The children reacted joyfully to the news, Johnny and Maggie jabbering their delight; only Biddy remained silent, but the glow on her face told Riah she was not really overcome with the news, and was likely thinking what a splendid man the master had been. And this made her want to show him up in a different light. ‘I haven’t got this house without paying for it,’ she said.
‘Paying for it, Ma?’ piped in Maggie. And she nodded towards her as she answered, ‘Yes, my dear, paying for it. The price is that I haven’t got to marry, ever, if I want to stay here and make a home for you.’
‘Were you thinking about marrying, Ma?’ The quiet question came from Biddy, and Riah almost barked at her, ‘Yes, I was, my girl. Yes, I was!’
‘But Tol’s got a woman, Ma.’
Her young son was sitting next to her on the form as he spoke and she sprang up so quickly that it tipped, causing him almost to slide off the end of it, and she cried at him, ‘Who said anything about Tol Briston? There are more fish in the sea than have ever been caught.’
She turned quickly from the table. What on earth was the matter with her? Why was she acting like this? She had never been like this with her children. Oh, if she only had a friend, someone she could go to. Some adult.
She thought of her family in Shields and shook her head. Oh, no, not them. And anyway, if they knew of her good fortune they would be round like locusts thinking she had come into money, and seeing the size of this place, they wouldn’t be past wanting to share it. Well, would that be a bad thing, because she was going to have a lonely life of it if she was left here solely with Johnny. She shook her head at herself. She would have to think of something, do something.
‘Did he leave you any money, Ma?’
Again it was Biddy speaking, and Riah turned on her and, more quietly now, she said, ‘No, he had no money to leave; his allowance goes into some kind of charity. It’s up to us, if we want to stay here, to work for the place, and so you, Biddy, and you, Maggie, when you’re a bit older, will have to go into service of some sort.’
‘Service, Ma?’ Maggie screwed up her eyes at her mother. ‘What can I do in service?’
‘You can be trained like your brother Davey but in the pantries or kitchen in a big house, unless, of course, you’d like to go and work in the blacking factory or foundry and such.’
The girl was puzzled by her mother’s tone and she drew her hand over her dark hair, saying, ‘I wouldn’t like to go into a blacking factory, Ma.’
‘You’ll go where you’re sent.’
‘What about me, Ma?’
She looked at Johnny, then said quietly, ‘There’s the garden to see to; I need a man here of some sort.’ She forced a smile to her face to emphasise the compliment but, the boy’s face sullen, he said, ‘I’d rather go out, Ma.’
‘You’ll go where you’re sent an’ all, and do what you’re told without any backchat. And that goes for you, too.’ And she inclined her head now towards Biddy who was looking up at her in a quietly penetrating way. And it was as if in this moment her daughter had become her enemy, whereas she should be finding her a comfort and be able to talk to her because Biddy was sensible and older than her years. She knew she couldn’t because there stood between them the man who had trained her to think and who, in the same way, had put a lock and chain on her own life. Whatever pity she’d had for him was now swamped under a feeling of resentment, that touched on her daughter too, and she thought, she’s got to get into service, and soon, for as long as she’s in the house, he’s here, and I can’t bear it. Books, books, books, I’d like to burn the lot. People are right, the gentry are right, the working class shouldn’t be allowed to handle them, they’re disturbers, troublemakers. Why had she to go and marry a man who could write his name?…It had all stemmed from that.
Three
’Davey said they were wantin’ a laundry hand up at the house and I told him to ask for a place for you, and he’s done it.’
‘In a laundry, Ma? But I don’t know anything about laundries.’
‘Well, you’ll soon find out. You’ll be trained.’
‘I don’t think I’ll like that, Ma.’
‘It isn’t what you like, it’s what you’ve got to do.’
‘I don’t think the master would have been pleased.’
‘Shut up, girl!’
‘I won’t shut up, Ma. I don’t want to go into a laundry. I could go to a nursery and teach children their letters and…’
‘And who’s gona take you on in a nursery around here, a girl of fifteen, no training behind her? What are you going to do? Go up to the lady of the house and say, Can I tutor your children, ma’am? Because I’ve been learnin’ for the past five years. You should consider yourself damn lucky you’ve been kept at home this long. You’ve let that learnin’ go to your head, girl, and the quicker you forget it the better.’
‘I’ll not forget it, Ma, and…and I’ll make use of it. Yes, I will.’
‘Tell me, where?’
‘Ma.’ Biddy’s lips trembled and there were tears in her voice as she said, ‘I don’t want to go into a laundry, not up at the big house. I won’t know what to do.’
Riah’s voice came soft now as she replied, ‘It’ll be all right. They’ll show you. Everybody’s got to start and it’s the only post that’s open, and you’ll get a shilling a week for the first year and everything found, and it’s a nice uniform, Davey said, and the same time off as him, and he’ll be there to keep an eye on you.’
Now the atmosphere changed at lightning speed as Biddy cried, ‘I don’t want our Davey to keep an eye on me; he can’t keep an eye on himself. Him! Gormless.’
