by Betty Neels
She wrote her letter, posted it, answered Mrs Beamish’s questions discreetly, and went along to see Mrs Samways. Yes, of course she could have a room and welcome, and Tom too, as long as she would be gone by Christmas. ‘I’ve my brother Jim and his family coming over for two weeks,’ she explained in her soft Dorset voice, ‘and dear knows where I’m going to put ’em all.’
‘Oh, I’ll be gone by then,’ Sadie assured her. ‘Perhaps I won’t want a room at all; I’m going to Bridport tomorrow morning to see about a job. There’s bound to be something.’
There wasn’t. True, there were two housekeeper’s jobs going, in large country houses, and not too far away, but they stipulated women over fifty and the agency lady, looking at Sadie’s small thin person, and her gentle mouth, added her forceful opinion that she simply wouldn’t do.
There was a job for a lady gardener too, but there again, observed the lady with scorn, she was hardly suited, and she tut-tutted when Sadie confessed that she couldn’t type or do shorthand, and hadn’t got a Cordon Bleu certificate. ‘What can you do?’ she asked impatiently.
‘Housework, and ironing and mending and just ordinary cooking—all the things a housewife does, I suppose. And I like children.’
‘Well, there’s nothing, dear. Come back next week and try again.’ She added as Sadie stood up: ‘You can always sign on, you know.’
Sadie thanked her. She would have to be desperate to do that. Granny had belonged to a generation that hadn’t signed on, and she had drummed it into Sadie from an early age that it was something one didn’t do unless one was on one’s beam ends, and she wasn’t that, not yet. She went back home and after her tea, composed an advertisement to put into the weekly local paper.
As it happened there was no need to send it. The next morning Charlie came plodding through the never-ending rain with another letter from Mr Banks. Sadie sat him down at the kitchen table and gave him a cup of tea while the letter burned a hole in her pocket.
‘Bad luck about you having to leave,’ observed Charlie. ‘We’m all that put out. Pity it do be the wrong time of year for work, like.’
Sadie poured herself another cup and sat down opposite him. ‘I hate to go, Charlie, I’m just hoping I’ll find something to do not too far away.’
‘Happen it’s good news in your letter?’
‘Well, no, Charlie, I don’t think so. The cottage is sold—he’d have known that, of course—I expect it’s something to do with that.’
He got up and opened the door on to the wind and the rain. ‘Well, I’ll be off. Be seeing you.’
She closed the door once he’d reached the gate and got on his bike to go back to the village, then she whipped the letter out and tore it open. It was brief and businesslike, but then Mr Banks was always that. The new owner of the cottage had enquired as to the possibility of finding a housekeeper for the cottage and he, Mr Banks, had lost no time in putting her name forward. She would live in and receive a salary to be agreed upon at a later date. He strongly advised her to accept the post, and would she let him know as soon as possible if she wished to take the job?
Sadie read the letter through several times, picked up the placid Tom and danced round the kitchen until she was out of breath. ‘We’re saved!’ she told him. ‘We’re going to stay here, Tom…’ She paused so suddenly that Tom let out a protesting mew. ‘But only if we can both stay—I must be certain of that.’ She put him down again, bundled into her mac and wellies and hurried down to the village.
Mrs Beamish wished her a good morning and in the same breath: ‘Charlie popped his head in,’ she observed, ‘said you’d a letter from London again.’ She eyed Sadie’s face with interested curiosity. ‘Good news, is it, love?’
It was nice to have someone to tell. Sadie poured the whole lot out and to the accompaniment of, ‘He be a good man, surely,’ and ‘Well I never did, Miss Sadie, love,’ she asked if she might use the telephone. The village had a phone box, erected by some unimaginative person a good half a mile from the village itself and for that reason seldom used.
Mrs Beamish not only lent the phone, she stayed close by so that she didn’t miss a word of what was said, nodding her head at Sadie’s ‘Yes, Mr Banks, no, Mr Banks,’ and then, ‘but Bob the thatcher won’t work in this weather: he’ll have to wait until the spring.’ She looked anxiously at Mrs Beamish, who nodded her head vigorously. ‘No, it doesn’t leak,’ said Sadie, ‘it looks as though it might, but I promise you it doesn’t. And what about the furniture?’
