Liza

by Irene Carr

  Now Liza felt at home, happy in her work and sure she would progress. She smiled as the others gathered round the actors, congratulating them. But there was work to be done. Gillespie pulled off his false beard and called, Now then, lads! Let’s have this place put to rights!’ The family had retired so the footmen turned to, carrying away the chairs. The maids took down the curtains and swept the hall, all save Liza, who went to her room to change out of her costume, one of Vanessa Gresham’s old dresses, tailored to fit her.

  The green-baize door leading to the servants’ quarters lay at the end of a passage that ran past the side of the stairs. There she was out of sight of the hall — and Toby waylaid her. He stepped out of a doorway into her path, one hand behind his back. Liza halted. ‘Excuse me, Master Toby.’ She tried to step out of his way, as a servant should, but he moved in front of her again and brought out his hand from behind his back. It held a sprig of mistletoe and he flourished it above her head. ‘Happy Christmas, Liza.’ He kissed her.

  Liza was dumbfounded: she had not expected this. She was also momentarily speechless because it had been no peck on the cheek but a passionate kiss on her lips. She stepped back. ‘Master Toby!’ she gasped.

  They were both flushed. ‘I had to do that. I’ve admired you for so long, Liza,’ he said.

  ‘Don’t be silly, Master Toby,’ she whispered. ‘You mustn’t.’

  ‘I can’t help it.’ He took her hand. ‘I love you.’

  The instinct that had made Liza whisper told her now that this was dangerous. ‘Please! If your mother or father find out I’ll lose my position.’ She tried to pull away but he tossed the mistletoe aside and held both her hands.

  ‘Don’t turn me away,’ he pleaded. ‘We can be careful and no one will know. Please. Don’t you like me?’

  That was the trouble. She did. ‘Yes, but—’

  ‘All I ask is that I can see you, now and then. You can trust me.’

  She thought she could. And she had known him for three years; they had grown up together. Liza wavered. It would only be for another week and then he would go back to boarding-school until Easter. He would have got over his crush by then. Where was the harm?

  ‘But you will be careful?’ she said.

  ‘I promise. Kiss me again.’

  She laughed. ‘Get away with you.’ But she brushed his lips with hers, then skipped past him. She snatched up the mistletoe from the floor, because that was part of her job, then passed through the green-baize door and out of his sight.

  Safe in her room, she laughed over the incident. She had been kissed by boys before but they had been members of staff, or she had met them on her day off in Blyth or Newcastle when out with another girl. Toby was different, the son of her employer. Her fear of dismissal was real. She had heard of plenty of cases where a maid had been found with one of the sons of the house and been turned out immediately.

  That was a sobering thought, but she was young and there was a frisson of excitement in thinking about Toby.

  He was careful, as he had promised. He never touched her or talked to her when any of the family might see them. It was an affair of quick kisses and embraces in dark, out-of-the-way corners. Until he asked her, ‘Will you give me something of yours? I’m going back to school tomorrow. Can I have some small keepsake? Please?’ She gave him her clean handkerchief and he tucked it away in his pocket. ‘I’ll treasure it until I see you again.’

  He held her in his arms until she detached herself gently. ‘Goodbye, Toby.’

  ‘Until Easter.’

  The next day she stood on the front steps, just one of the servants gathered there to see him off, smart in his tailored overcoat. He lingered before her perhaps a heartbeat longer than he had for the others before he moved on, but she avoided his gaze, knowing it would bring on her blushes, and no one noticed. He took his place in the carriage next to his father, the coachman cracked his whip and the twin greys trotted down the drive.

  Liza saw him go with relief. She would no longer have to worry that they might be discovered. But there was also a sense of loss and she was miserable all that day. Still, she consoled herself, it was all over now. And she worked harder.

  But it was not over. Toby came home at Easter, finished with school for good, and sought her out before he had been in the house an hour. He found her standing on a stepladder, hanging curtains she had made. She squeaked as he gripped her waist and he said softly, ‘Ssh!’

  ‘Don’t!’ Liza whispered frantically.

