The miles plodded past; now and then the mare flicked her ears; once, a skylark rose from the young corn and trilled into the sky; once her Pa farted lengthily. There was no sign of the castle. Only the dusty track, the blue sky and the long low slope of the downs.
And then suddenly and without any warning at all there was a very loud and very alarming noise behind them. Her father reined in the mare at once and turned to see what it was.
It was the most extraordinary thing they’d ever seen in their lives, a beautiful bright red carriage travelling along the track towards them making a loud chugging chuffing noise and with no horses pulling it. Neither of them could believe their eyes but there it was, large as life, twice as bright and getting closer to them with every second. It made Rosie think of the stagecoach she’d seen in Lavant two years ago. It was the same sort of shape and the same sort of colour only cleaner and brighter and it had the same huge white wheels, only they were cleaner and brighter too. But there the similarities ended. It wasn’t just that there were no horses. There was no coachman, no whip, no lantern on a pole, no horn, nothing at the front of it at all, just two big brass lanterns sticking out like great round eyes. And there weren’t crowds of people inside the thing either, all squashed up close together, just one grand lady in a fine blue coat and a huge hat tied in place by a long scarf and, beside her, a gentleman in a tweed suit and a deerstalker hat, looking serious. They were sitting on a high-backed settee, upholstered in black leather, and the gentleman was holding onto another big wheel which rose out of the floor towards him. It was such an amazing apparition that for once in her life, Rosie Goodison was too astonished to speak. She just watched with her mouth open as the car swerved to avoid them (how did it do that?) and then chugged cheerfully alongside. The lady smiled and waved her gloved hand as if she was stirring the air, the gentlemen gave a brief nod, the car coughed and then they were past and heading off along the empty track.
‘Oh Pa!’ Rosie said. ‘Tha’s the most mar…’
But at that point, the mare, who’d been shivering her flanks and showing the whites of her eyes in terror, suddenly took off and galloped full tilt along the track with John pulling on the reins with all his strength, as the cart rocked and threw him about, and calling to her to calm her, ‘Whoa, my beauty! Whoa there! Whoa!’ It took several dangerous minutes before she stopped and then it was only because the rear wheel of the cart had racketed into the ditch.
John jumped down at once and ran to her head to stroke her and calm her and Rosie climbed down after him, her heart beating most uncomfortably. What a thing to happen! Poor old Snowy! And she’d been going along so steadily too. ‘Is she all right, Pa?’ she asked.
‘She’ll do,’ John said, rubbing the mare’s nose. ‘Won’t you, old gel?’
Rosie stood beside him as the mare blew and shivered and wondered how they would get the cart back on the track again. It was horribly lopsided.
‘She’ll be all right presently,’ her father said. ‘Then you can hold her head while I get that wheel out. Lead her when I call “walk on”.’
It took considerable heaving and straining and, by the end of it, John was blowing almost as hard as the mare, but the cart was upright on the path and their obedient animal walked as soon as she was told.
‘Dratted contraption!’ John said as he took up the reins. ‘They ought to be ashamed a’ theirselves. Climb aboard, our Rosie.’
Rosie climbed and settled beside him as their rural silence eased back upon them. His face was so stormy and bad-tempered she felt she had to say something to soothe him, the way her mother would have done. ‘No harm done though Pa,’ she encouraged. That wonderful red carriage had been so breath-taking she didn’t like to hear it being described as a contraption. ‘We’re all right now, ent we?’
‘That’s as mebbe,’ her father growled. ‘Could ha’ been serious though. They wasn’t to know. Roaring about like that. Takin’ up all the road. Nasty noisy thing. ’Tweren’t nat’rul.’
‘I thought it were lovely,’ Rosie said. ‘All that colour an’ all, an’ those great wheels. Like a stagecoach. An’ did you see the seats? They was lovely. You think how comfy they’d be. When I’m grown up, I’m going to ride about in a carriage just like that.’
‘Don’t talk daft, gel,’ her father said. ‘They won’t let you.’
‘Who won’t?’
‘The people what owns ’em. That’s who. Rich people.’
‘They might. Or I might be rich mesself by then.’
