Miss Lily’s Lovely Ladies

by Jackie French

  ‘How many know?’

  ‘The whole truth? Only Jones.’ The earl smiled. It was Miss Lily’s smile. ‘Truth can be a burden and a trouble.’

  ‘How many know about Nigel and Miss Lily, then? My father?’

  ‘Your father believes there are two of us — the earl and his cousin. My oldest friends know. Oldest in both senses. Isobel, Hannelore’s aunt, some of the servants and tenants. I have never been sure which of the other locals have guessed. But there have been no sneers in church, no bricks thrown through my windows. When I die, Shillings may be inherited by my second cousin. I have never met him, nor have they. The people here have an interest in keeping things as they are.’

  ‘Keeping a generous landlord? I think it’s more than that. They like you.’

  ‘This is who I am.’ The earl’s voice was light. ‘I will never leave Shillings, except to do my duty to my people.’

  It should have been melodrama. It wasn’t. Perhaps because Sophie suddenly understood just how inseparable this man and his land were.

  ‘Will Miss Lily return?’

  He shook his head wearily. ‘I don’t think she can. As soon as we became a world of war, Miss Lily was a traitor, not a peace campaigner. She … I … meant well, but her efforts were mistaken. The balance of power kept war away, for a while. But once it happened, England and Germany were too well balanced, and so the war dragged on until the United States joined in. Now it’s best for Miss Lily to vanish. To accept that war is something that men do, like playing football, or condemning a village to lung disease so they can make a fortune with a mine.’

  Sophie thought of James Lorrimer’s words. ‘Surely there can’t be another war after this?’

  ‘Of course there will. Greed and hatred have grown even fatter in this war, like maggots feeding on dead men’s flesh. Have you any idea how many fortunes have been made these last few years? Not by men like your father, who profited accidentally, but by those who make weapons to tempt countries into illusions of invincibility. How many men have tasted the absolute power of war, and want some more? The despair and anger in Germany must lead to war too, unless some other solution can be found. I profoundly hope that won’t be Bolshevism. Bolshevism now is the war in different clothes.’

  For the first time in three years, Sophie felt truly helpless. ‘How can we stop it?’

  The voice was soft in the quiet room. ‘War? I don’t know. I thought I had an answer, but I don’t. Maybe there is no answer, and war of some kind inevitable. Perhaps the Earl of Shillings can be more effective than Miss Lily. It is my duty, at any rate, to see what he may achieve.’

  ‘Nigel … Miss Lily …’

  ‘Nigel.’

  ‘Nigel … how much espionage did Miss Lily take part in?’

  ‘Did I take part in, you mean? None, myself. But I did urge others to. And perhaps it made no difference whatsoever, for both countries’ foreign offices leaked like a sieve. How could they not, when our royal houses are so closely related? That is what I tell myself when I wake at four am and hear men’s screams again, and wonder how much of all those years of stalemate in the trenches was due to me.’

  ‘Stop it! Miss Lily was a force for good!’

  ‘She failed,’ said Nigel.

  ‘No. She succeeded in doing something she never planned. Miss Lily — you — taught me that women can have power. I’ve used that power over the last few years. Emily has used it too, and so has every one of your pupils I have met.’ Sophie lifted her chin. ‘We are the women who won the war. Not just your ladies — we encouraged and led others too. We are the women who fed the soldiers when supply lines failed, who nursed them when there were official hospitals for perhaps one in a thousand wounded, who ferried screaming men in ambulances made from butcher’s carts, or men to the front in ox carts because the officers forgot to organise how to get them there.’ She stopped, embarrassed. ‘I’m sorry. I’m making a speech.’

  ‘And a good one. Thank you, my dear.’ To Sophie’s horror, tears slid down Nigel’s face. But at least his smile had returned. She was glad she had not told him the whole truth. For the last years had been mostly fought with her father’s tools: an inherited and learned genius for organisation and enterprise. Charm had helped, and the compassion that was the foundation of that charm. But across Europe women had stopped believing they could only influence the world by influencing their men …

  ‘I wish you could take my place in the House of Lords. I was never able to speak there,’ Nigel was saying. ‘Miss Lily is articulate. But not Nigel. And yet he must be, if I am to be of use.’

