Emily (6 page)

They knocked on the back door and a girl answered. ‘Jane Dawson,’ Jane muttered. ‘I’ve been took on as kitchen maid.’

The girl opened the door wider to let her in, but partly closed it as she looked at Emily.

‘I’ve called to see ’cook or ’housekeeper,’ she began, but the girl interrupted, ‘We don’t need anybody else.’

‘Mr Francis asked me to call,’ Emily said firmly. ‘He was going to speak for me.’

The girl hesitated. ‘He particularly asked me to ask for Cook.’ Emily thought a small white lie wouldn’t harm.

‘Better come in then.’ She led her through a small lobby, then into a back room, where buckets and mops were hanging on the wall, and through another door into a large steamy kitchen, which was crowded with young maids, some in coarse aprons who were either mending the fire in the cooking range or scrubbing pans, and others who were dressed in grey with white aprons and caps and preparing trays with crockery, and several young men who seemed to be scurrying here and there, with either a silver teapot in their hands or a bucket of coal. Jane was standing with her back against a wall with a scared look upon her face, whilst a woman clad in a white apron and cap energetically rolled pastry on the table.

‘Mrs Castle!’ The girl hesitated. ‘There’s somebody to see you.’

Cook didn’t look up from her task. ‘Who is it? You know I’m busy at this time.’

‘Emily Hawkins, Cook.’ Emily spoke up for herself. ‘Mr Francis said he would ask –.’

‘Aye, he did, but I don’t need anybody else in ’kitchen.’ She glanced up at Emily and put down her rolling pin. ‘I’ve just taken a maid on.’ She nodded over to where Jane was standing and then looked searchingly at Emily. ‘Who did you say you were? Are you from these parts?’

‘Emily Hawkins. I lived with a relation, Hannah Edwards, over near ’Humber bank. Only she’s just died and I’ve had to move out of ’house.’

The cook sat down heavily on a wooden chair. ‘Ah! Aye, I heard she’d passed on. And what about ’lad? Samuel? Where’s he gone?’

‘Mr Francis got him work on one of his farms, but he’s living in ’cos Mr Francis wanted ’cottage back.’

‘Well aye, he would. It was a good little house.’ She breathed in heavily. ‘So what sort o’ relation are you? You’ve got ’family look.’

Emily was surprised. She had her father’s colouring, fair skin and blond hair. Who else did she look like? ‘Granny Edwards was my father’s auntie,’ she explained yet again. ‘She looked after me when my da died, my ma and brother went to ’workhouse,’ she added in case she was asked.

‘I’ll speak to Mrs Brewer, she’s housekeeper.’ Cook got up from her chair and placed the pastry in a dish. ‘She can take you for upstairs if she’s a mind. She’s allus saying she hasn’t enough staff.’

‘Thank you. Shall I wait?’

Cook looked up. ‘Janet!’ she called to the girl who had answered the door, ‘run upstairs and tell Mrs Brewer she’s wanted in ’kitchen as soon as she’s got a minute. And you, young woman,’ she signalled to Jane, ‘get your coat off and your apron on and start washing them pans.’

Mrs Brewer agreed to take Emily. ‘You can start tomorrow. Be here for seven o’clock, you needn’t come earlier as you have a long way to travel, but every other day except on your days off, you’ll have to be up at five-thirty to clean the fireplaces and light the fires before the family are awake. Will that be a hardship? Are you used to getting up?’

Emily smiled. ‘It won’t be a hardship, Mrs Brewer. I’m up at sunrise every morning. Thank you very much.’

She waved goodbye to Jane and almost skipped
down the drive. Her first position, with pay. Mrs Brewer had said she would get five shillings when she started tomorrow, the rest she would get at the end of the year. She would be given three grey dresses, white aprons, caps and stockings, and was expected to keep her boots clean and polished.

She was tired by the time she reached home. Sam had built up the fire and was sitting in the one chair which she had kept. ‘I’ll have to be off, Em. I said I’d be at ’farm for suppertime. I’ve built ’fire up for thee in case tha’s stopping tonight. Did tha get job?’

She took off her shawl and hung it on a nail behind the door, then looked round at the empty room. ‘I did. I start tomorrow at seven o’clock.’

‘I’m glad, Em. Mr Francis is a fine gentleman. Look how he’s allus looked after Gran. And now he’s given me this job on ’farm. I could stay there for ever. We’re very lucky.’

‘Yes,’ she said thoughtfully. ‘I suppose we are.’

