Blair smiled sympathetically, but decided that lifting the girl and speaking simultaneously was out of the question. He braced himself and hoisted, and was faintly surprised to find that he could, in fact, lift her. He began to walk along the path towards the stile into the village, while the minister’s wife moved from one side of him to the other, shifting the heavy pack so that she could tuck in an end of blanket here and a tail of cloak there.
‘She must have sheltered in the woods, and then when morning came she lacked the strength to carry her pack. She knew she had to pull herself on to the path, however, or she might never be seen until it was too late. Oh, if only she had come a little further last night, before the frost!’ she lamented, almost cross with the woman. She paused to feel the cloth of the woman’s bedraggled skirts. ‘Damp, of course.’ She sighed. ‘It is a thick winter gown,’ she went on, ‘though not new. The high neck and long sleeves may have protected her well enough. I wonder is she in mourning? Even her pack is black.’
They reached the manse gate and Mrs. Helliwell hurried ahead on the path, calling her children and her servants equally.
‘Agnes! Agnes, warm water and some thin broth, quickly. Anna, light the fire in your bedroom, that’s had the sun on it this morning. Quickly now. Giles, run for Dr. Feilden – and don’t run into Mr. Blair on the path. Tell him to come as quickly as possible, there is a sick girl at the manse. No, Giles, run.’
Giles, scarf tails flying at a man’s waist level, passed Robbins at breakneck speed as he followed his mother’s instructions and hurtled towards North Street. Robbins paused as he climbed the hill to watch him go.
III
He wondered what the emergency was, and heard voices as he walked by the low wall of the manse’s front garden, but did not look round to see Blair manoeuvre the awkward bundle in his arms through the front door. Robbins kept his head down and his hat low, and slipped around the corner of the manse garden wall where it rose from two feet to eight feet tall. He did not look the other way, either, into the kirkyard – he just did not happen to look, it was not as if he was avoiding it – and eyes on the ground he hurried into the end of the footpath that led to Letho House.
The rough woodland did not attract his attention either. It was thick with undergrowth, and muffled the path for a hundred yards or so, ideal cover, everyone in the village knew, for covert activities of a sociable kind. But as the woodland thinned out, Robbins emerged on the side of a smoothly pastured hill. The path, now he was on the Letho estate, was well-maintained against heavy wear. Stones, laid flat in the muddiest parts, strengthened it, and others provided footholds on the slopes. As the path undulated, Robbins could see brown and black cows and their calves in the pasture that fell away to fresh green speckled woodland in a soft valley, along which lay the road he had travelled earlier, in the coach. Where the wood was at its broadest, amidst the trees he could pick out the grey slate roof of Cullessie, Letho House’s nearest neighbour. He felt a flash of superiority at not belonging to that household’s staff, and carried on, following a rough hedge crusted with golden gorse blossom, climbing now. The damp grass smelled sweet in the sunshine, and birds flitted in and out of the hedge as he passed, their wings rich with brown and green and blue. A couple of fat pheasant meandered through the field, finding morsels to peck at. Some late primroses grew out of the bank as if they had been tucked into the crevices by playful children.
He paused at the top of the hill, and surveyed the land before him. There was another branch off his path here, cutting a slice from the hedge and continuing along the soft green ridge to the creamy grey steading of the farm at Hill of Letho. Downhill, to his left, the angle of sight through the trees let him see part of Cullessie’s crooked driveway, where it crossed the river. With his eyes, he could follow the path of the river back where it came from, curving round to cross in front of him while for a little it ran alongside the main drive to Letho House. When the drive cut away to curl around the next hill away from him, up to the solid gateposts of the inner park, the line of the river continued around the hill to where, out of sight now on the south side, it fell from a smooth blue lake. Above it, away from him, were the elegant lines of the Italian gardens that did their best to give a fashionable air to the severe stone block of Letho House. From this distance, it looked as neat and motionless as a vignette on an estate map. For a moment, he wished that that was all it was.
Robbins took a deep breath, and without looking back, he began to make his way down the hill.
As he drew nearer to the park, he began to see movement, deer grazing among the trees, men working in the gardens, dogs shifting with the sun on the front carriage sweep, a boy too far away to be recognised driving a pony and roller on the lawns of the inner park. It was a tricky slope to roll, that: Robbins had helped with the job himself, as a lad.
