The Downstairs Maid

by Rosie Clarke

  ‘You can help Emily bring the plates back from the refreshment tent, and leftovers, if there are any,’ Mrs Hattersley said. ‘I don’t know about dinner tonight. I’m all of a flutter. I think it will have to be something simple.’

  ‘They shouldn’t expect any more,’ Tomas said. ‘You’ve both been run off your feet all day.’

  ‘I could do with a rest,’ Emily said, ‘but I suppose we’d better make a start. Bring those trays, Tomas. We might borrow one of the gardener’s trolleys and bring back a load instead of carting one at a time.’

  ‘You’ll do no such thing,’ Mrs Hattersley said. ‘I don’t want more of the china broken thank you. Mary dropped a tray when she was bringing back a pile of empty plates.’

  Emily could understand Mary dropping a tray, because they’d all been on the go since five that morning. She was tired herself but Mrs Hattersley didn’t seem to think she needed a rest.

  Tomas looked at her a couple of times as they walked to the refreshment tent. Most of the stalls had been taken down but the trestle tables set up inside the marquee were still loaded with dirty crockery.

  ‘Cat got your tongue, Emily?’

  ‘I’m just tired …’ She glanced at a man coming out of the tent. ‘Oh no …’

  ‘What’s wrong?’

  ‘I know that man. Don’t leave me, Tomas. If he tries to come near me, don’t let him. Please. It’s very important that he shouldn’t get me alone.’

  Tomas’s gaze narrowed. ‘Who is he? Has he harmed you? If he tries anything today, I’ll knock his head off.’

  ‘I thought he’d left the district.’

  ‘He’ll be leaving quick enough if he upsets you.’

  ‘Thank you.’ She shot him a grateful smile just as her uncle saw her and began to walk in their direction.

  ‘Emily,’ Derek said as he came up to them. ‘Your mother told me I should find you here.’

  ‘Please stand aside and let me get on with my work.’

  ‘It’s important, Emily. They’ve carted Joe off to the infirmary and your mother wants you to go to him as soon as you can.’

  She stared at him, her heart thudding against her chest. ‘How do I know you’re telling me the truth?’

  ‘I wouldn’t lie to you about something like this.’ Derek’s eyes narrowed. ‘I’ve got a truck I borrowed from your pa’s neighbour, to take you, but if you don’t want a lift find your own way there.’

  ‘I’d rather go alone.’

  ‘Suit yourself.’

  Her heart caught as he turned and walked off. She turned to Tomas and fear was in her eyes. ‘I need to get to the infirmary but I can’t trust him. How can I get to Ely quickly?’

  ‘I’ll ask Mr Nicolas if I can take you in the Daimler. I drive it to the garage for repairs sometimes.’ Tomas sprinted off while Emily watched her uncle’s retreating back and agonised over whether she’d done the right thing. As she tried to fight down her panic, she saw Mr Nicolas turn his head and then start walking towards her. Instinctively, she went to meet him.

  ‘Come with me, Emily. I’ll take you in to Ely myself. Are you all right like that or do you need to change?’

  ‘I should like to go at once, sir.’

  ‘Tomas will explain to Mrs Hattersley so you will not be in trouble.’

  She hurried to keep up with his long strides. In her distress for her father she had forgotten to be shy or to worry about keeping to her place.

  ‘My father has not been well for a while. The doctor said he ought to be at the sea, because the air is better, but he wouldn’t listen. He didn’t want to take so much time off work.’

  ‘Better a few months at a clinic than eternity in a box. Now he’s had this setback he may listen to his doctor.’

  Emily dug her nails into the palms of her hands. She could feel a scream building inside her head but she fought it down.

  Her father couldn’t die. He mustn’t die, because she couldn’t bear it if he did. The tears were close but she refused to let them fall. Her father was ill but he was strong. He would fight for his life and then he’d go to the sea and get better.

  ‘I am sorry, Miss Carter. We sent your uncle for you immediately but that was some hours ago. Your father had an attack of coughing and his heart failed him. No one had realised that his heart was weak. His doctor told us he was in the first stages of consumption but any signs of heart trouble had been missed.’

