Skylark

by Jenny Pattrick

  I take a deep breath. ‘Jack,’ I say, and he looks up surprised. I usually call him Mr Lacey when we are downstairs or outside. ‘I have some news for you.’

  He laughs at that — almost a shout.’ Well, that makes two of us,’ he says. ‘I hope that yours is as happy as mine.’

  So I am filled with doubt. Am I simply a deluded fool to think he will be pleased? My news comes out more subdued than I had planned, more of a whisper than a bold statement. ‘I am with child, Jack. You will have a son or daughter at last.’

  Jack catches his breath sharply. Now he looks at me; now he pays close attention.

  ‘Oh, Mattie,’ he says. ‘Oh dear.’

  I cry out. My fork clatters to the floor. ‘It is not a matter of oh dear! Surely you are pleased? Surely you must expect this, after so many … such good times we have enjoyed?’

  He stands then and comes behind me. I feel his warm hands on my neck, rubbing the aches away as I always loved. ‘Dear Mattie,’ he says gently, ‘I have hurt you. I should have been more careful …’

  Or words to that effect. He’s gentle and loving and says he will make sure the child is cared for and brought up properly. And so on and so on, as my spirits sink lower and lower.

  Finally he comes out with his news. His beloved Lily, who he thought lost forever, is returning. ‘She has suffered dreadfully, Mattie. She needs a safe home and a loving husband. She has written via Doctor Ingram that she will be here within a day or two, travelling in secrecy out of fear that she will be pursued by a dreadful villain. Oh Mattie, we must make haste to prepare the house for a mistress!’

  My situation entirely forgotten. At that moment I would happily have picked up the poker and struck the ‘beloved Lily’ dead. How dare she assume Jack would wait for her! How dare she return just at this moment! ‘Clean the house yourself, you selfish man!’ I shout and run howling out into the kitchen garden where I begin pulling out weeds as if they were handfuls of the ‘beloved’s’ hair.

  Two days later, when Jack brings Lily back to the farm, I am calmer but determined. I will fight! I will not let my child, who is Jack’s, play second fiddle to a fancy woman who is surely wicked and a temptress. Even some kind of witch, to have entrapped my Jack for so many years while she travelled with loose performing folk and sent no note or news.

  Up the two of them ride, side by side, walking sedately through the gate, which Matiu holds open for them, grinning up to catch a glimpse of the ‘new mistress’. I would like to spit on her but must play my cards carefully.

  I expected a wild, flamboyant woman who would despise me and play the pander to Jack. I wait in the kitchen, seeing to my roast of mutton with parsnips and potatoes. She would not find fault with my cooking! In she comes, smiling, runs straight to me, and enfolds me in a warm hug! I am so surprised I forget to glower and smile back.

  ‘Mattie!’ she cries, ‘Jack has told me all about you.’ (I wonder how much he has told.) ‘You have been such a comfort to him while I have disgracefully left him all alone these past years. Bless you!’

  And she links arms with me and draws me to the table, where we sit side by side. ‘Jack,’ she says, ‘will you go out and see to the horses for a little while? Mattie and I need to talk.’

  ‘The meal …’ I say.

  ‘Never mind if it spoils a little. We must sort out a matter or two first.’

  Jack goes. Lily finds the brandy, pours us each a tot and sits again. I am too astonished to do anything but follow suit. I cannot keep up my resolve. She is so full of life, so friendly! As if I was her long-lost sister instead of a servant.

  She downs her brandy in one gulp and looks at me. She is so beautiful! Those dark, shining eyes! A small, neat woman, walnut-brown hair curling around her face and falling low and loose below her shoulders; her skin creamy, though the ride has brought a glow to her cheeks; her mouth like a little rosebud. You would not expect that she had been living a sinful life among questionable folk. The nuns had warned me that people of the theatre were fallen women and the men wickedly lecherous. I had been taught never to go near a theatre for fear of becoming a fallen woman myself. (And let none among you wag an accusing finger. My feelings for Jack were pure and constant; my hope marriage.) But here was Lily, so full of life, seeming so dainty and sweet, turning all my prejudices upside down.