He lumbered towards the door. ‘Well, I’d best be off then. I might see thee at ’market or somewhere, sometime.’

She nodded. ‘I hope so, Sam.’

He turned back towards her. ‘I’ll miss thee, Em, just like I miss our Gran.’ His blue eyes suddenly filled with tears which spilled over his cheeks. ‘I’ll miss thee a lot.’

She rushed towards him and put her arms around his waist and her face against his chest and smelled the aroma of earth and grain and remembered the time when he had carried her on his back all those years ago. ‘I’ll miss you too, Sam,
such a lot. You’ve been like a big brother to me. You’ve taught me such a lot.’

‘Have I?’ He wiped his face with his sleeve. ‘I didn’t know I’d done that. Well, fancy!’ He gave a tearful grin. ‘Just fancy me larning anybody owt.’

‘You’re a good man, Sam.’ She too wiped away a tear. ‘Don’t let anybody tell you you’re not.’

‘I won’t,’ he said solemnly and picked up his box. ‘And thou’s a good lass too, just like our Gran allus said.’ He opened the door. ‘Cheerio then, Em. I’ll be seeing thee,’ and he marched away without once looking back.

It was late afternoon but not yet dusk as the day had been bright and sunny, with very little cloud, not like a November day at all, so she decided that she too would walk to the river bank for one last time. She kept to the top of the dyke and walked swiftly and surely. She knew her way well now.

The tide was full and the river washing over the salt marsh, so that she had to stay on top of the dyke rather than go down to the water’s edge. There was a stiff breeze blowing which caught her hair and on impulse she untied the clips which held it back and let it fly free. There were ships sailing down towards the mouth of the river, their canvas sails spread, and she put her arms up and waved as she used to when she was very young. I’m no longer a child, she thought. I have to do grown-up things from now on. But just this last time I want to run and shout just as I used to with Dick and Jim and Dora and Jane.

She jumped down from the dyke and into the marshy fields and with her arms outstretched and
her blond hair flying she ran in great circles, whooping and shouting as if to the companions of her childhood, who had also gone to the adult world. Above her mallards flew over and then great flocks of geese and as she saw the pale sun dropping and the sky darkening, she climbed soberly back up to the top of the dyke and looked over the water, shining darkly with colours of red, silver and gold. ‘Goodbye, river,’ she called. ‘Goodbye, childhood. Goodbye, Granny Edwards. Goodbye, Sam.’

She sat on the hard chair by the fire; her body ached and her head jerked forward from time to time as she dropped into an intermittent slumber. Eventually she roused herself, built up the fire again with the remaining wood and went outside to fetch in some straw from the hen house. There was a sharp nip of frost in the air and she could smell the coldness of winter. She laid the straw on the floor in front of the fire and draped her shawl over it so that she wouldn’t itch from fleas, then, taking off her skirt and blouse, she lay down to try and sleep.

The night was long and she lay looking into the flames or watched the flickering, dancing shadows on the walls and ceilings. Outside she could hear the screech of owls and the bark of foxes and as she drifted off into sleep she could hear the echo of Granny Edwards’s voice gently chiding and Sam’s deep voice in answer. She dreamed she could hear her name being called and the clatter of pans being put on the fire.

She awoke with a start. A wind had risen and was rattling the door sneck, the fire had died down and
there was no more wood inside. She sat up and put her shawl around her and went to the door and opened it. It was not yet dawn, the sky was merely lightening with a pale milky hue and a cluster of stars still glimmered. She stretched; she was stiff and aching and she went to the pump and splashed her face and hands, the cold water instantly dispelling her tiredness.

Her bag was by the door and she rooted around in it for her hairbrush. She brushed and brushed her hair and twisted it into a bun so that it was neat and tidy. She dressed again and prepared to leave. Just one glance back, she thought as she walked away, and as she looked for the final time she could almost visualize Granny Edwards standing by the door watching her, just as her mother had watched her leave home all those years before. She straightened her shoulders and put her head up. Come on, Emily, she told herself. Another life is ahead of you. Who knows what is going to happen next?

The work was no harder than she expected, she loved the elegant rooms and the sweep of the staircase and she took great pride in her work. She was up at five-thirty as Mrs Brewer had told her she would be, and with the other housemaids had all the fireplaces in the downstairs rooms cleaned, the fire-irons polished and the fires relit by half-past six. Then they took off their dark aprons, washed their hands and put on their white aprons, ate their own breakfast in the kitchen and prepared the breakfast trays for Mrs Francis and her daughter Deborah, to be taken upstairs at half-past nine. The dining table was laid for Mr Francis and any visitors who might
be staying. If there were no visitors then Mr Francis breakfasted alone at eight o’clock, helping himself from the dresser in the dining room, where he ate simply of smoked fish, toast and marmalade and coffee, before going about his business on the estate.

