by Rose Lerner
“Nora, you’re shivering,” Mr. Bearparke said tenderly. “Let’s shut the door.”
She broke away from him in a single burst of motion and stood, trembling violently. “I can’t. I’m sorry. Ned—I’m sorry.”
There was a long silence. “You can’t?” he said at last, quietly. “Or you don’t want to?”
Sukey squeezed her eyes shut. If he became angry, she’d have to go out there and stand up to her master’s friend. She wished she’d stayed in bed and didn’t know about any of this. Please don’t be angry, she thought. Please be as harmless as you act.
If she needed to, she could wake John. Or would that make things even worse?
“I don’t want to.” Mrs. Khaleel’s voice was a thread.
Another silence. Then Mr. Bearparke laughed once more, as if his pain was absurd too. “I don’t believe you.” He did sound angry. “I don’t believe you for a moment. You do love me.”
She didn’t answer.
“You need time to get used to the idea, that’s all,” he said, his light touch almost restored. “I didn’t mean to spring it on you like that. I’ll ask again at Epiphany. Think it over, won’t you? And don’t forget to welcome Father Christmas when I’m gone. It’s good luck, you know.” But Sukey heard the doorknob and the key rattle in his hand as he went out and locked the door behind him, and it was a long moment or two before his footsteps headed away from the house.
Mrs. Khaleel sank down to the floor, still and hunched.
The safest thing to do would be to wait it out, and then go back to bed and pretend she hadn’t seen a thing. Mrs. Khaleel wouldn’t be best pleased to know she’d been eavesdropped on. So Sukey waited, listening to the hall clock tick and tock.
She thought about John. Being tall and self-contained didn’t really mean you never needed somebody to look after you. Sukey was already here. She might as well make herself useful.
She eased open the kitchen door. The cook tensed, her head snapping around. “Who’s there?”
“It’s me. Mrs. Toogood. I couldn’t help—well, I expect I could have helped overhearing, but I thought you might need me, and besides, curiosity killed the cat. How are you?”
“Tol-lol.”
Sukey was still a little startled every time Mrs. Khaleel talked like a Sussex girl. But the cook had lived in the neighborhood more than fifteen years, having come over from India as nursemaid to a local family when she was a little younger than Molly. Sukey was afraid to go to London, and here Mrs. Khaleel had gone halfway round the world. Sukey sat on the hall floor beside her. “Did you know he wanted to marry you?”
Mrs. Khaleel sighed. “I was afraid he did. It’s harder to say no to marriage.”
Sukey nodded.
“I can’t be a reverend’s wife,” she said, as if Sukey had argued. “I can’t.”
“Is that all? Why not? If he were a missionary in India, you wouldn’t have to worry about embarrassing him before his congregation.” Maybe that hadn’t been a tactful thing to say. And did she want to go home, as Mr. Bearparke thought? Or had she been glad to get away?
Mrs. Khaleel snorted. “Why does India need missionaries, Mrs. Toogood?”
“Because they’re heath…ens.” She grimaced. “I’m that sorry. I meant, because they aren’t Christians.”
“Precisely. I am not a Christian. It doesn’t seem to have occurred to Mr. Bearparke any more than it occurred to you.”
That brought Sukey up short. Sedate Mrs. Khaleel, a—a what? Did she worship idols? But she went to church every week! “Does Mr. Summers know?”
Mrs. Khaleel shrugged. “I was baptized when I came to England. In India it never troubled my employers, but here—I suppose people talked, and they didn’t like it. I go to church. That’s enough for Mr. Summers.”
Sukey felt a little relieved to hear that. “Then you are a Christian, aren’t you?”
Mrs. Khaleel looked at her. “I hope not,” she said at last. “And my name isn’t Nora, either. Ned Bearparke is a darling”—her voice wobbled a little over the word—“but I wouldn’t be happy with him.” The corner of her mouth turned up. “Maybe at first. But I’d hate him after a while. He doesn’t know it, but I do.”
“Your name isn’t Nora?”
“No. It’s Noor. But even before I was baptized, no English folk could be bothered to learn it. It isn’t even difficult to pronounce, any more than Khaleel! But half the time people get that wrong. If you knew how many times I’ve thought about giving in and calling myself Collins—” Mrs. Khaleel broke off at Sukey’s expression. “Sorry.”
