The Girl in the Attic

by Wendy Reakes

  He coughed and averted his eyes as if he didn’t want to look at me anymore. “I have to go away for a couple of days to take care of some business. Will you be all right while I’m gone?”

  “Of course. I feel a lot better and as you said this morning when you changed the dressings, my wounds are healing very well.”

  He stared into my eyes as if he was mesmerised by me. As I was with him. He leaned forward and parted lips touched. The kiss was tender and sweet, like the caress of a velvet peach. When he pulled away he looked ashamed.

  “I’m sorry,” he said breaking the spell of the moment with a shake of his head.

  He placed the empty soup bowl on the table next to the bed and stood up. He was leaving and I would miss him.

  He had his back to me as he looked down at Rain in the cradle he’d provided. He’d found it in the outside store, carrying the old boots I’d been looking for that night. He’d cleaned it up and told me Rain was now its new occupant. “I will be back in a couple of days,” he said. Stay safe until I return.”

  Then without looking back, he left.

  But he never came back.

  The days after Porter had gonewere the loneliest I had borne since stealing into the attic the night I lost my shoes. To pass the time, after I’d finished my chores and got Rain sleeping peacefully, lying in her crib outside in the sun, I took up the unfinished embroidery I’d found in Elizabeth’s locked trunk. So far, I had only created the flesh upon the face, but now I was following the hairline with threads of black. I was sure it must have been a portrait of baby William. While I sewed, hours on end, until my eyes could no longer focus in the fading light, I thought about Celia, hundreds of miles from the attic in Wilbury House, and I thought about Porter, the man who promised me he would return and who, so far, had not. What would our future hold now, mine and Rains? Perhaps I could re-plan our escape. I still had enough money left for the train fare. The walk to the station was a good distance. Would I make it with my leg so weak? It was something to consider, but for now, I would stay until Porter returned.

  Soon it would be September. Celia would be coming back and what a surprise she will have when she finds me still here. Will she be happy, I wondered, or just plain sick of the sight of me? I decided the former. Celia had a good heart. She wouldn’t place the blame on me. It was merely unlucky circumstances I had been discovered when I went searching for boots…or could it have been lucky, since I had met Porter. Maybe it was a well-timed blessing.

  Of course, it was no business of mine that with Porter away, the house and grounds were unguarded but I did have cause to wonder at whatever had detained Porter, why he hadn’t sent someone to step into his shoes, rather than leaving the house unprotected.

  I could put weight onto my leg now with the help of an old cane I’d found in the corner of the attic, alongside the oars and cricket paraphernalia. Now that I was up and about, I began to worry more about Porter’s absence; why he hadn’t returned, why he hadn’t sent word, and who was guarding the house?

  It was a mild afternoon on the first week of September when I decided to take matters into my own hands. After all, wasn’t it simply a case of going around the house, checking the rooms for intruders or anything else that shouldn’t be there…Intruders?! An intruder like me! How strange that I had come to think of the house as my home, to be protective of it, to want to care for its welfare. Then I realised, of course I would. Without the house, there would be no attic, thus, no home for me and Rain.

  I took the baby with me when I carried out my rounds. I was the caretaker now. I owed it to Porter and to Celia to make sure everything was in order.

  Walking freely about that grand building, without having to hide in every corridor or watch every door, I suddenly felt liberated after being cooped up for so long. I ambled about, opening and closing doors, sometimes entering the gloom where the shutters blocked out the midday sun. Most of the furniture was covered in white dust sheets, but the paintings lining the walls and the beautiful clocks and rugs were an exquisite sight for my sore eyes.

  Just as I was about to open a door, I stopped short when I heard a noise coming from the mistress’s boudoir. My instinct was to run and hide once more in the safety of my attic, but what would be the point in caretaking if I wasn’t going to tackle anything untoward?