  ‘Damned incompetence,’ Nicolas muttered. ‘This is supposed to be a hospital. Surely you could have done something once you had him here?’

  ‘I’m afraid it was too late by the time we realised he was in difficulty.’

  ‘Is my mother here?’ Emily asked. She was too stunned to think clearly or to blame anyone for her father’s death, even though her companion obviously thought the infirmary was to blame. The smell of disinfectant and carbolic was stinging her nostrils and the dark cream and bottle green paint on the walls was depressing. It was a horrible place and she hated to think of her father lying here in one of the narrow beds with bars up the sides. He’d been too young – this place was for the old and the infirm, people who had nowhere else to go. ‘Was she with him when he died?’

  ‘Mrs Carter was waiting in the corridor. She had a small child with her and we couldn’t allow her into the ward.’

  ‘My father died alone?’ Emily stared at the doctor in horror. Giving a cry of despair, she turned instinctively to her companion who responded to her need by putting his arms about her. Her father had been all alone in his last hours. The thought was unbearable, tearing her apart as she pictured him lying there in pain with no one to comfort him.

  She should have been with him. She’d been having fun at the fete and her father was lying in a hospital bed dying. The pain intensified to such a degree that she thought she would die of it. Pa alone and frightened …

  Nicolas stroked her hair as she wept against his shoulder. ‘He couldn’t have known much about it, Emily. I should imagine he was unconscious – is that not so, doctor?’

  ‘Yes … of course, Mr Barton. He was already unconscious when he arrived. He couldn’t have known or suffered after the first few minutes or so.’

  ‘It’s all right to cry, Emily,’ Nicolas said and she felt the touch of his lips on the top of her head. He smelled of fresh, light cologne, leather and wood, and the clean scent of his linen. His arms felt strong as they supported her, his body warm and comforting. ‘Would you like to see him? That would be all right, wouldn’t it, doctor?’

  ‘Yes, of course, sir.’

  Emily looked up at the man holding her. His sensitive face was concerned for her, caring. The expression in his eyes made her dare to ask, ‘Would you come with me please?’

  ‘I should not dream of leaving you.’

  She hesitated, then nodded and drew back. ‘Yes, I would like to say goodbye. It was just the thought of him lying alone, thinking no one cared.’

  ‘I’m sure he wouldn’t have thought it even if he’d known what was happening. I imagine he knew you loved him.’

  ‘He loved me. I’m not sure if he knew how much I loved him.’ She looked at the doctor. ‘Has my mother been to see him since it happened?’

  ‘She left as soon as we told her the news. Apparently, the child needed changing and she wished to catch the bus to get home.’

  Emily flinched, feeling as if she’d been struck. How could her mother just leave her husband lying there and go home without even saying goodbye? Ma had never truly loved him, but surely she cared enough to say goodbye? A wave of hopeless despair swept through Emily. If only she’d been at home with him, perhaps she might have seen how ill he was – she might have got him here in time?

  But it was all useless now. He was dead.

  ‘I should like to see him now please.’

  Nicolas held out his hand to her and she took it. His strong fingers clasping hers tightly gave her courage.

  ‘Death is only moving on to another place,’ he sa
id. ‘If you believe in God you will believe in the resurrection.’

  ‘Do you believe?’

  ‘Most of the time,’ he said and smiled wryly. ‘It isn’t always easy but I manage it most of the time.’

  ‘Then I shall try,’ she said. ‘It’s the least I can do for him.’

  Nicolas nodded to her and her head lifted, pride giving her the strength to face the worst moment of her life.

  Emily’s eyes felt gritty from crying. She sat on the edge of her bed and looked round her room at the manor. She’d made it her own, bringing things from her bedroom at home, all the little pieces that her father had given her over the years – stuff that she’d thought of as junk. It wasn’t junk to her any more, but precious, more valuable to her than the Sevres porcelain dishes that lived in the cabinets downstairs in the manor and only came out on special occasions.