  ‘Perhaps you’ve underestimated him.’

  He gazed at her. Finally he nodded. ‘Perhaps. Miss Lily had friends to help her. Nigel has only Jones and Isobel.’

  ‘And me now,’ said Sophie gently.

  His face twisted. Had she hurt him somehow? She said quickly, to change the subject, ‘You said you would tell me about my mother. I met her. I didn’t like her.’

  He nodded, not surprised. ‘Your father asked me if I could help him find a wife who would make his children socially acceptable. He had only begun to make his fortune then, but was already wealthy. I mentioned it to my ex-commanding officer. The poor orphan governess sounded ideal. I’m sorry. I owe both you and your father a great deal for my inadvertent part in that marriage.’

  ‘Would my father ever have told me about my mother himself?’

  ‘I think you must ask him that.’

  ‘I have. I wrote to him yesterday, telling him to divorce her, and marry Miss Thwaites. And I think he will, now that I can’t be hurt. It did hurt, just a little, to see her,’ she admitted. ‘But I’ve had Miss Thwaites, Bill, Her Grace and you.’

  ‘Thank you for that, my dear. Please do give my best wishes to your father. He and his factories are the saviour of Shillings more than ever now.’

  ‘The war has made you richer?’

  ‘How many millions of cans of corned beef did the war need? Now they can bring Shillings back. Two-thirds of the trees have gone as pit props. Most of the shire horses are almost too old to work, certainly too old to breed.’

  ‘Mechanical harvesters?’

  ‘Of course Miss Sophie Higgs would have the most practical answer! Accept the new and do not try to bring back the old.’ He leaned over and tentatively patted her wrist above her glove.

  It was the first time they had touched since Sophie had left Miss Lily nearly five years before — the first time Sophie had felt his hand except through cloth. It burned her skin. Perhaps he felt it too, for he drew away. We are man and woman now, she thought with sudden shock.

  But he was speaking as though nothing had happened. ‘That’s not the worst. So many young men lost, and others who’ll never work again. Their parents have worn their hearts and their backs out to keep the farms going during the war, so their sons have something to come back to. But now? Half the fences on this estate would fall down if a cow sneezed. It’ll take ten years and a lot of money before it will show a profit again.’

  Sophie didn’t bother asking Nigel if he planned to sell. ‘How will you manage?’

  ‘I’ve put a moratorium on rents for the next five years. I’ll put everything I can into fences, machinery. I’ll borrow if I have to.’

  ‘From my father?’

  ‘Yes. From your father.’

  She sat back in her seat. It was the way she had sat before she had come here, comfortable rather than graceful. It was deliberate, and he knew it.

  ‘Have you heard from Hannelore?’ she asked. ‘Or the baroness?’

  ‘No, though I’ve tried. I am afraid that may mean bad news. Things are so confused there. We must keep hoping.’

  He must never have received Hannelore’s letter. Best that it be forgotten, for Hannelore’s sake and so that Sophie need never confess to what she had done on the journey to Ypres.

  ‘Tea.’ The door opened and the trolley rumbled in, followed by Jones. ‘I’m longing for a cup
of char. I swear the stuff we got over there was burned toast and water. There is even cherry cake, especially for Miss Higgs. Thank God for the butter from the Home Farm.’

  The voice was Jones’s. The accent wasn’t, nor the ease of manner, but the authority was the same. Sophie knew where it came from now: it was the voice not of a man who had worked his way up through the servants’ hall, but of the man who cared for the owner of the house more than anyone else.

  She took her cup from him, milk and — a miracle, this — real sugar already added. That small act, adding the milk and sugar for her, was a declaration of friendship as loud as an announcement in the Houses of Parliament.

  ‘Call me Sophie,’ said Sophie.

  Jones shook his head. ‘Might accidentally call you that outside this room. Bad to get into the habit.’ He sipped his tea; it was still strange to see him seated alongside the earl. And she had never seen a butler eat or drink before. ‘Have you asked her yet?’

  ‘No. Still filling in the … background.’

