‘Don’t worry.’ She smiled at him. ‘Just leave it, we’ll see.’
‘You m . . . m . . . must, Trotter.’
‘All right, all right.’
‘Good! Good!’
John went out of the room, down the stairs taking them two at a time, almost upsetting Katie who was carrying a tray of dishes from the morning room. As he steadied her and the tray, he said, ‘M . . . M . . . Matthew. M . . . M . . . Master Matthew, has he gone?’
‘No, he’s still in there, Master John.’
John entered the morning room almost at a run, to see his brother standing looking out of the window on to the side lawn, and he said immediately, ‘I’ve s . . . seen her. She’ll c . . . c . . . come as the f . . . family. You kn . . . know, Matthew, you are too rough with p . . . p . . . people and Trotter is a s . . . s . . . sensitive p . . . person.’
‘Sensitive! . . . Sensitive!’ Matthew swung round from the window. ‘When she decides she’s not going to do anything she’s about as sensitive as a long-horned bull.’
John laughed at this, then said, ‘Well, I would have f . . . f . . . felt awful if she just t . . . took up the position of a s . . . s . . . servant to . . . tomorrow night. You see I cannot help it, Matthew, b . . . but I feel she is something sp . . . sp . . . special in a way, and both Anna and I owe her so much. You s . . . s . . . see, Anna went to her in the first place thinking she was a wi . . . witch and that she might be able to remove the b . . . b . . . birthmark. And you know, I . . . I somehow think she is a bi . . . bit of a witch because . . . ’
‘Don’t say that word, and don’t couple it with her! Do you hear me? Don’t ever couple it with her!’
‘Oh, Ma . . . Matthew, I’m s . . . s . . . sorry but I didn’t m . . . m . . . mean it in a nas . . . nasty way, you know that, it was a s . . . sort of a com . . . compliment.’
‘There’s no compliment in being called a witch. I know of places in America where people bow their heads when that word is used, some in shame, some in sorrow; those in shame because their ancestors were not ignorant scum but class people, who would have been known as gentry here, and it was mainly they and the clergy who condemned innocent people to be hung and just from hearsay.’
‘Oh.’ The syllable sounded placating but lacked a note of interest. ‘They were as b . . . bad as they w . . . w . . . were here then?’
‘Worse, I should say. There was a time towards the end of the sixteen hundreds when people in Massachusetts, and other states too, went crazy in witch-hunts. Some young clergyman wrote a book about an old woman in Boston who had been executed for being a witch. The story goes that the book got into the hands of three silly girls and they accused someone of being a witch, and to save her own neck the victim implicated others. It got so bad that there were special courts appointed to try the supposed witches. The frightened victims confessed to all kinds of things, saying that some travelled on broomsticks and held conversations with the devil. Those who dared raise their voice against the courts were immediately accused of being the devil’s tongue. Some of the victims were hanged and one man, so I heard from a descendant of his, was pressed to death. I tell you, John’ – Matthew pointed at his brother, his voice harsh, and his face red – ‘although it’s a long time since a witch was burnt in this country the fear still prevails. You’ve only to go back to what happened to Trotter because she danced with the parson’s wife. You won’t remember it, except by hearsay, but they put her in the stocks. And when the parson’s wife accidentally killed one of Trotter’s persecutors they burned down her grandmother’s cottage. Although the rubble has all been cleared away the foundations still remain as a grim reminder at the east end of the estate.’
‘I d . . . d . . . didn’t understand. I never meant . . . ’
‘Oh, I know you didn’t.’ Matthew made a conciliatory movement with his hand. ‘I never thought much about witchcraft myself until I went to America. I knew people here referred to Trotter as a witch, but to me then the word simply meant somebody bewitching as she undoubtedly was. But when I came across two families who, I understood, had hated each other for more than a hundred years and was told the reason why, well, since then, the very word is anathema to me, because hatred caused the death, supposedly accidental, of the son of one house and kept the daughter of the other house separated. They had fallen in love. The result was, one grew into a sour old maid and the other was killed. And this all came about through the word witch. And the sour old maid happens to be Uncle’s daughter.’
