Hope (8 page)

The church bells began to ring. ‘That means it’s time we left,’ Silas said. ‘That is, if Nell’s sure Albert is the one for her.’

It was September, and Nell had finally agreed to marry Albert when, a week after his proposal in the woods, he insisted he did love her, and explained that his slowness in admitting it was only down to shyness.

‘I’m sure,’ Nell said resolutely.

‘You look as pretty as a cherry tree in blossom,’ Meg said, placing a crown of white flowers on her daughter’s head. Albert had brought them down from Briargate early that morning while Nell was still asleep up in the loft. Meg had fashioned the crown with a little wire, moss and greenery, and fixed the smallest of the flowers on to it. The rest she’d made into a posy for Nell to carry.

Nell had made her pink and white dress herself with some help from Rose, the parlourmaid. It had a low neckline and puffed sleeves, and the skirt had ruffles around the hem and a bustle like a real lady would wear. With a starched lace-trimmed petticoat beneath it and dainty shoes with silver buckles passed on to her by her ladyship, Hope thought her sister looked beautiful.

‘Why haven’t I got a crown?’ Hope asked.

‘Because Nell is the bride, and anyway, you’ve got a bonnet with new ribbons,’ Meg said, handing the posy to Nell. ‘Now, take that look off your face, Hope, and behave in church.’

Hope knew that Albert was already at the church as she’d seen him come past a little while ago with Ruth and James, who would be his best man. Joe and Henry had left then too. Hope thought Albert looked funny in a wing-collar, but then so did everyone in their best clothes.

Old Gertie Ford was waiting in the lane as they came out of the house. She lived in the cottage across the way and her legs were too bad to make it to the church.

‘Good luck,’ she called out, tottering on her stick. ‘You make a pretty bride, Nell; make sure that handsome man of yours treats you right.’

Hope wondered why people kept saying that to Nell. Did it mean some husbands were bad to their wives?

The whole thing about getting married was a bit mysterious to Hope. She had asked her mother and she said it was because women wanted babies and they needed a man to give them one. But Hope knew babies grew in women’s bellies, so that didn’t quite make sense.

The clanging of the church bell became louder and louder as they walked down the hill into the village. Nell was holding her father’s arm; Hope and her mother were behind them. There was no one else to wave to the little party because almost everyone in the village would already be at the church.

‘Stop dawdling, Hope,’ Meg called out, ‘you’ll make us late!’

Hope ran to her mother and took her hand. ‘How long will it be before Nell has a baby?’ she asked.

‘That’s for the Lord to decide,’ Meg replied, but she looked down at Hope and smiled. ‘Don’t ask any more questions like that today either.’

Hope peeped through her fingers while she was supposed to be praying. The church looked very pretty as that morning some of the women in the village had fixed garlands of flowers around the pulpit and on the end of each pew. But it was strange to see all the neighbours and friends from the village sitting in the front pews where the gentry usually sat. Mr and Mrs Calway were there, and the whole of the Nichols family, the Carpenters from Nutgrove Farm, Mr Humphreys, the Pearces, Boxes, Webbs, Wilkinses, even Maria Jeffries, the barmy old lady who walked her goat on a lead around the village. Hope had asked her mother where Sir William and Lady Harvey and Rufus were going to sit when they came, but all she said was that they didn’t go to servants’ weddings. Hope didn’t understand that. Nell looked after Lady Harvey, and Albert made the garden nice for her. So surely they should come here today to make things nice for Nell and Albert?

‘I’ll be nasty to Rufus next time I go to Briargate,’ she promised herself.

She still went to play with him on Monday afternoons, unless the weather was bad. Sometimes she got fed up with him because although he was five now, he was still such a baby. She understood that was because he hadn’t got brothers and sisters like her, and he’d never done anything or gone anywhere on his own the way she had when she was five, but it was still annoying. Yet she liked looking at all his books, and took pleasure in being able to read them to him. She also liked drawing and painting with him and playing hide-and-seek in the garden.

But above all she loved going to Briargate. Just walking up the big staircase to the nursery made her feel she was a special guest. It was so good to see all those beautiful pictures, to touch polished wood and velvet curtains and enter into a world that was so different to the one she came from.

