by Val Wood
‘What do you think? Would you like to go? Is it too far, or too long away from home?’ he asked.
‘It isn’t too far, Papa. Of course not,’ she answered impetuously. ‘I’m not a child, you know. You forget I’m eighteen now. I’m a woman.’
He gave a sad smile. ‘I don’t forget,’ he said softly. ‘Every day I’m reminded that you are my grown-up daughter and not the little girl who used to cling to my hand so as not to lose me.’
Immediately she was contrite. ‘I’m sorry, Papa. I’m so thoughtless and peevish sometimes, and I don’t mean to be, but I can’t help myself. I know that you miss Mama as much as I do.’
He chose his words carefully, realizing that whatever he said could be construed as she wished.
‘I do miss her, of course, but life must go on, Amy, and I now have Melissa to share mine, as I hope one day you will have someone special to share yours.’
He saw her expression tighten at Melissa’s name and knew that his fear that Amy was jealous of Melissa was justified.
She shrugged. It was Amy’s most expressive gesture to show that she didn’t care one way or another, but he was astonished to hear her say bitterly, ‘She won’t mind if I go away, will she? I expect she’ll be pleased to see me go.’
‘Go where?’ Neither had heard the door open or Melissa’s footsteps as she came into the room. Her cheeks were pink from the cold and her eyes were bright. ‘Someone going somewhere?’ she asked artlessly, drawing closer to the fire.
‘Amy has had an invitation to visit her London cousins and then travel to Switzerland with them and her aunt.’
‘Oh, really?’ Melissa sat by the fire, putting her hands towards the flame. ‘How kind! But for how long? Can we spare you? We should miss you if you were away too long, Amy. And your papa would worry, wouldn’t you, Christopher?’
‘Why should he worry? I’m perfectly capable of looking after myself.’ Amy drew herself up to her full height of five foot two, an inch shorter than Melissa, which annoyed her. ‘Why does everyone treat me like a child, or as though I’m witless?’ She looked from one to the other. ‘My cousins are more or less the same age as I, and if they are allowed to travel then I see no reason why I shouldn’t go too. You must manage as best you can without me.’ She gave Melissa a withering look and then smiled sweetly at her father. ‘It will do you good to be without me for a while.’
Melissa raised one or two further objections, but was careful not to overdo them in case Amy should change her mind. Finally, she said, ‘Well, if you’re sure, Amy, but your papa must take you to London himself. I wouldn’t settle otherwise. And in the meantime perhaps we should take a look at your wardrobe and go shopping for material to make new gowns. Or we might look at ready-made. We don’t want your smart London cousins thinking that we’re just country mice who don’t know how to dress.’
Amy stared at her, her lips apart. ‘Oh,’ she breathed. ‘Yes, please.’
‘Right after Christmas, do you think? I have some catalogues, so we could make a start at looking at styles and fashions.’ She smiled at the girl. ‘Or we could take the train into Hull. Wouldn’t that be fun?’
Their Christmas was quiet. They had no visitors this year but it passed pleasantly enough; there was a flurry of snow on Christmas Eve and they decorated a tree brought in from the estate. The gardener found holly with bright red berries to arrange on the chandeliers, and on Christmas morning they drove to Ellerker to attend the church service.
This, Melissa decided as they sat down for a lunch of goose and accompaniments, was the best Christmas she had enjoyed for a long time. Amy was excited about the anticipated holiday with her cousins and also at the prospect of shopping for new clothes. Have I been at fault here, Melissa wondered as she listened to Amy’s chatter, have I indulged her as Christopher’s motherless daughter, treating her with kid gloves, when I should have endeavoured to become more of a friend, a confidante?
‘So shall we go by train?’ Amy asked. ‘Into Hull, I mean?’
‘Oh yes, I think so, don’t you? Chapman could drive us to Brough station.’
‘No, no,’ Christopher interrupted. ‘There have been several accidents. Only a few weeks ago someone was killed on the crossing. I’ll drive you through to Hull, or Chapman can.’
‘Oh, Christopher,’ Melissa complained. ‘The accident was the crossing keeper’s fault and I hear that he has since been dismissed. We shall be perfectly safe, and neither you nor Chapman will want to wait around whilst we shop. And besides,’ she gave Amy a complicit glance, ‘we shall go somewhere nice for lunch and maybe even afternoon tea before catching the train home.’