  ‘Now,’ she says, ‘Jack has been open with me about the situation. We must think what to do.’

  Tears gather in my eyes. I am furious with them for making me seem weak but they will fall and fall. ‘I had hoped,’ I manage to blurt out, not at all the poised lady I had practised to be, ‘that Jack would marry me now that the child is on the way. But now you have come …’

  ‘So marriage is important to you?’

  I look at her astonished. ‘Of course! Who would want a child raised in sin?’

  Lily eyes me sternly. ‘Mattie, I have raised a child perfectly well out of wedlock. I did not consider her to be sinful. Or that I was. Who’s to know whether marriage comes in to it?’

  ‘The Good Lord knows,’ I say, feeling on firmer ground. ‘Without marriage, without baptism, the child will not enter heaven — should he die.’

  Lily snorts. ‘That is rubbish and I believe not one word of it. My little one was a beautiful, blameless child. Neither she nor I have been blessed by a priest but I have no doubt she is beloved of God and at rest in heaven.’

  This is the first I have heard that her child is dead. ‘Oh, Lily, how sad. I did not know! Was it the diphtheria?’

  Now Lily’s tears gather. ‘Alas no. She drowned in a most horrid way. I cannot bear to think about it. Later you will hear the story.’ She steadies herself with another tot of brandy and takes a long breath. I have always been fascinated by the way Lily will take a deep, deep breath to steady her soul at difficult times. I suppose it is the theatre training.

  ‘Now,’ she says, more cheerfuly, ‘let us take stock. You are with child and the child is Jack’s?’

  I nod.

  ‘And I am with child and the child is not Jack’s!’

  Her look is both cheeky and rueful. The tilt of her head, the wink, the spread of her hands too perfect. I have to laugh. ‘You are not speaking true! You are unkind to tell such a lie.’

  She widens her eyes. This is the first time — certainly not the last — when I am not sure where truth lies and where invention takes over. ‘No, but Mattie, my dear, you must believe me if we are to get on. Now listen: Jack must stand by you and your child. But also he loves me and always has. You must accept the fact,’ she lays a rather grimy hand on mine, ‘that he wishes to marry me and settle me here.’

  I sigh. It is the truth. My tears gather again. Lily raises a finger to still them. All her actions are dramatic. All perfectly executed and captivating. And somehow not quite real. She stands and walks about the kitchen, thinking. I take time to turn the roast and make gravy. Jack will be hungry after his long ride.

  When the gravy is made, Lily takes my shoulders in her two hands and guides me to the table again. Her face is serious now and I think this time she is not play-acting.

  ‘I’m going to suggest a way around all this,’ she says, sitting down beside me, ‘which may shock you. But nevertheless it may be a good workable plan. So please keep an open mind and make no outcry until I have finished and you have thought carefully.’

  I watch her face, both fascinated and frightened. I feel like a rabbit transfixed by strong lamplight.

  ‘I believe that Jack needs both you and me,’ she says. ‘I am his dream, you might say, and you his reality.’ She frowns and shakes her head. ‘No that is not quite right — we are both real in his eyes. I cannot find the right words. But Mattie, let us find a way to please our Jack and to satisfy ourselves too, eh?’ And here she winks. ‘Now. I propose that you and Jack marry secretly.’

  I gasp, as you can imagine! Again she raises a finger to stay any words from me.

  ‘Your child will be baptised and named
a Lacey, and God will be pleased with you. But …’ She taps an agile fingernail on the table, tap, tap, tap. ‘… In the eyes of the community, I will be Mrs Lacey.’

  I am completely lost. What on earth is she suggesting? Two Mrs Laceys? A pair of wives? Can she be mad, perhaps? Deranged by her dreadful experiences? But she continues as if what she is suggesting is perfectly sensible.

  ‘Jack likes to be admired. He enjoys the respect of his friends and neighbours. He will enjoy having me on his arm when he visits. I could be the public wife and you could be the private one. He also enjoys, I am sure, the things you have given him: a warm and well-ordered home, good food and comfort — of all kinds. I would not be so skilled at these things. There is also this … Mattie, at the moment I am desperate. I must hide from a man who thinks I am dead. The child inside me will be born in a few months.’