She didn’t think Nell, James and Ruth felt that way, but perhaps that was because they were servants. They were always quick to take her into the kitchen, as though they were reminding her that was where she belonged. But then she liked the kitchen just as much as the rest of the house. It was good to see food they never had at home, to observe the care Cook took in preparing meals, and she rarely came out of there without something to take home – a pie, a cake or a jar of preserves.

Then there was Lady Harvey. Hope thought she had to be the loveliest lady in the land. Her golden hair, blue eyes, soft voice and wonderful gowns were enough on their own, but she was so nice too, and always made a fuss of her.

Nell and Albert were kneeling in front of the altar now. Nell looked so different with her hair down; Mother had washed it for her last night, and twisted it all up in rags to make it curl. Hope had never seen it look so shiny and bouncy, and the little crown of flowers was very pretty. She decided that when she was grown up she’d have her hair like that every day.

She turned her head slightly to look at Alice and Toby in the pew behind her and grinned at them. She was thrilled they’d managed to come as they didn’t get home very often because it was so far from Bath. Alice had whispered at the church door that they’d walked all the way, and would have to walk back tomorrow, but it was worth it. She also added that she had something for Hope.

She hoped it might be a paintbox like the one Rufus had.

‘Why are you crying, Mother?’ Hope whispered later. She was getting bored now because the Reverend Gosling kept asking Albert and then Nell the same things, and it seemed to be taking for ever.

‘Shhh,’ Meg hissed, putting one finger to her lips.

‘I pronounce you man and wife.’

At the Reverend Gosling’s words, said in a loud and important voice, Hope got interested again. She hoped that was the end of it now and they could go home for the party.

Everyone had been very worried that it would rain today, because the cottage wasn’t big enough for everyone to get inside. But it had been warm and sunny for three days now, and last night Silas and Matt had fixed up a long table made of old doors in the field next to the vegetable patch, and there were planks resting on logs for seats. Nell had borrowed some sheets from Briargate as tablecloths, and there was a whole barrel of ale, enough pies, buns and other food for the scores of people, and Gareth Peregrine was going to play his fiddle so everyone could dance.

‘You may kiss the bride.’

Hope put her hands over her eyes at the Reverend Gosling’s order to Albert; she couldn’t bear seeing men kissing women. Matt was always kissing Amy, especially when he thought no one was watching, and she didn’t think she could bear it if Nell and Albert kept doing it all the time too.

But she had to peep through her fingers just to check Albert did it, because she’d never seen him kiss Nell before. She was relieved it was just a peck. Matt and Amy did big sucking ones.

Mabel Scragg, who owned the bakery next door to the Rentons, came waddling up to them as soon as they’d got out of the church. Hope didn’t like her, she always called her ‘a little madam’, and once she’d boxed her ears for calling her Scraggy. ‘The first one married off then,’ she said to Meg, her fat chins wobbling. ‘I reckon it will be your Matt next.’

‘Aye.’ Meg smiled towards her oldest son who as always was standing so close to Amy they could be stuck with glue. ‘But it’ll be her folk paying for it, thank heavens.’

‘Your Nell’s done well for herself with Albert and no mistake,’ Mabel went on. ‘Fancy them getting the gatehouse and Lady Harvey’s keeping Nell on too! Mind you, that won’t be for long, not if she takes after you!’

Hope frowned at Mabel’s last remark. She wasn’t the first to make it. Almost everyone had. She wanted to know what they meant.

By the time it grew dark, Hope had her answer. All the grown-ups still at the party were tipsy, including her mother and father. The food was all gone, they had to tip the barrel up now to get the last dregs, and Gareth Peregrine had stopped playing his fiddle and was sleeping off the drink down by the chicken coop. Even Joe and Henry had helped themselves to some ale. Hope had tried it too, but she didn’t like it.

She had noticed that ale made people say things they wouldn’t normally say. Matt had said he loved Amy in front of everyone, and she’d giggled as if she thought he was wonderful.

There had been a great many gardening jokes all evening about beds, planting and seeds as they were leaving, none of which Hope understood. But as the couple went off over the common hand in hand, someone said they wondered if they’d be wetting a baby’s head next June.