‘Oh!’ he said, in mock anguish. ‘So I’m not invited?’
‘No, you are not, Papa.’ Amy smiled. ‘You know you would hate to kick your heels whilst we shop. This is a ladies only treat.’
And although neither Christopher nor Melissa dared to glance at the other, both felt a great sense not only of relief, but also of warm contentment that perhaps after all they were becoming a complete family and not a divided one.
In the first week of the new year Melissa and Amy travelled to Hull on the train, having finally persuaded Christopher that they would be perfectly safe. They had a carriage to themselves, and although it was cold and they hadn’t expected that there would be quite so much soot or smoke, they enjoyed looking out at the countryside and the estuary, seeing it from a different viewpoint.
‘The estuary is very muddy, isn’t it?’ Amy remarked.
Melissa nodded; she had been watching the water birds on the riverbank. The railway line ran very close to the Humber. ‘It’s sediment, I believe,’ she answered. ‘I recall my father telling me that the high tide carries it up the estuary from the sea, and that’s why we get so many birds. They’re searching for food, see.’ She pointed to a flock of curlews delving in the muddy water with their long pointed beaks. ‘I expect they’re looking for worms and other creatures.’
‘Yes,’ Amy said. ‘And fish – and eels! I once went down into the kitchen when Cook was baking an eel pie for the kitchen staff’s supper. She asked me if I’d like to try some.’ She gave a shudder. ‘I refused.’
They were getting along very well, Melissa thought. If they continued in this vein she would be quite sorry to see Amy go off on her holiday. ‘Why did you go into the kitchen?’ she asked. ‘Were you hungry?’
‘No,’ Amy said. ‘It was just that I’d remembered Papa telling me that when he was a boy he often went down to the kitchen and the cook used to give him a slice of pie or a piece of cake. It wasn’t the same cook as we have now.’ She paused, thoughtfully. ‘It was just after Mama had died, when I went down, I mean. Papa was out on the estate and my governess was confined to her room because of a cold. There was no one else in the house I could talk to and – and I had nothing to do except read my text books, as I’d been told I should, but I didn’t want to.’
She swallowed and licked her lips and was suddenly jerked about as the train drew to a halt at the next station. ‘But Mrs Gorton, who was our housekeeper then, came in and said I shouldn’t be there, because I’d disturb the kitchen routine.’
Melissa frowned. A woman without any understanding of a lonely child, for that was what Amy had been. ‘And have you been down since?’
Amy shook her head. ‘Never,’ she said. ‘Even though Mrs Gorton left. When I told Papa what she said, he said he would give her immediate notice and I didn’t like to go down after that in case they all thought I was a spoilt telltale.’
‘Oh, Amy, why didn’t you tell me?’ Melissa said. ‘The kitchen staff would love it if you went down to see them. Not when they were preparing lunch or dinner, of course, but at any other time. I go down quite often. Otherwise they don’t know who they are serving; we’d just be names to them and not real people. Owners of the great houses with masses of servants might not know who works for them, but that’s not your papa’s way.’
The train pulled out again
with a screeching whistle and a thick show of steam. ‘In fact,’ she went on when the noise had died down, ‘when we were returning from the funeral before Christmas, your father had Chapman stop the carriage to speak to someone in a horse and cart, and it was someone who used to work here when he was a boy.’
‘Really? And Papa remembered him from all that time ago?’ Amy was astonished.
‘Not a him, a her. And she’d worked in the kitchen when she was a young girl.’
‘Papa is so kind, isn’t he?’ Amy said indulgently. ‘He visits their old cook too. Imagine him remembering a servant girl when there must have been so many. She must have been extremely gratified.’
Mmm, Melissa thought, and murmured, ‘Yes, I suppose she would have been.’
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
A brace of pheasants had been delivered from the manor and these, with the addition of the other old hen whose neck Mrs Tuke had wrung, were plucked and stuffed with sausage meat and roasted, making what Harriet considered a sumptuous banquet for Christmas Day. She recalled other Christmas dinners that she and her mother had shared: a small joint of fatty pork, or a thick soup made from marrowbones and vegetables.