  ‘Come down, then.’ He lifted her off the steps and set her on her feet. ‘Aren’t you pleased to see me?’

  She was, but demurred. ‘Not if you misbehave.’

  ‘I won’t,’ he said, then promptly did.

  Liza pulled away from his kisses but stayed in his arms. ‘You promised,’ she reproached him.

  ‘I promised to be careful and I will be.’ He stooped to her again but this time she was ready and put a hand over his mouth.

  ‘No more!’ she said firmly. ‘Go about your business and let me attend to mine.’

  He laughed but obeyed. From then on, however, they met surreptitiously at least once every day. As the summer blossomed they ranged further afield. Toby found an old abandoned summer-house in the woods around the house. When Liza had time off she would meet him there. It was approached by a wide track so they could see anyone coming when they were still a long way off, but Toby had to slip out of the back only once. Then the approaching gardener had stopped short to cut down a dead tree; his horse dragged it away to be chopped into kindling. He did not see Liza, sitting quiet and still in the summer-house.

  As the summer drew on, Toby became bolder. ‘No!’ she told him sharply.

  ‘I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to upset you, but ...’ he shook his head helplessly ‘... it’s just that I love you. I want you to be mine for ever.’

  ‘No, Toby, please,’ Liza said unhappily.

  But he would not be halted. ‘I mean it. I’ve been trying for a long time to summon up the courage to ask. I want you to marry me.’

  There it was, the question she herself had avoided. Would she wed Toby if he asked? He was handsome, she was flattered by his adoration, fond of him, knew she would live in comfort for the rest of her days. But—

  ‘I’m sorry, Toby,’ Liza said. ‘I can’t. I like you, but marriage—

  ‘Is there somebody else?’

  She could have laughed at the idea that she might have carried on two clandestine affairs. ‘No, there isn’t.’ And then, grasping the nettle, she went on, ‘I don’t want to see you like this again. It’s not fair to you — or me. We must pretend that none of it ever happened.’

  Then Liza left him, ran back to the house and up to her room and wept.

  The pair tried to put their love behind them. Liza acted the part of the cheerful, smiling girl the rest of them knew, and Toby did not pursue her, but he wandered about with a long face until his father asked him testily, ‘What’s the matter with you? You’re walking about as though you’ve lost a pound and found a shilling.’

  ‘I’m bored,’ Toby lied.

  ‘Ah! Then we’d better find you something to do.’ And Gresham told Vanessa, his wife, It’s time he decided what to do with his life, or at least try a job or two to see what interests him.’

  Toby spent a week in a shipping office, another dipping his toe into the deep waters of insurance, a third in a barrister’s chambers. Then he went off by train to London. He returned a few days later. His father was pleased with the news he brought, his mother less so, but she told herself she had known he would fly the nest some day.

  Later Toby told Liza. He stopped her in the hall. ‘Oh, Toby!’ she whispered.

  ‘I have to talk to you, but only for a minute and not for much longer.’ He paused. ‘I just can’t stand being in this house, seeing you every day and not being able to speak, look, touch.’ He closed his eyes for a second, as if to blot out the sight of her. Then he opened them. ‘I�
��ve decided to go away. I’ve been given a commission in the Royal Artillery at Woolwich.’

  Liza stared at him, aghast. ‘They could send you anywhere in the world! And you could be gone for years!’

  ‘I know.’ He shrugged. ‘But I can’t stay here.’

  ‘I’ll miss you.’ Liza’s eyes filled with tears. ‘I can’t marry you but I like you, I’m fond of you.’

  He managed a grin. ‘So there’s no hope for me with you?’ He read the answer in her shaken head, her tears.

  Then the green-baize door flapped open and Gillespie came through from the servants’ quarters, to see Toby making for the front door and Liza entering the drawing room. He assumed she had work to do in there and Toby was on his way out. And he was. The door slammed behind him and he strode off down the drive.