  ‘That’s me,’ said Jones cheerfully. ‘The background. Here’s to the war — may we have seen the back of it — and to friends we won’t see again.’

  There are shadows in your eyes too, thought Sophie. She just hadn’t noticed them before. ‘Ask me what?’

  ‘To marry me,’ said the earl. ‘Cherry cake? Mrs Goodenough is expecting you downstairs before dinner,’ he added. ‘She’s stuffed a shoulder of mutton for you. You must have told her once that you used to eat it back in Australia.’

  ‘Dear Mrs Goodenough. Did you say “marry”?’

  ‘Yes.’ The earl sipped his tea. His hand trembled. He laid the cup back on its saucer.

  ‘Which one of you? Nigel or Miss Lily?’ She hoped she was the only one who heard the slight note of hysteria in her voice.

  ‘Does it matter?’ For the first time there was an edge in Nigel’s voice. ‘You would be the Countess of Shillings.’

  ‘Bearer of the heir?’ There was no mistaking the tremor in her voice now. She wasn’t sure if it was laughter or shock.

  ‘Stop it. Both of you.’

  Sophie blinked at Jones.

  ‘Tell her the truth, you idiot,’ Jones ordered.

  Nigel stared at him. It was an earl’s stare, of power and privilege. Jones ignored it.

  ‘What truth?’ asked Sophie quietly.

  Jones turned to Sophie. ‘He loves you. And I use the word “he” advisedly, because it is the man who loves you, not Miss Lily. He fell in love with you in your first week here. It shocked him so much he planned to propose to you at Christmas time, then panicked and tried to send you away. I told him he was an idiot then too.’ Jones grinned. ‘But you weren’t easy to get rid of.’

  At some level she had known it. Known Miss Lily loved her; had assumed the love to be maternal. She loved Miss Lily too, profoundly. She realised, shocked, that she could love Nigel too.

  But not like that.

  ‘Countess is the best bit of the bargain.’ The earl kept his voice light. ‘I know I am old enough to be your father, though not as old as the one you have. Not to mention … other things.’

  ‘And yet you arranged for me to meet other suitors,’ said Sophie slowly.

  ‘I didn’t say it would be good for you to marry me. I just asked if you would.’

  Not for an heir — or not just for one. Sophie could hear the words that were not said, would never be said, perhaps, unless she committed herself to him. This man offered her his love: a marriage of true minds, even of challenges she would relish — managing his estate, as he would willingly let her join him in doing; helping the Earl of Shillings establish himself in the House of Lords and wider political world — and the Countess of Shillings too. And with her by his side, Miss Lily could at last emerge, hand in hand with Nigel.

  But this was not the same as James Lorrimer’s proposal. This was made with love. Her own hands trembled — not from shock, but from this unexpected depth of feeling. Nigel and Miss Lily were so dear, so impossibly sincere. They had been hurt so much; it felt impossible to hurt them further.

  ‘I don’t know. I … I just don’t know.’

  ‘Are you sure? Your father would be proud.’ The earl was trying to make his voice light. ‘He could visit, and your Miss Thwaites too. You could even spend most of each year back in Australia. I would be a … kind … husband, my dear.’

  So he understood even that. ‘Nigel … Jones — I’m sorry, I don’t even know your other name.’

  ‘Just Jones,’ he said. ‘Now.’

  ‘I would love to say yes. But how could it work? No, I don’t mean the marriage; in a funny way I can see that that would work quite well. And I love you. I loved — still love — Miss Lily. It … it’s taken me perhaps five minutes to love Nigel too.’

  ‘Let her think about it, Nigel,’ said Jones quietly. ‘How many mountains do you expect the poor girl to climb in a day?’

  Nigel tried to smile. ‘I … I need you, very much.’

  ‘I know,’ said Sophie softly. She suddenly realised how much she needed to be needed, and how much she needed to be loved.

  They ate in the library. Impossible to eat in the dining room, with Jones either serving or at the table. Or was it? When the war had finally drained away, would Jones resume his post as butler?