‘Oh! Oh! R . . . really? I’m sorry, Ma . . . Matthew. I understand how you f . . . feel so strongly about it. R . . . R . . . Rest ass . . . assured I’ll n . . . never apply that name to Trotter again. In fact, I d . . . d . . . don’t think I’ll ever use it again in . . . in . . . in any way.’
Matthew drew in a long breath, lowered his head and shook it from side to side before saying, ‘You must think me odd at times, John, a little crazy, but living over there has changed my views on everything and everyone. There’s a rawness about it that . . . that finds its counterpart inside me. When I left England for the first time I felt capable of holding my own with anyone, gentry or commoner. Well, I found I could hold my own with the so-called gentry, they were no different as I said from what they are over here, except perhaps a little more ruthless, for they have more to gain and more to lose; but it was the common man, the ordinary fellow who stands up to you and tells you that he’s as good as you, boy. They don’t do it in so many words, it’s by looks and actions, it’s more of what they leave out than what they put into their attitude towards you that brings you down. What you value they laugh at, they spit at; oh yes, literally. It turns your stomach at first, because everybody spits; no matter where they are, who they are, they spit. They chew tobacco and spit. I found it so nauseating that I actually wanted to vomit at times. Really, I did.’ He nodded his head now as he smiled at John. ‘Then you get used to it. You have to. In fact, at times you’re even tempted to copy them instead of swallowing, especially if you’re smoking a pipe. Good lord!’ He laughed now as he put his arm around John’s shoulders, saying, ‘I have gone on, haven’t I? America, first lesson, from witches to spit!’
‘It was in . . . inter . . . interesting. I wish you would talk more, Matthew. You’ve told me v . . . v . . . very little about Uncle; I don’t even know what he looks like, this uncle. I only hope he doesn’t t . . . t . . . take after Gr . . . Gr . . . Grandmama. He was her half-bro . . . brother, wasn’t he?’
‘Yes, but I can assure you there’s nothing of Grandmama in Alvero Portes, except perhaps his determination to have his own way; but unlike Grandmama, he tempers this with a great deal of tact. Anyway, we’ll talk about him later; but now, to get back to the present and my bone of contention, namely Trotter. You succeeded where I failed, and when I come to think of it, you always did have a better effect on her than I had. Well now, I think you’d better go and carry out your charm in the kitchen because the wind there I fear is against me. If they had any sense they’d know they couldn’t cope with everything tomorrow and that I was thinking of them when I ordered the additional staff.’
‘N . . . n . . . no, you weren’t.’ John pushed Matthew none too playfully now in the shoulder. ‘Y . . . you know you weren’t. Os . . . os . . . ostentation you said, a bit, not too much. Are you ins . . . ins . . . insisting on them wearing s . . . s . . . satin breeches and g . . . gaiters?’
‘No, kilts like the Scots in order to placate your future wife’s grandmother who, I understand, hails from over the Border.’
‘Oh.’ John put his head back and let out a free peal of laughter, and they were both laughing when they crossed the hall and picked up their tall hats and coats and went out of the door and to the stables.
A few minutes later, as Tilly watched them both riding down the drive, she thought how unlike their temperaments were. If only Matthew had been born with a little of John’s kindness and softness. But what about the other way? Yes,
she supposed it would have helped John if in his turn he’d had a little more self-assurance; but not so much that it amounted to bombast.
She repeated the word to herself, bombast. But could that word be correctly applied to Matthew? What did it mean? She was thinking in the way of Mr Burgess as she said to herself: Stuffing, padding, loud assertiveness, over-stressed eloquent phrasing. Well no, bombast was the wrong word, there was no padding about him, he was too forthright . . . Loud assertiveness? Yes; he yelled more often than not, especially when he was angry. And of course, he did assert himself, but not with high-falutin phrases . . . Oh, why on earth was she standing here dissecting his character? Didn’t she get enough of him when they were face to face? She was becoming daily more irritated by his very presence. And then the party tomorrow. He had taken as much trouble over it as if it was to celebrate his own engagement. Hm! Perhaps it was, too. Well, the sooner the better. She turned from the window and went about her duties.
