Obsession

by Claire Lorrimer

  Harriet laughed and departed to write her notes for Albert to give the various shopkeepers. Sitting at her escritoire in her bedroom she was suddenly reminded that in two weeks’ time it would be Charlie’s third birthday, and that as a consequence of his being so ill this past week she had delayed writing the promised letter to Mrs Joan Bates. She would do so as soon as she had completed the orders for Albert, after which she would pay her morning visit to the invalid.

  At lunchtime the previous day, Felicity had arrived, unexpectedly bearing a delightful clockwork toy for Charlie – a box which when wound up played the noise of a drum which the little wooden bear on top was beating. She had stayed to have lunch with them, after which she had managed to persuade Brook to ride home with her, knowing as she did that his morning exercise routine had been interrupted by his wish not to miss the doctor’s daily visit. As she had expected, Harriet had still been too concerned about Charlie to go with them.

  It had been quite dark when Brook returned, having stayed to take tea with Felicity and her brother, Paul, who was on one of his rare visits home.

  Brook had laughed off her fears for his safety, pointing out that no harm could have come to him with his groom accompanying him back from Melton Court.

  ‘I suppose I was being silly to fret!’ Harriet had admitted as he put his arm round her. ‘I start imagining all the perils that might occur, and how I would not be able to bear it if you came to serious harm and I lost you.’

  Brook’s arm had tightened around her. ‘Nothing short of death can ever do that, my darling,’ he had said, ‘and I can assure you that I was never in danger of that happening this afternoon.’ He had stopped to kiss the top of her head, his eyes suddenly alight with laughter. ‘Mind you, my darling, I might have been tempted to have a little flirtation with your friend, Felicity. I swear, if Paul had not been present this afternoon, she would have been quite agreeable to a little coddling. I don’t think she is aware of it, but sometimes she can be overly flirtatious.’

  Harriet had smiled. ‘It’s just her way, Brook. She told me once that she enjoys men’s attentions, which is why she dresses so beguilingly. She calls herself a merry widow, but one thing I am sure of is that she would never in a hundred years try to come between you and me.’

  ‘Nor could she if she did try!’ Brook had replied. ‘Now, my love, I shall go upstairs to enjoy that hot bath Hastings is supposed to be preparing for me, and I will see you at dinner.’

  ‘And I shall go and change into my most seductive gown to see if I can rival my dear Felicity in your eyes!’ Harriet had smiled, confident as she was that she had nothing in the world to fear.

  The following morning, when finally they had risen from the marital bed after a night of love-making, Brook departed to his study to write some overdue replies to the letters on his desk. Harriet had decided that she, too, had a seriously overdue letter to write to Felicity on Charlie’s behalf, thanking her for all the gifts she never failed to bring him each time she visited.

  After looking in on Charlie as she’d intended, Harriet thought once more about her letter to Mrs Bates. It would not be a difficult one to write, she thought as she went to her escritoire, as there was so much to tell her: not least, of Charlie’s ability to pick out with one finger the first six notes of the National Anthem with only an occasional mistake. She might also like to know of the Shetland pony his doting grandfather had given him and, most importantly of all, Charlie’s complete recovery from an onset of measles which had laid him very low for several weeks. The first paragraph of her letter would be the easiest to write as the words would come so readily from her heart.

  Ten minutes later she was seated at the desk, her pen in hand.

  It is not possible, dear Mrs Bates, for my husband and I to love the little boy you gave me that day in Ireland three years ago more than we do. He is the happiest, most affectionate little boy and …

  She broke off as there was a knock on the door and Ellen came into the room.

  ‘Excuse me, madam,’ she said in her customary toneless voice, ‘but Cook has sent up to say that young Doris has cut her finger so badly it might come off, and shall she send Jenkins to ride down to the village and fetch Doctor Tremlett to come up and stitch it on?’

  Harriet rose quickly to her feet, saying, ‘Thank you, Ellen. I’ll go straight downstairs and see Doris. The poor girl! I suppose she was disobeying orders and using one of Cook’s carving knives again!’