  Getting up, she walked over to the little chest of drawers on which her treasures were displayed. There was a cut-glass bowl with a silver top. Only one of a set and therefore not saleable, her father had told her. He’d given her the little Derby figurine too, because it had been repaired on one hand. There was an opaque glass vase with a tiny chip at the lip; it would have been valuable had it been perfect – and a set of silver brushes for her hair, slightly dented but nothing Christopher couldn’t have sorted out. Pa had given her them as a birthday gift. At the time she wished he’d bought her a new pair of shoes, but the shoes would’ve been worn out by now and the silver brushes would last for ever.

  ‘Oh, Pa …’ she whispered, her throat catching. ‘Why did you have to die? I loved you so much …’

  Her life seemed to have gone so fast up to the point where she’d left home to live at the manor. She hadn’t realised how lucky she was, often resenting those cold, wet days when she’d sat outside houses on the cart and waited for her father to return with an armful of treasures. Emily had longed for a different life and she was happy here – but just for a while she wished she could go back to the time when her Pa was well and always laughing at her.

  She remembered the good days when he’d done well and bought her fish and chips in a newspaper. She’d sat beside him as he drove home at a leisurely pace, eating the delicious food and smiling and waving to the friends they met on the journey. They seemed sunlit, idyllic days and she forgot about the cold mists that crept over the Fen roads, soaking them both through and making her wish herself at home by the fire.

  Pa wouldn’t want her to feel miserable. Emily dashed the tears from her face and then washed it in cool water from her jug. She was daft sitting here moping. Mrs Hattersley would be rushed off her feet and the best thing Emily could do was to go down and help her.

  A knock at her door made her stiffen and it was a moment before she said, ‘Come in.’

  The door opened and June entered. ‘I’m so sorry, Emily,’ she said. ‘I heard about your father. If there is anything at all I can do please ask.’

  ‘No, I don’t think so. He’s gone. No one can bring him back.’

  ‘Death is so final,’ June agreed. ‘I was engaged to be married before I came here. My fiancé died two days before our wedding of a fever. I had no idea he was ill.’

  ‘I’m so sorry. Did you love him very much?’

  ‘Yes. I never had any desire to marry anyone else.’ June smiled at her. ‘So you see, I understand how it feels to lose someone – and I wanted you to know that we are all your friends here.’

  ‘Thank you.’

  Emily was close to tears again as the other woman went out, closing the door softly behind her. She’d never guessed that June had a secret, but the fact that she had been willing to share it to comfort Emily made her feel she was with friends and some of her loneliness eased.

  ‘You will want time off for the funeral,’ Mrs Hattersley said the next morning. She had bread baking in the oven and the smell was delicious. ‘Shall I ask for the whole day for you, Emily?’

  ‘No. I’ll only need a few hours. I shall come back here as soon as the service is over.’

  Emily had drawn her luxuriant dark hair back into a tight knot at the nape of her neck, fastening it with combs and pins. There were shadows beneath her eyes and her nose looked red, because of the tears she’d shed on waking.

  ‘You won’t go home afterwards?’

  ‘I’ve nothing to say to anyone that can’t keep for another day. I think my uncle is staying at the house with Ma. I shall never enter that house again while he is there.’

  ‘Do you mind if I ask why?’

  Emily hesitated, and then told her – including the part about her mother blaming her for her uncle’s attack.

  ‘It wasn’t your fault.’ Mrs Hattersley nodded to herself. ‘That settles it then, Emily. I was wondering if I should come with you. After what you’ve told me I wouldn’t think of letting you go alone.’

  ‘Are you sure you can take time off?’

  ‘We’ll prepare dinner before we go and get a move on when we return. If they have to wait upstairs for once that’s too bad. I’m coming with you, and there’s an end of it.’

  Mrs Hattersley’s plump face reflected her distress and her voice wobbled; her eyes a little watery as if she was battling against tears. Emily’s throat caught because she knew that the cook was her friend and was determined to look out for her.

  ‘You’ve all been so kind. I don’t know what I should have done if Mr Nicolas hadn’t looked out for me. He handled everything.’

