Tilly Trotter (The Tilly Trotter Trilogy)

by Catherine Cookson

  ‘You put the frog down his shirt?’

  ‘Yes, sir.’ Her head drooped still further. She didn’t know why she was telling this man the truth, she felt that she must be mad, he could put her out of the door this minute for treating his children so, gentry’s children were allowed to do things that others weren’t, especially to servants. She should never have thought tit for tat, not in this household.

  Mark looked at her lowered head. Her face certainly portrayed her character for she was still a child. There had been no adult vindictiveness behind her action, and perhaps it would teach Master Matthew a lesson. He needed teaching a lesson, and likely he had taken it in for he hadn’t given her away. Yet he knew that his son’s reticence in this matter hadn’t been to save the nursemaid but to avert his own displeasure and so bring nearer the threat of boarding school. Well, little did he know it but the threat was upon him. He said now, ‘I can understand your motive but . . . but you must have scared him badly.’

  ‘I’m feared I did, sir, and . . . and I’m very sorry.’

  ‘Well’ – he smiled a wry smile – ‘don’t be too sorry. Though I wouldn’t take such drastic measures again. Still, for the short time he’ll have with you I think you’ll manage him.’

  Her eyes widened and she whispered now, ‘You’re . . . you’re not dismissing me, sir?’

  ‘No, no.’ He shook his head. ‘I’m sending him and his brother to boarding school. They don’t know it yet’ – and now he poked his head close to hers as he ended, ‘In fact their mother doesn’t know it yet, so—’ He tapped his lips with his forefinger, and she smiled back at him and answered, ‘Aye, sir, not a word.’

  ‘Well now, get away to bed and I’ll go down and tell the mistress that you haven’t tried to bewitch him.’

  It was the wrong thing to have said and they both knew it.

  ‘Goodnight, Trotter.’

  ‘Goodnight, sir.’

  Strange girl, strange girl. The thought ran through his mind as, slowly this time, he went down the bare stairs, while Tilly, getting into bed once more, thought, He didn’t mean nothing; he’s a nice man, a very nice man. He put her in mind of her granda, though he wasn’t so old.

  Four

  The day the boys went to boarding school was a day of tears, lamentations, recrimination, and the revelation to Tilly of how a house is run below stairs.

  At ten o’clock in the morning she had taken all the children to their mother’s room. They were all crying, Jessie Ann most of all, and when their mother joined in Tilly could hardly stop her own tears from flowing. What had touched her more than anything was the young bully’s attitude towards herself not an hour ago; while she was helping him into his new clothes he had drooped his head and pressed it against her waist as he muttered, ‘I don’t want to go, Trotter; I’d . . . I’d behave if I could stay.’

  For the first time in their acquaintance she put her arms about him and said, ‘It won’t be for ever, Master Matthew. There’s the holidays and they’re long. You’ll be home for Christmas an’ just think of the parties you’ll have.’

  He had raised his head and, looking up into her face, she had seen the frightened boy behind the bully as he said, ‘It . . . it will all be so different, I won’t know what to do; and they’ll be big boys.’

  ‘You’ll hold your own, Master Matthew. Never fear, you’ll hold your own. And you’re not going to the end of the world, just outside Newcastle. And when you come back at Christmas we’ll have some carry-on, like we did last week. You said you didn’t enjoy it but I know you did when we played “Pat-a-cake, Pat-a-cake” and “Here we go round the mulberry bush”, and’ – she had bent her knees until her face was level with his – ‘I’ll let you put another frog in me bed, and I promise you I won’t stick it down your nightshirt.’ But his answer to this had been like one from an adult, for all he had said was, ‘Oh! Trotter.’

  Now she was marshalling them out of the room and Mabel Price was saying, ‘There now. There now. No more tears, not from big boys, no more tears.’ And the master was bending over the mistress soothing her. But that she wasn’t soothed was evident when her voice, raised unusually high, reached the landing, saying, ‘I shall never forgive you, Mark, never!’

  Then she was standing with most of the staff on the steps watching Fred Leyburn driving the master and the boys away.

