Grace's Story

by Jennie Walters

  ‘Because I’m a married woman, and I’m only doing my bit to help the country in an emergency. You had a good place in the kitchen, my girl, and you’ve thrown it away. What’s going to happen when our boys come back? Have you thought about that? You’ll be out on your ear in no time, and let me tell you this - ’ she leaned forward and wagged a warning finger under my nose, ‘no one’s going to want a wife who doesn’t know how to cook and smells of horses.’

  ‘Now, Polly, that’s a long way off,’ Da broke in. ‘Grace is old enough to make up her own mind, and if she wants to work in the stables then I’m not going to stand in her way. I’m too glad of the help, to be honest. She’ll make a first-rate groom and that’s what matters to me. Surely it’s better she should be happy here than miserable in the kitchen?’

  A first-rate groom! It was so wonderful to think I might actually be good at something that I couldn’t help beaming. And indeed, my new place turned out to be everything I could have hoped for. To begin with, anyway. We had four horses to look after - Bella (Lady Vye’s hunter), Moonlight, old Daffodil and Cracker, who had recently been bought for the Vyes’ older son - and two ponies - Cobweb and little Pippin, who pulled the mowing-machine - which was just about manageable between the two of us. First thing, Da would open up the stables and help me sweep them out, then we’d take Bella and Moonlight or Cracker for a ride if they needed the exercise, which was hardly like work at all. After that it was time for feeding and grooming the horses, turning those out to grass who weren’t wanted that day, and then mucking out the stalls, soaping and polishing in the harness-room.

  We ate our meals together very companionably there, for it’s such a cosy place. There’s a fireplace and a boiler for preparing hot mashes and warming the hot-water pipes, a comfortable armchair beside it, and a stag’s head with spiky antlers mounted on the wall above - keeping a kindly eye on us all, or so it seems to me. I did miss having a friend like Florrie to talk to, but it was such a relief not to have Mrs Jeakes watching my back, despairing over everything I did. If Da had any advice, he’d tell me straight out and I’d usually remember next time; it was as simple as that.

  ‘I shall be leaving you in charge of the stables shortly,’ he said to me on the Saturday, after we’d given the horses their hay and oats. ‘I have to go out for a while.’

  I’d been careful not to nag him about learning to drive; once you’ve put an idea in my father’s head, he needs time to think it over. I couldn’t resist raising my eyebrows at him, though.

  ‘You win. Monty’s going to take me for a spin in the motor-car,’ he said, laughing at my expression. ‘And if I manage to stay on the road, we shall be out for the whole of tomorrow, too.’

  ‘There you are! You’ll be driving by yourself in no time,’ I said, thoroughly delighted.

  Having the stables to myself was quite a treat. In the afternoon, being well ahead with my chores, I took Cracker out for a ride. She was a lively character, although I was beginning to get the measure of her. Both the Vye sons would soon be home from school for the Christmas holidays, which was just as well; they could help exercise the horses. The weather had turned bright and frosty, and I couldn’t believe Lord Vye was actually paying me to ride through his beautiful grounds. Then who should I find on my return to the stables but Philip Hathaway, feeding Moonlight a carrot. The sight of him brought back such a flood of uncomfortable memories that I felt myself blushing as I jumped off Cracker and led her into the stable block.

  ‘Hello, Grace,’ Philip said. ‘So you managed to escape from the kitchen for good? Well done! You look very fetching in those breeches.’

  ‘Lord Vye’s given me permission to wear them,’ I said, my cheeks hotter than ever. Luckily, unbuckling the girth and heaving off Cracker’s saddle gave me an excuse to hide my face. ‘They’re more practical than a skirt.’

  ‘I think it’s an excellent idea.’ He smiled at me. ‘Here, let me give you a hand with that.’ And he made as if to take the saddle out of my arms.

  ‘It’s all right, thank you, sir. I can manage.’

  ‘Still as prickly as ever, I see.’ He followed me towards the harness-room. ‘Why don’t we declare a truce? You should be pleased with me. It took some persuading, but I think my uncle finally believes it was you who rescued his horse, and now he knows why. Didn’t you wonder what was happening?’ He opened the door for me and we went through together.