  She hurried down the big staircase and through the green baize door leading to the kitchen. Sixteen-year-old Doris, the kitchen maid, was sitting with her arm on the scrubbed table top, her hand bandaged in a blood-soaked teacloth. She was white as a sheet, and even the implacable cook was looking shocked.

  ‘Her finger’s hanging near right off!’ she said to Harriet. ‘I don’t know how many times I’ve told that girl not to use the big knives for cutting up carrots but …’

  ‘I know, Cook!’ Harriet said firmly. ‘This is not your fault. We shall get Doctor Tremlett up here as quickly as possible. I’ll ask Hastings to hurry down to the stables and tell Jenkins it’s very urgent.’

  Keeping her voice as calm as possible, she turned back to Doris, saying, ‘I know it must hurt, Doris, but try to be a brave girl, which I’m sure you can be. Cook shall make you a nice hot cup of cocoa while we wait for the doctor.’

  ‘Will he cut my finger right off, ma’am?’ Doris enquired in a shaky voice.

  Unwilling to lie, Harriet said gently, ‘I don’t think that is likely, Doris, but even if the very worst happened and he did have to do so, it wouldn’t hurt any more than it does now.’ She had a sudden inspiration. Upstairs in one of her wardrobes she had already packed in tissue paper and tied with red ribbon Christmas presents for every member of staff. ‘If you are very brave, I shall have a little surprise for you!’ she added.

  Doris’s tears ceased abruptly. Like all the staff, she was devoted to both Brook and Harriet, and now she knew that if her mistress was promising a surprise for her, it would surely be something nice.

  Cook made hot cocoa for Doris and Harriet, promising to return when the doctor arrived, left them sitting round the big kitchen table in a far calmer state than the one in which she had found them.

  On reaching her bedroom, she sat down once more at her writing desk and picked up her pen. It was only then that she saw the top sheet of notepaper on which she had been writing the letter to Mrs Bates was missing. Had it slipped to the floor? she wondered, stooping to see if it was there, but she could see no sign of it.

  Her heart pounding, she recalled the start of the letter she had begun when Ellen had interrupted her with the message concerning Doris. It told Mrs Bates how much she and Brook loved the little boy Mrs Bates had given them three years ago. Realizing the danger if those words were ever to be read by Brook, Harriet began a desperate search around and behind the desk, but there was still no sign of it.

  White-faced, she rang for Ellen with one last hope – that her maid had found it, blown on to the floor perhaps and, thinking it rubbish, had thrown it away. No one else would have been in the room as the bed had been made and the room tidied by the housemaid whilst she had been having breakfast.

  When Ellen arrived, her thin, expressionless face became one of surprise as she heard Harriet’s question. ‘I’m sorry, madam,’ she said in her usual toneless voice, ‘but I followed you out of the room when you left to go downstairs to see about Doris. Would you like me to ask if one of the maids …’

  ‘No, no, it’s not important!’ Harriet interrupted quickly. Although her heart was beating violently, she knew she must not reveal her anxiety. The letter must be somewhere in the room, and Ellen must not find it before she did, lest the woman’s curiosity was aroused by her concern, and prompted her to read it.

  Dismissing her, Harriet sat down heavily on the side of her bed, her thoughts in turmoil. Why, she asked herself, should she suddenly suspect that Ellen had been lying? Was it simp
ly because she knew for a fact that no one else would have gone into her room in the brief half hour she had been absent? Or was it because she was prejudiced by dislike of the woman?

  Ever since Ellen had replaced Bessie as her personal maid, Harriet had waged an ongoing battle with herself not to look for ways to find fault with her. So far she had found it almost impossible to do so as Ellen was by far the most efficient servant she had ever employed.

  Unsure how next to proceed, Harriet considered the possibility that a housemaid could have come to the room whilst she had been downstairs, to refill the water jug, perhaps, or tend to the fire which was kept burning these cold December days. A maid might have thrown away what she’d assumed was a piece of waste paper laying on the floor. Whenever she had closed the door on her way downstairs, it caused a small draught which in this instance could have wafted the letter off the blotter.

