by Evie Grace
‘I will see what I can do.’ Cook sighed and called the scullery maid who was chopping vegetables to stop and put some eggs on to boil.
‘I don’t want to eat,’ Agnes said. ‘I wish to meet my brother.’
‘You will have to wait until your mama says that you can.’
‘Oh?’ Her heart sank. She was aching to see him and could only pick at the rubbery eggs on toast when it was brought upstairs.
Nanny gave her a long, hard stare.
‘Be patient,’ she said. ‘Life will return to normal soon enough.’
But it didn’t.
Later the same afternoon, Mrs Pargeter came bustling into the schoolroom.
‘That bird can’t stay in here – it is injurious to health. Miss Treen, I should have thought you would have known better.’
‘Mr Berry-Clay thought fit to give the bird to Agnes yesterday and we have remained quite well.’ Nanny was being sarcastic, Agnes decided.
‘Please don’t question my authority – the nursery is my domain while I’m at Windmarsh Court. I have full responsibility for what goes on in here. The infant is my priority and he will be moving to his quarters tonight. The mistress needs her rest. No, this will not do.’ She swept through in her wide skirts, and within half an hour, Agnes found herself and Nanny and the bird removed to a spare guest room where they spent the rest of the afternoon making it their own, with the help of the butler and the footman who were charged with moving the furniture to the new schoolroom.
‘I suppose we will have to make do,’ Nanny said crossly as she yanked at the curtains and forced the windows open.
Agnes was torn between siding with Nanny and the frisson of excitement that she felt about their move. She liked the idea of a change of scene to counter the dull routine of her daily life.
‘If Mrs Pargeter is bringing the infant to the nursery, we will be able to meet him,’ she said hopefully.
‘I don’t think she will allow it. She will make some excuse that she needs time and space to establish baby’s routines. She will say the doctor has ordered peace and quiet.’
‘When is she leaving Windmarsh?’
‘Soon, I hope. Oh, don’t listen to me. I am a little out of sorts. She is here for at least one month, but who knows what your parents will decide? They are already gone quite mad, talking of this French chef – rich food is unsuitable for a child’s digestive system as well as his morals.’ She turned to where Mr Turner and the footman were carrying the globe into the room. ‘You could have left that behind, but now that it’s here, it can go beside Agnes’s desk.’
‘We’ll be able to travel the world again,’ Agnes said, delighted. She ran and sent it spinning, but there was something wrong with it: someone had stuck a piece of brown paper across the southern hemisphere. ‘Oh, what has happened to it?’
‘I’ve covered the places that we don’t need to study,’ Nanny said. ‘I didn’t want them to remain a distraction.’
Agnes frowned. What was the point in hiding them when she remembered exactly what they were?
‘We will review Paris,’ Nanny said, but Paris no longer held any magic. All Agnes wanted was to meet her brother. She heard him crying at night when she was trying to sleep. She heard him crying during the day when Mrs Pargeter was running him back and forth to Mama’s room. She saw him once, just the copper glint of his hair peeking out from his white swaddling clothes, as the nurse carried him past her on the stairs.
It was a whole week after her baby brother’s birth and Agnes was wondering if her parents had completely forgotten her, when they called her to the drawing room.
‘I told you to be patient,’ Nanny said when they went downstairs at the allotted time, but it was easy for her to say, Agnes thought. She was pretty sure that Nanny had managed to slip away and see the new arrival on the sly.
She rushed straight into the drawing room without knocking.
‘Good evening,’ Papa said jovially, standing up from his fireside chair to greet them. ‘Come and meet your brother, Henry James Robert Berry-Clay.’ He held out his hand towards Mama, who was sitting in the chair opposite with the sleeping infant in her arms.
‘Oh!’ Agnes suppressed a cry of joy, not wanting to wake him. She had thought she would hate him, but he was the sweetest-looking creature she had ever seen with his shock of carroty hair and pale lashes that gleamed like pure gold. With his snub nose, pouty lips and smooth skin, he reminded her of the cherubs that were carved into the mantel. She turned back to her governess. ‘Isn’t he adorable?’
‘He is very handsome indeed,’ Nanny agreed before making an excuse to leave the room.