  I look in astonishment at her waist and see only a slight thickening. She nods at my glance. ‘I have not eaten well in the past months and must regain my strength.’

  I am shocked. Of course I am. How often had the nuns taught us that a man must take only one wife? That the custom of my native forebears was sinful and displeasing to God? But I am a little intrigued. How on earth could such an improper suggestion be made to work? Also, I am worried that my roast is spoiling.

  So we call Jack in and have a surprisingly happy meal. Jack should be anxious; he should be worried about my child and Lily’s and what the neighbours will think. On the contrary; he compliments the meal. He talks about a new foal and the state of the road into the valley. He gazes too many times at Lily, but he shares a joke with me when Lily uses a knife instead of a spoon on her apple pie. She will need a lesson or two in manners if she is to be accepted in the houses of the neighbouring farms. Lily’s plan, I suddenly see, could work within our own little household, but in the wider world? Surely not.

  And there is another matter. One which I am more than anxious to discuss with her.

  After the meal Jack stretches lazily. He gives Lily a fond kiss on the cheek and then the same to me! In front of Lily! What to think? Has Lily discussed her plan with him?

  ‘I’ll leave you ladies to talk,’ he says, ‘while I take a stroll over to the stables.’ He is grinning as he walks past the window. Like a cat with the cream.

  Lily laughs out loud to see him. ‘There is a happy man, Mattie. Let us see if we can keep him thus.’

  I cannot keep my question to myself a moment longer. I blurt it out. ‘But Lily … who will share his bed? If I am to wed him secretly, surely I …’

  ‘Well, of course, that is The Question,’ says Lily with a grand gesture as if she is quoting from some play or the Bible. ‘My thought is that we will both share his bed. Why not?’

  I gasp in horror. ‘Both of us? At once?’ I begin to suspect that Lily is indeed a fallen woman as the nuns warned. A child of Satan.

  Lily winks most wickedly. ‘No, no, dear Mattie, I meant one at a time. Surely we can take turns. Though now that you mention it … together might be fun, don’t you think?’

  Oh, she was ever the tease, our Lily, none more than that day when we discussed arrangements as if planning a pleasant picnic, not a very unusual — many would say immoral — way of life.

  ‘Listen to me,’ she says now, serious again, her moods darting around like fish in a pond. ‘You must understand, Mattie, that I am an artiste. I might be desperate now to hide and deliver my baby safely, but once danger is past, I know that the theatre will call me again. I love dear Jack, but also I love my work as an artiste.’ She sighs, hand on her breast. ‘No matter how much I might want to be a good and constant wife, I suspect that in the future I will let Jack down and make him unhappy. So you see, our arrangement will be like a security for him.’

  Her glance in my direction is both rueful and uncertain. As well it might be. I am suddenly angry. This woman wants to have her cake and eat it too, while I snatch at crumbs. ‘I will not be a servant in this household,’ I cry out, ‘while you play the lady for a time and then run away again. I will not!’

  Lily claps her hands. It seems she is delighted with my outburst. ‘Bravo, that is well said. Indeed. You will be mistress in this house while we are alone. Perhaps when visitors come we can put on a little show, so that Jack — and the children — are considered respectable.’ She plants her hands together in exaggerated supplication. ‘Please say yes, Mattie. Dear Mattie?’

  I hum and hah, fiddle with the dishes soaking in the pail. ‘I will marry Jack truly, in front of a priest?’

  Lily nods firmly, but then hesitates. ‘I suppose we must ask Jack?’

  ‘Well, no,’ I say firmly, and with as much dignity as I can muster in this extraordinary situation. ‘Jack must ask me.’

  SCENE: The same, two years later, 1866–67

  An amusing ‘coincidence’!

  This ‘scene’ is not proper for the young ones. Perhaps Jack and Lily and I will enjoy it together one evening in the privacy of the bedroom. It is worth a laugh, as Lily would say, if she were in a happier mood.

