking about taking up with they railway navvies. Your Pa don’t approve, but I’m too weary to argue against it.’

  ‘If it’ll bring in some wages, I shouldn’t think he would object to it.’

  ‘He objects to everything these days. He don’t feel like a man no more. He thinks he drove our Frank away by his taunts, and now you’re the only one bringing money in, apart from my bits. If Wilf finds work, your Pa will feel even more useless.’

  ‘Would he rather Wilf hung about the house idling?’

  ‘I believe he would,’ Ma said, with the ghost of a smile. ‘But that’s enough gloomy talk for one day. Are things still going well for you up at Clifton?’

  ‘Mostly,’ Carrie said cautiously. ‘Miss Barclay is more of a stickler than I expected, and I have to put everything away just so. If anything’s out of place she almost takes a fit. Cook says it’s because that other maid stole from her and her Ma, and she’s para-summat about it now.’

  ‘Well, I hope she don’t think you’re going to steal from her,’ Ma said indignantly.

  ‘I dunno what she thinks. Cook reckons she’s been crossed in love and she’s taking it out on the rest of us.’

  ‘This Cook seems to know a lot,’ Ma said, but Carrie was less interested in Cook’s gossip than in something else that she was burning to know.

  ‘Ma, has John been here since I left? It’s a whole month now, and I expected a message from him.’

  Her voice trailed away as Ma shook her head.

  ‘Our Billy’s seen him a coupla times, Carrie, and he asked after you, but said to say he was very busy, and he’d see you when he could. That’s all I can tell you.’

  Carrie bit her lip, smarting at the way John seemed to be snubbing her. If he didn’t want her, why didn’t he tell her so? The way he’d held her and caressed her in Leigh Woods had left her in no doubt that he’d wanted her then. He’d got permission from her Pa for walking-out, but they’d done precious little of it. She felt misery wash over her, and then, as she heard Billy’s running footsteps, and remembered where he’d been, she chided herself for being so self-centred, when poor Elsie must be in such a turmoil.

  ‘Do you think I should go and see Elsie now, Ma?’ she said reluctantly.

  Ma nodded. ‘Pa should be nicely finished by now, and have the old fellow nailed down. What did the corpse carrier say, Billy?’

  ‘He’s fetching him directly. Can I come back to Elsie’s with you, Carrie, to see it go?’

  ‘No, you cannot,’ she said crossly. ‘It’s not a peep-show.’

  But she knew that it would be, for anyone of a curious disposition. She’d seen it all before. When the corpse carrier had put the loaded coffin on his cart, he’d be escorted all the way back to the store-house by a gaggle of urchins, wagering their farthings on whether or not the coffin-lid was going to pop open and the shrouded occupant chase after them. She shuddered again, wondering how they could find such fascination in these ghoulish games.

  She had no real wish to go and visit Elsie, but she knew she should. If the boot was on the other foot, and it was one of her family, Elsie would be the first to offer her rough comfort. It would make her late back at Clifton, she thought anxiously, but these were special times, and surely Miss Helen would understand.

  * * *

  ‘You should have been back here more than half an hour ago!’ Helen screamed at her. Her normally pretty face was contorted with rage, and her eyes flashed blue fire at Carrie. ‘Do you think I’m paying you to dawdle about making fancy eyes at every Tom, Dick and Harry?’

  It was so far from the truth it took away the shock at meeting such a tirade. Cook was probably right, Carrie thought. Miss Helen had definitely been crossed in love to make her act so unlike herself.

  ‘I’m very sorry, miss,’ she said nervously. ‘But me friend’s granpa just died, and I went to console her.’

  ‘I don’t want to hear your feeble excuses,’ Helen raged. ‘And if you mean the common tart I saw you with on the Downs in the summer, then I doubt that she’ll need much consoling from you. She’ll soon find consolation elsewhere.’

  Carrie gasped, all her swift sympathy for the young lady vanishing in a trice. By now, she knew that the gentry could resort to coarseness as good as any servant could give, and the so-correct Miss Barclay had a ripe turn of phrase on her when it suited. But this was too much.

