Autumn Softly Fell (7 page)

‘It’s like trying to find a needle in a haystack, child. He could be
anywhere. Anywhere.’ Her uncle turned away, crossed to the window. His broad shoulders seemed to blot out the light, as if a shadow had fallen across the day room. But Dorothea drew comfort from his words which seemed to suggest that he
had
made an effort to find her papa even if the search had been, up to now, fruitless. She wanted to tell him to go on looking, not to give up. It was more important than anything.

But at that moment he turned to face her and the words died in her throat.

‘Come here, child.’

It was the last thing she wanted, but Uncle Albert was not the sort of man you dared to disobey. Her feet dragged, her legs were like jelly, she hung her head because she could not bear to look into his eyes but there was no escape. His big hand tilted her chin and she had to look up at him.

Her head was spinning. She felt faint. He was so tall and grim and angry that she couldn’t bear it. But as he moved her head from side to side, she realized that the angry glare was fading from his eyes. He was looking at her now with a curious expression, half
wonderment
and half something else – pain, perhaps?

‘Yes,’ he muttered to himself. ‘It’s quite definite. I can’t think why I didn’t see it before. It’s Florence all over. Florence reborn.’

She found her voice. ‘Who, who is Florence?’

‘Eh? What? But surely you know, child? Surely you know! Florence was your mother. My sister. And you are the spit and image of her.’

He let her go and turned away. A shudder seemed to pass through him. The shadow in the room had gone. Dorothea could breathe again.

‘I think,’ he muttered, ‘I think for now it would be best if you stayed here, with us.

‘Until, until Papa comes back?’

‘Yes, yes. When—if—he does. Or maybe….’ He cleared his throat. ‘It’s not a bad place, once you get used to it. Not bad at all.’

He sounded almost as if he was trying to convince himself, and Dorothea remembered Henry’s words:
he’s an interloper
…
he’s not one of us
….

‘No more running off, now, do you hear me, child? There’s no knowing what might have happened if young Fitzwilliam hadn’t come along. Do you promise?’

‘I, I promise, Uncle.’

‘Good. Good. And now, well, talking of Fitzwilliam, he had rather a bright idea. A governess, he said. To keep you in line. To
improve
you.’

A governess? What was a governess?

Dorothea did not have chance to ask. Uncle Albert, with one last keen glance, departed as abruptly as he’d arrived.

She was to have a governess. But what did that mean? If Henry had suggested it, surely it couldn’t be too bad.

Nanny soon put her right on that score.

‘It’s no more than you deserve, my girl. If you’d behaved yourself properly, it needn’t have happened. Running away like that! Mrs Brannan was most put out. Spoke very sharply to me, she did. Well, I can’t be everywhere at once. I haven’t got eyes in the back of my head – which she doesn’t understand, seemingly.’

Nanny glared at Dorothea. (
Don’t take any notice,
Henry had said:
it’s her job to be horrid
.)

‘Wilful disobedience, is what I call it. And see what’s come of it! You’ve been such a naughty, wicked girl that only a governess will do. You needn’t think that a governess will be all kindness and charity like dear old Nanny! Gracious me, no! A governess will beat you as soon as look at you. Why, I knew one as used to hold her boy’s head under water for two whole minutes at a time, to teach him his manners. So just you watch out, little madam! You’ll soon be put in your place, make no mistake!’

‘
WHATEVER SHALL I
do?’ said Dorothea in despair. She had just been given the terrible news. As if it wasn’t bad enough that all governesses were monsters, the one who was arriving at Clifton Park tomorrow was a
foreign
monster. Nanny had been breathless with horror, having heard it from Cook who’d got it from Mrs Bourne who knew every last detail of the business of the house.

The boy Richard, propped on his pillows, looked at Dorothea with his big dark eyes, guarded. ‘Tell them to send her away. That is what I would do.’

‘No one will listen. There is no one to tell.’ Only Nora, who had no standing at all, or Nanny, who never took heed and who might either brush you aside or lash out, give you a hiding. Dorothea knew that she had not been forgiven yet for her
wilful disobedience
in running away. ‘You don’t understand,’ she told Richard. ‘You don’t know what it’s like. I’m no better than Polly, locked in a cage.’