  Liza, in the empty drawing room, dabbed her eyes. She was losing Toby, probably for good. For a moment she hesitated. Was this love? Should she run after him and tell him ‘Yes!’? But when she was calmer she knew that she was not ready to spend the rest of her life with Toby.

  The following days flew by and when they chanced to meet Toby would give her a casual smile and nod, as he did the other staff on passing. Then it was time for his departure and the servants lined the steps again, but Liza hid in her room at the top of the house. She did not dare to try to smile and bob a curtsey as he passed, was sure that either Toby or she would give the game away. Her room was at the front of the house on the top floor. She looked down on the open carriage standing on the drive and Toby surrounded by his family. Then he climbed in after his father, the carriage pulled away — and Toby looked up. Liza was too far away to read his expression but knew from the way his head turned that he was searching the windows of the house for her. His gaze lifted and she stepped back a pace, away from the window.

  She knew then that he truly loved her.

  * * *

  ‘Are you telling me we’re broke?’ Millicent Spencer stared at her husband in disbelief. ‘Penniless?’

  Charles sighed heavily. ‘I am.’

  The coachman had cracked his whip over the two bays and was driving the carriage along at a smart clip. The rain was now torrential, lashing against the windows. They were hastening because they were late for a dinner engagement. Charles had come home from his office to find his wife dressed and pacing the hall. He had changed hurriedly.

  Now he said, staring out of the window, ‘I didn’t want to break the news like this but I haven’t had a chance to tell you quietly. It’s not the sort of thing you discuss in front of the servants.’

  Millicent still could not, did not want to, believe it. ‘Are you certain? It can’t all be gone. There must be something left!’ She clung to the strap by her head to steady herself when the carriage leaned over as it swung round a bend.

  The coachman cracked his whip again: they were on the long straight stretch that followed the line of the railway cutting. It was a good road but a slick of rain, puddles and mud covered it.

  Charles shook his head, still not meeting her gaze. ‘Not what you mean by money. I’ve suffered some huge losses at Lloyds. The house will have to go, and the servants. We might be able to afford a cook, but that’s all.’

  Millicent saw now that he was haggard and grey. She realised this husband of hers was looking old, ill — and ashamed. She forgot their rows, his lovers and hers. She reached out to take his hand and said softly, ‘I’m sure it wasn’t your fault, just bad luck. We’ll manage.’

  He turned to her at last, grateful, but said, ‘I’m so sorry.’

  Then a dog ran out into the road. The horses swerved and the carriage smashed through the fence that ran alongside the railway cutting. The coachman and the footman, who had ridden behind on the carriage, were thrown clear as it slithered down the grassy bank but both lay still, dazed or unconscious. The doors burst open and Charles fell out as the wreckage came to a splintering halt, partly on the line, partly alongside it. He was shaken but conscious, and gazed about him blearily. Millicent had cried out once as she and Charles were tossed about inside the carriage but now she was silent.

  He looked for her as he climbed to his feet. The horses lay on their sides, trapped by their harness, whinnying and threshing in panic. He called to them reassuringly as he tottered to the carriage, now upturned, wheels still spinning in the air, and the rain beat down on him. In seconds his hair was plastered to his skull but he knelt down heedlessly in the mud and crawled into the carriage.

  His wife lay on what had been the roof. She was still and her eyes were closed. ‘Millicent!’ He could not tell if she was breathing, so he bent his head to her mouth to listen. Water dripped from his hair to splash cold on her face but she did not twitch. Still he could not hear her breathing but there was something else, a distant thrumming. In panic he forced his way out of the wreckage, dragging her with him. He hauled her out and clear of the track just before the train came. It passed within a yard of where he lay with his wife in his arms. The noise beat about him, the thunder of the engine and the squeal of the locked wheels as the driver braked. The smell of steam, coal smoke and oil wrapped around him.

  The footman came to him, stumbling, a hand to his head. There was blood on his face, washed down there from the wound on his scalp. ‘Run and fetch help,’ Charles urged him. ‘A doctor and an ambulance. I think your mistress is badly hurt.’

  The man ran off and the coachman took his place. ‘Anything I can do, or should I see to the horses, sir?’