  It was an event, and for many of the staff a happy event, that that little rip was leaving them, at least for a time; and Tilly should have been the happiest among them, but strangely she wasn’t. In a way, in a very odd way, she would miss him, much more than she would Luke.

  ‘Come along about your business, all of you!’ Mrs Lucas was floating up the steps now and her voice scattered the rest.

  On her way upstairs Tilly was joined by Mr Burgess who had just arrived. ‘Well,’ he said, ‘I’ve missed the departure, I saw the coach going out of the gate. Best thing that could happen to those two, by far the best thing.’

  ‘But you taught them well, Mr Burgess.’

  ‘Learning isn’t enough, Trotter, if it isn’t associated with your fellow men and women.’ He inclined his head towards her and smiled. ‘Learning is only of any use when it helps people to live with one another, put up with one another, and in this narrow establishment what I could have taught that boy would have helped him not at all.’

  She was amazed to think that he thought this house a narrow establishment and yet in a faint way she knew what he meant.

  He said now in an undertone, ‘Have you read the book that I gave you?’

  ‘Yes. But . . . but I don’t understand it.’

  ‘You will as you read it again and again.’

  ‘One thing seems to turn against the other and it hasn’t a story.’

  ‘Well, I wouldn’t say that now; Voltaire is telling you of life. When I gave you the book I thought perhaps I was starting you at the top of literature instead of at the bottom, but from now on when you read lower down in the scale you will understand more for having read the top bars first, if you follow me.’

  No, she didn’t. Anyway, not quite. But she liked listening to him and she had learned a lot from him. He had given her two books, not just loaned them to her, given them to her, but the only time she had a chance to read was by the candle at night, and then she soon ran out of light because she was allowed only two candles a week. But lately she had conceived the idea of saving the droppings and moulding them and putting a string through them. She daren’t look at her books during the day in case Miss Price came on them, but what she did do, and what she could do without being questioned, was look at the children’s work and now and again listen to Mr Burgess teaching them . . .

  The mistress was in great distress all day, she knew this by the activity below. She had left her day couch and returned to bed, and by eight o’clock that night the master hadn’t come home. Then at supper there was revealed to her another side of the master’s character, which startled and depressed her. It was when Amy Stiles said, ‘Doesn’t take you all day to go to Newcastle and back; you’d have thought he’d have come right home knowin’ the state the mistress was in.’

  ‘Which mistress?’ There had been a snigger at this and Frank Summers, the head gardener, repeated, ‘Aye, you’ve said it, which mistress. She’s a whore that one; her rightful place is on the Shields waterfront.’

  ‘An’ she’s all airs and graces.’ Again Amy Stiles was talking. ‘How she dare come in this house and visit the mistress God above knows. She’s brass-faced, that’s what she is, brass-faced. They say she treats them all up at Dean House like dirt ’neath her feet. And another thing they say’ – she looked round the table now – ‘the old fellow knows what’s going on.’

  ‘How do you know that?’ Phyllis Coates looked at Amy for a second.

  ‘How do I know that? Well, because our Willy knows the still-room maid, Peggy Frost. She thinks the old boy’s dotty, but wily dotty, you know. At the table he calls her, me darling, me
dearest, and she’s always kissing him on the head, and she’s always saying funny things to make him laugh. And he laughs, a great belly laugh.’

  ‘By! By! you are well informed.’ Phyllis Coates was nodding her head.

  ‘Don’t be funny, but I know this. ’Tis said she’s got more than one on the string an’ the master might be playing second fiddle.’

  ‘’Tis said! ’Tis said!‘ Phyllis Coates tossed her head. ‘The things you hear, Amy. You know’ – she now looked round the table, thumbing towards her companion – ‘she should be writing a book, she’s got the ’magination.’

  There was laughter at this, but it died away when the cook said, ‘Well! enough. Let them up there attend to their business and we down here’ll attend to ours. ’Tis Saturday and the end of the month, let’s get down to it.’ Then as if she had said something she regretted she glanced sharply at Tilly and now added, ‘You finished?’

  ‘Yes, Mrs Brackett.’

  ‘Well, you can go.’