  ‘Now that was good of him. It is very like Mr Nicolas. We shall miss him now he’s gone off to join his unit. He’s joined the Royal Flying Corps – that’s the flyboys to you and me, Emily.’

  Emily’s heart caught at the news, because she didn’t think she could bear it if anything happened to Mr Nicolas. He had comforted her when she was told of her father’s death, holding her as she wept. She knew she could never see him as just her employer’s son again; he was special to her, though of course she would never let him see it. He was a member of the family and she was just a kitchen girl – but that didn’t stop her liking him more than any man she’d ever met.

  ‘Everyone will be devastated if anything happens to him,’ she said.

  Mrs Hattersley looked grave. ‘War is a bad business, Emily. I wish it hadn’t happened. There will be a lot of young men going off to Belgium and some of them will never return.’

  ‘I shall pray Mr Nicolas isn’t one of them.’

  ‘We must hope he comes through safe. You’ll be wearing grey or black for the funeral I expect.’

  ‘I don’t have a black dress.’

  ‘The upper parlour maids wear a black uniform. Mrs Marsh might allow you to have one so you could wear it to the funeral.’

  ‘Thank you. That would be just right – if she would allow it.’

  ‘I think she might. Now go and make a start on the vegetables. Sitting around moping never helped anyone.’

  Emily got up and went through to the scullery, putting all thoughts of Mr Nicolas from her mind. She was happy to work. It helped to take her mind off the fact that her father had died alone and that she would never see him again.

  ‘I’m sorry I wasn’t there, Pa,’ she said and a tear rolled down her cheek. She brushed a hand over her cheek, dislodging wisps of springy hair that hung about her face despite all her efforts to restrain it. ‘I’m so sorry I wasn’t with you when you needed me.’

  Chapter 22

  Emily felt frozen throughout the service. Clouds had obscured the sun as they arrived at the ancient church, but a thin ray filtered through the beautiful stained glass windows, sending spirals of colour on to the worn stone floor. She sat on the hard wooden pew behind her mother and uncle, with Mrs Hattersley by her side. The rest of the church was filled with friends and villagers. Joe Carter had been a popular man and a lot of voices swelled the choir when the hymns were sung.

  Emily’s mother was sniffing the whole time and her uncle was comforting her, for all the world as if he c
ared about what had happened. Bitterness swirled inside Emily as she remembered the day he’d tried to rape her and then punched her father in the stomach when he stopped him. If Harry Standen hadn’t arrived, he might have killed her father. She would always be grateful to Harry for being there at the right time and she would never forgive her uncle. Once during the service he turned his head to look at her but she stared through him and his gaze dropped.

  Afterwards, when they followed the coffin outside, Emily was glad of Mrs Hattersley standing beside her. She could smell the sharp tang of freshly dug earth from the grave and the faint scent of decaying flowers from another grave nearby. The small graveyard was neat and these graves were set beneath the branches of a tree. Emily thought it was peaceful and hoped her father could see from wherever he was now, and would know she loved him.

  Emily fought her tears as the vicar intoned the blessing and then Ma stepped forward to throw some dirt on the coffin. She was wearing black and weeping onto her brother’s shoulder as he supported her. Emily threw a flower Tomas had picked from the gardens at Priorsfield Manor.

  After everyone had melted away leaving just the family and Mrs Hattersley by the grave, Ma looked at her daughter.

  ‘Are you coming back to the house?’

  ‘I do not wish to come back while …’ Emily looked at her uncle.

  ‘Then you won’t be coming home again. I thought to tell you in private but now you’ve made your attitude clear I might as well say it now. Your father’s will leaves everything that matters to me. There’s an envelope for you with his lawyer – and he’s given that pile of junk in Ely to the person who works for him.’

  ‘Pa left Christopher all his stock in the shop?’ Emily frowned. ‘What about the stuff in the barns? Pa told me it was mine.’

  ‘It was worthless and I had someone clear it out, because I’m selling up and the next owner won’t want that junk.’

  ‘You’ve sold it already?’ Emily was angry. ‘It belonged to me.’