Sukey was too self-conscious to ask if she’d been mispronouncing it without knowing. “You did the right thing, turning him down,” she said, feeling surer of her ground here. “My… This is a secret, so please keep it.” There were people who knew. But nobody official. Nobody like Mr. Summers. You could hang for bigamy. That was part of why her mother had never tried to go on the parish, no matter how hungry they got. Sukey shouldn’t say anything.
She turned John’s ring on her finger, a nervesome habit she’d got into. It comforted her for no reason at all. Mrs. Khaleel’s eyes followed her fingers. A little wistfully, Sukey thought. “A ring’s nothing,” she said, holding hers tight to protect it from any listening pharisees with a sense of humor. “My father, he left my mother. He’s got another wife now in Chichester, and me and my mum have been getting by as best we could since I was a kid. People think, ‘Oh, marriage, you’re a fool to turn that down, you’d be set for life’, but you aren’t really.”
“We will keep each other’s secrets.”
Sukey nodded, feeling a little proud that Mrs. Khaleel trusted her.
“Would you like to sweep the trouble away from the door? I’m sure your husband would loan you his key.”
Sukey dangled the key before her eyes, and they smiled at each other.
The door had been opened already. The luck was gone, wasn’t it? But maybe the trouble wasn’t. As Sukey took up the broom, a thought struck her. “But he’s moving into the house.”
Mrs. Khaleel’s hand fisted in her lap.
“You should tell John. He could—” Sukey had no idea what he could do. But he knew a lot of things she had no idea of. Why not this? “He could talk to Mr. Summers.”
Mrs. Khaleel huffed a laugh. “He told me that too. I daresay he would, for all the good it would do me.”
Sukey privately agreed. Mr. Summers seemed kindhearted enough, but Mr. Bearparke was his curate and friend, and Mrs. Khaleel was just his cook. She swept the broom hard across the floor and out the door, and hoped it was really so easy to banish trouble.
* * *
Boxing Day is my favorite day of the year, Sukey thought as the mummers’ play began in the taproom of the Lost Bell. She wasn’t sure if it was true or if she was drunk on cider and the feel of three whole crowns in the purse between her breasts. Two were wages for the last few weeks, paid on the quarter day yesterday, and one was her Christmas box, given to her by the vicar with festive ceremony this morning.
They’d each got a crown, and John and Mrs. Khaleel a guinea. And the upper servants had already received several presents from the tradesmen with whom they managed Mr. Summers’s accounts. Sukey couldn’t get over it. Two crowns was a whole quarter’s wages at Mrs. Humphrey’s, and usually half of it was held back for things broken or scratched or burnt.
Terrified of losing her purse, she kept touching her bodice to be sure it hadn’t fallen out. She’d ought to put it somewhere in the butler’s pantry, but…well, she’d never say so aloud, but what if another servant stole it? She mostly trusted them, but how could you even blame someone for stealing something so tempting, when it was in such easy reach? It was for the best John was taking his guinea to the savings bank this afternoon, or she’d have run through it in a flash.
He’d offered
to share it with her. But she’d said no. Why? What was she so afraid of, that she’d turn down half a guinea for it? What could he expect in return that she wasn’t already giving him whenever she had the chance?
But maybe that was the problem: he didn’t expect anything in return. She didn’t want to be anybody’s charity case.
He’d said he’d buy her new gloves without holes too. She’d need them come January, so she’d thanked him and tried to feel smug about her luck in landing him. But even that galled a little, not less because he’d scolded her again five minutes later about making the bed.
She ought to put her own coins aside for a rainy day, but maybe she’d buy something pretty for the servants’ ball on New Year’s Day. A new cap or a shawl.
She’d never much minded wearing her only gown before. When you dressed for coal-stains and dust every day, it was exciting enough to be clean and curl your hair and leave off your cap and neckerchief. She’d always felt pretty. But she hadn’t been married then. She’d had nobody to impress.
John had laughed up his sleeve at her when she’d bragged of Lively St. Lemeston servants’ balls. God only knew what the servants he’d been used to living among got up to at the New Year. They drank champagne, most likely. They owned evening gloves and dancing slippers.