She stood listening so intently that Mrs Beamish got a little impatient and coughed, then looked put out when Sadie said finally, ‘All right, Mr Banks, and thank you very much.’
There were two more customers in the shop now, both listening hard. ‘What about the furniture, Sadie?’ one of them asked.
‘Well, he wants it, most of it, that is, but he’s bringing rugs and things like that—they’re to be delivered some time during next week. Mr Banks says I’ll have to be at home to put things straight and get in groceries and so on.’
‘So he’ll be here well before Christmas?’ asked Mrs Beamish, her eyes sliding over her shelves of tins and packets. He might be a good customer.
‘Yes, I expect so, but I don’t know if he’ll be here for Christmas. I suppose it’s according to whether he has to work.’
‘Well, love, we’re that pleased—it’ll bring a bit of life to the village, having a real writer here. I suppose he’ll have a car, but where is he going to put it?’
‘There’s room for a garage if he opens the hedge a bit further up the lane, and he can park on that bit of rough grass just opposite the gate,’ said Sadie.
Everyone nodded and Mrs Beamish said: ‘You just go into the sitting room, love, while I serve Mrs Cowley and Mrs Hedger, then we’ll have a nice cup of tea together—we could make out a list of groceries you might want at the same time.’
And for the next few days Sadie had no time to brood. She missed Granny more than she could say, but life had to go on and as far as she could see it was going to go on very much as before. She had run the cottage and looked after her grandmother for two or three years: instead of an old lady there would be a middle-aged man. She had a vivid picture of him in her head—rather like Mr Banks only much more smartly dressed because presumably playwrights moved in the best circles. He wouldn’t want to know about the running of the cottage, only expect his meals on time and well cooked, his shirts expertly ironed, the house cleaned and the bath water hot. Well, she could do all that, and she would be doing it in her own home too.
She took the bus to Bridport and bought herself two severe nylon overalls and a pair of serviceable felt slippers so that she wouldn’t disturb him round the house and experimented with her hair—something severe, she decided, so that she would look mature and sensible, but her fine mouse coloured hair refused to do as she wished; the bun she screwed it into fell apart within an hour, and she was forced to tie it back with a ribbon as she always had done.
After a week, things began to arrive from a succession of vans making their way through the mud of the lane to the gate. Rugs, silky and fine and sombre-coloured, a large desk, a magnificent armchair, a crate of pictures, fishing rods and golf clubs. Sadie unpacked everything but the pictures and stowed them away. The dining room, which she and Granny had almost never used, would be his study, she imagined. She moved out the table and chairs and the old carpet, and laid one of the splendid ones which she had unwrapped with something like awe, and when Charlie came with the letters, she got him to help her move the desk into the centre of the room. She added a straightbacked armchair from the sitting room, a small sofa table from Granny’s bedroom and the bedside lamp from her own room. It wasn’t quite suitable, for it had a shade painted with pink roses, but it would be better than the old-fashioned overhead light in the centre of the room. It looked nice when she had finished, and she laid a fire ready in the small grate; there was nothing like a fire to give a welcome.
She had had one brief letter from Mr Banks, assuring her that all was going well; he would let her know the date of Mr Trentham’s arrival as soon as possible. By then she had cleaned and polished, tidied the shed, chopped firewood and pored over the only cookery book in the house. It was to be hoped that Mr Trentham wasn’t a man to hanker after mousseline of salmon or tournedos saut; Sadie comforted herself with the thought that if he was past his first youth, he would settle for simple fare. She made an excellent steak and kidney pudding and her pastry was feather-light.