  Perhaps it would be best to say nothing to anyone, Harriet decided. Were a search to be made for it by anyone else but herself, the contents could be read. How could she have been so careless as to leave it lying uncovered on her blotter? She could but hope now – must hope – that it had already been found and thrown away as rubbish. Later today she must find time to write the letter again. For the time being she could not bring herself to do so.

  Upstairs in her attic room, Ellen sat on the side of the bed reading and rereading the extraordinary but fascinating words – words that she had no doubt at all would compensate the scheming Mistress Goodall for the not inconsiderable amounts she had paid out to her, Ellen, since the start of her employment.

  She gazed once more at the piece of paper she was holding.

  ‘… the little boy you gave me …’

  Master Charlie, the baby her mistress had brought back from her sister’s house in Ireland – a baby she, Ellen, had been told by Cook was most particularly and surprisingly welcome after the mistress’s many miscarriages. In the years since the start of her employment, Ellen had seen for herself how doted upon by both parents the boy was. ‘My son,’ the master boasted whenever he had the chance, and his nanny, Cook and the other servants all sang his praises at meal times.

  Quite suddenly, she recalled an occasion when she was finishing Harriet’s evening toilette and her husband had come into the room. He’d fastened a new, beautiful emerald necklace round his wife’s throat. After she had thanked him, he’d sat down on the chaise longue, watching her in her mirror whilst she, Ellen, had been searching for a pair of matching emerald ear drops. He’d then related his discovery of his son’s musical ability. ‘When I went up to wish Charlie goodnight,’ he’d said to Harriet, ‘he was in his little bed singing one of his nursery rhymes in a voice as pure as a choir boy’s. He must have inherited that ability from you as I can’t sing a note in tune.’

  ‘Not in my family!’ her mistress had replied. Hardly surprising, Ellen now thought with an uncustomary flash of excitement: not if young master Charlie was not their child.

  Ellen drew a deep breath. This must be one of the astonishing facts which the devious Mrs Goodall wished her to unearth. The woman had never given a reason for paying her, Ellen, to spy upon the couple, although it had very quickly become apparent that she was hoping to break the marriage bond between the two and take Harriet’s place as the master’s wife. It had been quite a while now since Ellen had realized that Mrs Goodall’s ever-more frequent visits to the house and her supposed friendship with Harriet were no more than a ruse to be in her husband’s company.

  Ellen’s heart missed a beat as she considered the consequences were the master not to have known about the child’s real parentage. She was holding the proof he was not here in her hand. She could now give her paymaster the very weapon she needed to break the marriage apart.

  Ellen’s next thought was that she must not simply hand the half-written letter over to Felicity. If she was to realize her dreams for her sister’s future well-being, she needed a great deal more money than she was now receiving. This piece of notepaper would enable her to demand a very large sum of money indeed.

  The lovesick woman, Mrs Goodall, could afford it, Ellen told herself, her heart beating furiously. She was the richest person Ellen had ever encountered. She herself had no experience of, or wished to have, human passions: their obsessive desires.

  In her previous employment, Ellen had watched a happily married gentleman become helplessly enslaved by a chorus girl who bartered her favours for money. His wife had found out, taken him to the divorce court, and refused to allow him any further access to her very substantial dowry. The man was ruined, financially and socially, while his wife departed to America and quickly found another husband. She would have taken Ellen with her had she been willing to leave her invalid sister.

  She may not have experienced obsession, Ellen now told herself, but she recognized it when she encountered it. Such thoughts were now momentarily diverted by a belated feeling of astonishment. It was difficult to believe that her God-fearing mistress had contrived such a far-reaching deception and, until now, done so successfully. She, Ellen, was in no doubt whatever that the master believed the child to be his.

  She drew a deep breath. The longer she lived, she thought, the more surprised she became by the ways of the gentry. They claimed to stand for honesty, truth, fairness and all the other virtues, but when it suited them they did as they pleased regardless.