  With Rain resting on my hip, I listened some more as I leaned onto my good leg and levered the brass handle downwards, slowly opening the door. Inside, the sun was filtering through the shutters leaving white stripes across the floor and across the gold flock wall coverings. The room where the Mistress slept and dressed was an elegant bedchamber and nothing like I’d ever laid eyes on before. I walked through an archway, tentatively, fearing what I would find inside. A bed with a pink satin canopy dominated the room, and lace cloths covered electric lamps on the small side tables. A large dresser sat on the opposite side where the sheet had slipped off to the floor. In front of a grand fireplace, two easy chairs remained covered with a sheet where at the bottom I could see pink velvet fringe. And there in front of the fire, in the grate was a tiny sparrow hopping on one leg as he attempted to fly.

  I limped over to the bed and placed Rain atop it. She had fallen asleep, oblivious to the opulence of her surroundings. At the side of the room a door led to a washroom where a bath as big as two tubs put together sat in the middle of a white marble floor. I spotted a basket and picked it up. It would be perfect for carrying the little bird before I released it into the sky.

  I took a quick glance at Rain, as I went past the bed. She was asleep in the middle of the mattress beneath the pink canopy, looking like a proper princess. I went to the fireplace where the bird was still flapping about with the intention of escaping. “Hello, little fellow. Did you come down the chimney? Where’s your mama then?” His feathers felt like whispers on my skin as I gently closed my fingers about him and placed him inside the basket.

  Just as I was about to take the basket into my arms, my eyes caught a small hand-painted portrait on the wall at the side of the mantle, hidden among a cluster of others. There, staring back at me, the face of a young boy, carrying a smile I would never forget. A name was scrawled upon it at a slant. William, it said. And facing me was the exact likeness of the black-haired lout.

  Numbed by the image, I grabbed the basket with the bird inside and knowing I couldn’t carry it and the baby, I decided to leave Rain safety asleep while I took the little bird up to the attic.

  When I reached the top, I heard noises coming from the courtyard below the house. The sound of horses and carriages.

  The family and the servants were back.

  I walked as swiftly as I could with my hobbling leg, along the path through the forest of furniture to the end where my breathing became a laborious pant. My head was spinning. I had to get down to the servant quarters and into the mistress bedchamber before any of the servants came up the stairs. Oh God, I won’t make it. I won’t make it. God help me.

  I went thought the attic door to the wooden steps and down to the servant’s floor. I rushed along the corridor and sneaked down the stairs leading to the family’s bedrooms.

  When I looked at the door of the mistress’s boudoir, I expelled a gasp when I saw the door was shut. I had definitely left it open when I’d left Rain and taken the bird upstairs. If it was now shut, someone was in there and they had discovered my baby.

  There was nothing else for it. I had to own up to my presence and plead my case so that I wouldn’t get thrown in gaol. Oh, why did I start the caretakers rounds today of all days?

  Resolute that I would own up to my presence, I rushed across the landing and slipped into the room. The shutters were still closed, but there was light streaming through a door off the dressing area, perhaps where the nanny slept with the baby.

  I almost screamed out loud when I felt someone tap my shoulder.

  I swung around with fear in my eyes to see Celia next to the door, holding Rain up over her shoulder. I
didn’t know what to think or how to react. She placed her finger to her lips to hush me, shoved the baby into my arms, and without taking her eyes off the room next to the dressing area, she ushered me out the door.

  I rushed as best I could from the corridor and up the stairs to the servant’s quarters, along that floor, still quiet and dark, and up the stairs to the attic where I closed the door behind me.

  I collapsed into a heap in the safety of my own parlour. I had managed to get Rain onto the bed before pain shot up my leg and I almost screamed in agony. I moved to be next to her and then we both went to sleep while below in the house, life before winter began again.

  End of Part Two

  Part 3

  Chapter 23

  April 1901

  I have lived in the attic at the top of Wilbury House for almost five-years. My life has been a curious one, but for Rain, well, how more curious could one be about a child growing up in an attic with only the sky outside to remind her there was more to life than the place she dwelled with her mother.

