by Maggie Ford
‘Child!’
The word interrupted the flow. He was holding out his arms and, as she burst into tears at the gesture, she automatically threw herself into them, felt them enfold protectively about her, felt herself being gently rocked, hearing him croon, ‘There now, it’s all over now. All over…’
It was odd being held this way by the man who employed her; yet he felt suddenly more like a father than any she had known. In the midst of her weeping came the knowledge that from now on she could get him to do whatever she wanted. She had achieved what she’d first set out to do. She’d schemed, planned, never getting very far, yet by this simple gesture of his it had come about, and she hadn’t even done it intentionally.
* * *
‘What do you think you’re doing, Bertram? Have you gone completely mad?’
Mary was glaring at her husband, her rounded face suffused with the anger she could hardly contain. Giving him no time to reply, she swept on, ‘If you think I am going to stand for this nonsense with that girl, you are sadly mistaken.’
She could hardly stop shaking as she stood facing him in the lounge. Whether or not the whole house could hear her raving, she didn’t care any more. He had gone too far this time. She was devastated and so deeply hurt that she could hardly contain her emotions.
It felt utterly inconceivable that a man like him, a medical man with a background of sober habits could let a slip of a girl twist him around her little finger. How could he have been so foolish, refusing to see the dangerous situation staring him in the face?
He’d ignored all her warnings of trouble if he didn’t get rid of the girl and, as the months had passed, little things had arisen to alarm her: Jay doing less and less work about the house, seeming to have more days off than she was entitled to. When she warned Bertram about it, he maintained that she worked hard to warrant it, which wasn’t true and had even raised discontent with the rest of the staff.
Servants talked – were bound to talk. In larger houses containing a multitude of servants, tittle-tattle was rife, passing from mouth to mouth, especially if it concerned one of themselves or was of the juicy kind, and before long would reach their employer’s ears. In this house there was only Chambers and that little kitchen maid who these days seemed to be taking on duties Jay should be doing.
It was that which had first alerted her that something wasn’t quite right. Mrs Jenkins was the one who knew everything that went on, but Mrs Jenkins hadn’t breathed a word of anything out of the ordinary, so she had assumed her fears to be all in her imagination. Mrs Jenkins, who had the family at heart, was very loyal but apparently misguided. She should have confided in her all she had gleaned, since it directly concerned the doctor’s wife. She felt very angry towards Mrs Jenkins for withholding any information, even if it would have been painful to hear, with probably little she could have done about it.
Chambers had been the one to let it all come out.
‘I’m not sure I should say, madam,’ she’d said when asked why she was looking so glum.
‘Say what?’ she’d demanded.
‘Well…’ Chambers had looked across the bedroom to young Dora, but noting she was busy putting away the gowns her mistress had rejected for an evening out with the master, she went on cautiously, ‘Well, what’s going on between the master and Jay.’
Mary’s heart had missed a beat. Surely it couldn’t be what the words had put into her head. She had quickly turned to Dora, telling her to go down to the kitchen and order tea to be brought up. ‘Small ears carry tales’ was the saying, especially when those ears belonged to Jay’s young sister and the matter concerned them both.
‘Tell me what you mean!’ she commanded sharply after Dora had left.
‘It’s just that – I mean, Jay don’t do any work now in the house any more.’
She hadn’t noticed until then. In her wish to avoid seeing the girl she really hadn’t noticed whether she worked or not, but Chambers had warmed to the subject, gaining momentum. ‘She spends all her time, I think, in her room or up in the master’s study.’
‘The master’s study! What does she do there?’
‘Painting, I think.’
‘Painting?’ She recalled thinking that the questioning was becoming almost childish but found a pressing need to know what was going on. She also recalled feeling relieved that perhaps it wasn’t as unpleasant as she’d first imagined; but even if innocent, why was it going on behind her back?
‘What do you mean – painting? What sort of painting?’
