‘I know, lass, I know, but it’s none of our business. We work here, that’s all, an’ we could be out on our ear afore you could say Jack Robinson.’
Bridget had been silent for a moment and Sophy had risked peeking out from under her blankets. Bridget was slowly shaking her head, her face sad but her voice angry when she’d murmured, ‘Makes my blood boil, the things that go on in this house, and all the time them actin’ the holy Joes. I’d like to take that little lass to one of his damn committees and show them what his lady wife does when she’s of a mind. Last time she caned her, she was black an’ blue all over.’
‘Wouldn’t make any difference if you did.’ Patrick had entered the conversation, which was rare. He was a man who didn’t say much. ‘The nobs stick together, as you well know. Like your mam says, it’s none of our business an’ you’d do well to remember that, lass.’
This had effectively finished the conversation but it had left Sophy feeling warm inside that Bridget cared about her so much. Reaching up now, she whispered in Bridget’s ear, ‘I love you.’
‘An’ I love you, hinny.’ Bridget’s gaze rested on the shining hair which was strained into one tight plait so that not even a curl escaped. The mistress had insisted on it as soon as the baby mop of curls had grown, along with the dull dresses and ugly, thick-soled boots the little girl was made to wear, but nothing could disguise Sophy’s beauty, Bridget thought for the umpteenth time with great
satisfaction. And that was something that stuck in the mistress’s craw all right, cruel devil that she was.
As though her thoughts had conjured the mistress up, Bridget heard her mother say, ‘Good afternoon, ma’am,’ a moment before Mary appeared in the scullery doorway. She and Sophy stood to their feet, it was one of many niceties the mistress demanded but Sophy knew better than to stare at her aunt and kept her eyes lowered.
Mary Hutton’s cold reptilian eyes swept over the silver on the rough wooden table. ‘Haven’t you finished that yet? It’s’ – she consulted the small silver pocket-watch pinned to the bodice of her thick linen day dress – ‘almost four o’clock and we have guests for dinner tonight.’
‘Nearly done, ma’am.’ Bridget dipped her knee just the slightest.
‘See to it the dining table is set with the silver and my best crystal, and use the new damask cloth I bought last week, the one with the roses and leaves. Eight places. And the fire in the drawing room needs attending to. It was almost going out when I left.’
‘Yes, ma’am.’ Bridget knew this to be untrue, since she had piled up the coal in the large grate only an hour before, but not by intonation or expression did she reveal this. The mistress was never satisfied, and if there wasn’t anything to find fault with, she’d make something up. It had always been the same. ‘Do you want the best candelabra in the centre of the table, ma’am? The one with the crystals hanging from it?’
‘Of course, girl.’ It was a snap. ‘I told you it’s a dinner party.’
And if I’d put the best one out you’d have said you wanted the second best that the bishop bought, Bridget thought grimly.
Mary stood a moment more, surveying the maid. She hadn’t glanced directly at Sophy but each feature of the child’s face was burned on her mind, day and night. It was through this creature that the gulf between her and Jeremiah had come about – she had long ago glossed over her own actions in the matter – and her marriage had been ruined. She had been forced to lie to the bishop and the rest of her family – the truth would have brought unthinkable humiliation – and continue the deception year after year. And
the child herself, she was the very embodiment of the mother’s provocative predilection for lasciviousness, with her great saucer eyes and Titian hair. She had watched her own sons soften towards the girl despite her warnings that they should have little to do with her, and the scut was a cross that her poor Patience had been compelled to bear daily. From a small child the girl had displayed the same waywardness as the mother – it was in her every glance, the tilt of her head, the pout of her lips. But she would break her spirit, Mary thought; the creature would not get the better of her.
She now turned about, her petticoats swishing and her carriage ramrod straight as she left the kitchen after checking a few details about the evening meal with Kitty. Sophy sank down on the bench and continued to rub at the silver plate she had been cleaning when her aunt had made her entrance, Bridget disappearing to see to the drawing-room fire.
She liked it when her aunt and uncle had a dinner party. Kitty always let her stay up late and have a taste of the different dishes, just a mouthful, before Bridget whisked them up to the dining room, and often there were five or six courses instead of the normal three the family had. She slid off the bench and sidled into the kitchen where Kitty was occupied in expertly filleting a whole salmon. ‘What are they having for dinner, Kitty?’ she said, standing by the kitchen table.