‘Can I hold him?’ Agnes asked.
‘I don’t think so – I fear that you might drop him,’ Mama said.
‘Mama, please,’ she begged.
‘No. Don’t argue with me, Agnes. It’s unseemly.’
The baby yawned and opened his eyes.
‘James, ring for Mrs Pargeter,’ Mama said quickly. ‘She must take him now. I can’t stand to hear him cry. You know how it upsets me.’
‘I wish you would comfort the infant in your arms, Louisa, as you used to do with Agnes at the beginning,’ Papa said. ‘Even at the Union I’ve seen mothers cleaving to their children with deep affection. And in the poorest homes, the people seem happier than us, the children running about freely and engaging at will with their parents. The interaction isn’t always loving, but more often than not there is laughter and demonstration of a deep attachment between all members of the family.’
‘You spend too much time with those wretches,’ Mama said, giving Agnes a sideways glance. ‘Don’t let their base behaviour bring you down to their level. We have standards, and I should like to maintain them in the proper manner. The child will return to the care of Mrs Pargeter immediately.’
Papa looked downcast. He picked up a brass bell from the side table and shook it. Its deep jangle brought Mrs Pargeter into the room within an instant. As the baby began to sob, she scooped him from Mama’s faltering grasp and took him away.
‘I should have liked to have spent more time with Henry,’ Agnes said.
‘There will be plenty of time for that,’ Papa said before turning to Mama. ‘I wish you would take more rest. Doctor Shaw recommended that you remain in bed for a full two weeks.’
‘I should like to dine with my husband this evening. That Pargeter woman is tiresome. I don’t think I can put up with her for much longer.’
‘You are happy enough to hand Henry over to her,’ Papa pointed out. ‘Her being here enables you to recover and not be overburdened. She will stay until Henry is old enough to pass into Miss Treen’s capable hands.’
‘She is a treasure,’ Mama said. ‘Do you think she will manage with the baby and the older one?’
The older one? She means me, Agnes thought.
‘I know of nannies who look after several children at once. She shouldn’t find it too arduous.’
‘That’s true. She has had it easy for a long while, and it would benefit Agnes. She has become quite self-absorbed recently.’
Papa turned to Agnes. ‘You don’t mind sharing your governess when Henry’s a little older, do you?’
It was a statement rather than a question. Agnes shook her head, not wanting to defy her dear father, but she did mind. Very much. In her opinion, Henry should have had his own nanny. Why should she share Miss Treen with anyone else?
She soon found that she had no choice. From then on life revolved around Henry’s comfort, not hers. She had been displaced and hidden from view – as far as Mama was concerned, at least. Papa still loved her, she thought, but he had to share his affection between his children. It was hard for her to accept.
Even the bird seemed unhappy about the new situation. The more that Agnes listened to her song and watched her fluttering around the cage, a few tiny feathers floating down to the cage floor each time she flew into the bars, the less sure she was that she could describe the bird’s
frantic trilling as pretty. It made her uneasy to hear another living creature singing her heart out as though she was calling to the other finches outside, begging for her freedom.
In spite of all the care and attention lavished upon him, Henry didn’t stop crying. One evening when he was four weeks old, Agnes was trying to sleep with him bawling from the nursery across the landing. When she slipped out of bed to see if there was anything that could be done, she found Nanny and Mrs Pargeter having a difference of opinion at the nursery door.
‘I wish the mistress hadn’t given him up to be fed by bottle,’ Nanny was saying. ‘It is never satisfactory and this only goes to prove it. He has terrible colic, the poor little mite. I’ve heard that a little gin and rosehip syrup helps to improve matters.’
‘You are quite wrong in your opinion. From my extensive experience, infants do just as well whichever way they are nursed. As for the suggested remedy, I wouldn’t recommend it.’
Henry continued to cry from his crib.
‘One of us should go to him,’ Nanny insisted. ‘I can’t stand to hear him cry like that.’
‘I forbid you to attend to him. The moral duty must be taught early – when baby cries, he must be left to cry, not learn to demand.’
‘Would the bird soothe Henry’s nerves with her singing?’ Agnes interrupted.