But they had enjoyed themselves, she remembered, revelling in being able to stay in bed for an extra hour, and after preparing their meagre meal taking a walk into town to see the grand folk going into church and hearing the joyous peal of the bells. Sometimes they walked down to the pier overlooking the estuary which was what most Hull folk liked to do on their days off; but she also recalled seeing the poor of the town queuing up for the soup kitchen or standing outside the church gates waiting for the congregation to depart and hoping that a coin would be pressed into their outstretched hands.
We were never so poor that we had to degrade ourselves like that, she thought thankfully.
Mrs Tuke placed two jugs of home-made wine on the table, one of elderberry, rich and dark red, the other apple, which smelt sweet and potent. A third jug contained ale. Harriet chose the apple, as did Mrs Tuke, who today appeared to have relaxed her rule of not eating with her family; Noah and Fletcher chose ale and Mr Tuke poured himself a second glass of elderberry.
‘You’ll be roaring drunk,’ Mrs Tuke muttered. ‘It’s two years old.’
‘Not going to waste it.’ He took a sip with a puckered mouth and after swallowing drew in his cheeks. ‘You get used to ’taste after a glass or two.’ He screwed up his lips again and took another mouthful. ‘This was my old ma’s receipt,’ he said to no one in particular, and no one answered or made a comment.
Harriet picked up her glass. ‘My ma and me,’ she ventured, ‘we used to toast ’queen’s health in a glass o’ beer.’
Everyone looked at her. Mr Tuke scowled, Mrs Tuke cast her gaze down at her plate, Noah began eating, but Fletcher smiled and raised his tankard to her.
‘We saw Her Majesty when she came to Hull,’ she went on in a quiet voice. ‘Whole of ’town was decorated wi’ flags and ribbons and flowers.’
Only Fletcher appeared to be interested. ‘What did she look like?’ he asked.
‘Beautiful,’ she said. ‘Very regal. Prince Albert was with her, and ’rest of ’family. It was such a special day.’
‘Waste o’ money,’ Mr Tuke grunted, stuffing his mouth with pheasant. ‘Lot o’ fuss about nowt.’
Mrs Tuke cut into a small slice of chicken. ‘Some of ’best folk in ’county were there, so I understand. I heard that Mr Hart and his family attended.’
Noah belched. ‘Oh aye, they’d be there. They’ve nowt else to do but grovel afore their so-called betters.’
‘How would you know?’ Mrs Tuke muttered. ‘You don’t know ’em.’
‘Nor want to,’ he contended. ‘They’re no different from us.’
‘Better mannered, for one thing,’ she observed.
Harriet felt a tight band around her chest. How could they argue today of all days? It’s my fault, she decided. I shouldn’t have brought up ’subject of ’queen. I didn’t think. Everybody I know was so excited about seeing her, I never thought that some folk might be resentful of her. We weren’t, in spite of being poor.
‘So, Mrs Tuke,’ Fletcher said, and Harriet didn’t at first realize he was talking to her and not his mother, although she too looked up. ‘It seems that it’s just you and me who’s toasting Her Majesty’s health.’ He lifted his tankard again. ‘Here’s health unto Her Majesty.’
She thought he was mocking her and was ready to give a cutting reply, but he gave her a swift wink and she grasped that he was hoping to provoke his brother and father. She raised her glass. ‘Her Majesty,’ she murmured, and saw that Mrs Tuke also lifted her glass and sipped, although she didn’t utter a toast.
I don’t know how much longer I can suffer this atmosphere, she thought. I’m on tenterhooks in case I say summat I shouldn’t and set them off arguing.
‘That reminds me,’ Noah said, putting his fingers in his mouth to remove a piece of meat from his teeth.
‘Of what?’ Fletcher said.
‘That you owe me ’price of a heifer.’
Fletcher put down his knife and fork.
Noah put down his cutlery too and leaned his elbow on the table. He pointed a finger at his brother. ‘I bet you ’price of a young heifer that I’d bring a wife home afore you.’ He sat back and grinned. ‘So you owe me.’
Fletcher’s face reddened. ‘I didn’t agree to any such bet! If you want to choose a wife for ’sake of price of a heifer that’s up to you, but don’t expect me to fork out for ’expense of it.’
Noah pushed back his chair. ‘We’ll settle it again then,’ he roared, and Fletcher too prepared to rise.
Mrs Tuke banged on the table with a knife. ‘If you leave this table now you don’t come back to it. There’ll be no food on ’table for either of you in future unless you cook it yourselves, cos I’ll not be here to do it.’
