by Sheila Burns
They drove up to their own front door, where Davies was awaiting them still wearing one of the other Fiddler’s Hill jackets. Lindy hardly dared ask him the question, but she had to.
‘Is Mrs. Waterford here?’ It would be too awful if this were another disappointment, for many had promised (particularly from the agencies) and then had never turned up.
‘Yes, m’Lady, she’s here and doing fine. She’s got the hang of it all right. No messing about, I’d say.’
‘You think she’ll do?’ It was silly to ask another servant, and something she should not have done, she told herself, yet here she was doing it.
‘Oh yes, m’Lady, she’ll do all right. A bit of luck this is, even if she does look a bit funny. She’s lame, m’Lady, and one arm sort of funny. She had a bad car accident, she said, and her husband was killed. A bit upsetting, you know, but that’s the way life goes. She’s got grey hair and she don’t seem to bother with it. A pity, for she isn’t old, leastways she don’t strike me as being old. She sticks to dark glasses, them big ones, and she has trouble with her spine, so she said.’
‘She’ll never be able to do the work.’
‘Well, she’s mad keen on the job, m’Lady,’ he said. ‘She was ever so pleased to get here. But it’s just as well for you to know what she looks like, so that you don’t get a shock when you see her, else you might be a bit upset.’
Lindy shook her head. She felt ethereally young again, glad-hearted and ecstatic. Nothing could possibly really worry her now that she had a cook. She entered the house and went elatedly up the stairs with their amber carpeting. The day was gay and she was happy.
She went to her own room, and through the long windows saw the pearl of a summer sea, and the strip of cliff between her and it. She was so happy that nothing in the world could stem the tide which ran through her. They’d got a cook!
When she came downstairs, in a different frock, Simon was having a drink in the dining-room, and talking to Davies. Seeing that they were busy, she hesitated on the lowest stair and paused, then as she stepped down into the hall she caught her first glimpse of Mrs. Waterford, going through the passage at the far end of the hall to the scullery. She was far shorter than Lindy had expected, but she had no idea why she had expected her to be tall. A leg dragged slightly, for she was a little lame; her hair was cut like a tassel, coarse grey hair entirely out of keeping with her, and it seemed to Lindy that perhaps she wore it this way to hide some scars.
She had said that her age was thirty, but this smallish gnome-like figure struck Lindy as being older; quite a lot older, she would have thought.
Let’s just pray that she can cook, she told herself.
They went into the dining-room, and once again she sat down under the challenge of Edna’s painted eyes over the mantelpiece. Today they did not seem to matter quite so much. Everything centred on the sort of meal that Mrs. Waterford turned up for them; and if it was bad … The idea sent Lindy jittering.
There was vichyssoise ‒ a favourite of Simon’s ‒ which was a good start to the meal, followed by sole, then cutlets with fresh peas, and an ice-cream sweet. Nobody could have complained about that.
‘If you ask me we’re sitting pretty,’ said Simon in some triumph, ‘and don’t tell me that we haven’t earned it!’
‘I know, and what a huge relief it is! I’ll give her time to get washed up and the kitchen tidied, then go along and thank her.’
‘I shouldn’t,’ Simon was reserved, ‘you might put her off.’
‘But why?’ She was surprised that he should think this, for her idea was to be encouraging, not thwarting. But she did not go to see her that night, for she came over faint with the coffee, nearly passed out, and in the end Simon had to carry her up to bed.
It was absurd to collapse just as they were through the wood, and Mrs. Waterford appeared to be exactly the right person to have. Lindy lay in bed thinking how fortunate she was to have found her; she must write to Mrs. Inkerman in the morning, for this had been her idea. She slept well, and woke next day feeling quite herself, had breakfast in bed, and during the morning went to the kitchen to speak to Mrs. Waterford. The woman was standing by the stove stirring something in a saucepan, and she turned. She certainly did look strange when one went closer to her, for now the zigzag scar down her cheek showed quite hideously. It had healed badly. She had made an attempt to powder over it, but undoubtedly her sight was bad, for she presented a floury face through which the scar showed quite fearsomely. The hair was ill-cut, a shaggy shock of coarse grey hair. Quite plainly she had lost heart in the appearance which she presented to the world. Lindy concealed her reactions (she was afraid of offending the woman). When she spoke the voice was hoarse, a strained whisper. Lindy remembered Mrs. Inkerman telling her that the voice had been affected.