  For my part, I have become a permanent recluse, dreading leaving the safety of my parlour in fear of being discovered and thrown in gaol. Outside I was vulnerable, unprotected by my roof and rafters.

  Porter still hadn’t returned. It had soon become clear about his fate when Celia told me what she had heard from the other servants. “He’d been on his way to Taunton,” Celia had said, wide eyed. “That’s what the groom told us on our return, when we asked about Mr Porter’s whereabouts.”

  “Taunton,” I whispered. “To find my cousin, to ask her to take me in. I am sure of it.”

  “He only got as far as Bridgewater, so said someone from the pub next to the Bridgwater & Taunton Canal. They all think he was taken, pressganged at the dockside and perhaps made to fight in the Spanish and American war.” As an afterthought, she said with a raised brow “Honestly, Marley. I didn’t even know there was a war going on.”

  My heart was breaking when Celia relayed the story she had heard about Porter. But when the end of the war had been decreed in December 1898 and he still hadn’t come back, he had been declared dead and a new groundsman recruited to Wilbury House.

  I was alone again, secretly mourning the loss of the only man who had shown kindness to me. The only man I have ever loved.

  When Celia had come back that day in ‘98, she had found Rain -just a baby then- lying on the softness of the Mistress’s bed. “Fortunately, I went up with the nanny and master John, to prepare the room for the mistress and settle the baby down before she went up,” Celia had said. “Nanny walked straight past the bed, without a glance, but when I saw Rain, I stood as still as a stone statue, trying to get into my head what on earth she was doing there. When nanny went into the nursery, I picked up the baby and stole her away.” She’d looked at me with tears in her eyes when she’d realised I was still in the attic and not -as she’d anticipated- in Taunton. “That’s when you came into the boudoir and took her from me.”

  Two hours later, Celia had come to the attic when she was given a short break in her chores. “We’re really busy down there,” she’d said, rushing. “Normally we come back before to get the house ready before the family arrive, but it didn’t work that way this year because of the new baby.”

  She’d looked directly at the cane leaning against the bed. “What happened? Why didn’t you catch the train?”

  I quickly told her about the night I’d tried getting the boots from the stores, about getting shot and about Porter nursing me back to health. “He told me he’d return in a couple of days but he never came back. Never!”

  “We can try again,” Celia had said.

  I’d nodded glum like.

  Celia had seemed cautious when she’d said, “Unless, unless you’d prefer to stay…then we can go on as before.”

  I’d searched her eyes for a hint of deception, but then I knew she was in earnest. “You would like us to stay, Celia?” I asked.

  She’d sat next to me and held me in her embrace. We were both crying. “Of course, I do. I never wanted you to leave in the first place.”

  “I suppose we could stay a while until next summer when Rain is a little older,” I’d said, worn out from the traumatic events of that day. And as I looked at the little bird I’d captured, I decided that day he could stay as well.

  Rain had developedinto a beautiful, bonny child. When the house downstairs had celebrated Master John’s first birthday in 1899, Celia, Rain and I had our own little party after Celia brought up the remnants of the cake. She’d placed a candle in the centre and we both helped Rain to blow it out. It had turned out to be a marvellous celebration and we did the same each year after. Celia had given Rain a toy which had once belonged to her when she was a child. It was a tin monkey which, at the flick of a wrist, climbed up a wooden pole. Her mother had suggested she gave it to baby John but Celia had given it to Rain instead. When she saw that little monkey it had brought her so much pleasure, her precious smile had just brightened my day.

  Even now she still hadn’t spoken a word. I’d spent many times with her, trying to get her to move her mouth and her tongue like mine but she only laughed at my peculiar expressions. Hers was a silent laugh, leaving me to only imagine the sound of those chuckles coming from her pretty rosebud lips. In contrast to her pale skin, her hair was jet black, reminding me of her father and she was slender, shorter than me but she had a talent that far surpassed anything I had to offer.