  By the end of 1866 my wedding was a distant, pretty memory and we were back to reality. Samuel and Sarah were both born healthy and were now crawling or walking about the house. Doctor Ingram came in time for Samuel but he was not called for Sarah, which I thought unfair. However, truth to tell, Lily was as good a midwife as the doctor. She sang me funny songs during the labour which she said were designed so my laughter would bounce the baby out of the womb! Out she came some hours later with more screams than laughter, but alive, as was I, praise be to God. My Sarah is a great and everlasting joy to me.

  And the neighbours? Well, they raised eyebrows no doubt, or maybe praised Jack for ‘doing the honest thing by the servant’s child’. Or more likely simply looked the other way. He was not the only man to have lain with a servant. I warrant, though, he was the only man who married the servant and lived in sin with the mistress! Ha! At any rate, Jack was popular, so the farming folk about these parts were well inclined to ignore their horse-breeder’s private life.

  In those early days we managed to maintain a happy household. Lily had a way of making things right when we were together at home. She would snap her fingers at any doubt or guilt I might have. She was never raised by nuns; her parents were not your usual purveyors of good manners and discipline. They had died early, of course, so Lily raised herself in any wayward manner she thought fit. She was fortunate in that sense. Sometimes my cheeks would burn to think what we got up to. The way we might squabble, Lily and I, about whose turn it was for Jack, never mind what Jack might think! Oh, that man was too desirable, with his laughing eyes and his narrow hips and long thighs. He knew it too, and would drive the two of us mad of an evening, complimenting us both and twitching his moustache until we were both on fire, the naughty man.

  But we stuck to our rule — turn and turn about — until one night when a storm from the south blew up the coast, bringing hail and a howling wind. It was my turn with Jack and the two of us were nicely tucked up and the babies happily asleep in the big nursery, which Jack and Matiu had built that summer. Outside the wind battered; inside the fire burned low in the grate and by its glow I saw Jack’s shadowed face as he bent to kiss me.

  Suddenly our enjoyable business was shattered by a pattering of bare feet. Not a sleepless child but Lily, her nightdress flying out like the wings of a swooping owl, as she leapt onto the bed, sending us all tumbling.

  ‘What is it?’ cried Jack, thinking some disaster had struck the house or the children.

  Lily sent us both shrieking by placing an icy foot on each of our exposed and rosy stomachs. ‘I’m too cold,’ she laughed. ‘Warm me up quick before I turn to ice!’

  Well, warm her up we did. And more. Somehow the raging storm outside seemed to goad us into our own wee maelstrom of wildness. Lily was in a fine, high old mood and brought us all to a peak in a manner of speaking. It was a grand night.

  Not one we repeated very often. My
quiet nights with Jack were precious to me. I am not like Lily. I treasure days and nights that proceed peaceful and ordered like a long reach of quiet water in a river. Lily’s habit of stirring us into a frenzy of activity is all very well but best taken in small quantities like good liquor. Now I think about it, perhaps Jack’s nights with Lily were always full of drama. But I remember best the nights when he and I talked and kissed and made babies gently like a real married couple. Which we were, though the world never knew.

  Soon it was apparent that both Lily and I were again with child. Lily thought it had to be the night of the storm, which made me giggle and blush. But in truth it could be any of many nights, as we both well knew. The months passed and towards our time Lily became poorly — lethargic and dull — which was not her wont at all. Jack took her in to Whanganui in the trap to see Doctor Ingram. I wanted to accompany them, as it was many months since I had visited town, but Jack looked away and said ‘Not this time’.

  Well, it was hard to accept. I was the wife. I was the one carrying the legitimate child. Lily was the fallen woman, yet she was the one to visit the doctor and be seen by all as the devoted wife, when she did little around the house but entertain the children with songs and little dances. I cried and made a fuss but Jack’s face set hard against me for the first time that I remembered. He drove off without saying a word of goodbye, or showing any concern about leaving me alone and near my time.

  I sat on the little bench in the kitchen garden and sobbed. Matiu brought me an apple but I sent him away.

  Lily and Jack came back next day, Lily in much brighter spirits. No doubt she attended the theatre with Jack. Doctor’s orders were that she was to eat lambs’ liver and plenty of spinach, both of which she despised. I grinned at her grimly and promised Jack I would force the hated foods down her throat. A petty revenge, but sharing is not always easy.