Fletcher started and turned to his mother. ‘Sorry,’ he said. ‘Sorry, Ma. We’ll not fight today.’ He glanced at Noah and then at Harriet. ‘Not today. Sorry,’ he repeated.
Noah guffawed. ‘Yellow-belly! Scared o’ what your ma thinks!’
‘That’s enough,’ Fletcher warned him. ‘Leave it for another day. And don’t go upsetting your wife.’
Noah glanced at Harriet and then snarled at his brother. ‘Don’t you go telling me what to do about my wife. You keep your nose out o’ that.’ He pointed a finger again. ‘That’s another score to settle.’
‘Sit down!’ Mr Tuke bellowed; he seemed to have just woken up, as if what had gone before was nothing to do with him. Then he said, ‘Mrs Tuke’s full o’ threats and promises, she is, but she won’t keep to ’em. Mrs Tuke,’ he said, ‘carve me a slice o’ chicken.’
Mrs Tuke did so, and as she placed it on his plate Harriet was horrified to see that her eyes were full of sheer unadulterated hate, as if she’d just as soon slice him with the knife rather than the chicken.
After they had finished their meal, Fletcher and Noah went out, and Harriet and Mrs Tuke cleared away the dishes. They put the leftovers in the pantry, saving a few pieces of chicken for the dog, and began washing up. Harriet, after glancing towards Mr Tuke, who was snoring in front of the fire, asked, ‘Would you really have left? And where would you have gone? It’s hard for a woman on her own.’
Mrs Tuke didn’t answer for a moment. Then she said, ‘Sometimes I think I couldn’t be any worse off than I am now. I did threaten once before; that’s what Mr Tuke meant.’ She picked up a pan and scrubbed at it as if her life depended on it. ‘But I didn’t go. My conscience wouldn’t let me.’
She said no more and Harriet didn’t like to pry. ‘A conscience is a difficult thing,’ she murmured. ‘But I could leave now and not feel too badly about it.’
Mrs Tuke again attacked the pan. ‘He’d come after you,’ she muttered. ‘Noah would. He’d be worse than his father. He’d find you no matter if you hid in the deepest of Hull’s dark alleyways, and he’d drag
you back.’
‘Then I have to find another way to cope with this – this situation.’ Harriet looked out of the small square window and saw Fletcher running towards the house. ‘I feel unnecessary. I’ve nowt to do but milk ’cow twice a day and gather eggs every morning.’
‘Mebbe you should’ve thought—’ Mrs Tuke broke off as Fletcher burst through the door.
‘Dora’s about to calve,’ he announced. ‘Do you want to watch?’ he asked Harriet. ‘You’ll have to be quick.’
‘Oh!’ Harriet grabbed a shawl. ‘Yes, please, if I won’t be in ’way. Is that all right?’ she asked her mother-in-law. ‘Leave the rest of ’dirty pans for me.’
Mrs Tuke shrugged, and then said, ‘It’s like a miracle ’first time you see it.’
Harriet hopped into the rubber boots and dashed after Fletcher. ‘Is she all right on her own?’
‘Who? Ma?’ He turned to look at her, forehead creased. ‘Yes, she likes her own company.’
‘I meant Dora!’ Harriet giggled, and Fletcher gazed at her as if the sound of laughter was new to him. Harriet guessed that there wasn’t much merriment in that house or in their lives; but then he laughed too and opened the cowshed door.
Dora lay on the straw grunting and protesting and Fletcher knelt beside her. ‘Come on then, old girl,’ he murmured. ‘Nearly there. Look,’ he said suddenly. ‘Here come the front feet. Do you want to help her?’
Harriet gasped as she saw first the water sacs and then two feet appear from the cow’s vulva. ‘What do you want me to do?’
‘Just take hold of the feet and when she starts to push, pull gently.’
Harriet felt squeamish as she took hold of the sticky mucus-covered feet and drew in a gasping breath as the cow lumbered to her feet; when Fletcher said ‘Now’ she pulled and the feet came out further. The legs appeared, followed by a nose and the rest of the head and within a few minutes the shoulders; she felt as if her arms were being pulled out of their sockets. Fletcher’s firm hands were on the half in half out body when suddenly the whole wet and glistening calf was lying on the straw.