Kitty smiled. She knew what Sophy was really asking. ‘Salmon puffs to start with, like they had when the bishop came last time, do you remember?’
Sophy nodded. Kitty had done a whole extra puff for her and the filling – a mix of salmon flakes, cream, butter, flour, eggs and spices – had been mouth-watering.
‘Then soup, chicken fricassée, followed by lamb cutlets. The hot pudding is pears in ginger sauce, and the cold is Charlotte Delight, and I’ve made some of my shortbread to go with their coffee. Does madam approve?’
Sophy nodded, grinning. Pears in ginger sauce was her favourite pudding.
‘An’ aye, before you ask, you can stay up, as long as you’re in
your nightie in case the mistress takes it on herself to come down for any reason.’ Kitty had the notion the mistress was beginning to suspect that on such occasions the odd treat or two found its way into Sophy’s small frame.
Sophy nodded again, her eyes alight as she hugged herself in anticipation. Pears in ginger sauce, and her birthday tomorrow. Last year Bridget, Kitty and Patrick had bought her a sketchbook and coloured pencils which she kept hidden under her bed away from prying eyes. They always bought her something. One year it had been a whole box of chocolates to herself, another, a picture book which resided with the sketchpad and pencils and had been looked at so often it was falling apart. Her favourite present, though, was one she’d received when she was five years old, a cloth dolly she’d named Maisie. She slept with Maisie every night and in the day tucked her well down under her blankets on the pallet bed, knowing if Patience or her aunt ever became aware of the doll’s existence, that would be the end of Maisie. ‘I’ll stay in bed and look at my picture book and if we hear anyone coming I’ll hide it under the covers and pretend I’m asleep.’
‘Aye, that’s right, hinny, you do that.’ Kitty’s voice held a tinge of sadness, and as she had done countless times before, she thought, You poor little mite. There was this bairn, as bonny as a summer’s day and as sweet as a nut in nature despite the way she was treated by her own kith and kin, and then there was Miss Patience, as spiteful and mean-minded a little madam as ever had been born, who was spoiled rotten by the mistress.
‘Kitty?’
‘Aye, me lamb?’
‘Do you think my mother can see me? From heaven, I mean?’
Kitty stopped what she was doing and stared down into the earnest little face. ‘Whatever’s brought that into your head?’ she said softly. ‘Of course your mam can see you, hinny. She watches over you every day, I’ll be bound.’
Sophy nodded but without conviction. ‘Uncle Jeremiah said in his sermon last week that there’s a divide between heaven and earth like there is between heaven and hell, and that when you’re
in heaven you don’t care about earth any more and you just praise God all the time.’
‘Did he?’ Kitty had to confess she turned off once the master got on his bandwagon in the pulpit.
‘He said God and the angels can see us but not real people who have died. They’re not allowed.’
‘Not allowed my backside.’ Kitty didn’t have a clue one way or the other, but her voice was adamant. ‘Your mam
can
see you, hinny, an’ don’t let anyone tell you different. I’d stake my life on it. All right?’
Sophy gave a small smile. ‘All right.’
‘An’ preachers an’ suchlike, even ones like your uncle, they don’t know everything,’ Kitty added, hoping she wasn’t perjuring her own soul. ‘Their own take on things comes into it and the master, well, he isn’t the most merry of men, now is he? If there’s a black way to look at something, he’ll find it, but it don’t necessarily mean it’s right.’
Sophy took a few moments to consider this. She hadn’t looked at it like that before. Her expression lightened and now her voice carried more confidence when she said, ‘I think my mother can see me. Heaven is somewhere where all your wishes come true and she would want to see me if she could, wouldn’t she?’
‘Aye, for sure, hinny.’
Two small slender arms went round her middle and Kitty found herself hugged briefly before Sophy disappeared off back to the scullery. Kitty stared after the child for a moment before getting back to the salmon. Whatever next? she thought with wry humour. You never knew what that little ’un was going to come out with. Bright as a button she was. Fancy her listening to the master’s sermon like that when most of his parishioners, including herself, couldn’t have repeated a word the minute they’d left the church.
She shook her head, dropping the filleted fish into a dish where it would poach in a drop of milk with a dash of vinegar before being flaked.