‘Pictures, I think,’ had come the reply. ‘It’s ’cos she’s clever at it.’
‘And how do you know this is going on in the doctor’s study? Tell me!’
Chambers had hung her head. ‘I saw her go in there,’ she mumbled. ‘She had a key. She looked all around, secretive like, as she unlocked the door, but she didn’t see me, and then she went in. I didn’t see her come out ’cos I had work to do. Just lately there seems to be just me and Rose, the kitchen maid, doing all the work around this house.’
‘Does Jay tell you about this painting, or what she’s been doing?’
‘No, not a word, but there’s something going on we don’t know about. She gets more time off than we do and she wears dresses I ain’t seen before when she do go out. I’m sure the master gives her an extra salary. Then there’s that man what comes every Tuesday around seven thirty. I take him up to the master’s study. He’s there until about eight thirty and then he leaves. I asked Cook about it but she said to mind me own business. If you ask me, madam—’
‘I am not asking you, girl,’ Mary had cut in sharply. ‘That is all. Go on about your work now.’
Chambers had curtseyed and gone off, a little sullenly, she’d thought.
Now Mary faced her husband in a fit of anger that had had time to work itself up into a fury but had suddenly exploded this morning when she hadn’t intended it to. She had planned to tackle him with coldness and dignity. Instead she was screaming at him like a harridan.
‘You’ve no answer to give me, have you?’ she cried, virtually at the end of her tether after stewing for days over this. His attitude, the way he was regarding her, as though she were a babbling fool, was all that had been needed to send her that last few inches. And she didn’t care who overheard.
‘Lies!’ she shrieked at him. ‘Lies! Painting be damned!’ She saw him recoil at her choice of words. ‘This talk of you finding her so like our… our dearest Millicent…’ She stumbled over the word, trying to keep back the tears the mere mention of that dear name brought. ‘All lies! In truth you’re besotted with the girl and she’s leading you on and you’re fool enough not to see it. You’re a silly, middle-aged man, carrying on with—’
‘I’m carrying on with no one!’ he interrupted fiercely. ‘I find her sweet and caring – all the things I miss since we lost our cherished daughter. She is an inspiration to me, a boon. She fills that emptiness in my heart. If that is a crime—’
‘Don’t be so melodramatic!’ Mary winced with embarrassment but quickly recovered. ‘And I don’t believe you. The truth is that you’ve found in her your own lost youth. You’ve allowed yourself to be seduced by her wiles. Painting! You and she have been deceiving me.’
‘Mary, you are being ridiculous.’
Mary’s eyes opened wide until they almost resembled saucers of blue set in her full cheeks. ‘It is you who are being ridiculous, you stupid, stupid man! You beast! And she’s nothing more than a little whore…’
‘That’s a terrible thing to say, my dear.’
‘But true. And I shall not remain in this house a minute longer than is necessary to collect a few belongings. I shall stay with my sister Edith and her husband in Kensington. If and when you finally come to your senses, that is where I may be contacted. Dora is coming with me.’
Bertram hadn’t shifted from the hearth where he’d positioned himself throughout her tirade. The only visible sign of his emotion was the clenching an
d unclenching of his chubby hands.
His voice, when he spoke again, was steady, though obviously being held in check.
‘If that’s how you feel, my dear, then I think you should go to stay with Edith and Edward. I can see that there is no way to convince you of my innocence. My only fault is the desire to seek solace for the void the loss of our daughter has left in my heart. I can only ask you to accept my apologies for failing to confide in you that need. But if you cannot see fit to understand my feelings, then I think it best you stay with your sister for a while.’
His outward calm had transmitted itself to her a little. In a haughty but more controlled voice, though still trembling on the brink of tears, she sought to clarify.
‘And I can take it that you have no intention of terminating this relationship, whatever it is, with this person who is even less than half your age – young enough to be your daughter?’
Too late she realized her error as he nodded in ironic confirmation. It was too much for her. Turning, she fled from the room, the lightweight beige fabric of her day dress puffing out around her ankles as she went.