  This evening, she now recalled, Mrs Goodall was coming to dinner with her brother, and she would almost certainly have an opportunity to inform her that at long last she had evidence which Her Ladyship could use very successfully to disrupt the relationship between husband and wife.

  It was with difficulty she contained her impatience until Mr Denning and his sister arrived for dinner and Felicity came upstairs to leave her cloak in Harriet’s dressing room.

  ‘Well, why that strange look, Ellen?’ Felicity greeted her sharply as Ellen closed the dressing room door behind her. ‘Dare I hope you finally have something to relate to me?’

  Her tone of voice was edging on sarcastic, but on this occasion Ellen was not disturbed by it. Any moment now, she told herself, madam would be begging – actually begging – because she, Ellen, had no intention of handing over the half-written letter until she had what she wanted – a promissory note for a large enough sum of money to enable her to ensure she could begin a new life with her sister.

  ‘Yes, madam, I do!’ she said quietly. ‘I discovered a half-written letter from the mistress to a Mrs Bates …’ She paused.

  Frowning, Felicity said urgently, ‘Well, go on! What about this Mrs Bates? I can’t be away too long or your mistress will be up to see if all is not well with me!’

  ‘I will come straight to the point,’ Ellen replied. ‘In the letter, madam thanks a Mrs Bates for giving her her baby. She refers to her doing so in Ireland three years ago; this was when the master was abroad and madam went to see her sister in Ireland. I wasn’t employed here then but Bessie, who was her maid before me, told me no one knew madam was about to have a baby when she’d left here to go to her sister.’

  Felicity was so overwhelmed by the importance of what Ellen was saying that she had not interrupted. Brook adored that child – spoke of him endlessly, proudly as his son. The letter seemed to prove he was not so, and that his beloved wife had deceived him: foisted another woman’s child on him …

  She stopped thinking and demanded fiercely, ‘Give me the letter! Now! At once!’

  ‘I’m afraid I do not have it on me, madam!’ Ellen replied smoothly. ‘I thought it best to keep it in my bedroom where it would not be found until I saw you.’

  It struck Felicity suddenly that she had already been upstairs over-long and she should not remain talking to Ellen much longer. At the same time, she would not bring herself to leave without seeing the letter. She needed proof – proof that Ellen’s extraordinary revelations were true.

  ‘Then go and get the letter!’ she ordered sharply. ‘I may not have another
opportunity this evening to come up here again without your mistress, so be quick about it!’

  Ellen remained where she was.

  ‘Did you hear me, woman?’ Felicity said angrily. ‘Don’t just stand there! Go and fetch it at once.’

  ‘Of course I will get the letter for you to see, madam,’ Ellen said in a level tone, ‘but I have had all day to think about it, and as I am the only person who could have gained possession of the letter, I realized that as a consequence of its discovery, I would almost certainly be dismissed and …’

  ‘I’ll give you an excellent reference,’ Felicity interrupted. ‘Get you a new job so …’

  It was Ellen’s turn to interrupt. ‘Excuse me, madam,’ she said quietly, but firmly, ‘I do not want a new job. I wish to take my invalid sister down to live by the bracing air of the seaside. I shall need money to buy a bungalow; to remove her there and furnish it in a manner she – and indeed, I – would like. I have been able to save some of the money you have paid me to be your watchdog ever since you employed me but it is not nearly enough, so …’

  ‘So you want more, is that it?’ Felicity hissed, aware now that she was being held to ransom. ‘Well, you will get it, my good woman – but only after I am assured the contents are as you say.’ She paused to regain her breath before adding: ‘and there is a further stipulation – you are going to be the one to show this incriminating letter to your master. I do not wish to be involved at all. If … and I do mean if, Ellen, it has the result I wish to achieve, I promise I will give you enough money to do as you wish without equivocation.’

  Ellen’s pale blue eyes narrowed, and her mouth tightened in a thin line. Her voice now little above a whisper, she said, ‘I do not wish to cause offence, madam, but before I carry out your wishes I need some kind of guarantee that … that you will fulfil your promise.’