She was tired of feeling small and young and country mouse, and as if John had done her a favor by condescending to marry her. She wanted him to pay her court, and feel smug about his luck. She wanted to be better than pretty. She wanted to be beautiful.
Mr. Foley cut a particularly funny caper, and Sukey nearly spilled her cider laughing. The grumpy bookseller’s Quack Doctor was always the drollest part of the mummers’ play.
But all the actors were very gay, capering about with bright patches and strings of spangles pinned to their coats. This year Mr. Whittle from the Lost Bell did the rest one better, sporting an entire coat of bright patchwork. Lord, that must have taken weeks. Did he sew it, or his wife?
It made her think of Mrs. Dymond’s sister, bent over her needle from dawn to dusk through all of election season when she’d come, pregnant and unhappy, to live in Mrs. Pengilly’s attic. Mrs. Dymond’s wardrobe had been unrecognizable afterwards, embroidered and trimmed and dyed to within an inch of its life. Sukey supposed everyone distracted herself in her own way—
That was it! Sukey had meant to go round the shops herself after this, but Mrs. Gilchrist—the girl was Mrs. Gilchrist now, because when you were that beautiful, gentlemen overlooked a little thing like another man’s baby on the way—knew the inventory of every Whig milliner and dressmaker and pawnshop in town by heart, and she’d read enough fashion magazines to carpet Market Square. She’d know exactly what Sukey’d ought to buy.
Sukey fidgeted with her ribbon-trimmed hairpin. It would be a fine excuse to visit, but could she really bear to give it up? She’d had it in her hand the first time she’d seen John. He’d trailed it up her back last week.
She shivered, remembering, and John put his arm around her to keep her from cold, as if the crowded taproom wasn’t the warmest place in town.
“I’ll take you to the Honey Moon after this if you like,” he murmured in her ear. “I’ve heard the mince pies are to die for.”
She gave her hairpin a little pat of farewell, and set her hand over his. “Saturday afternoon is my time to be free of all of you, you know that.”
So when the play was over, Sukey walked up Cross Street, passing the Honey Moon’s delicious smell of brandy and ginger without going in, and waited nervously in the Gilchrists’ kitchen while the maid-of-all-work went to inform her mistress of Sukey’s visit.
That poor girl must be worked to the bone, Sukey thought, for the kitchen was neat as a pin. Mrs. Gilchrist was the finickiest soul she’d ever had the misfortune to meet.
“Sukey? Happy Christmas. Is everything well with you?”
Sukey recognized Mrs. Gilchrist’s rose gown (which must have been let out at the bodice, for the girl’s graceful bust had never been so large before), but the great gold shawl wrapped about it with such aplomb looked brand new. So did the snowy linen at her neck and wrists and the frothy cap atop her dark hair. Dashing young matron was a style that suited her.
Sukey bobbed a quick curtsey and held out the hairpin, feeling awkward. “You left this at Mrs. Pengilly’s, ma’am.”
Mrs. Gilchrist’s perfectly arched brows went up, and her lips twitched. “And you finally decided to return it?”
Sukey’s awkwardness faded into annoyance. “I’m sorry, ma’am. It slipped my mind.”
Mrs. Gilchrist looked at the hairpin. “You keep it. I probably wouldn’t wear it again anyway.”
Sukey’s jaw dropped. “I don’t have lice.”
“I’m sure you don’t,” Mrs. Gilchrist said hastily. “I didn’t mean to suggest any such thing.”
“Of course you didn’t.” No, she hadn’t meant to suggest it, but she’d been thinking it. Probably wouldn’t borrow a hairpin from her own sister, that’s how particular she was.
The girl waited with an air of faint puzzlement as to why Sukey was still there.
Sukey shifted nervesomely. “Could I ask you for some advice? About clothes?”
Mrs. Gilchrist’s face lit up. “Please do!” Something about her big dark eyes and the shape of her mouth made her forever look as if she might start crying. But if she cried about fashion, they’d be tears of joy.
“I got married.”
“Oh, yes, I heard the banns. I wish you joy! You married Mr. Dymond’s valet, didn’t you? Who hates puns on his name and is very good with stains?”