‘What about me?’ said Richard sulkily. ‘How would you like it if you weren’t even allowed to get up? How would you like it if you had a withered leg?’

Very proud of it he was too, thought Dorothea bitterly, her mind on the terrible governess as she sat there on the edge of Richard’s bed. But then she listened to her words again and told herself to stop being so unkind. Richard might be a bit of a misery at times, he did tend to
wallow
in it (as Mrs Browning would have said). But wasn’t it enough to make anyone a misery, being in his shoes? Besides, most of the time she enjoyed his company and being permitted to visit his room was the only lasting advantage of her failed escape. She had a duty to cheer him up, not to wallow in troubles of her own.

‘Is your leg really so bad? Can’t you stand on it at all?’

Richard lowered his voice. ‘Sometimes I try, when Nurse isn’t looking. Sometimes I can stand up for just a second, if I hold onto the bed.’

‘Try now. I will help. You can hold on to me instead of the bed.’

But Nurse as always seemed to have a sixth sense and came striding into the room at just the wrong moment. ‘Now that’s enough. Master Richard is tired. He needs his rest.’

‘But I don’t
like
resting, Nurse. It is resting that makes me tired in the first place.’

‘What sort of talk is that?’ Nurse plumped his pillows, felt his forehead, manhandled him like a rag doll. ‘All this to-do is making you peaky. Miss Dorothea must leave you in peace.’

As she was ushered from the room, Dorothea heard him call anxiously after her, ‘You will come again, I suppose?’

‘Of course I will come. As often as they’ll let me.’

But Nurse said, ‘I’ll have the last word on that score,’ and she shut the door in Dorothea’s face.

‘And where have you been, my girl?’ said Nanny as Dorothea returned to the day room.

‘I was talking to Richard. Nurse sent me away.’

‘Humph! Well! Isn’t that Nurse all over!’ Nanny glowered, sitting in her chair by the fire. ‘Such an uppity creature. My word, isn’t she! All out for herself, too. I know
her
game. There’ll be rich pickings, she’s thinking, when Master Richard comes into his own. That’s what
she’s
after, mark my words! Artful madam!’

‘W—what do you mean, Nanny? What will Richard come into?’

‘Never you mind, my girl. It’s none of your business. I’ll have no more of your questions. You can save your breath to cool your porridge. Now, you just sit quiet like a good girl and don’t go waking Baby whilst I pop and have word with Cook. I haven’t told her yet what
that woman
said to me this morning.’

Dorothea sat meekly at the big table, anxious not to get in Nanny’s bad books. But once Nanny had gone Nora winked and said cheerily, ‘Take no notice, miss. She’s like a bear with a sore head today. She’s had words with Mrs Bourne again.’

It was scant comfort, however, to be reminded of the bickering and squabbling which seemed to be the stock in trade here. Nanny never had a good word to say about anyone except her ally Cook. But what was it, exactly, that she had got against Nurse? What sort of rich pickings could Nurse ever hope to gain from so thin, puny and pasty-faced a boy as Richard? It was yet another mystery. At times, she felt as if she was being kept in the dark about
everything
.

Nora went off to ‘do’ Nanny’s room, leaving Dorothea alone in the day room, the fire crackling, Polly biting the bars of her cage. How dreary it was! Dorothea yawned, tracing the grooves in the table, found herself wishing that Roderick was here, even though she’d been only too glad to see the back of him at the end of the Easter holidays.

He’d arrived from school to express surprise at finding her in the nursery. ‘I thought you’d have gone back where you came from by now.’ He had gone on to tell her loftily that he had no time for her – no time for mere
girls
– even if she
was
his cousin – which, he’d added, looking down his nose at her, he very much doubted. Dorothea had done her best to keep the peace by staying out of his way but every time she’d turned round, it seemed, he had been there – for all the world as if he was following her.