  ‘Yes, attend to them,’ Charles said distractedly. He got out his handkerchief to mop his wife’s face and realised she was being drenched. He shrugged out of his jacket and wrapped it round her, held her close. The train had stopped and the passengers had climbed out. Some were helping the coachman to cut the horses free and get them on to their feet while others gathered around the smashed carriage. ‘Can you keep this crowd back?’ Charles asked two men. They obeyed and he bent his head over Millicent again.

  A doctor came, and then a horse-drawn ambulance. They all went to the hospital and Charles waited in a draughty annexe for more than an hour until the doctor, a young man, came out to tell him gently, ‘Multiple injuries. I’m very sorry, Mr Spencer.’

  He had been expecting the bad news, was not surprised, but it was as if something died in him. He went in to see his wife and then they found a cab to take him home. He was soaked to the skin, but he sent a telegram to Edward before he took a hot bath and crawled into bed.

  * * *

  Edward came post-haste, to find his brother in bed. The doctor, an elderly man this time, took him aside. ‘He’s very ill. He spent several hours wringing wet and that, with the shock, has brought on pneumonia. On top of that, I understand he has business worries.’

  Edward questioned his brother tactfully about his ‘worries’ and soon learned that that was an understatement. He tried to cheer him: ‘You can come home and join me in partnership again, or I’ll advance you enough to get you on your feet.’

  Charles did not rally. Instead he said, ‘I want to make my will. Everything I have left goes to Cecily, of course, in trust until she’s twenty-one. It’s little enough, God knows. We’d made plans for her, but now ...’ He told his brother what those plans had been. ‘That’s all water under the bridge now. Will you be trustee and guardian?’

  Edward agreed. ‘If you wish, but I’m fifteen years older than you. I could go myself before long. I think there should be another trustee in case of that happening. Is there anyone you want to name?’

  ‘I’ll leave that to you. Now fetch the solicitor.’ The will was drawn up and signed.

  Edward arranged Millicent’s funeral and stood beside Cecily at the interment, held her as she wept. Charles had wanted to attend, had even dragged himself from his bed, but then he collapsed and turned his face to the wall. Edward arranged his funeral, too, and held Cecily again while she wept. He thought that it was a bad time for both of them but her more than himself. He waited a few day
s while he settled Charles’s financial affairs, and for Cecily to recover from her first grief. He found that there was little in the estate after his brother’s commitments at Lloyds had been met.

  He finally talked to Cecily about her future one evening after dinner. ‘You can live with me, I’d be glad of your company.’ In fact, he was not sure about that. ‘And we could find you a good school.’

  * * *

  After her initial heartfelt grief Cecily had recovered with the resilience of youth. She thrust out her lower lip. ‘I’m not going to live in the north.’ She still remembered the fearsome row she had overheard as a child, the mad woman screaming her hatred and her determination never to go back to that place. ‘Never! never!’ She recalled now that Edward had been the other man in that argument and regarded him with distrust. She had clung to him at the funerals because she had needed someone. Now he had the right to order her life, but she would scheme and fight him to have her way.

  * * *

  Edward sighed to himself. He had not approved of the way Cecily had been brought up, and it was his bad luck that he had to suffer the consequences. Then he remembered that this child had only recently been bereaved, and there was Charles’s expressed wish to take into account. ‘Very well. Your parents wanted you to attend a finishing school in Switzerland, so I’ll make arrangements for you to go there.’

  Cecily pulled a face. ‘Isn’t there anywhere else?’

  ‘No. If your parents had been alive you would have had to obey them. When you are twenty-one and inherit you may do as you wish, but for now the responsibility is mine.’

  Cecily saw that he was determined. ‘Well, all right, I’ll go to Switzerland.’

  So Edward made those arrangements, too. He also persuaded a distant cousin, an elderly childless widow living in Hampshire, to take in Cecily when she was on holiday from school. Cecily also agreed to that, with a grimace, rather than stay with him. ‘Will you let me have a photograph of yourself ?’ he asked her.