‘He’s very easy to look after is Mr Francis,’ Mrs Castle said as they ate breakfast at the big kitchen table one morning. ‘But then he allus was, even when he was a young man.’

‘Have you been with the family a long time, Mrs Castle?’ Emily was curious; the cook seemed to know all that happened in the household and yet she had never seen her out of the kitchen.

‘Aye, since I was just a nipper like yonder lass.’ She pointed over to Jane, who was sweating by the range as she stoked the embers. Jane was always the last to eat as she had to make sure everyone else had food on their plates and that the fire didn’t go out. ‘I started as a kitchen maid, just as she has, so don’t look so glum, Janey, you might get to be cook when I’m dead and gone.’ She gave a great rumble of a laugh. ‘But don’t bank on it yet ’cos I’m not planning on going for a long time.’

‘We don’t see much of Mrs Francis or Miss Deborah,’ Emily added conversationally, ‘except when we take ’breakfast trays up.’ Rarely had she seen Mrs Francis downstairs; she seemed to take little interest in the running of the household, seemingly content to leave it to Mrs Brewer, and as for her daughter, Deborah, Emily only ever heard her voice echoing through the house, usually petulant and grievous.

Mrs Castle gave a searching look at Emily. ‘It’s not our place to see them we work for.’ She touched her nose, ‘We keep this out of everything,’ she patted her mouth, ‘and we keep this buttoned up. And’, she went on, ‘anything we hear we keep to ourselves.’

Emily was suitably chastened. ‘I didn’t mean –’

‘I know,’ Mrs Castle interrupted. ‘It’s onny natural to be curious about them you work for. But there’s things you’ll hear or see that you won’t understand, so it’s best if you don’t hear or see ’em, if you follow my meaning.’

She leaned across the table and lowered her voice. ‘Try to be invisible, Emily. That’s ’best thing to do.’

‘It’s not fair,’ Jane grumbled as they undressed and climbed into the bed they shared in the topmost room. ‘I’ve got ’worst job of all. I’m at everybody’s beck and call. And just look at my hands.’ She held out her raw and chapped hands for Emily’s inspection. ‘And I miss my ma, and I even miss Jenny and all ’other bairns.’ She burst into tears. ‘I wish I was at home.’

Emily put her arms around her. ‘Don’t cry, Jane. It’s not easy for you to leave everybody. It’s worse for you than me, ’cos I haven’t left anybody behind, only Sam, and I know he’ll be all right at ’farm.’

Jane sniffled and wiped her nose on a handkerchief she took from under her pillow. ‘My ma allus said she didn’t know how Sam managed so well considering he had no ma or da, and especially as he wasn’t very bright.’

Emily bridled. ‘He might not be very bright, but
he can grow vegetables and catch game and he never wanted for any money ’cos he works hard.’ But she started to wonder as she lay next to her sleeping friend, how it was that Granny Edwards and Sam hadn’t finished up in the workhouse as her mother and brother Joe had done. Granny Edwards was a good manager, I expect, she thought sleepily as she turned over and tucked her hand beneath her cheek. That would be the reason.

She opened the curtains in Mr Francis’s study one morning, and looking out at the winter landscape she was surprised to see him mounting his horse and riding away. The groom looking up at the window saw her and gave a wave. She raised her hand and turned to start her chores. Wonder where he’s going so early? It’s not yet a quarter to six and still dark. But she remembered Cook’s advice to not see or hear anything and dismissed the question from her mind. She finished the study and, first knocking on the door, she entered the sitting room. She put down her dustpan and brush and went across to the window to open the curtains.

‘Who are you?’

The sudden voice startled her and she jumped. ‘Oh! I’m sorry, ma’am. I didn’t see you there.’ Mrs Francis was sitting in a high-backed chair hidden from Emily’s view as she’d come in through the door.

‘What’s your name? Are you new? Have I seen you before?’ The questions were abrupt, requiring an immediate answer.

‘Only when I’ve brought up breakfast, ma’am,’ she stammered. ‘Emily Hawkins is my name and
yes, I haven’t been here long. This is my first position.’ She stood in front of Mrs Francis, unsure of whether to withdraw or wait for dismissal.