‘What are you doing now, Dotty Dot-dot? What game are you playing?’

‘I’m not playing any game, I’m just minding my own business like Nanny said I should. Please won’t you leave me alone? And don’t call me Dot. Only Papa calls me Dot.’

‘Then what
am
I to call you? Cuckoo in the nest? Answer me! Answer me at once! If you don’t, I shall pull your hair!’

He had pulled so hard it had made her cry out.

‘What’s all this? What’s this hullaballoo?’ Nanny had suddenly loomed over them, had swatted Dorothea aside with one clout, had grabbed Roderick by the ear. ‘Master Roderick! If you
won’t
behave yourself then you must be taught a
lesson
!’

She had given Roderick such a leathering it had made Dorothea’s eyes water. The fact that Roderick gritted his teeth and didn’t utter a sound had only served to spur Nanny on.

‘You were very brave!’ Dorothea had whispered afterwards when Nanny was safely out of the way and Roderick was lying under the table on his belly with his head in his hands. Mickey had liked to be called
brave
. It had made him puff out his chest.

‘I don’t care about being brave,’ Roderick had said in a voice which made Dorothea wonder if he’d been crying. ‘But she shan’t catch me again. I shan’t let her. You’ll see.’

Now Roderick had gone. He was back at school. And Dorothea’s heart sank as she sat at the big table and thought about tomorrow and the arrival of the monster. After tomorrow, long, dreary days would seem like paradise. Things were about to take a turn for the worst, she had no doubt.

‘Oh, but Dorossea, zis is very bad! Did your previous governess teach you
nothing
?’

Dorothea’s blood ran cold. Was this the moment when the monster struck?

They were sitting at the big table, books spread out in front of them. The lesson was called
arithmetic
. It was impossibly
complicated
. Dorothea would not have understood it even if her head had not been spinning with fear. What made it worse was that the governess did not
look
like a monster. She was tall, thin, quiet,
self-contained
. She came from France and her name was
Mademoiselle
Lacroix
. Without Nanny’s warnings, Dorothea might easily have been taken in. As it was, she’d been on her guard for over a week since the Mam’zelle’s arrival, waiting for the moment when the monster would show her true colours. That moment had perhaps arrived at last.

‘Dorossea, I ask you a question.’

Dorothea shook, her teeth chattered. ‘I’ve n—n—never had a governess.’

‘Then school. Have you not been to school?’

‘I went to the board school b-b-but only the b-boys did
arithmetic
.’

‘And the girls?’

‘S—sewing.’

The monster smiled. ‘Sewing is a noble art. But we need do our sums too.’

The smile, the gentle voice – such deception! Any moment now the governess would pounce.

Day after day of waiting for the worst had taken its toll. Dorothea could stand it no longer. ‘I can’t do sums! I don’t want to do sums!’ She flung the book away from her. ‘I don’t understand, I don’t understand!’

She stopped, appalled, her chest heaving. What had she done?

Mlle Lacroix leaned forward. Dorothea cowered.

‘If you do not understand,’ the governess said in her strange
sing-song
way of speaking, ‘then we will start again from the beginning. But first—’ She reached out. Dorothea shied away, hunched up in her chair, but there was no escape. The governess caught hold of her hand across the table. ‘But first, Dorossea, tell me, why are you always so desolate? What can be so dreadful that you never smile?’

Dorothea looked at the hand holding hers, the long pale fingers, the soft skin. Was such a hand really capable of the cruelties that Nanny had described?

The fingers stroked. The voice soothed. ‘Dorossea? Will you not tell me?’

What did it matter, Dorothea thought, what did anything matter anymore? She might as well speak. It wasn’t as if she had any choice. The monster had her trapped.

But once she started to talk, it all came out in a rush, everything: how much she missed her papa, how she was angry with him, too, for leaving her (oh, the shame of feeling like that, the shame!), how the nursery was a prison and the days dragged on and on and nothing ever happened and she felt trapped and stifled and lost and hopeless. The monster listened, did not interrupt, did not become angry or impatient – did not, in fact, behave much like a monster at all. Her expression softened, her eyes became moist, and all the time her fingers went on stroking, stroking, stroking.