The path reached the flat bank of the river at around the point that the main drive left it to head for the house. Robbins carried on beside the river, hefting his pack on to the other shoulder, and sighing as he did so. So close now, and away from the village, he found his heart confused, anxious, wary, but reluctantly, so reluctantly, happy to be back.
A little below the cool lake a bridge crossed the river, a simple stone span to carry the path up to where a couple of planks gave access over the haha to the inner park. Robbins kept a steady pace up the steep hill. The boy with the roller was working on the other side now, and did not see him. The path disappeared for all official purposes, but the way was clear up to the point where the drive, curving gently from the park gates, divided in two to make the wide carriage sweep to the front of the house. He paused again for a moment where it divided, to examine again the home he had not seen for nearly four years, since before his old master had died.
The house was not new, nor very elegant. The main door was central but unimposing, with two broad, shallow steps before it. The main wing was made to look taller than its three storeys by chimneys with no sense of proportion, and the front would have been severe in any stone other than the creamy grey Fife sandstone, soft against the newly-painted white of the window frames and door. On either side of the main house were two smaller houses, facing each other across the carriage sweep. The one on the right was connected to the main house by a curving wall with a gate into the garden, and it was the house of John Thalland, the factor, and also his place of work. The one on the left, separated from the main house by the lane to the stables, had stood empty for some time, perhaps because of its proximity to the stables, the kennels and the servants’ quarters. Robbins at last took the left hand branch of the carriage sweep, passed the empty house and turned left again. The door to the servants’ block was closed but not locked, and he took a moment to compose his already extremely calm exterior before pushing it open and going in.
Inside, a short stone passage sloped down at an angle to finish a foot or two lower than it began. A couple of hessian bags of sand, kicked against the wall near the door, indicated that the rain had been running in again. The whole servants’ wing was built along a slope, and as he walked along the main corridor into which the little passage opened, the male servants’ rooms and the silver safe were up steps to his right, and the kitchens and stillroom were down two steps to his left, facing on to the kitchen gardens. When it really rained, or heavy snow melted, water could be seen running straight through the building and out at the other side. Old Mr. Murray had tried everything to stop it, but every winter the indoor servants had colds and rheumatism, and Mr. Fenwick, the last butler, had had to retire early for in the winter he was so stiff he could not get out of bed. The women were better off, as they slept upstairs, but they spent most of the day in the kitchens, which were the worst part. Robbins wondered what he would die of.
The main kitchen was hot with preparations for dinner. At one end, the huge fireplace was pouring out heat so powerful it should have been impossible to approach it, but the cook and the two kitchen maids, a ball and two sticks in silhouett
e, moved before it like acolytes in a foreign temple, busy with the sacrificial meats. Instead it was Mary, one of the upstairs maids, that noticed him first, and he was happy that it should be so. She rose from the firwood table at the cooler end of the kitchen where she had been mending stockings, and brushed down her grey dress. She was a little taller than he, for he was not quite at the middle height himself, and she did not curtsey in reply to his bow but smiled her triangular smile at him and put out her hand like a man to shake his.
‘It is good to see you again, Mr. Robbins,’ she said, in a sing-song Island accent, with the look always in her eyes that made you hesitate to believe her.
‘And you, too, Mistress Macdonald. I trust you are well?’
‘Not so badly, sir.’ Her cornered eyebrows rose contentedly, then her gaze flickered past his shoulder. ‘Oh, Iffy!’ she cried, and darted forward, but the saucepan was already on the floor. Iffy, the marginally older of the two kitchen maids, stood above it with the spoon still in her hand, staring. The other maid, her sister, turned at the sound and went pale.
‘Oh, Mr. Robbins, you’re back!’ she said, then remembered to curtsey.
‘Well, I was not dead, Effy. There is no need to look quite so astonished,’ said Robbins, drily. He bowed to Mrs. Mutch, the cook, who gave him the briefest of nods in reply and went on counting spoonfuls of curry powder. In a moment or two she had finished, and circumnavigated Iffy and her spilt saucepan to greet Robbins properly.
‘It is good to see you, Mr. Robbins. How was your journey?’