  It was the most informal meal that Sophie had ever eaten at Shillings. Nigel ate automatically, slumped in his armchair, a world — or war — away from Miss Lily’s grace and posture. Jones ate steadily, a man who had learned to eat what he could and when he could. Mrs Goodenough’s efforts deserved more, as Sophie told her when she slipped into the kitchen tactfully after the servants would have finished their own meal: ‘A wonder, Mrs Goodenough.’

  ‘The pheasant?’

  ‘Perfection. Crisp potatoes, and those peas! And the apple tart a dream.’ She smiled. ‘I did dream of your cherry cake, sometimes, in France.’

  ‘If I’d known your address, I’d have sent you some, Miss Higgs.’ Mrs Goodenough hesitated. ‘How do you find his lordship?’

  It could have meant many things, and probably did. This woman was no fool. Her words carefully did not demand that Sophie pretend to have met Nigel/Lily for the first time; could have been a query about her reaction to what Mrs Goodenough must know had been disclosed today, or a simple enquiry about her master’s health.

  ‘I think he will be happy when he is back here full-time.’

  ‘Happier if he were married too,’ said Mrs Goodenough bluntly.

  Sophie swallowed. Did the whole household know? But Jones and Mrs Goodenough must have been colleagues, conspirators, for decades.

  ‘I don’t know,’ said Sophie softly. And that, too, could mean many things.

  To her surprise she slept well, not even waking at her usual three am, listening for shelling, or men screaming. She woke as dawn filtered through the brocade curtains, even before the maid came to refresh the night’s fire, if such luxuries still existed with the house so briefly tenanted by its master. She felt — different. Nor was it just the refreshment of the deepest, quietest sleep she’d known for years.

  She dressed quickly, longing for Australian sun; left off her corsets altogether, wondering if Nigel would notice with Miss Lily’s eyes. But going corsetless had been one of the comforts that had enabled her to work and keep working through the years of war.

  Down the stairs, out into the orchard. It was only as the light dappled lichened tree trunks and leafless twigs that she realised this walk was almost an echo of her first morning at Shillings.

  But then Jones had not come striding through the dew towards her. He wore the trousers and jumper of yesterday, or similar; army boots, bright with dew and polish. He hadn’t yet shaved, which shocked her deeply for three seconds, before she laughed at herself.

  ‘Good. You’re smiling.’

  ‘At you. You haven’t shaved.’

  ‘I saw you from the window.’

  Which would not have b
een the servants’ hall. Did Jones share Nigel’s chamber, despite Nigel’s claim?

  Jones met her eyes. ‘I sleep in the dressing room, like a good batman.’

  She should feel relief that Nigel was not a homosexualist, just as he had claimed, that any marriage would be a true one. Yet she felt nothing except curiosity answered. She suddenly realised that after five years of seeing men’s bodies in intimate agony, she might never see one with pure desire again. And even now, did Nigel truly know who he was? He, too, had been shaped by social expectations, to be solely either man, or woman. He needed time — and friends — to find his true self. And she knew this because, at last, she had woken up knowing who Sophie Higgs should be.

  But Jones was waiting for a reply. ‘Will you become a good butler again too? I … I’d be sorry to see it.’

  ‘I was a magnificent butler.’

  ‘Yes. Magnificent. But you used the past tense.’

  He nodded. ‘Probably Nigel’s secretary. The war has loosened things. A man of my background could be a secretary now.’ He grinned. ‘If a Lloyd George can be Prime Minister, a Jones can be an earl’s secretary.’

  They turned through the apple orchard, the buds a promise of spring. At least spring varied little if you were an apple tree, she thought.

  ‘It must be a shock,’ Jones added abruptly.

  ‘Yes. But not as much as it should have been. If Nigel had asked me that first Christmas, I would probably have said yes.’

  ‘You were too young. I told him you were.’

  ‘You were right.’

  She did not say that she was tempted to say yes now too, not because of Nigel’s rank, or even love of Shillings, but because all she had been through had made her an unconventional woman, although one who understood the need to keep conventions when necessary. Nigel and Jones would understand her. Perhaps no one else ever could.

  ‘I know the answer now,’ she said quietly. ‘May I tell you both?’ She smiled. ‘It is really an answer for the two of you.’

  He held out his hand. ‘Will you come to breakfast, Miss Higgs?’