It was two days later that she had another letter from Mr Banks, telling her that Mr Trentham proposed to take up residence in three days time. A cheque was enclosed—housekeeping money paid in advance so that she could stock up the larder; her salary and the remainder of the household expenses would be paid to her at a later date. He regretted that he was unable to say at what time of day Mr Trentham would arrive, but she should be prepared to serve a meal within a reasonable time of his arrival at the cottage. He added a warning that her employer was deeply involved in a television script and required the utmost quiet, qualifying this rather daunting statement with the hope that Sadie’s troubles were now over and that she would make the most of her good fortune.
He didn’t need to warn her about being quiet, thought Sadie rather crossly. There was no TV in the cottage simply because Granny had never been able to afford one; there was a radio, but she would keep that in her own room and she wasn’t a noisy girl around the house. There was, in fact, nothing to be noisy with. Mr Trentham could write in the dining room with the door shut firmly upon him and not be disturbed by a sound.
That afternoon she went down to Mrs Beamish’s shop with a list of groceries and spent a delightful half hour stocking up necessities to the satisfaction of herself and still more of Mrs Beamish. And the next morning she went into Bridport and cashed her cheque before purchasing several items Mrs Beamish didn’t have, as well as visiting the butcher’s and arranging for him to call twice a week. He delivered to Mrs Frobisher and the Manor House anyway, and she assured him that it would be worth his while. It was sitting in the bus on the way home that she began to wonder about Christmas. It seemed unlikely that Mr Trentham would want to stay at the cottage, especially as he had children, in which case she and Tom would spend it together, but Christmas was still five weeks away and it was pointless to worry about it.
She spent the evening storing away her purchases and the next morning went to pay Mrs Beamish’s bill, ask William the milkman to let her have more milk, and then tramped through the village to Mrs Pike’s Farm to order logs. Together with almost everyone else in the village, she was in the habit of wooding in the autumn and she had collected a useful pile of branches and sawn them ready for burning, but with two, perhaps three fires going, there wouldn’t be enough. And that done, she went home and had her tea and then sat by the fire with Tom on her lap, deciding what she would cook for Mr Trentham’s first meal.
She made a steak and kidney pudding after breakfast the next morning because that couldn’t spoil if he arrived late in the day, and then peeled potatoes and cleaned sprouts to go with it. For afters she decided on Queen of Puddings, and since she had time to spare she made a batch of scones and fruit cake. With everything safely in the oven she made a hasty meal of bread and cheese and coffee and flew up to her room to tidy herself. It was barely two o’clock, but he could arrive at any moment. She donned one of the new overalls, a shapeless garment which did nothing for her pretty figure, brushed her hair and tied it back, dabbed powder on her nose and put on lipstick sparingly; if she used too much she wouldn’t look like a housekeeper.
The afternoon wore on into the early dark of a winter’s evening. She made tea and ate a scone and had just tidied away her cup and saucer when she heard a car coming up the lane. She glanced at the clock—half past five; tea at once and supper about eight o’clock, perhaps a bit earlier, as he was probably cold and tired. She gave the fire in the sitting room a quick nervous poke and went to open the door.
Mr Trentham stepped inside and shut the door behind him. In silence he stood, staring down at her, a long lean man with thick dark hair, grey eyes and a face which any girl might dream about. He wasn’t middle-aged or short, or stout; anyone less like Mr Banks Sadie had yet to meet. She stared back at him, conscious of a peculiar feeling creeping over her. She shook it off quickly and held out a hand. ‘Good evening, Mr Trentham,’ she said politely, ‘I hope you had a good drive down. I’m Sadie Gillard, the housekeeper.’
He was smiling at her with lazy good humour, and she smiled back, relieved that he was so friendly, not at all what she had expected. Indeed, already the future was tinted with a faint rose colour. Thoughts went scudding through her head: she should have made a chocolate cake as well as the usual fruit one and got in beer. Mr Darling at the Bull and Judge would have known what to sell her…thank heaven she had made that steak and kidney pudding… She was brought down to earth by his voice, slow and deep, faintly amused.
‘There seems to have been some mistake—I understood that there was to be a sensible countrywoman.’ His smile widened. ‘I’m afraid you won’t do at all.’