  ‘Why should she?’

  They all looked at Phyllis Coates. ‘She’s been here on two months, she’s one of us, she should have her share accordin’ to her place.’

  There was a long silence following this remark, then the cook muttered, ‘It’ll be coppers only then.’

  ‘Well, coppers are not to be sneezed at.’ Now Phyllis Coates turned and smiled at Tilly, and as Tilly rose to leave the table she said, ‘Sit down.’

  What followed next didn’t seem real to Tilly. The cook brought to the table a box holding silver and copper and, tipping it on to the board, she spread it out with her hands; then taking from the ample pocket of her white apron a notebook, she wet her finger on her tongue and licked over its pages before she began to read: ‘Grocer an’ meat exchange brought total twenty-five shillings; fishmonger and poultry exchange, eighteen shillings and ninepence; miller, two pounds seven and fourpence.’ She lifted her head and looked about her. ‘That was with putting a penny on the stone, an’ things, instead of three farthings like last month; I don’t see why Mrs Lucas should have the plums.’

  ‘I’m with you.’ Robert Simes nodded towards her. ‘Her and Mr Pike come off very nicely at their own end, thank you very much. Oh, I know what I know. Only nine bottles to the dozen!’ He tapped the side of his nose with his finger, and to this the cook said, ‘You needn’t tell me, I’m not blind or daft, I wasn’t born yesterday:’ then went on: ‘Now the eggs an’ vegetables an’ fruit that went to the market, that was good this month with the currants an’ things , eight pounds two and sixpence.’ There were nods of approval all round the table. Wetting her pencil between her lips, the cook began to add up the sum and after a long pause she said, ‘Twelve pounds, thirteen and sevenpence I make it.’

  ‘Is that all?’

  The cook looked at Robert Simes and she nodded, saying emphatically, ‘That’s all!’

  ‘Lord! Old Pike used to make nearly as much as that on the wine bill at one time.’

  ‘Aye, at one time we all did well, but this house is not as it was at one time, and we all know that an’ all, don’t we?’ The cook’s double chins were flapping against the starched collar of her print dress and there were murmurs of, ‘Aye. Aye.’

  ‘Well now, to share it out.’ The cook now put her hand among the silver and coppers and, separating the coins, she said again, ‘Well now, three five to you, Robert.’ She pushed three pounds five towards the footman. ‘The same for meself.’ She extracted another three pounds five. ‘Two pounds for you, Phyllis, and two pounds for Fred. You can take his.’ She pushed four sovereigns down the table. ‘One for you, Amy.’ She handed a sovereign to the second housemaid. ‘Fourteen shillings for you, Maggie, although you haven’t deserved it, you haven’t worked for it.’ The girl giggled as she picked up the four half-crowns and four single shillings from the table. ‘Now that leaves . . . What does it leave?’

  Everybody at the table knew that the cook was aware of what it left, she had had it all worked out before she had tipped up the box, and now she said, ‘Nine and sevenpence, so what are we going to do with that?’

  ‘Well, ’tis mine.’ Ada Tennant was bobbing her head.

  ‘We said Trotter was in on this, didn’t we?’ Phyllis Coates was staring across the table at the cook now and the cook muttered, ‘Well it better be halved then.’

  ‘’Tisn’t fair and you know it, Cook. By rights Trotter’s above me and Amy here.’

  ‘That’ll be the day.’ The cook now cast an almost vehement glance at Tilly, and as Tilly was about to say, ‘I don’t want anything,’ the cook said, ‘Half or nothing.’

  When the four and ninepence ha’penny was pushed down the table towards her, Tilly hesitated in picking it up, until she glanced at Phyllis Coates and Phyllis’ eyebrows sent out a message by moving rapidly up and down.

  When Tilly lifted up the coins she felt for a moment that they were burning her fingers, it was like stolen money. And in a way it was stolen because they were doing the master and thinking nothing of it; even Phyllis seemed to accept it as her right.

  A few minutes later, after she had left the table, Phyllis caught up with her at the bottom of the attic stairs and, her voice a husky whisper, she said, ‘Don’t you worry, you’ll have your full share next month. Fred ’ll see to it.