‘Now, girl, I’m warning you. You know what happened when you attacked your brother afore with your tongue.’
‘Yes, I know, Ma. But don’t let it happen again, ’cos I told you then, and I tell you now, don’t let it happen again.’
‘Oh, my God!’ Riah turned away. ‘To think it should have come to this, to be threatened by my own flesh and blood.’
‘I’m not threatening you, Ma, I’m only telling you I won’t be hit. I can’t stand being hit. It…it does something to me, I…I want to strike out. It was the same when we were playing and Davey used to punch me, I always punched him back. I…I can’t stand being pushed about.’
‘Well, let me tell you, girl’—Riah was facing her again—‘you’ll be pushed about afore you get very far through this life. I’m warnin’ you. Now get yourself upstairs and get your things together, for the morrow mornin’ I’m taking you up to The Heights.’
‘The morrow, Ma?’
‘Yes, the morrow.’
As Riah marched out of the library Biddy put her fingers on her eyeballs and pressed them tightly, telling herself that she mustn’t cry; she had been crying a lot since the master had gone. The next moment she looked about her quite wildly. His papers, all his writings, what would happen to them? Would her mother put them in the fire? It was just possible she would.
She had started sorting his papers from the drawers in the library a couple of days ago. He had been writing a history all about the philosophers. He had talked to her about it. The very last time, a few weeks before he died, he had told her about Rousseau, who wasn’t for Voltaire and his philosophy, and how he had been a man who had the courage of his own convictions, although he was born poor, and lost his mother and father, and wasn’t recognised in his own time, not until after he was dead, and then he was made into a great man whom others took a pattern from, both poets and philosophers. The master had said they would later start to read his book called Confessions, for it was very enlightening. She had been looking forward to this because she wondered if she was going to like the writings of a man who didn’t like Voltaire; and she had spoken of this to the master but he had assured her and she remembered she had laughed at him. Why, she didn’t know, for he had said nothing that could have evoked laughter. But it was like that: she often laughed at him for no reason, and he seemed t
o like it, not like Lord Chesterfield, who seemed dead set against laughter, describing it only as the outlet of fools.
She hadn’t known he wrote poetry too.
Eeh! If her mother came across some of his writings she would surely burn them, especially that one about their Davey. She would get that and keep it; perhaps she would take it away with her. Nobody would know. He must have written it that Sunday when she had brought him back to bed and he asked for his writing materials.
She had brought all his papers from the two bureaux in the drawing room. The bed was no longer there and the room was much as it had been before it became a bedroom.
Kneeling down on the floor, she sorted among the papers she had arranged in piles until she came to the one she was looking for; then sitting back, her legs curled under her, she read it again.
So does the eye mislead the brain;
So does insanity its power gain;
So does the heart dictate the urge;
So does desire all reason purge;
So does man look upon his kind,
And with love drives out of mind his mind.
So did I see David as a boy
And today what four years did destroy,
And as my tears make a pool
I will by dying drown a fool.
She gulped in her throat; then moved her head from side to side before slowly folding the piece of paper and pushing it down the front of her print dress.
Hastily now, she gathered all the papers together until there were six piles, and having tied them up she pushed them well back into the bottom of the cupboard that ran under the bookshelves. Next, she made a choice of four books which she meant to take with her. One was by Sir Richard Steele and Joseph Addison. They were all essays and very interesting. The master had been particularly fond of this book. The second was the first volume of Lord Chesterfield’s Letters To His Son. The third was Voltaire’s Candide. And the fourth book, seemingly thought-years removed from the others, was A Book of Fables And Fairy Tales.
She was about to leave the library with the four books held close to her breast when she stopped and looked back down along the room towards the table where she had sat, she felt, for as long as she could remember. And five years was a long time to remember.
She had promised herself one day to reckon up the hours she had spent in learning. If only they’d had another year together, she knew she would have become very fluent with her Latin and French. Nevertheless, he had recently praised her progress. Oh, she missed him. Her eyes ranged about the room. Every part of it held his presence; yet he was gone; but where? He had said there was no Heaven or Hell and no Purgatory, the place where Catholics believed they were sent to before they were sorted out. Then where was he? He had once said to her that when you died you went back into a power, and if you could believe this then you would return again, be born again.
The day before he died he had said something very strange to her. She had thought about it last night in bed and it had frightened her a little. What he had said was, ‘If you are ever faced with a great obstacle, or decision, Biddy, ask me what to do.’ Well, how could she ask him if he was dead? It had made her feel creepy.
She looked towards his chair and whispered softly, ‘Goodbye, Master, and thank you. Your work won’t go to waste, it won’t. I won’t let it. No matter what happens, I won’t let it.’
PART THREE
THE LAUNDRY
One
They started off from the house just as it was getting light. When she had kissed Johnny and Maggie, Biddy had only just prevented herself from joining them in a bout of weeping.
She carried in her hand just a bundle of underclothes for she had been told that was all that would be necessary; but nevertheless the bundle was heavy, for in the middle of the garments she had placed the four books. Her mother had gone for her, crying at her, ‘When do you think you’ll have time to read that stuff?’ And she had answered pertly, ‘I suppose they’ll let you breathe some time in the day.’