‘You did beautifully last night, and thank you so much,’ Lindy said.
‘I want to please,’ she said it over slowly. ‘Would you prefer that I make out menus for a week, or for the next twenty-four hours, for you to check? And who does the shopping?’
‘My husband and I go down into the town each morning, and you make out a list of what you want. In an emergency Davies can go. We have a well stocked store cupboard. I’ll show you.’
Lindy took Mrs. Waterford down the stone corridor to the far storeroom, and held open the door. As she walked on ahead she got the feeling that this woman was watching her very closely, far more closely than was necessary. The fact that she could not see behind those huge smoked glasses, made Lindy apprehensive. The larder was full and there was a big store refrigerator at the far end. Simon had once said that you could store a dead elephant in it if you wished.
‘This is excellent,’ said Mrs. Waterford in her husky voice, and she looked round the store room. ‘Was this built on?’
‘I don’t really know, it was here when I came.’
‘Yes.’ No more. She was almost curt in speaking, too abrupt, but this could be explained by a certain sensitivity about her strange voice. ‘I shall manage, I’m sure.’
‘I am afraid this house is isolated, my husband and I like it, because we love the view, but it is very lonely.’
The woman said that she did not mind this. She liked a house to be quiet, and had no use for shops, cinemas and such. One got the feeling that she was not friendly, but Mrs. Inkerman had warned Lindy of this, and she only hoped that she would get on with the daily women, though they would be far easier to replace than a cook.
Within a few days she realised that the arrangement was going to work. The relief was immense. The meals were perfect, the expenses cut down, one had to admit that Mrs. Baker had been extravagant, for undoubtedly she had kept old Mr. Baker on the fat of the land out of their stores. Simon was enchanted. Two days later they drove into Suffolk again, and returned to the ideal late dinner. They sat over it.
‘Let’s hope she stays for ever,’ Simon said. ‘I have not met her face to face yet, I’m keeping away lest I put her off. Is the scarring bad?’
‘Yes, quite horrid, poor thing.’
‘What a ghastly shock for her, and she lost her husband?’
‘Yes.’
‘Did she tell you where it was?’
‘No, and I wouldn’t ask. I didn’t ask Mrs. Inkerman either, I did not feel it mattered, the awful part was that it did happen. Anyway she must hate the memory. Let her settle in quietly with nobody worrying her. It’s the only safe way.’
They walked round the garden later on, for in the summer’s evening when the tide was running out, it was lovely in the garden. Simon stopped dead and faced her, his hands nearly meeting round her waist’s span. ‘We are so lucky to have each other. Don’t look ahead,’ and he kissed her. He kissed her with that passionate tenderness of his, drawing her to him so that she felt almost submerged in his affections. The luckiest girl in all the world, and the happiest! Then as he released her both of them saw Mrs. Waterford walking on the far side of the garden. She was looking at t
hem. The wind had made the coarse hair untidy, she was too far off to see details but she looked unwomanish, her dress badly made, her body twisted. She went.
‘You didn’t tell me she was lame,’ Simon said. ‘I hope she isn’t mad. She was watching us.’
‘Curiosity, I’d have said. Oh Simon, do remember that she can cook and whatever she looks like we must stick to her.’
‘Yes, of course.’
That evening a telegram came from London, from no known address, it was to Lindy and from Alan. She opened it with some apprehension.
Arriving tomorrow morning with my new wife.
Look forward to seeing you.
Alan.
She read it again, with an awful fear in her heart, then she turned to Simon. How could they stop him? Alan had always had this atrocious habit of appearing out of the blue without any proper warning. And who on earth had he married?
‘What do we do, Simon?’