Her father looked at her eager face and smiled pityingly. ‘That ent the way the world goes, gel,’ he said. ‘The rich stays rich and the poor does the best we can.’
‘That ent fair,’ Rosie said passionately, and she made up her mind that things would be different for her or she’d want to know the reason why.
‘Soon be there now,’ her father said.
And sure enough, after another twenty minutes or so, they rounded a bend in the lane and there it was rising above the trees, Arundel Castle, even more huge and impressive than she’d imagined it, its crenelated stone walls and rounded tower, honey coloured in the spring sunshine. It was so big and so splendid, it made Rosie feel small and insignificant.
‘Oh Pa!’ she said.
‘You’ll be fine there, our Rosie,’ he said, feeling he ought to comfort her. ‘They’ll look after you.’
But she sat quietly beside him and didn’t speak, which worried him because it was unlike her to be quiet, and the mare took them steadily on, past a row of cottages like their own and across a bridge over a wide green river until they came to a halt under the walls of the castle. There was a very grand door to their right, with a round tower on either side it.
‘That ent the one we’re to use,’ John said. ‘Tradesmen’s entrance is up the hill. We’ll tether her down here. No need to wear her out wi’ climbin’. Tha’s a mortal steep hill.’
He tethered the mare to one of the posts that lined the road, and Rosie stroked her nose and said goodbye to her. Then she took her bag out of the cart and she and her father toiled up the hill together. It was a very long hill and very steep, with grand shops on either side of it and lots of grand people coming and going and a huge inn halfway up and a baker’s shop with its windows full of loaves and pastries that were a temptation even to look at, although they didn’t stop to look, naturally, but just climbed on, further and further up, until her calves were aching with effort. And at last they reached the top of the hill and another part of the castle wall where there was another grand gate so large and tall that she felt daunted all over again. But her father was pulling the bell and the door was opening and a porter in a very grand uniform was standing in front of them asking what their business was and it was time for her to walk into the castle and start her new life.
‘Ah yes,’ the porter said, when he’d been told who she was, ‘I been expecting you. If you’ll just follow me, I’ll show you the way.’ And he stood aside to let her through the gate.
Whatever else, she wasn’t going to let her father see she was afraid. That wouldn’t have done at all. She’d made up her mind a long time ago, when she saw Milly crying and clinging to her mother, that when the time came for her to go into service, she would go boldly and without carrying on. She straightened her shoulders and stuck out her chin, found a bright smile for her father and kissed him goodbye as if she hadn’t a care in the world, even though her heart was beating much too hard. Then she followed the porter.
They walked along a neat gravel path that curved through a bewilderment of shrubs and bushes until they reached the castle walls and a short flight of stone steps that lead them into a small dark hall, with high stone walls and stone flags under their feet.
‘Wait there,’ the porter said and walked up another flight of stairs and disappeared.
Rosie stood in the stony silence with her bag at her feet and waited obediently, feeling overawed and a bit too aware that she was only twelve years old and had n
o experience of the world beyond Binderton at all. It seemed a very long time before the porter’s boots appeared on the stairs again and he re-joined her, followed by a portly lady in a fashionable dress of lavender silk, with puffed sleeves like the posh ladies were wearing in the town and a white cap, frilled and beribboned and stiff with starch. She had a very stern face and she looked down at Rosie for a long time before she said, ‘Rosemary Goodison.’
Rosie didn’t know whether she was supposed to curtsey or not, so she just nodded and said, ‘Yes, ma’am.’
‘Follow me,’ the lady said and led the way up another flight of stairs into a long, dark corridor. The walls were decorated by deer’s heads, nailed to wooden plaques and hung as though they were three dimensional pictures. They had such soft faces and such reproachful eyes that Rosie felt quite sorry for them, but she was brisked past before she could take a really good look.
‘It is nearly time for the staff luncheon,’ the lady said, turning in at the next door. ‘You will eat here — I daresay you’re hungry after your journey — and then one of the maids will take you up to the nursery, where you will be given your uniform and your duties will be explained to you.’