‘Tolerable, Mrs. Mutch,’ he replied, moving out of her way as she returned to her pastry on the table. ‘A pity, though, that the scheme for the tunnel under the Forth came to nothing last year. It would shorten the journey considerably.’
Mrs. Mutch shuddered.
‘You’d no get me down it. And it’s been wet enough in here the last few weeks without going under the Forth.’
‘I was thinking of you,’ Robbins said, sitting down and laying his pack beside him. ‘No improvements, then?’
‘Oh, Mr. Murray heard of some new scheme last month. They’re to put the servants’ wing up on stilts.’ There was a tremendous giggle at this point from Iffy, and Mrs. Mutch scowled at her. ‘I dinna ken what we’re to go up to get in, they’ll have to put up ladders. And how will they lift it up to put it on the stilts? And will we still be in it when they’re doing it?’
‘Aye, well, Mr. Murray will do what he can,’ nodded Robbins, trying to picture it. ‘Oh, aye, I have the few things you asked me to get. I went to William Henderson’s on the South Bridge.’ He leaned over his pack, and untied the strap. Under a layer of waxed cloth he found the packages he wanted. ‘Fine black tea, six pounds of it for two pounds and eight shillings. Four pounds of macaroni at two shillings – you didna say which kind, so it’s the ribbons.’
‘Oh,’ said Mrs. Mutch, dismayed. ‘It was the pipes I wanted, to put cheese in.’
‘Well, you’ll have to wrap it in the ribbons. Sorry,’ Robbins added. He pulled out a final large parcel from the grocer’s. ‘And one North Wiltshire cheese, six shillings and sixpence.’
‘That’s no bad.’ Mrs. Mutch nodded approval, standing on tiptoe to reach across the table with her rolling pin.
‘I did as you suggested and waited till the prices had gone down again after the General Assembly.’ He poked around in his bag, tired at the effort of being sociable. He had been mostly on his own for two years in the Edinburgh house, and had not missed company. ‘A commission for Mrs. Chambers and one for John Thalland. Oh, and these.’ He pulled out two small flat packets from his bag and turned them until he found an E on one and an I on the other.
‘Iffy! Effy! Come here, please,’ he said. Iffy gave the floor a last wipe and followed her sister over to the table, both unsure of themselves. He handed out the parcels. ‘These are for you. They’re no from me,’ he added hastily, embarrassed at this act of vicarious gallantry. ‘Patie next door in Edinburgh sent them for you.’
Each parcel contained ribbons, green for Effy and blue for Iffy. It was an extravagant way to reduce both girls to nervous giggles, something which could usually be done with little effort and no outlay. Robbins looked at them. Neither was pretty, both scrawny little things with thin hair. Perhaps the appeal lay in their being twins.
‘And what is the news here?’ he asked. ‘Who is in the house?’
‘Well, Mr. Murray, of course, and Mr. Blair of George’s Square is here for the summer. Mrs. Freeman and Miss Blair will join them later.’ To Mrs. Mutch, the guests were mostly faceless appetites, but servants were part of the family and she felt bound to take an interest. ‘And just now we have Mr. Kennedy, who is from somewhere in England.’ She did not meet Mary’s eye: Mary was suddenly busy with her mending again.
‘I do not believe we know him,’ said Robbins.
‘A friend of Mr. Murray’s from the university.’ Mrs. Mutch shrugged. She returned to the furnace to see what Iffy and Effy had achieved. Whatever it was, it did not seem to please, and was followed by slamming and banging and little angry sighs from the cook. Robbins looked at Mary.
‘He’s a bit more work than some guests,’ she remarked blandly.
‘More work than Mr. Blair?’ Robbins was surprised.
‘I said than some guests,’ Mary repeated carefully. There was a long pause. ‘He’s very fashionable,’ she conceded eventually.
The kitchen door opened again, giving a welcome stir to the hot air. A slim, white-haired woman entered, dressed in the same dove grey as the maids and cook but in a cloth of obviously better quality. A snow-white lace cap blended with her hair and met the pretty collar at her straight neck. She glanced with approval at the activity by the fireplace, then looked above where Robbins was sitting, where copper pans gleamed secretly against the duck-egg blue walls, and frowned. Then her gaze dropped, and a surprised smile made her neat face friendly.