CHAPTER TWO
SHE FOUGHT DOWN instant panic. ‘I am a sensible countrywoman,’ she told him in a calm little voice, ‘your housekeeper, and I can’t think why I won’t do, especially as you haven’t eaten a meal here or slept in a bed or had your washing and ironing done yet.’
He had his head a little on one side, watching her, no longer smiling. ‘You don’t understand,’ he told her quite gently. ‘I’m looking for a quiet, experienced woman to run this cottage with perfection and no unnecessary noise. I write for a living and I have to have peace.’
‘I’m as experienced as anyone will ever be. I’ve lived here in this cottage for twenty years, I know every creaking board and squeaking door and how to avoid them…’
His eyes narrowed. ‘Of course, stupid of me—you’re Mrs Gillard’s granddaughter. To turn you out of your home would be decidedly unkind.’ His faint smile came again. ‘At least tonight. We’ll discuss it in the morning.’ He turned to the door again and opened it on to the chilly evening. ‘I’ll get my bags.’
When he came back with the first of them Sadie asked: ‘Would you like tea, sir?’
‘Yes, I would, and for God’s sake don’t call me sir!’ He disappeared into the blackness again and she went to put the kettle on and butter the scones. She had laid a tray with Granny’s best china and one of her old-fashioned traycloths and she carried it into the sitting room and put it on a small table by the fire. By the time he had brought in a considerable amount of luggage and taken off his sheepskin jacket, she had made the tea and carried it in.
‘What about you?’ he asked as he sat down, ‘or have you already had yours?’
‘Yes, thank you, I have. If you want more of anything will you call? I shall be in the kitchen.’ At the door she paused. ‘Would you like your supper at any particular time, Mr Trentham?’
He spread her home-made jam on a scone and took a bite. ‘Did you make these?’ he asked.
‘Yes.’
‘Wild strawberry jam,’ he observed to no one in particular, ‘I haven’t tasted it since I was a boy. You made it?’
‘Yes.’ She tried again. ‘Your supper, Mr Trentham?’
‘Oh, any time,’ he told her carelessly. ‘I’ll unpack a few things and get my books put away. Where have you put my desk?’
‘In the other room. If you wouldn’t mind having your meals in here, you could use the dining room to work in.’
He nodded. ‘That sounds all right. Whose cat is that, staring at me from under the table?’
‘Oh, that’s Tom—he’s mine. I did ask about him, and you said you wouldn’t mind…’
‘So I did.’ He buttered another scone. ‘Don’t let me keep you from whatever you’re doing.’
She went out closing the door soundlessly. The kitchen was warm and smelt deliciously of food. She put the custardy part of the Queen of Puddings into the oven and began to whip the egg whites. Her future was tumbling about her ears, but that was no reason to present him with a badly cooked meal. When she heard him go into the hall she opened the kitchen door to tell him: ‘Your bedroom is the one on the right at the top of the stairs. Would you like any more tea, Mr Trentham?’
He paused, his arms full of books. ‘No, thanks. It was the best tea I’ve had in years. In fact I don’t normally have tea, I can see that I shall have to get into the habit again. Did you make that cake too?’
‘Yes.’ She went past him up the stairs and switched on the light in the bedroom and pulled the curtains. It looked very pleasant in a shabby kind of way but a bit chilly, she was glad she’d put hot water bottles in the bed.
‘You can come in here and help,’ he called as she went downstairs, and she spent the next half hour handing him books from the two big cases he had brought with him, while he arranged them on the bookshelves she had luckily cleared. He had a powerful desk lamp too and a typewriter, and a mass of papers and folders which he told her quite sharply to leave alone. Finally he said: ‘That’s enough for this evening.’ He gave her his lazy smile again. ‘Thanks for helping.’
He went outside again presently to the car parked in the lane and came back with a case of bottles which he arranged on the floor in a corner of the sitting room, an arrangement which Sadie didn’t care for at all. There was a small table in one of the empty bedrooms; she would bring it down in the morning and put the bottles on it. She collected the tea tray and started to lay supper at one end of the table, and he asked for a glass.