It was a very long room with high windows on one side of it and an enormous table set in the middle. Two servants in grey cotton dresses and starched white caps and aprons were busy laying the table, one from each end, working steadily from chair to chair with long baskets full of cutlery over their arms. One of them looked up and smiled. So Rosie smiled back. And, just as the girl set her last knife, fork, and spoon on the tablecloth, all three doors were opened, and the rest of the servants streamed into the room. There were so many of them that Rosie wondered where they would all sit, and they were all in uniforms of one kind or another and looked very smart. Watching them, she was acutely aware that her own clothes were horribly patched and faded and felt out of place among so much clean linen and so many white aprons. But there wasn’t time to think about it because an obviously important man had walked in and was taking his place at the head of the table and he’d no sooner arrived before the kitchen maids carried in two huge pies that were so hot, they were steaming visibly and set one at each end of the table. Seconds later everybody in the room was standing behind a chair. Rosie looked round in a bit of a panic, uncertain what to do, saw a chair that had no one standing behind it and ran to fill the space. Mr Importance nodded, put his hands together and said a ponderous grace, then there was a loud scraping of chairs as they all sat down and he and the housekeeper, who had taken her position at the other end of the table began to cut the pie. Rabbit, Rosie thought and waited happily for her portion of it.
It was a sumptuous pie and must have contained several rabbits because everybody got a joint and a good helping of sliced potato topped with chopped parsley and plenty of vegetables and gravy. Rosie ate every mouthful that was put on her plate, pie crust, chopped carrots, peas, onions, capers, ham, rabbit, gravy and all. And that wasn’t the end of the feast for when the plates had been cleared, the kitchen maids carried them out and returned with two enormous roly-poly puddings, oozing treacle. Pa was right, she thought, surreptitiously licking her spoon so as not to waste a drop. Hadn’t he said she’d eat well?
When the meal was over the important man rose, nodded at them all and left, which seemed to be the sign for everybody to get back to their work. Rosie went to stand by the window out of the way of all those moving bodies, noticing that the housekeeper was talking to a pale girl in a blue uniform and a ruffled cap and apron. That must be the one who’s going to take me up to the nursery, she thought, and, as the conversation was obviously going on for a bit longer, she looked out of the window so as not to be seen staring.
There was a courtyard below her, with a neat green lawn circled by wide gravel paths and there, right underneath the window, was the red carriage, fairly gleaming in the sunshine and looking even grander than it had done when it was in the lane. She was staring at it when she became aware that the pale girl was standing beside her.
‘I’m Maisie,’ the girl said. ‘Mrs Tenbury says to take you to the nursery.’
‘Thank ’ee kindly,’ Rosie said, being careful to be polite.
Maisie grinned. ‘I’m the other nursemaid,’ she said. ‘It’s not a bad life, all in all. The grub’s good. We’ve only got the one baby to look after at the moment but there’s another one coming in a week or two, so we’ll be run off our feet then, what with nappies an’ all. I ’spect that’s why you been hired. What’s your name?’
Rosie told her and, because she couldn’t resist it, took a last sneaking look at the red carriage.
‘That’s a motor car,’ Maisie said. ‘Bet you never seen one a’ them before.’
‘I seen that one on the road this very morning,’ Rosie told her. ‘It drove past us.’
‘Fancy,’ Maisie said. ‘Come on. I got to take you up to the nursery.’
John Goodison was tired when he finally got back to Binderton, but he gave Snowy a good rub down and put her in the field before he went in for his dinner.
‘I thought you was never coming,’ Maggie said, lifting a covered plate from the oven. ‘I kep’ it hot for you.’
‘It was a fair ol’ journey,’ John said, taking up his knife and fork. ‘You got any pickle?’
The pickle was produced and then Maggie asked the question she’d been holding back until he was settled at the table. ‘Did she go off all right?’
‘Right as rain,’ her husband said. ‘Not a peep out of her. You know our Rosie. She don’t worry about nothin’.’
Chapter 2
After all those forbidding stone walls and those long dreary corridors, the nursery made a pleasant change to Rosie Goodison. It was up on the third floor and full of light, with a pretty wallpaper brightening the walls, a carpet gentling the floor and long white curtains to soften the windows. All the furniture was painted white too, nursery table, high-backed chairs, dresser, toy box and all, except for a rocking horse that was standing in the corner looking so lifelike it wouldn’t have surprised her if it had kicked up its heels and galloped out of the room.