  Carrie had just spent a tearful time with Elsie, and persuaded her at last to go home to Jacob’s Wells Road with her and spend a couple of nights in Carrie’s old room. She didn’t deserve these insults. She snapped out a response.

  ‘Elsie’s in a real old state, miss, and I didn’t think it right to leave her.’

  She yelped as she got a stinging slap across her cheek for her insolence.

  ‘And didn’t you think it right to come back here where you’re paid good money for the little that you do, and have generous time off? I’m beginning to think I made a mistake in taking pity on you and your wretched family.’

  Carrie forced back the scalding tears. Her face stung as if a dozen bees had attacked it, but however much she hated lowering herself in front of this haughty bitch, she daren’t risk losing this job. If it meant eating every crumb of humble pie, she had to do it.

  ‘Please don’t say that, Miss Helen. You know how grateful I am to be working for you, and I do try my very best to please you, truly I do. This was the first lapse I’ve made, and it won’t happen again.’

  She hung her head and crossed her fingers behind her back as she spoke, feeling a hypocrite at acting so abjectly. It wasn’t Carrie Stuckey’s style at all, but there were times when it was necessary, and this was one of them.

  She might look humble, but inside she was seething at the pain in her face, and wondering how the dickens she was going to ask for an extra hour off tomorrow to attend Granpa Miller’s burying. She’d promised Elsie she’d be there, and there would be few enough mourners at the graveside.

  To her astonishment, she suddenly heard Helen give a tinkling laugh. She had become quite unpredictable lately, giving more weight to Cook’s suspicions that there was an unrequited love lurking in the background. But if it was so, then she hadn’t confided in her personal maid.

  ‘Oh Carrie, I fear that my temper is not at its best at present. Does, your poor cheek pain you very much?
’

  ‘I’ll live,’ Carrie muttered, not sure how to take this sudden show of concern. She took a pace back as Helen moved towards her, as if afraid she was going to receive another whack to send her reeling.

  ‘Then I shall try to make amends to you,’ Helen announced. ‘What shall it be? A trinket, perhaps? A bauble for your hair?’

  ‘If I could change my time off tomorrow to the morning for my friend’s granpa’s burying, that’d be enough, if it’s all the same to you, miss,’ Carrie said quickly.

  She ducked as she spoke, wondering if she’d gone too far. If Miss Helen was going to go off half-cocked again, she’d be in for another slapping. But to her wild relief, the young lady gave a shrug of her elegant shoulders, her voice careless.

  ‘Oh, take the extra time and be done with it. I daresay your mother will want to see you again in the afternoon as usual. I trust she’s thriving?’

  ‘She’s reasonable,’ Carrie said, knowing there was no real concern behind the question, and longing to be out of there to bathe her face with witchhazel before it bruised.

  Helen nodded. ‘Good. Then perhaps you could attend to your duties now. Take these items away and get them back to me as soon as possible, and take especial care with the lace. I don’t want to see a speck of yellowing on it.’

  She indicated the basket of frills, which needed hardly any laundering at all, and which Carrie guessed had been put out just for the pleasure of giving her extra work to do. She didn’t care. While she attended to the task, the lace laundry room was her domain, where she could escape Miss Helen’s irascible tongue for a while.

  But first she must attend to her face. She sought out Cook in the kitchen and asked for the witchhazel. Cook tut-tutted, full of concern as she inspected the damage.

  ‘The young madam,’ she said indignantly. ‘Her Mama would never have struck a servant like that one does. Did you explain why you were late, dearie?’

  ‘Oh yes, but it made no difference. Still, she’s let me have time off for the burying tomorrow, so I suppose I must be grateful for that.’

  She listened to herself, so accepting of her betters’ treatment, and it angered her to be so subservient. And to be so tied to someone that she had to ask permission to be with a friend in need, when she had always been as free as a bird. But until her menfolk found decent jobs, she had no choice.