  ‘Thank you,’ I said, ‘but I’m trying to forget about that and I’d be grateful if you would too.’

  He laughed. ‘That’s a pity, I should say it was your finest hour. And now here you are in the stables, doing the unexpected thing all over again. I take my hat off to you, Grace - you’re full of surprises. ’

  I stowed Cracker’s saddle on its wooden tree and put her bridle to one side for cleaning later. ‘And what can I do for you, sir? Did you want to go for a ride?’

  ‘I thought I might take Moonlight out, if that’s all right, although I insist on carrying his saddle. Which one is it?’

  I was too quick for him, though, and had the saddle down in a second. ‘You must let me do my job, sir. It’s what I’m here for.’

  ‘I suppose so,’ he said, jumping up. ‘But in return, you have to promise to stop calling me “sir” all the time, as I seem to remember mentioning before.’

  ‘What shall I call you, then?’ I asked, looking for Moonlight’s bridle.

  ‘How about Philip? At least when there’s nobody around. I hate all this “sir” business - we’ve known each other too long for that.’

  That’s one thing I’ll say for the Hathaways: they treat everyone just the same. ‘I’ll take my coffee in the library, Fenton,’ that’s His Lordship’s idea of conversation with one of us. But Philip’s mother always stops by to see Ma when she’s visiting the Hall, and they chat away in the kitchen over a cup of tea like nobody’s business. They made friends when they were young, and Mrs Hathaway’s evidently the sort of person who doesn’t pretend to forget about that. She trained as a doctor, which is out of the ordinary to begin with, and she does some sort of work at the cottage hospital, so she’s seen a little of the world that most of us live in.

  Philip held the door for me again, and talked all the way back to the stable block and for most of the time it took to saddle up Moonlight. He’d just finished the first term of a medical degree at Oxford University, apparently, and was planning to become a doctor like his father.

  ‘What about the war?’ I couldn’t help asking. ‘Won’t you be going off to fight?’

  ‘I haven’t decided yet,’ he said, which surprised me a little. Whatever my reservations about him, I’d have thought he’d was the type to do his duty.

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘I’m not quite sure I agree with this war.’

  That wasn’t much of an answer. ‘I shouldn’t think there’s many who do,’ I said, walking around Moonlight’s head to look him in the face. ‘But it’s started now and we all have to do our bit. Do you think the Huns are going to march through Belgium and France and then stop at the Channel? What will you say when they’re knocking on our front door? “Do come in and make yourselves at home?”’

  Why, German warships had even started shelling Hartlepool and a couple of other towns along our east coast. One hundred and thirty-seven people had lost their lives: not soldiers or sailors but ordinary people like us, going about their daily business. A girl had been killed scrubbing her front step. The war wasn’t in some faraway country any more, but right here, at home!

  ‘And who are these dreadful Huns, bayoneting babies and old women and carrying out all these terrible atrocities we read about in the newspaper?’ he asked. ‘Do you really think their soldiers can be so very different from ours?’

  ‘Of course they are! They’re Huns, aren’t they? You just said it yourself. And they’re the ones who’ve started all this off.’

  ‘They’re only doing what they’re told, the same as our troops.’ He untw
isted the cheek strap on Moonlight’s bridle. ‘Perhaps we should let the generals fight it out with each other. They might not be so quick to declare war if no one was prepared to back them up.’

  I had no idea what he was talking about. ‘We have to back them up! What else are we going to do? Pretend it isn’t happening?’

  The thought of Tom, and Alf, and all the thousands of other brave young men preparing to defend their country, even sailing over from abroad (not to mention veterans like Colonel Vye) while Philip Hathaway stuck his head in the sand at Oxford University and got on with life as usual - well, it made me want to spit. I thought he was just making up excuses not to fight. A rotten coward, in other words. And if he went around saying that kind of thing in public, he’d most probably be lynched.

  ‘Here you are,’ I said, handing him the reins. ‘Have a nice ride. Sir.’