There was a discontented-looking young woman sitting at the table, wearing the same blue and white uniform as Maisie and jabbing a spoonful of bread and milk at a baby girl, who was turning her head away from it and scowling.
‘You took your time,’ the young woman said, glaring at Maisie. ‘I thought you was never coming back. Is this the new un?’
Maisie introduced them, briefly. ‘Rosie, Janet.’ And Janet grunted and turned her attention to the little girl, jabbing the spoon at her again. ‘Eat it, when I tell you, you naughty little thing,’ she said.
The baby stood up for herself. ‘Shan’t!’ she said. ‘Don’ like it.’ Her face was dark with distress under her lace cap and she was squirming in her highchair.
‘What’s her name?’ Rosie said.
Janet scowled at the child. ‘Disobedience,’ she said. ‘I never knew such a child.’
But Maisie introduced her properly. ‘She’s Rachel,’ she said. ‘Aren’t you Rachel? I don’t think she likes it, Janet.’
‘She’ll do as she’s told,’ Janet said, scowling worse than ever. ‘If I say she’s to eat it, she’s to eat it.’
The baby turned down her mouth ready to battle on but at that moment a kitchen maid arrived carrying a tray covered by a table napkin. ‘Brought yer dinner,’ she said to Janet and looked at the dish of congealing bread and milk. ‘She finished with that?’
‘Yes,’ Rosie said firmly. ‘It’s gone cold.’
Janet was uncovering her meal. ‘And whose fault’s that?’ she said. ‘Rabbit pie is it?’
Rosie handed the remains of the cold bread and milk to the kitchen maid, lifted the baby out of her chair and set her on the floor. ‘What does she do now?’ she asked Maisie.
‘Rides on the horse sometimes,’ Maisie said. ‘Plays with her bricks. She likes her bricks. Only I’m supposed to be showing y
ou your uniform.’
Rosie could see the bricks from where she stood, all neatly packed in a little box. She bent down and took the baby’s hand, very gently the way she’d done with the babies at home. This part of the job was going to be easy. ‘Shall we build a little house?’ she said.
The baby nodded so they took her and her bricks into the next room and made a quick escape, leaving Janet to stuff her face with pie.
It was another white room with two beds, a small china chamber pot, a washstand with a basin, jug, and soap dish, and standing on either side of the fireplace, a neat white cot and a crib hung about with embroidered muslin.
‘This is where we sleep,’ Maisie said, when she’d shut the door behind them. ‘That’s Baby’s cot an’ that’s the crib for the new baby what’s coming an’ this is your bed and that’s mine. Janet’s got a room of her own. We could take it turn an’ turn about to look after baby in the night if you like. She’s good most a’ the time but she gets restless sometimes.’
Rosie sat on the carpet with Rachel and took the bricks out of their box. ‘How old is she?’
‘Three in June.’
‘No wonder she don’t like bread an’ milk,’ Rosie said. ‘Our babies was eating all sorts by the time they was three. We’ll have to smuggle her in some roly-poly. She’d like that. We’ll see if Hoity-toity leaves any.’
The name made Maisie laugh. ‘You’d better not let her hear you if you’re goin’ to call her that,’ she warned. ‘She’s got a sharp tongue on her.’
‘I seen that,’ Rosie said, grinning. ‘Like a razor. It’s a wonder she don’t cut her mouth to shreds.’ Then she turned her attention to the more important things about this new life. ‘When do they pay us, Maisie? They told Ma it was £8 a year.’
‘Quarterly,’ Maisie told her. ‘At the end of the month. Next time’s the end a’ June. An’ we gets a half day off every week starting at three o’clock. I ’spect Mrs Tenbury’ll tell what day you got when she sees you tomorrow. We takes that turn an’ turnabout too, like going to the hall for our dinner. It’ll be Hoity-toity’s turn to go down tomorrow an’ we shall be up here.’
Everybody's Somebody Page 2