‘Silas only had to sneeze and I was in the family way,’ Meg said, laughing her head off. ‘I just hope Nell doesn’t take after me, or she ties a knot in Albert’s John Thomas.’

There was more talk along these lines later among the women, and Hope listened to it all carefully. One said she thought Albert was a cold fish, and there were several voices raised in agreement, including her mother’s. Even Ruth said she’d seen more passion in a rice pudding than in him, and she pointed out Matt who was dreamily dancing cheek to cheek with Amy and said that was more normal.

So putting it all together with bits Hope had learned about breeding from farm animals, she realized that this was what humans got married for, and the result was babies.

Later, when she danced with her father, who was already staggering with drink, he’d said he hoped he wouldn’t be too old to dance at her wedding.

‘I won’t get married,’ she said firmly. ‘No one is going to do that to me.’

Three months after Nell’s wedding, Matt married Amy. It was the week before Christmas, in the church at Publow, the next village. Fred Merchant, Amy’s father, had welcomed Matt into his family with open arms for he’d always wanted a son to pass the farm on to. Everyone in the village believed Matt was made for life.

Once again Hope saw her mother cry at the service and her parents get tipsy, but she had the feeling that they were far happier about Matt marrying Amy than they had been about Nell and Albert. She had never once heard her father ask Matt if he was sure about it, the way he had with Nell. And she’d seen her mother embrace Amy dozens of times, exactly the way she did all her own children.

Hope didn’t like Albert. He had a way of looking at people as if they had a bad smell about them, and he hardly ever spoke. Nell had said in his defence that he was just shy and he was talkative to her. That might be so, but Hope couldn’t understand why that would make Nell change. She never came home on her afternoon off now; the family only ever saw her at church on Sundays with Albert. Every time Hope came back from Briargate after playing with Rufus, her mother always questioned her about Nell.

‘Is she looking well? Did she say anything about Albert? When is she coming home next?’

Hope could only ever tell the truth, that her sister looked just the same as she’d always done; that no, she didn’t say anything about Albert, and that Nell said she couldn’t come on her afternoons off now she had a home of her own to take care of.

Ruth and James always came home when they had the afternoon off. They said they thought Nell should have more time now she was married because Lady Harvey let her go earlier in the day, and when she went out without Nell, she sent her home.

Hope once heard Ruth say Albert was a tyrant, but her mother had put a warning finger to her lips to stop her from saying any more.

Hope had asked the Reverend Gosling what a tyrant was, and he said it was a man who forced his will on to others.

In the spring of ’41, Hope was up in the day nursery at Briargate playing chequers in front of the fire with Rufus when Lady Harvey came in with another lady.

Rufus was good at chequers, so Hope didn’t have to let him win sometimes to appease him. He’d won the last two games and at the point when Lady Harvey came in, Hope was concentrating hard on the new game so she could beat him.

Ruth leapt to her feet as she always did when anyone came into the nursery and began tidying away a puzzle they’d been doing earlier. ‘Rufus!’ Lady Harvey said. ‘I want you to meet Miss Bird, she’s going to be your governess and teach you to read and write.’

Rufus remained kneeling on the hearthrug and looked up at the tall, stern-faced lady in a grey dress and bonnet. ‘Hope is teaching me to read and write,’ he said dismissively.

Hope’s favourite game was ‘school’ and she had already managed to teach Rufus all the letters of the alphabet, and to read some simple three-letter words.

‘Don’t be so rude, Rufus, and how many times have I told you a gentleman always stands up when a lady enters the room?’

‘I’m sorry, Mama,’ he said, and reluctantly got up.

Hope thought she’d better get up too, and she followed Ruth’s example by helping to pick up the puzzle pieces.

Lady Harvey explained to the visitor that Hope was her maid’s younger sister, and she came to play with her son once a week. She then went on to tell Rufus that Miss Bird would be giving him lessons in the schoolroom every day.

‘I’d rather go to Reverend Gosling like Hope does,’ Rufus replied.

‘Reverend Gosling only teaches the village children,’ Lady Harvey said sharply, looking cross that her son was being so uncooperative. ‘And Miss Bird will be teaching you some history, geography and music too. She plays the piano.’