She was a thinker, was little Sophy, and knowing with it. That didn’t bode well for any woman in what was definitely a man’s
world, but Sophy’s position was worse than most. She was between two worlds, neither gentry nor servant, and likely to remain there until she was wed. And what sort of husband would the master and mistress choose for the lass? Likely some dusty old widower who would incarcerate her in a life of toil bringing up children who were not her own, or some psalm-singing hypocrite like the master, who preached one thing and did another.
Eeh, where had that last thought come from? Kitty shook her head again, but this time at herself. A few minutes with the bairn and she was thinking all sorts of things. But it was true. In spite of how he was, she had respected the master at one time, him being a man of the cloth an’ all, but since the child had been born she had seen another side to his pious nature that couldn’t be ignored. He knew full well how his lady wife treated the bairn, yet he let her get on with it – and why? Because he’d disapproved of Sophy’s mam marrying a Frenchman. Now she wasn’t learned like the master, and she dare say he’d forgotten more about the Good Book than she’d ever know, but to hold a grudge all these years? It wasn’t right. Whatever way you looked at it, it wasn’t right. One day, chickens would come home to roost and then the roof would go off this house – she could see it coming. Aye, the older the bairn got, the more she could see it coming.
Settling her chin into the ample folds of her neck, Kitty continued with her preparations, not dreaming that that day was closer than she had imagined.
The dinner party had gone off splendidly. Mary had been trained by her mother in the arts of being a good hostess and it was something she excelled in and thoroughly enjoyed. The other three couples – Dr Lawrence and his wife, Mr Longhurst, a local magistrate, and Mrs Longhurst, and the Williamsons – he was standing for Parliament this year and Mrs Williamson was involved in a string of good works – knew each other very well and the conversation at the dinner table had been merry. Jeremiah had roused himself to join in the general joviality, even making the odd quip or two, which was unusual.
Bridget had sensed the convivial atmosphere and seen how her mistress was basking in her success when silently serving the various courses, all of which boded well for the next little while. When one of the mistress’s social functions didn’t pass as smoothly as Mary would have liked, the whole household, but in particular Sophy, suffered the brunt of her frustration for days.
By the time the Williamsons’ carriage and pair and Dr Lawrence’s neat little pony and trap had been brought round to the front of the house from the stables by Patrick, it was clear that several members of the party were a little intoxicated. The women were giggling and fussing as Bridget helped them on with their coats and furs, and the men’s voices were over-hearty. The Williamsons and the Longhursts were travelling together, and Mary and Jeremiah walked the three couples across the drive to the waiting conveyances, but Dr Lawrence, who was slightly behind the others, stopped midway and came back to Bridget, who was standing in the doorway in case she was needed.
‘I forgot to give this to your mistress.’ He handed her a small slim package. ‘It’s just a little thing for the child, Sophy, but I wouldn’t like her to think I’ve forgotten her this year. She always writes such a formal little note of thanks. We don’t buy for the others’ children’ – he gestured with his head towards the group talking by the carriages – ‘so one has to be discreet, but as Sophy is our god-daughter . . .’
‘Of course, sir.’ Bridget dipped her knee as she took the gift and slipped it in her apron pocket, her mind racing as Dr Lawrence joined the others. Sophy had never received a present from Dr Lawrence and his wife and had certainly never written to thank them, so that meant . . . How could she? How
could
the mistress be so mean? To withhold the doctor’s presents like that, it was stealing, that’s what it was. Did the master know? And him a clergyman. But she wouldn’t put anything past the pair of them where that bairn was concerned, so why was she surprised? And even when Sophy was occasionally summoned to the drawing room with Patience when visitors arrived, ost ensibly to keep up the pretence that she was treated as a
member of the family, she had noticed before that this never happened if the guest was Dr Lawrence. And now she knew why. He might mention something.
The carriage was drawing away, the trap following, and as a few desultory snowflakes drifted down in the bitterly cold night, Mary and Jeremiah walked towards the house. Bridget made up her mind quickly. She wouldn’t say a word about the present, not until she’d given it to Sophy anyway, and then she would mention it casually when she was serving the mistress’s elevenses in the morning room tomorrow. No doubt she would get into trouble, but that didn’t matter. She could make out that the doctor had given her the gift when she was busy with her duties, and she’d put it in her pocket and forgotten all about it till morning when she’d found it and given it to the bairn.