Bertram stood quite still. He could hear her calling for Dora in a high, frantic voice and wondered absently what the staff must make of it. Fuel for wagging tongues, no doubt.
His heart felt as though it had been drained of blood; yet now all he could think of, as his wife’s door slammed to, was that Ellie – Elizabeth as he was wont to call her these days – would be near destroyed by the loss of her younger sister, whom she had brought here under her own far-too-young protection, seeking his protection for them both.
Thirteen
September: Dora had been away nearly three months. It felt more like three years, more like a lifetime. Bad enough when the mistress had forbidden Dora to associate with her. At least she had caught a glimpse of her now and again and they’d exchanged hurried smiles. Now there wasn’t even that to console her. For the first time ever she felt… well, orphaned.
She wondered if Dora was pining as much as she was. There’d been no word from her at all since she and Mrs Lowe had left. She had found where Dora was living from an address book in one of the drawers in Doctor Lowe’s desk and written to her several times, no longer labouring over her spelling or her English since Michael Deel had spent time with her over it.
She was a quick learner, he told her. She hadn’t realized it herself. Never going to school as often as she should have, with Mum always needing her help, she had thought herself a bit of a dunce. It had taken Michael Deel to bring out talents she’d thought she never had and, in fact, she had come to enjoy writing letters.
Writing got all the tension out of her and she had written pages and pages to Dora, full of hopes and fears – what she had been up to and how she was looking forward to hearing all Dora had been up to. Though her sister was really bad at writing, her spelling pitiful, written exactly as she spoke, she expected some sort of reply.
At first she wondered if Dora was too ashamed of her efforts to write, but soon came a feeling that her own letters were perhaps being intercepted and not passed on. Likewise she suspected Dora’s letters were also being interfered with. She wouldn’t put it past Mrs Lowe.
Poor Dora. All on her own, with only her mistress for company, at her beck and call and probably hardly let out of her sight. She must be feeling totally isolated, trapped. She could walk out, but Ellie knew she would never have the gumption: she was still only thirteen. But even at thirteen she could have found her way back here. If ever she did turn up, Ellie was prepared to give up all her plans to better herself here and go off with her to do the best she could in the wide world. Dora was worth that sacrifice.
Oddly enough, having got much of what she’d been aiming for, Ellie also felt isolated. Nothing was as she’d imagined it would be. She now ate her meals in Doctor Lowe’s study, Florrie bringing her food there. Ellie could see she was far from being pleased about that, tossing her head when Ellie tried to make conversation or even smile at her; if Ellie addressed her, she was now calling her Miss Jay, as if they’d never ever been friends.
‘You’ll no longer be expected to work around the house,’ Doctor Lowe had told her, which was exactly when Florrie had started showing off. And it was then that she had known things would never be the same again. Though she was on her way to becoming all that she’d planned to be, she didn’t feel at all happy. She wanted Florrie to be her friend again, to have Mrs Jenkins scold her for small errors instead of behaving stiffly and correctly in her presence. But most of all she wanted Dora back here beside her, to confide in, protect, giggle and share thoughts with.
Then, last week, Doctor Lowe had said that he would be moving her out of the bedroom she’d used as a parlourmaid.
‘Chambers and the girl Rose are to sleep there,’ he told her with an almost fatherly smile. ‘You will have my daughter Millicent’s bedroom for your own.’
It was evening. His surgery had finished for the day and they were having a light supper together, seated opposite each other across the small round table in his study.
Ellie wasn’t sure whether she enjoyed eating with him. Try as she might, she could never feel entirely at ease with him. Whether it was because at times he seemed just a little too fatherly, making it hard not to flinch away should he touch her arm, or whether it had something to do with the fact that she still cringed from the memory of the medical help he’d given her, a lingering sense of it being a little too personal, she couldn’t say. But she always managed to disguise her feelings.