As Biddy remarked later to Katie, ‘She’s going round lookin’ like I feel, as if the only thing that would ease her would be to slap somebody’s lug.’
It was many a year since the house had known such gaiety, and the almost full moon and the soft night together seemed to lend enchantment to the whole affair.
At ten o’clock Matthew’s eloquent but brief speech, followed by the drinking of the health of the happy couple, was over and most of the guests had dispersed into the grounds, which gave Matthew the idea to have the quartet brought from the gallery on to the terrace. The young people were dancing on the sunken lawn; and not only the young, for the wine seemed to have loosened the stiffness in the legs of their parents and many were showing their paces, dancing not only the minuet, but the schottische, and even the faster polka.
The waiters, too, were kept busy, moving among the guests handing plates of sweetmeats and even more substantial cuts; and it was nothing to see a velvet-coated gentleman gnawing at a chicken leg, or another holding his head back as he dangled a slice of sirloin above his gaping mouth.
The lamps on the terrace and the lights from the house assisting the moon showed the scene up almost as if it were being enacted in daylight. Tilly was standing just within the open window of the morning room at the end of the terrace. The shadow cast by the cypress tree fell across the window and so hid the expression on her face, a mixture of anger and disdain as she looked down on the scene. Her eyes were focussed on a small group of women.
Those three! She felt that she had jumped back thirteen years. As on that night years ago Mrs Tolman, Mrs Fieldman and Mrs Cragg and their parties had all arrived together, and just as on that night they had made a point of speaking about her as if she weren’t present, so they had done tonight but with a difference. On the previous occasion when they had discussed her they had not been certain of her position in the house, but tonight they were, and as if prior to their arrival they had together decided what form their attitude towards her was to be, they had all stared boldly at her as they stood side by side like three ravens: one was dressed in blue taffeta, one in dark green silk, and the other in black lace, and the colours combined were like the sheen on a raven’s back. What was more, they had pointedly ignored John’s introduction of her, and his ‘Miss Trotter, a friend of the family’ brought a sound like a hoot from Mrs Bernice Cragg. But the final insult was when Alice Tolman, the eldest of the four Tolman girls, who, although being twenty-eight years old and plain, was of a pleasant nature, had stopped to speak to her, for it was then her mother sailed towards them and, without looking at either of them, said, ‘You should know your place, Alice, even if others forget theirs.’
She should never, never have allowed herself to be persuaded to act as hostess tonight. She looked down at her dress. It was pretty, simple but pretty, made of yellow cotton with a pale blue forget-me-not sprig. She had purchased it in Newcastle at the last moment. The bodice was close fitting and the skirt not entirely fashionable, for it wasn’t over full; the neck was square but not low enough to show the dip between her small breasts. The sleeves were elbow length with an attached loose frill that came halfway down her forearms. Her hair, swept upwards from the back and the sides, made her appear even taller than she was. She wore neither powder nor rouge and therefore in comparison with most of the ladies present looked a tall, willowy pale thing.
All the Drews had exclaimed aloud when they saw her. But then they would, wouldn’t they? They were like her family and real families never decried their own. But Anna, too, had said she looked nice, only she had used the word beautiful. And John had endorsed her remark. Matthew had said nothing, he had merely looked her up and down. But he had said nothing.
He had, she noticed, been drinking heavily during the evening. They all had, the noise from the garden proclaimed this, and the merriment had, in some quarters, turned to vulgarity, fathers chasing young girls who weren’t their daughters, men guzzling meat like market day yokels. In fact, the whole scene had now taken on the appearance of a fairground. She turned into the darkened room and peered at the clock on the mantelpiece. Ten minutes to twelve. She was tired, weary. She wished she could go to bed, but this she wouldn’t be able to do until the last of the guests had gone, and as yet no-one had shown any sign of leaving.