  He led Moonlight over to the mounting block without another word. I pulled on the opposite stirrup while he got into the saddle and then tightened the girth.

  ‘Can we not try to be friends, Grace?’ he asked, looking down at me when he was done. ‘We shall be seeing a lot more of each other soon, and I’d like it if we could get on.’

  But I merely turned on my heel and walked away, too angry to wonder what he might have meant. We hardly spoke when he came back from his ride, and I was still out of sorts when Da returned from the driving lesson. At least that didn’t seem to have gone too badly.

  ‘I got the thing started,’ he reported, ‘and drove a couple of miles. The darn clutch pedal’s tricky to manage - I shall need some more practice before I can get the hang of it properly. There are so many things to think about at the same time, that’s the trouble, what with the clutch, and the gear lever, and steering. It’s quite a performance.’

  I could see he was enthusiastic, though; he told me that Monty had agreed to take him out the whole of the next day because he ‘showed promise’ (at least, Da thought that’s what he said). Since it was Sunday and I had the afternoon off, they said I could sit in the back for a little while, so long as I didn’t speak or otherwise be a distraction. My first trip in a motor-car! It was wonderful in every way. The smell of the leather seats, the purr of the engine as we sailed down the drive with the wind in our faces, and then the sight of the open road stretching out for miles ahead, beckoning us on … I shan’t forget it, as long as I live.

  ‘You were right, Grace,’ my father said to me that night. ‘People will never stop riding horses, but there’s something to be said for the motor-car. I’m going to talk to Mr Braithwaite about the chauffeur’s job. I shall need a few more lessons, but I may be able to manage it.’

  He was to be disappointed, however. Mr Braithwaite came to talk to Da, rather than the other way round. He said that a chauffeur had just been appointed with overall responsibility for the stables, and that he was dreadfully sorry, but we would have to move out of the gate lodge directly after Christmas.

  Six

  I have not washed for a week, or had my boots off for a fortnight … It is all the best fun. I have never felt so well, or so happy, or enjoyed anything so much. It just suits my stolid health, and stolid nerves, and barbaric disposition. The fighting-excitement vitalises everything, every sight and word and action.

  From a letter by Captain Julian Grenfell to his parents from Flanders, 3 November 1914. He died of his wounds in May 1915, aged 27.

  The new chauffeur was called Jim Gallagher. He was good-looking, and didn’t he know it: curly brown hair and eyes so blue you couldn’t help but notice them. If he smiled (which didn’t often happen), it was as if he’d decided you were worthy of some wonderful present. And he only smiled with his mouth. Those pale eyes stayed cold, looking past your shoulder to see if anyone more important was about. In fact, the only thing to be said in his favour was that he had consented to sleep in a room over the stables until his wife and family arrived after Christmas, when they would take possession of the gate lodge. I disliked him on sight, and nothing he did over the next few weeks made me change my mind. You could tell straight away he didn’t care about horses, for one thing.

  ‘I shall inspect the stables every morning,’ he told us straight off. ‘If there are any decisions to be made, we can talk about them then. Apart from that, I’ll be spending most of my time on the motor-car - it’s not been left in good condition and needs a lot of work. I shan’t want to be bothered, so don’t come running to me with every little problem. Understand?’

  ‘How can you let him talk to you like that?’ I asked Da when we were on our own. ‘Doesn’t he realise you’ve been running the stables for ten years? You’ve forgotten more about this place than he’ll ever know.’

  He shrugged. ‘The man’s been put over me, so I shall just have to get used to it. Still, at least it sounds like he’ll leave us alone.’

  That was true. We were able to get on with our work in peace for the most part, and carry on taking our meals together as usual - although Mr Gallagher (who ate with the others in the yardhouse) seemed somehow to sense the moment we sat down and would come marching in with some order that he should have given us hours earlier. The harness-room wasn’t our cosy sanctuary any longer, not when he could suddenly turn up there without warning.