While he was working, she could enjoy her meals alone, even though it was becoming boring with little to do all day but draw and paint, read books or go out for a stroll. She could now come and go as she pleased, glad to be free of the place.
Sometimes she’d take an omnibus and wander around the big shops up west, sometimes go to visit Mrs Sharp, her only social contact with the outside world. With Ronnie Sharp at work it wasn’t much of an outing, and she guessed Doctor Lowe wouldn’t like her being out late, even though the early-September evenings were still light.
Mrs Sharp would always stop whatever she was doing to make her a cup of tea and to gossip, the gossip shallow and pretty uninteresting but a refreshing escape from the claustrophobic world her life had become. She’d hoped there’d be some word about her father, but though she questioned Mrs Sharp, the woman had heard nothing. It was as if he’d vanished off the face of the earth. Whether he’d ever learned about her mother was debatable. As to Charlie, no one knew where he was either. Probably it was just as well.
Mrs Sharp’s most interesting topic was what her Ronnie was up to. Ellie had taken to writing to him, telling him about herself, and he’d write telling her about himself. That was as far as it had ever got.
She’d have liked to contact Dora, though it would only mean trouble for them both; but there were times when she thought she had never felt so lonely. Trying to become a lady wasn’t as enjoyable as she had imagined.
At Doctor Lowe’s revelation Ellie stopped eating and looked up at him in surprise. It was the first time he’d ever spoken his daughter’s name without prefixing the word dearest or of having grief twist his podgy features. With his wife’s departure he had begun to change.
‘It’s foolish to let the room lie empty,’ he continued as Ellie went on staring. ‘It should be brought to life again.’
‘Didn’t your wife want it to stay as it was?’ she asked. ‘After…’ She let the words die away, fearing to upset him. Instead he gave a wry grin.
‘Yes, and so did I. But time passes and the emptiness fills. I have you to thank for that. Yes, you, my dear,’ he stressed as she tried to wave away his gratitude.
‘It can in some ways be a comfort to keep alive a cherished memory, but there is a tendency to let oneself be dragged down by it with no wish or will to face the world again. I was in danger of that happening and until you came I was content to let it continue.’
He sighed and push
ed his plate from him. ‘I finally feel ready to come to terms with our loss and it is all due to you, my dear. I wish her mother could feel the same way, but there is little I can do about that.’
He seemed resigned to his wife having gone. It was almost as if a weight had been lifted from him. It struck Ellie that he was, in fact, glad of the freedom to spend more time with her without recrimination from his wife. Ellie had long guessed that they’d probably not enjoyed a close companionship for years.
She often wondered whether their marriage had been a love match or a contract between two families such as the better off were often said to indulge in. She imagined it to have been the latter, for she’d not seen the slightest glance of affection pass between them for as long as she had been here. It had seemed to her, as time went on, that his only show of such feelings had been towards herself, while his wife had bestowed hers on Dora. Almost like a contest between the pair.
She couldn’t help feeling sorry for him. It couldn’t have been much of a life, and to lose his only daughter too. Now, without his wife here, he was beginning to smother her a little too much, making her feel uncomfortable.
It was starting to feel wrong, playing on his good nature as a means to an end. She’d begun to hate herself, knowing she was treading on everyone for her own purposes. But what important purposes they were. It took all her efforts not to be reminded that he was a kind man, too kind to be taken advantage of like this. She didn’t want to hurt him, but she couldn’t abandon her scheme to find her father. This man was her only chance of attaining that goal; one day she would leave and it would break the man’s heart.
* * *
His daughter’s old room was lovely: spacious and bright – the bed covers, the matching drapes, the wallpaper apparently still as they’d been left. How doted on she must have been to have such a room. Ellie gazed about and thought of the tiny box she and Dora had shared in the two-up, two-down terraced dwelling in Gales Gardens. How lucky this girl had been. Ellie smiled. No, not lucky. She was dead. Ellie Jay was alive: she was the lucky one.