She made her way out of the room into the hall and as she went past the foot of the stairs on her way to the kitchen she was almost knocked on to her back by one of the Fieldman boys chasing Miss Phoebe Cragg. Neither stopped to apologise, and she stood for a moment watching them racing out of the front door and down the steps on to the drive.
When she reached the kitchen it was to see Biddy still busy at the table packing plates with pies and tarts and handing them to the girls, who in turn would take them out the back way to supply the waiters, who had set up a long table, near the end of the terrace.
Without looking up, Biddy said, ‘They’ve gone through the fancy titbits an’ now they’re startin’ on the real food.’
‘Will you have enough?’
‘I should say so; we’ve baked two hundred pasties and a hundred big tarts in the last four days. But I can tell you something, Tilly, I’m droppin’ on me feet.’
‘Yes, I know you are, Biddy; I wish you’d let me help.’
‘What!’ Biddy turned and looked at her and smiled wearily now, saying, ‘Your place is in there. Get yourself back. How’s things goin’?’
‘Oh, very well I should say.’
‘Aye, by the sound of it I should say that an’ all. As Katie said, it’s more like a harvest do than an engagement party. It’ll surprise me if the rabbits don’t start breedin’ after this.’
‘Oh’ – Tilly managed to laugh – ‘’tisn’t as bad as that. They’re all very jolly, wine jolly, mostly.’
‘Aye, well, when drink’s in wits are out, as they say. An’ when the men reach that stage it’s no use warnin’ the lasses to keep their eyes open and their skirts down. As the saying goes, there’s no difference atween a lord and a lout when they are both without a clout.’
‘Oh Biddy!’ Again Tilly laughed; then she added, ‘I’ll slip up and see how Willy is. He was as sound as a top an hour ago but the narration might have woken him up.’
As Biddy turned away to hand two plates to Peg, she said, ‘You’re not enjoyin’ it, are you?’
Tilly half turned now and looked at her, but Biddy was busily filling more plates and she answered, ‘About as much as you are.’ Then she went out; but she did not go into the hall, she took the back stairs and entered the gallery from a side door, and as she crossed it to go up the corridor Matthew came out of his father’s room accompanied by Alicia Bennett.
Her pause was hardly perceivable, only long enough to glance at them and as Matthew went to speak she was already some steps away from them.
Inside, she was ablaze. How dare he take that woman in there! Whatever he wanted to do with her, why didn’t he take her to his own room?
She reached the night nursery and stood fo
r a moment looking down on the sleeping child. She was gripping the side of the cot as much in anger as for support as her thoughts reminded her that after all it was his room. Every room in the house was his room; that’s what she kept forgetting. He was the master here, Mark was dead, and she herself had no position other than that of housekeeper.
She sat down on the low nursing chair near the banked-down fire which, in spite of the heat, was always kept alight, and she asked herself what was the matter with her? She felt so unhappy, so lost. She had felt unhappy after Mark died, but then the companionship of Mr Burgess and the waiting time whilst she was carrying the child she saw now as a time of peace. Even in her loneliness there was a certain kind of happiness, but she had never known a moment’s happiness since she had come back into this house.
Pulling a small table towards her, she leant her arms on it and dropped her head on to them . . .
She jumped with a start when a hand came on her shoulder, then gasped as she looked up into Katie’s face.
‘Eeh! I’m sorry to wake you, Tilly, but we wondered where you were. They’ve nearly all gone.’
‘What!’
‘Well, it’s half past two.’
‘No! Oh dear, dear!’ She rose to her feet. ‘I . . . I must have fallen asleep.’
‘Well, it’ll do you good. An’ that’s what I want to do, fall asleep, I’m nearly droppin’ on me feet.’
‘You say they’ve nearly all gone?’
‘Aye; the Rosiers have just left, and the Tolmans and the Craggs, at least the old ’uns of that lot have. But some of the young ’uns are hangin’ on, especially the fellows who came on horseback. One went off with a lass up afront of him. I don’t know who he was but all of them on the drive were splittin’ their sides.’
Tilly Trotter Wed (The Tilly Trotter Trilogy) Page 15