  One day he met Florrie on her way out as he was coming in; she had the afternoon off and the three of us had shared a quick bite of dinner together. He looked at the remains of our meal on the table and then at me. ‘You’d better not be wasting all day gossiping, young lady, or I shall have you back with your friends in the kitchen on a permanent basis. It still doesn’t seem right to me that a slip of a girl should be doing man’s work. There must be a strong lad somewhere who’d be glad of the job.’

  ‘Not that we could find in two months of looking,’ Da said. ‘Anyway, Grace is as good a groom as anyone could want. If she starts slacking off, she’ll have me to reckon with, don’t you worry.’

  I had found it hard to cope for the first few days, what with all that heavy labour and hours spent riding after being so long out of practice. Now, though, there were muscles in my arms and colour in my cheeks from being out in the fresh air, and I managed my chores without too much trouble. I put in an honest day’s work for my pay, as Mr Gallagher would know if he did his job properly and paid any sort of attention to the stables. He’d taken against me by now, though, and I knew why. One morning he had come to inspect the place when Da was out with the gig (as quite often happened), so it was my turn to show him round and take his instructions - once we had got one thing settled.

  ‘Would you mind putting out your cigarette, please, Mr Gallagher?’ I asked, smelling tobacco smoke on the air before he’d even walked in.

  ‘I won’t be staying long,’ he said, puffing away as he strode towards the stalls. ‘The muck heap’s too full. Take a barrow load round to the kitchen garden for compost, will you?’

  ‘I’m sorry, sir,’ I said, standing in his way. ‘Nobody smokes in here, that’s the rule.’

  It was hard to believe he could do such a stupid thing, even out of forgetfulness. There was too great a risk of fire, with all that straw about and a full hayloft up above to feed the flames. I knew my father would say as much to anyone, no matter who they were.

  Mr Gallagher stared at me. Then he took another pull on the cigarette and sent three perfect smoke rings sailing into the air, one after another. ‘So now you’re giving out orders, are you?’ he said, when he’d quite finished. ‘Strange, I thought that was my job.’

  I couldn’t believe he was being so awkward! It made me even more determined not to back down. ‘Lord Vye insists, I’m afraid.’ (Well, he might, at a pinch.) ‘I’ll lose my job if he hears there was anyone smoking in here.’

  ‘And we can’t have that, can we? Not when you’re such a very good worker. According to your father, that is, and why would he lie?’ He put his face next to mine; I could smell the rank smoke on his breath and see a shred of tobacco on his tongue. ‘I’m ke
eping a close eye on you, young lady, and don’t you forget it for one second. Now get that muck heap in order, double quick.’ He tossed the cigarette into a bucket of clean water and strode out of the stables, leaving me to lean against the wall before my knees gave way. My heart was beating like the clappers; Mr Gallagher wasn’t the type to be shown up by a girl and get over it in a hurry.

  ‘It’s so unfair,’ I complained to my father, after I’d told him the whole story. ‘Why should we have to take orders from a jumped-up ignoramus like him? Think of all the years you’ve been working for Lord Vye!’

  ‘We both know His Lordship doesn’t care about the stables. He’s only interested in that motor-car, and he wants a nice-looking chap to drive him about in it.’

  Da put a hand to touch the scar that puckered up one cheek, probably not even aware of what he was doing. Years ago, he’d broken up a drunken fight and been cut about the face, which was why he’d had to stop working in the house (footmen having to look presentable). Becoming a groom and then coachman was much more to his taste, though, since he’d always loved horses and learned to ride as a young boy, growing up next door to a farm.

  ‘I’m sure your mother and I won’t end up out on the street,’ he went on. ‘We can probably bunk down over the stables until another place comes up.’

  ‘You don’t think Lord Vye’s paying you back for what happened in the summer with the Colonel’s horse, do you?’ I asked. This uncomfortable idea had been in my mind for a while. ‘There’ll be consequences,’ Da had said at the time, and now here he was, having to give up his home. Was it because of what I had done?

  ‘I can’t see His Lordship harbouring a grudge about that. Mr Gallagher needs a cottage - he has a wife and two little ones coming to join him in the new year, so it makes sense for them to have the gate lodge. We’re rattling around in it now, with you children grown up and gone.’