It was two miles to The Heights, that’s if you took the byroads; it was much longer by the coach road. She had on her Sunday frock and her best hat, coat and boots. She looked, she told herself, as if she were going some place special; but where was she going? Into a laundry. She had no idea of the work it would entail, only that it would be hard and that it was the commonest employment a girl could be put to in a house of the gentry.
As they walked her mother talked spasmodically, telling her how she must behave; also, that everything at first would be very strange,
Biddy was paying little attention to the advice because she had a lump in her throat and all she wanted to do was cry. Most of the time she walked with her eyes cast down, partly in misery and partly to avoid the potholes over which there were thin films of ice for she knew that if she stepped into one and messed up her boots her mother would rave at her. She didn’t know what had happened to her mother lately. She could remember the time when they had laughed together. But that time seemed far back now.
On the sound of cartwheels crunching on the rough road, she lifted her head and saw coming towards her a familiar horse and cart. Glancing at her mother, she knew that she had already seen its driver and his companion.
When they stood to the side of the road to let the cart pass Tol drew the horse to a standstill and, looking down at them, he said, ‘Well, hello there. You’re out early.’
As Riah answered briefly, ‘Yes, yes, we are,’ she looked past him to the young woman sitting at his side; but he made no effort to introduce his companion, only said, ‘Where are you off to then?’
Biddy lowered her head as she heard her mother reply tartly, ‘Well, I thought you would have known. News flies around here quicker than birds.’
There was a pause before Tol replied, ‘Well, it appears I don’t know everything, only that you’ve had a bit of luck, Riah. And I was glad to hear it, very glad.’
‘Thank you.’ Her tone was sharp.
‘Well, what’s this I don’t know?’
‘I’m taking her to your place. The Heights. She’s startin’ in the laundry.’
Biddy’s head came up now at the sound of Tol’s voice that was bordering on a bark as he cried, ‘The laundry? She’s startin’ in the laundry? Biddy? No, you can’t put her on that, Riah. And up there; it’s slavery.’
‘She’s got to earn her livin’ and she has to start somewhere, and it’s the only vacancy.’
‘Vacancy, be damned!’ There was silence now before, his voice less sharp, he said, ‘I can’t understand you, Riah. Never could and never will. Gee-up there!’ He took his whip and flicked the horse, and this alone told Biddy that he was very angry.
They had walked some yards before Riah burst out, ‘He should mind his own damned business. What is it to him where I put you?’
‘He knows it isn’t right, Ma.’
They both stopped and faced each other, and Biddy dared to go on, her voice breaking as she said, ‘Only the scum go into laundries. I’ve heard you say that yourself.’
‘That was outside laundries, wash-houses. This is different. This is a family, where you’ll be in uniform. And what does he know about it anyway? He didn’t come after the master died, did he?’
So that was it. She still hankered after him. But he had his woman, and she looked nice. That had incensed her ma. Here her mind jumped off at a tangent as she thought, I’m thinking like the master, using words in me mind like incensed.
‘Him preaching to me what I should do when his whoring is the talk of the place.’
Whoring. She had never heard her mother use that word before. It was a bad word. But the young woman hadn’t looked bad, she had looked pleasant. She wondered why Tol didn’t marry her. What did whoring really mean? She’d have to look that up. She should have brought the dictionary with her. Yes, that’s the book she should have brought with her. She would get it next time when she got her leave.
The thought of leave brought her mind b
ack to what lay before her and she tried to visualise not only the laundry, but the house and the people in it. She had no idea what to expect. Faintly she recalled the church service when gentry filed into their special seats that were set in a kind of gallery to the right of the pulpit. But they had been dim distant figures. She had seen the rows of servants who sat in the pews at the back, and one thing she remembered about them was that they were nearly all dressed alike. One of the village girls told her that her mother supplied the hot bricks for the gentry’s feet, and that at one time they used to have a stove in the gallery, but the smoke from it made them cough, so now they only had hot bricks in velvet covers.
They had reached the main gates, and as if their coming had been announced the lodgekeeper Bert Johnson was throwing open the gates, and so Riah, going up to him, said, ‘We are making for the house, we’ve got to meet the housekeeper at half past nine.’
‘Get out of the way! Go on, outside!’ As he flung his arm wide they retreated hastily backwards. And now he cried at them, ‘Get out of sight!’
‘Out of sight? Why?’
‘Why?’ He now came towards them, his face thrust out. ‘The coach is coming down the drive, that’s why. It’s the mistress. Move yourself!’
They backed into the main road and stood by the hedge, and presently there came through the gates a coach and pair. The coachman sat stiffly on his box. He wore a high hat, a dark brown overcoat, and he wielded a long whip.
As the carriage turned into the road both Riah and Biddy caught a glimpse of the brim of a hat at one window and the face of a young person at the other.
During the passing of the vehicle the lodgekeeper had stood as if to attention, and now, as he closed the gates, Riah approached him, saying, ‘Well, is it all right for us to go through now?’
The Black Velvet Gown Page 20