‘He is too young to have nerves,’ Mrs Pargeter said scathingly.
‘Go back to bed, young lady,’ Nanny said.
Agnes returned to her room and lay under the covers with her hands over her ears, but nothing could block out the infant’s cries. How she wished he would stop! What ill wind had brought him to Windmarsh? She prayed for a hawk to fly down, snatch him up from his perambulator and carry him far out to sea. She sat up again, biting back tears of frustration.
Babies were supposed to be gifts from Heaven according to Nanny. This one was a squalling monster from Hell.
She got up for a second time and crept across the landing, wondering if there was any way she could quieten him. She pushed the door to the old schoolroom open and paused. Mrs Pargeter was snoring from her bed in the room that had been Nanny’s. The baby was sobbing.
Mrs Pargeter must be wrong, she thought. He sounded distressed, lonely … She recognised his pain.
She took a step inside and another, testing each floorboard before she put her full weight on it. There was a creak. She froze, but Mrs Pargeter’s snoring continued unabated. She tiptoed past the door to her room and into the nursery where she could just make out Henry’s shape in the crib.
She looked in from above. His blanket had fallen away, revealing his tiny body, dressed in a robe with short sleeves. His eyes were wide open, and his mouth turned down at the corners. His shoulders heaved with another heart-wrenching sob.
‘Oh, my poor little brother,’ she whispered, leaning down to touch his arm. ‘You are cold.’
She glanced behind her. Did she dare pick him up?
She leaned into the crib and slid her hands underneath him, cupping his head as she lifted him out. She carried him carefully over to the nursing chair and sat down, holding him in her arms. He stared at her.
‘You have no idea who I am, have you?’ she whispered as a rush of love and pride flooded her breast. ‘I’m your sister.’
He smiled a brief, toothless smile – at least, it looked like a smile, although Nanny had told her that babies didn’t smile properly until they were a few weeks old. Then he closed his eyes and fell asleep. Very slowly and quietly, she laid him back in the crib, covering him with the blanket.
‘Goodnight, dear, sweet Henry,’ she whispered before she returned to bed.
For the first time in her life, she didn’t feel alone.
Chapter Three
Consommé and Garlic
‘It’s going to be a social gathering the like of which hasn’t been seen at Windmarsh for many years.’ Nanny picked up the hairbrush from the dressing table and its silver back glinted in the morning sunshine. ‘Let me put your hair up for you.’
Agnes had already visited the schoolroom to feed the golden linnet with extra seed and thistle tops. Now she sat down and submitted to Nanny’s ministrations.
‘I expect Mama and Papa will require me to play the piano or recite a poem.’
‘I’m afraid not,’ Nanny said crisply. ‘It is Henry’s day. They don’t want anything or anyone to take attention from him. You must promise to be seen and not heard. Think of it as an opportunity to practise your good manners.’
It was early July, and Henry was eight weeks old.
‘It is a most unsatisfactory arrangement,’ Agnes said, disappointed. ‘I shall be bored witless.’
‘You will behave like a young lady and not let your feelings show,’ Nanny scolded. ‘I thought you were looking forward to today.’
‘I was, but …’ Her voice trailed off.
‘You can’t be the centre of attention any more. Your brother will always be put first because of his sex. That is the way it is. There’s nothing that can be done about it.’ The bristles of the hairbrush caught her scalp as Nanny pulled her hair overly tight.
‘Ouch! That hurt.’ Agnes put her hands up to her head, but she was more upset by Nanny’s harsh words than her actions.
‘I’m sorry. You must be brave.’
There was a knock at the door.
‘Do come in,’ Nanny called, and the lady’s maid entered with the clothes Mama had chosen for Agnes to wear for the occasion. The maid laid them on the bed and left the room just as Miriam arrived with breakfast. She put the tray on the dressing table in front of Agnes.
‘Oh, there is such a to-do in the kitchen.’ She smiled. ‘Monsieur has sent out a cold breakfast, saying he can’t do hot because he is too busy preparing luncheon. We ’ave seven house guests to look after and more visitors on their way, and the master has taken the footmen aside to help with the surprise he has arranged for after the baptism.’