‘Oh God!’ said he. ‘It’s hard enough being rude to Alan, but when he brings a wife as well, what do we say? She is bound to be awful!’
‘I don’t really see why; it would be almost worse if she was some poor little dear, helplessly in love with Alan.’
‘Could anybody be in love with Alan? Don’t be absurd! We shall have to tell him we are going away.’
‘But he’ll find out that we aren’t.’
‘Alan has got to learn that we really don’t want him, and find him a nuisance. We can’t beat about the bush. You would have thought he would have got it the first time.’
‘We simply can’t be rude.’
‘I can, don’t you worry!’ He put an arm round her. ‘I won’t have you worried, sweetie. We’ll get out of this. I’ll think up something which is foolproof. Don’t you fret.’
She had a bad night on the strength of it, torn as it seemed two ways, felt sick again, and was in no mood to meet Alan and his new wife when morning came. He appeared just after eleven o’clock. A car stopped at the front door and Alan got out. With him was a stout little woman in the middle forties, one would have thought, somewhat prim and proper. She wore glasses. Davies, who had been warned, announced them, bringing them into the drawing-room where Simon and Lindy were having coffee.
Alan came bouncing in, still in that same disgusting suit, and full of joy. ‘This is a surprise for you all!’ he said, ‘a real surprise, I know. This is Maisie. Isn’t she wonderful?’
‘Marvellous!’ said Simon quite cruelly, but he held out a hand. ‘Some coffee for two, please, Davies.’
The door shut.
‘Lovely to welcome you.’ Lindy was trying to be nice to Maisie, who looked the last person one would have anticipated for Alan. ‘How did this happen?’
Maisie was not disturbed nor shy. She sat herself down on the edge of the sofa and grasped her large unwieldy handbag. ‘I’ve known Alan ever so long,’ she said. ‘We’ve been friends, true friends, and suddenly, well, we thought it’s no good going on for ever this way. I told him so. He saw it all right, then we got married. It was Monday. No fuss, no to-do, just that. We got married.’
‘How lovely!’ was what she said, and wondered if this could be true.
Alan, however, treated it with more glamour. ‘I took my own time to make up my mind,’ said he. ‘But I always knew that Maisie was the girl for me.’
‘Where are you going to live?’ Simon asked, and this was when the coffee appeared on a huge silver tray, with macaroons and cake as well. Alan helped himself gleefully, he was one of those men who ate everything there was and was proud of it.
‘In digs for a bit. Then I shall buy a little house, not too far from the office, somewhere that’ll be all right when I retire, but that’s a long way off.’
‘And where are you going to spend your honeymoon?’ It struck Lindy that an icy tone had come into Simon’s voice.
Alan looked at him impishly, and laughed. ‘Here,’ he said. ‘You can put us up, surely?’
It was the same story all over again! Davies had not got out of the room with the tray and he looked back at them. There was sheer pity in his eye. She could almost imagine him saying to himself, ‘Oh, my Gawd!’
‘You’re going to spend your honeymoon here?’ asked Simon in that rather lordly voice he produced when he was really very angry indeed.
‘Well,’ Lindy knew that Alan was slightly surprised, but he had the nerve to face anything, ‘Lindy is my cousin, and you have lots of room. We aren’t lucky like you are, we have not got the money to bust on a big honeymoon …’
‘We never had one,’ Simon reminded him, and at that moment it seemed to Lindy that she heard the sound of crying again, far, far away in the chimney pots.
‘Well, that was very silly of you,’ said Alan.
It was the last straw. ‘Not half as silly as it is of you to come calmly down here and tell us you are having a honeymoon on us,’ said Simon coldly, ‘because this is the last thing you are going to do! The very last thing. You’re going right back where you came from.’
Alan went scarlet. It was Maisie who spoke. ‘Oh my goodness!’ she said, ‘and I thought you said he was a gentleman!’
There was a pause then.
‘There is the Crown.’
‘I tell you I can’t afford the Crown, and look what happened last time; I broke my arm tripping on that awful old drugget of theirs. They ought to have paid for it, and I said so, I said so quite vehemently.’