  ‘I don’t want it. I mean . . . well—’ She looked down on Phyllis from the first step of the stairs and although she knew it might turn her friend against her she couldn’t resist saying, ‘It somehow feels like stealin’.’

  Phyllis was in no way insulted by this remark, it only proved to her how naive this lass was in the ways of a household such as this, and so she punched Tilly gently in the arm as she said, ‘Don’t be daft. How do you think we get things together who are soon to be married? or them who’ve got their old age to face? ’cos take it from me, the gentry do nowt for you. Twelve pounds a year I get and they think they’re giving me gold dust. And Fred gets twenty-five and his uniform. We won’t be able to set up a very big establishment on that. No’ – she now patted Tilly’s arm – ‘take all you can get, lass, and ask for more. It’s the only way to survive in this life. And don’t let it worry you, the thought of stealin’. My God! no, ’cos they’d have the last drop of blood out of you, the gentry. An’ the master’s no better than the rest, although he does a good turn here and there when it pleases him; like letting people stay in a cottage. But if he’s put out, you’re out. As for the mistress, well she got rid of the whole laundry staff, four of them, ’cos her lawn petticoats got put in with the coloureds. That’s why we only have two dailies. You mark my words, girl. Now go on and don’t look so depressed. Why, it should be the happiest night of your life; you’ve got rid of that little bugger, haven’t you? An’ that’s all he was, a little bugger.’

  Tilly lowered her head, biting on her lip to stop herself from laughing. Yes, she supposed that all Phyllis had said was true, especially about the little bugger. It sounded so funny though, coming from her, for she had never heard her swear before. She leant towards her and said softly, ‘I’m glad you’re my friend, Phyllis,’ and Phyllis, pleased and embarrassed, gave her such a push that she almost fell on to the stairs as she said, ‘Get away with you! Go on an’ get to bed.’ And on this she turned and ran down the passage back to the kitchen, and Tilly went upstairs four and ninepence ha’penny richer.

  It was her third Sunday off. The summer was at its height, the sky was high, and the sun was hot, so hot that it penetrated the crown of her straw hat and lay warm on her head. She was glad of the thin dress she was wearing; it was a cotton one that Phyllis had given her. She’d had to let the hem down and again take in the waist. Her waist and hips were so narrow that she had to put tucks in everything she wore.

  She was making her way, as usual, towards the cottage, for the simple reason she had nowhere else to go. If she’d had even a half-day on a Saturday she could have gone into Shields and seen the market, but she couldn’t gather up the courage
to ask either Mrs Lucas or Miss Price to change her day. But she was content. Life was running smoothly, she had been in service for three months, and the two remaining children she was finding were manageable; she was learning things from Mr Burgess; she had Phyllis and Fred for friends and also Katie Drew. Yes, she could class Katie Drew as a friend for on the two previous Sundays she had visited the ruined cottage she had met Katie and her brother, Sam, somewhere along the road. In fact, she now looked forward to meeting them, she expected to meet them.

  On her first Sunday off she had almost shunned going to the cottage in case she should run into Hal McGrath, but when she had met up with Sam and Katie Drew she felt safe; and on her following Sunday off they had been there again, and here they were now coming towards her. She had the desire to run and meet them, and when Katie left her brother and ran, she, too, ran, then they both stopped simultaneously and said, ‘Hello.’

  ‘How you getting on, Tilly?’

  ‘Fine, Katie. Are you all right?’

  ‘Aye . . . Isn’t it a lovely day?’

  ‘Yes, beautiful. I’m sweatin’.’

  ‘You’re not the only one. Sam here’ – she nodded to Sam who had now joined them – ‘he’s just said he’ll need a scraper to get his trousers off.’

  Tilly looked at Sam and Sam looked at her. He had on his Sunday suit and a clean neckerchief. His face, she knew, had been scrubbed yet there remained on it the marks of the pit, especially around his eyes. His lashes seemed to be stained with coal dust and there were blue indentations on his brow, the insignia of a pitman.

  ‘Hello there,’ he said.