  She first began painting when she’d turned two. I had offered her the easel I’d retrieved from the far reaches of the attic. We’d found paints but they had dried to a hard crust over the years. Still, I’d managed to thin them out them with some turps which Celia had brought me from the store outside. With the help of the solution, I’d managed to get some colour out of them, albeit it the paints of only four colours had remained quite lumpy.

  Rain had been unperturbed by the density of the paint and after I’d stretched a square of white sheeting onto a frame of wood, without any help from me, she’d began painting thick brown lines over it. When the dark brown stripes were finished, she’d added a dot of black to the blue and followed the brown lines with the use of the tip of her finger. I couldn’t make it out at all until she added some splashes of white. “That’s a nice painting, Rain,” I’d said offering motherly encouragement.

  When the paint had almost dried on the canvas, I’d hung the picture from an old nail jutting out of the wood surrounding the glass door. Later, when the candle was lit, I saw Rain staring up at her work. I’d followed her gaze and I’d gasped when the picture had suddenly come alive. It was a picture of the roof rafters above our heads and as the light from the candle struck the white streaks, they’d depicted rays of sunlight creeping through its grooves. The picture had become three-dimensional when the flame of the candle touched the contours of the lumpy paint.

  Afterwards, when I’d lain in my bed watching my daughter sleep, I thought perhaps the image had been a fluke, since a child of her mental ability couldn’t possibly have created something so wondrous.

  The following week, after I’d made another canvas, Rain had dipped her fingers into the lumps of paint and worked it across the stretched sheet like an expert. That time she’d covered the canvas with a simple pale blue with more streaks of white splattered across it, lined by black. I couldn’t make it out at all, until night came and we lit the candle. As we both looked at the image before us, the light shone over it to create a summer blue sky with white clouds, looking like they were floating over the canvas.

  Then I knew my daughter had been bestowed a gift. ‘An artistic genius,’ Celia had called her and I, her mother, wholeheartedly agreed.

  Rain and I spent our summers alone when Celia went with the household to their summer home on the Italian lakes. It was a lonely time, but since she’d found out what her legs could do, I gave Rain the chance to run the corridors of the house without deterrence. The new groundsman wasn’t as diligent as
Porter had been and rarely came inside to check the house, so we were free to roam and run, as long as nothing was disturbed that didn’t need to be disturbed.

  As I watched Rain run like the wind, just like I used to do when I was a girl, it warmed my heart. I was intrigued by the notion that Rain had become accustomed to her life in the attic. She had indicated to me no desire to leave our secret abode, that she was content with her lot, as I was content with mine. I didn’t know how long that would last, seeing as she would soon grow and develop and would surely have desires to go beyond her attic confines to explore the world outside. But for now, she was content, and I hung onto that for as long as I was able.

  At the same time each year, as if it was a well-timed annual ritual, Celia and I planned our get-a-way. Always before the household went off to Italy for the summer, we talked at length about how it could be done but each time, there had been a reason not to go, as if God was making things happen to keep us locked up for good. The year Rain had turned one, she’d caught the pox. Master John had caught it, much to the distress of the mistress who had, a few days before, given permission for him to mix with some local children. Then he’d passed it to Rain. While they nursed John through that week, not knowing if he would live or die, my child had suffered too. Celia had been run-ragged, looking after Master John as she, in turn, offered Rain the same treatment. The only benefit John had, that was not available to Rain, was being whisked off to a foreign land to recuperate in the sun. Instead, I kept my daughter out on the attic terrace where the English sun served her just fine.

  By the time Rain had turned three, I had spent the last of my money on tickets to Taunton, which Celia, as in previous years, had purchased prior to my departure. When the family decided to delay their trip to Italy due to the unrest in Europe, my plans were once again thwarted. After the death of Queen Victoria on January 22, 1901, at the ripe old age of 81, following a reign of sixty-four years, the whole country had gone into mourning and no one was travelling. Instead of holidaying in Europe, that year, the family had, once again, taken off to Brighton with only a handful of servants, thus preventing me from fleeing in June.