Sukey smiled fondly. “That’s him.”
“It’s splendid being married, isn’t it?”
“Yes, ma’am,” Sukey said at once, determined Mrs. Gilchrist should have no inkling of her doubts on the subject. “And there’s to be a servants’ ball for the New Year. I want to look my best. I have a few crowns, and I hoped maybe you’d seen something, at the pawnshop or somewhere.” She took off her pelisse. “Something to spruce up this old gown a bit.”
Mrs. Gilchrist looked critically at the plain serge. It wasn’t even clean, not really. Sukey hoped very much that no coal dust was actually visible. Then she looked at Sukey’s face. “You’re very pretty. I’ve always thought so.”
That was a pleasant surprise. “Thank you, ma’am.”
“We’re about of a size. Well, you’re a little taller, but that’s all right. I’ll dress you if you like.”
Sukey’s jaw dropped. She was sorry for every uncharitable thought she’d ever had about Mrs. Gilchrist. “Would you really?”
The girl smiled broadly, just such zeal in her eye as Bonaparte must have when he looked at the map of Europe: You won’t even recognize yourself by the time I’m through. “Come upstairs and let me see what I have in my workbox.”
There were three gowns in the bottom of Mrs. Gilchrist’s workbox, neatly folded and waiting for a glorious resurrection. The girl held each one up against Sukey, eyes narrowed, and Sukey forgot how to breathe.
“This one,” Mrs. Gilchrist said, nodding to herself. Sukey was glad to have the momentous decision taken out of her hands. “It brings out your eyes, and I don’t think it looks too outdated. I copied it from the September 1810 Ackermann’s Repository.”
The chosen gown, of soft ice-blue worsted wool, was cut very low. Sukey had taken it for an underdress, as there wasn’t even a seam at the waist; darts gathered it under the bosom—in other words, scant inches from the neckline. “Your mum let you wear that?”
“Oh, there’s a chemisette for underneath.” The girl waggled her eyebrows. “But I promise it’s still very daring. Watch the pins don’t come out if you dance in it.” She rubbed at a crease in the wool, mouth twisting. “Don’t worry, I’ll get that out before Friday.”
“I’m not worrying,�
�� Sukey said, more understandingly than she might have before her marriage. She was beginning to think it a heavy burden, to see only the smudges and not the silver. “It’s beautiful.”
She crossed town to Mrs. Pengilly’s next, to see how she was getting on. To her surprise, as she climbed the stairs she heard John’s voice from within. But why was she surprised? True to his promise, he’d found a new attic lodger before taking up work at the vicarage.
Her first instinct, strangely, was to sneak off. But she rapped on the door.
John opened it, of course. He smiled broadly when he saw her, deepening the grooves that laughter had cut in his face. “Come. We were just having a glass of cherry bounce.” His flushed face told her he’d already had a glass or two. His voice, raised so Mrs. Pengilly could hear, thrummed through her.
It wasn’t unsplendid, being married.
Harry Pengilly junior poured festive red brandy into a delicate glass and handed it to her.
“Ooh.” She breathed in deep. “Smells like summer.”
“Smells like Christmas,” Harry Pengilly boomed.
It tasted like both, shot through with cherries and cinnamon. Warmth spread through her like sunshine and a crackling wood fire. “Have you still got any of the cherries? Those are my favorite part.”
“A girl after my own heart.” Mr. Pengilly passed her a bowl of brandy-soaked cherries. She dropped two in her mouth, moaning as the taste spread across her tongue.
John watched her, amber eyes bright, and Sukey wanted to taste cherry bounce in his mouth too. Last Boxing Day—she remembered it with a wince. She’d had some of Mr. Pengilly’s cherry bounce, but she hadn’t enjoyed a drop, for Mrs. Humphrey had given her a single penny for her Christmas box along with a lecture on why she didn’t deserve more.
Every year Mrs. Humphrey had fed her carp-pie with her coin, and every year Sukey had let it ruin her holiday. She’d got Christmas boxes from the boarders, from Mrs. Pengilly and Mrs. Dymond, and yet that penny had sat like a stone in her pocket, sucking up her joy.