‘I’m sure you did!’ remarked Simon, and again he was ice, coldly bitter. ‘But we have got to come to some rearrangements about this. You cannot spend your honeymoon here, whatever else you think about it, or about us.’
‘How dare he?’ gasped Maisie and she was going a dark and unpleasant red.
‘I dare because this happens to be my own house, and at the moment I cannot have visitors here,’ said Simon. ‘Understand this. I will pay for a long week-end at the Crown for you ‒’
‘I wouldn’t go near the damned place,’ grunted Alan, now furious.
‘All right then, but don’t say I did not offer. Finish your coffee and go back to London or wherever it is you came from.’
Lindy wanted to cry. She felt the desperate almost uncontrollable weakness which comes when tears are very near, and knew that this was not the right moment. She swallowed hard. It was then that she knew she was going to be sick again. She got up. ‘Sorry,’ she said.
‘And all you do is to run away,’ Alan told her.
‘I want to be sick.’
‘So do I,’ Alan was now in one of his fiery moods, ‘I want to be sick that my little cousin has married such an awful man, and that people can be so utterly beastly, and …’
She had to rush through the door, and out into the downstairs cloaks, and she was sick, very sick. She could not appear again, for she felt too ill. She crawled up to her room and that was where Simon found her when he had rid himself of Alan and Maisie, and, he prayed, for good.
‘My poor sweet, how awful for you! He’ll never come back again. I saw what was happening and told him I’d shoot him if he did. They’ve gone for ever.’
She had to admit that she could not be more thankful.
At three that afternoon a call came from the States. It changed Simon again, she could see it, and he said that he would have to go up to London tomorrow to see his solicitor. He would have to start early. He walked out on to the cliff and was gone some time. When he came back he was in one of his silent moods. As if I had not had sufficient for the day! she thought. She went to bed early, and Simon had gone when she woke, so she stayed in late, and came down only when Joan Headley came to see her.
‘Something wrong?’ Joan asked.
‘Reaction! That awful cousin of mine turned up with a new wife, but anyway I’ve got a cook, and she seems like the staying sort. Davies says that she is an ice-box (she is certainly very quiet), and I don’t think he likes her.’
‘Does that matter?’
‘Not really.’
/> Joan lit herself a cigarette and pushed it into one of those strange long holders of hers. ‘No old servant ever likes a new one. It’s her staying power which counts. When Simon comes back, do dine with me?’
‘We’d love to.’
‘And why not come and dine at the Crown on Saturday?’
‘I’d love it.’
She was grateful to be asked, and she felt better.
Chapter Fifteen
Lindy went for a walk that afternoon, going to the estuary side of the peninsula, the sheltered side. She took a path that she had never taken before, overgrown in places, but winding its way down to the water itself. The place was quite unbelievably lovely.
The beach was pebbly, much more so than on the sea side, and there were strange water birds walking about the shore. She stood there for a moment taking in a long deep breath. It was a tiny bay and close beside her was a hut. Had someone had this hut put here for bathing? she wondered to herself. What was the idea of it? It was disorderly, and by the look of it no one had been here for a very long time, and yet it must have been put here to serve some purpose. The door answered to her pushing and opened. The place was not alarming, a small hut, the wall plastered, and into the plaster shells had been set. It was typically of the sea. On the right there was an old-fashioned Primus stove, rusted beyond belief. There was a centre table, with things on it. Some fusty old knitting, and a letter which was half written, for possibly the owner had been interrupted at that moment.
The place had obviously belonged to a woman. There was a chaise longue by the far window, and once the chintz cover had been charming, vivid blue with fishes and shells on it, now dilapidated, hallmarked by the time, and dusty. There was an expensive easy chair. Possibly no one had known of the whereabouts of the place, and had never come into it, or half the things would have been stolen.
She picked up the half-finished letter from the table, and blew the dust from it; it smelt salty, of the sea.
Dearest Rafaello,
Tomorrow then? What a thrill! Simon has no idea, too wrapped up in himself, I suppose. I have got him to transfer that money to my account; we should be all right.