‘Oh,
ma petite,
what a sad story you tell me!’ she said when Dorothea finally fell silent. ‘You love your poppa very much, I think.’

‘There is no one else. I don’t have anyone.’

‘Ah, but zis is not true, Dorossea. Do you not have your aunt and your uncle? Is not Nora always kind to you? Is there not Richard, too?’ (She pronounced his name strangely:
Rishar
) ‘And there is someone else, someone you have forgotten, someone who watches over all of us.’

‘I d-don’t understand.’

‘God,
ma petite.
God watches over us. We are all in His hands.’

Dorothea was bewildered. She had been expecting a beating, to have her head held under water until she nearly drowned. Instead – was it possible? – the governess was offering words of comfort. And now, to complicate matters further, there was talk of God. Dorothea did not know much about God. She remembered a man once coming to Stepnall Street to tell them they should go to church, it was their duty. Mrs Browning had given his short shrift. ‘Go to church? I’ve never heard such rubbish! Do you think we’ve got time to waste, praying on our knees? Church is not for the likes of us! We’ve a living to earn! Now be off with you!’

What was the truth of the matter? Did God really have everyone in his hands, as Mlle Lacroix said? Whatever the case, even God’s hands could not be as soft and comforting as those of the governess. Dorothea was beginning to doubt Nanny’s words. There must be some mistake. Not all governesses were monsters, they couldn’t be.

‘Now,’ the governess said with a gentle smile. ‘We shall try the sums again, yes?’

She wanted to tell Richard the extraordinary news – that not all governesses were monsters – but Nurse turned her away, said that Richard was too poorly for visitors, she must come back another day. Was Nurse being entirely honest, Dorothea wondered, or was she using her authority to keep them apart? There was nobody she could appeal to. Nobody was interested in Richard. He was, as Henry had said, often overlooked.

Lost in her thoughts as she wandered slowly back along the corridor, a sudden noise brought her back to herself. Her heart was in her mouth as she looked round in fear, half expecting to see Mrs
Bourne looming up—but it was only one of the housemaids on the stairs with a duster.

‘Oh my days, Miss Dorothea! You did give me a turn! I thought it was Bossy Bourne, checking up on me!’

The maid’s name was Bessie Downs, a friendly girl if something of a chatterbox. Nora, however, called her
slovenly
and
a slouch
and said you couldn’t believe half of what she said.

‘I’m keeping out of everyone’s way, miss.’ Bessie Downs flicked her duster around in a desultory manner as she sidled up to the landing. ‘They’re all as miserable as sin today, I can’t tell you. Cook’s got a face on her that would curdle milk and as for Bossy Bourne—But when is she any different? Such a slave-driver and always finding fault! Do you know, miss, I’ve never met such a quarrelsome crew as this lot in all my born days. But they do say that it’s the mistress that sets the tone of a place, so what chance do we have with Old Sourpuss?’

Bessie Downs paused, looking at Dorothea expectantly whilst tucking hair under her cap on one side as it fell out on the other.

‘Old Sourpuss? Do you mean Aunt Eloise? Why do you call her that?’

Bessie Downs seemed pleased by the question, lowered herself down to sit on the top step, patted the place next to her for Dorothea to sit too. ‘I call her Old Sourpuss because she’s as sour as old milk. I reckon her face would crack in half if she ever tried to smile. But then again, what has she got to smile about? They do say—’ Bessie leaned close, lowering her voice. ‘They do say as she only married the master because no one else would have her. Her family wanted better for her than a factory man but beggars can’t be choosers. Twenty-seven she was, when she got wed, if you can believe it! Near enough an old maid! If I get to such an age without a ring on me finger, I’ll slit my own throat, I swear!’

Dorothea shivered at the gruesome turn of phrase. Bessie Downs was what Mrs Browning would have called
a saucy piece,
but there was something about her that held you enthralled. She ventured to say things that no one else Dorothea had met in the house would dare to.