‘What is it?’ Agnes lifted the lid on the teapot, releasing a bitter fragrance into the air.
‘We don’t know yet.’ Miriam chuckled. ‘That’s why it’s going to be a surprise, miss.’
Agnes recoiled. ‘What is that smell?’
‘It is coffee, made the French way,’ Miriam said. ‘I agree – it has the fago of smoked herring about it.’
‘I don’t think our young lady should be drinking coffee for breakfast. It is too stimulating,’ Nanny said. ‘Please bring us some tea instead, and poached eggs on toast. We cannot start the day with pastries. What is the master thinking of?’
‘I believe he is giving Monsieur the benefit of the doubt. I don’t like to talk ill of anyone, but he is the most dreadful little man. He has passed over the usual tradesmen, bin rude to Mr Turner and the scullery maid, and made the gardener’s boy cry.’
The gardener’s boy was eighteen, older than Agnes. It seemed strange that he should cry without good reason. She wondered what the Frenchman had said to him.
‘I must go, or we won’t be ready for the vicar at eleven.’ Miriam disappeared downstairs and Agnes never did get her tea, but she did get to wear white just like Mama. She wore a dress down to her ankles, new shoes with jewelled buckles, white kid gloves and a silver ribbon in her hair, and pantaloons that were made from the finest broderie anglaise adorned with lace frills.
She felt as if she was floating on air as she glided down the steps to the hall, where she caught sight of her full glory in the great mirror on the wall opposite the walnut long-case clock. Its gilded hands gleamed as they crept slowly towards the hour of eleven.
‘Slow down, Agnes. Please show a little decorum,’ Nanny said, following along behind her in her Sunday best, but Agnes carried on in a rush to meet Uncle Rufus, who was waving to her from just inside the front door.
‘Agnes, is that really you?’ he said, walking over to her. He handed his coat to the footman. ‘Well, I never did. You’re turning out to be quite as I expected, rather unremarkable.’ He lea
ned on a stick with a silver fox’s mask for the handle. ‘What do you think, Mrs Berry-Clay?’ He turned to his wife, a short, plump woman who was wearing a green satin dress stitched with gold, and a matching bonnet adorned with ostrich feathers.
‘Oh, there must be something wrong with your eyes. She’s always been a pretty girl. Agnes, you haven’t seen your cousins for a while. Look at how they have grown up in the last few months. When were we last here all together? For the New Year, if I remember rightly. Philip? Edward?’ Smiling, Aunt Sarah looked behind her, but her sons had vanished. ‘Where are the boys? Where have they gone?’
‘To make mischief, no doubt,’ Uncle Rufus said proudly. He was shorter than Papa but he had the same red hair, just less of it, and he didn’t wear a beard, only side-whiskers and a moustache. He was younger than Papa but looked several years older, Agnes thought. She didn’t like him. He made her flesh creep.
‘The young gentlemen are heading to the drawing room,’ Nanny said disapprovingly. ‘Come this way.’
The party walked up the stairs together, following the sound of voices to the drawing room, where the furniture had been moved against one wall to make space for more seating and a font, decorated with white flowers and ferns. A long table had appeared beside the tall arched windows to accommodate the christening gifts: knife, fork and spoon sets; a tooth-cutter; knitted items and bottles of port to be laid down for the future.
There were two boys at the table, attracted like magpies by the shiny silver cups and rattle.
‘You may look but not touch, Miss Agnes,’ Nanny said in a very loud voice, but the two boys ignored her, and their parents said nothing.
Her cousins were very odd with their rather large skulls and peg teeth, Agnes thought as she watched the older one picking up the cups and dropping them back on the table, and the younger one shaking the rattle. Philip was about fourteen and Edward was eight. Philip with his stoop and bowed legs was the most unfortunate of the brothers in appearance.
Mama and Papa arrived in the drawing room with Mama’s parents – Agnes hadn’t seen them since the New Year and she was sure they were shrinking with age. Mama’s unmarried sister Caroline, some of their neighbours and a few of Papa’s business associates and their wives, turned up too. Apart from her cousins, there was no one near Agnes’s age.