‘Mr. Robbins! I trust you have arrived well?’
Robbins rose and bowed, and Mrs. Chambers nodded her head.
‘I have the parcel you requested, ma’am, if you will permit me.’ He bent to his pack, and brought out a package which seemed to hold cloth. ‘Twelve yards at nine shillings the yard, from the Russia warehouse in the High Street as directed.’
‘You are very good, Mr. Robbins.’ She took the parcel, and opened a corner to see the darkest crimson of the cloth inside. ‘Perfect. Did you find the groceries for Mrs. Mutch?’
‘Yes, ma’am, I have delivered them and have the prices to hand.’
‘Excellent. If you will step up to my room after dinner, I can repay you for all. And have you brought news, and heard all of ours?’ She sat at the table, upright and precise. ‘Mary, bring some tea.’
‘Not all, I think,’ Robbins replied. ‘There is little enough to report from town. Miss Armstrong is to marry, as we expected. I saw Mr. Hugh Fairlie, I believe, in the High Street last week, and he was kind enough to recognise me and to say he would be back here in Letho by now.’
‘I believe he is back today, Mary, is that so?’ Mrs. Chambers asked her as Mary set down the teapot.
‘I heard Daniel say as much this morning, ma’am.’
‘He has been spending a great deal of time in Edinburgh recently,’ Mrs. Chambers added. ‘There may be a marriage to come there, too.’
‘And how are Daniel and William? Have they been managing?’ Robbins asked.
‘They’ll be glad enough to see you back, but they’ll not admit it,’ smiled Mrs. Chambers. ‘Daniel has been introducing William to the delights of Letho –’
‘Oh, no!’ said Robbins. ‘Who is it this time?’
‘But oddly,’ Mrs. Chambers went on, ‘William seems less interested than you would have thought. Not that that makes him work any harder. I think he misses the town, you know, he is not a country man. He and Jennet are laying the table for dinner just now, and I believe Daniel is tidying the wine cellar. That’s his coat, over the b
ack of the chair as usual.’ She nodded at the discarded garment. ‘You’ll want all the keys back from him. I have kept an eye on him, but I think you will find everything in order there.’ She looked about the kitchen, wondering what else there was to say urgently. ‘Those copper pots need retinning, Mrs. Mutch. I think you told me that before. Remind me again when the man comes round. Oh, did Mrs. Mutch tell you we have two guests?’
‘Yes, Mr. Blair and a Mr. Kennedy.’
‘That’s right. No extras for dinner today. Do you wish to serve, Mr. Robbins, or will you recover from your journey first?’
‘I’ll serve happily, Mrs. Chambers, if I have time to change.’
‘Plenty of time yet.’ She glanced at the kitchen clock.
‘There were two ladies and a gentleman came from Edinburgh on the post,’ Robbins remarked, ‘and descended at the inn. Is company expected at Dures or the Fairlies’?’
‘I do not believe so,’ said Mrs. Chambers. ‘No doubt Daniel would know about the Fairlies, for Nan Watson is working there now.’
‘Oh, aye?’ said Robbins, investing the two syllables with understanding, if not delight.
‘Were they young or old? I hear Mrs. Kirk at Cullessie is expecting her nieces from Bath,’ said Mary.
‘That’ll be them, then,’ said Robbins, ‘for they were young, and they mentioned Bath indeed. And the gentleman, a naval officer, they addressed as their brother, and he may simply have travelled with them for their safety.’
‘What are they like?’ asked Mary. Letho was very small, and she had an active mind.
‘The older sister was quiet, the younger and the brother a bit bad-tempered. But it is a long journey, and they will have been tired,’ he added diplomatically.
A bell rang.
‘Front door,’ Robbins and Mrs. Chambers said simultaneously, and smiled as Robbins rose, remembered that he was still in dirty travelling clothes, and sat again. Running footsteps pounded along the passage to the kitchen door and Daniel, cobwebs in his brown hair, flung himself into the room and lunged round the table to seize his coat. Pulling it on as he went, he was almost back to the door again before he took in Robbins’ presence, and he skidded to a halt, still buttoning, and bowed low, like a puppet with the strings cut.
An Abandoned Woman (Murray of Letho Book 4) Page 2
