The Lost And Found Girl (27 page)

Carriages of gentry and carts of luggage and servants began to arrive a few days before the planned banquet and ball. There were young gentlemen and ladies with their families as well as Lord Redfern’s political allies amongst the guests and their liveliness spread to the Abbey servants who picked up on their exuberance. When Daisy had to carry buckets of slops to the washhouse she returned the long way round to glimpse a view of the east lawn and saw a small group of young gentlemen taking the morning air.

She lingered by a wrought-iron gate in a high stone wall and peered through. She was rewarded by the appearance of three young ladies dressed in sumptuous full-skirted gowns and an older woman in black, their chaperone presumably. She held on to the iron bars of the gate and pressed her face against the cold metal. Such luxurious gowns for day wear! How beautiful they must look when dressed in their evening attire. She ran back to Annie to tell her what she had seen.

‘Who are they, Annie?’ she asked.

‘Sons and daughters of other lords and ladies,’ she answered. ‘His lordship sent out the invitations. It’s an honour to be asked to visit Redfern Abbey and part of a young lady or gentleman’s education.’ Annie leaned forward and lowered her voice. ‘The servants’ hall is overrun by ladies’ maids and valets. We’ve had to get out every flat iron in the Abbey, and all the kettles, to steam the silks and feathers.’

‘Oh, I wish I could see them,’ Daisy breathed.

‘Well, you’ll get to see the ballroom because the housekeeper wants an all-round final polish. I’ve a village lass arriving today to do the staircase with you.’

‘I’m going inside the Abbey?’

‘Yes and you do exactly as I tell you or we’ll both be in trouble.’

Daisy and Biddy picked up their banister brushes and polishing cloths and followed Annie through the kitchen passage.

‘I didn’t think you’d still be here,’ Biddy commented.

‘Annie said she’d keep me on until the New Year.’ Daisy didn’t want to be reminded of leaving. ‘Do you like working at the Abbey?’

‘Oh aye, but me mam doesn’t because then she has to look after me dad and the little ’uns by ’erself. Mind you, the extra pay helps wi’ buying our Christmas meat. Me dad likes a big joint o’ beef and a collar o’ bacon an’ all.’

‘What will you do after Christmas?’

‘There’s nowt much going until the weather warms up. I help me mam give our house a good fettle and hope me dad has enough work to afford us cloth for a gown.’

Daisy sympathised. She desperately wanted a new gown for Sundays.

‘What do you do if he doesn’t?’

‘Well, there’s the second-hand table in the back room at the draper’s.’

Daisy searched through that every time she went into the village. It had some lovely things on it from the better-off houses in Redfern. She sighed. ‘They’re still too dear for me.’

‘Try the market in town. One of the carters from the village’ll take you for a few coppers.’

‘I need to find work first, though.’

‘The butcher’s wife is allus looking for a maid.’

Daisy’s heart lifted. ‘Is she?’

‘Aye, nobody sticks it at her house ’cause you ’ave to wash the chitterlings when her husband sticks a pig. Her lasses used to help her but they’re all wed now. It makes me right sick, that does.’

Daisy had cleaned pigs’ entrails before for Mother. ‘It did me when I first had to do it. I got used to it, though. He’ll have killed all the pigs by Christmas, won’t he?’

‘Aye, they’ll be salting ’em down now afore December sets in. But he brings home beasts regular to butcher in his back yard. Cleaning the raw tripe is worse. It smells like a slurry pit.’

‘I haven’t done that before.’

Biddy laughed and Annie slowed her pace for them to catch up. ‘You’d know if you had! Then you have the sheeps’ guts to clean. She’s got no shame, that butcher’s wife.’

‘What do you mean, “no shame”?’

Biddy grinned and raised her eyebrows at Annie. ‘She doesn’t know what sheep’s guts are used for.’

‘The same as pigs’, I suppose, for sausages?’ Daisy ventured.

Biddy giggled.

‘What then?’ Daisy pressed. ‘Why are you laughing?’

‘Ee, you don’t know much, do you? How old are you?’

‘Eighteen,’ she answered proudly, lifting her head. Well, she would be soon.

Biddy lowered her voice. ‘You have to get them really clean because the butcher’s wife sells ’em to the apothecary and he makes – you know—’

‘No, I don’t.’

‘You know.’ Biddy cast her eyes in both directions to make sure no one else was in hearing distance. ‘Things. Things for gentlemen.’ She giggled again.

‘What things?’ Daisy said and Biddy giggled even more.

‘You know,’ Biddy went on. ‘When they have a –
you know
.’

Daisy shook her head and Biddy added in a whisper, ‘A whore.’

Daisy blushed and her mouth dropped open. What on earth would a gentleman do with washed sheeps’ guts?

Biddy seemed to realise that Daisy had no idea what she was talking about and asked, ‘You do know what whores are for, don’t you?’

‘Yes. They fornicate. They are wicked and men go to them instead of getting wed like the Bible says they should.’

Biddy rolled her eyes. ‘You’d best tell her, Annie.’

Annie had been listening with a weary expression on her face. ‘Ee, Biddy, does your ma know you talk about these things?’

Biddy’s face fell. ‘You won’t tell her, will you?’

‘I will if you don’t shut up about it.’

‘About what?’ Daisy demanded.

Annie took a deep breath. ‘Well, I’ll tell you, but only because I don’t want you chattering on when we’re in the Abbey. And don’t you breathe a word to anyone that I told you. I have seen one. The gentleman puts it over his – y’know
– before he – y’know – and it stops him catching the pox from her.’

Daisy’s eyes widened with shock, partly to hear Annie speaking of such things and partly because it was about fornication! She remembered a little boy being sent home from Sunday school because he’d used the word pox, and the teacher had put the fear of God into her about the wages of sin. The following week the sermon had been about evils from the Bible she’d never heard of and most of the congregation left with reddened faces muttering to each other. Daisy knew that fornication led to hell.

‘Well, it would serve him right if he did catch it,’ she responded, ‘because he’s not supposed to do that until he’s wed. That’s what his wife is for.’

Annie answered her kindly. ‘Ee, Daisy lass, you don’t know much at all, do you? Men have these urges and some will do anything to satisfy them.’

‘Well, they should get wed then, shouldn’t they?’

Annie shook her head and replied briskly, ‘Aye, well, they do and they still go to whore houses.’

What for, if they have a wife? Daisy thought, but didn’t ask. She didn’t want Biddy to make fun of her any more.

Biddy too had grown tired of the joke and said, ‘Well, if you don’t mind your hands in stuff that smells o’ sheeps’ droppings and cow pats, try the butcher’s wife. She’ll want a testa-, testa-whatsit, though.’

‘Testimonial,’ Annie said. ‘Daisy hasn’t got one.’

‘How come she got work here, then?’

‘It was a mistake at first and then they let her stay because we needed the hands. But don’t you go telling nobody or else there’ll be no more work here for you, my lass.’

Biddy shrugged. ‘The butcher’s wife won’t have her
without one. She has some well-off customers on her books.’

Another dead end, Daisy thought. The smell from her polishing cloths was beginning to make her head ache and she held them behind her back. Annie went up some steps to a door that opened onto a plain wooden staircase. Daisy looked up and recognised it as the one that led to the indoor servants’ attics. She followed her for two flights then stopped outside a simple wooden door.

‘Now listen to me,’ Annie said. ‘Once we’re through that door there’s no talking unless you have to speak to me. You won’t see any gentry because they are all at a reception and luncheon in the other wing. Every piece of wood and gilt on the staircase must be gleaming. I’ll be following you and checking. Understood?’

Daisy was literally speechless when she went through that simple wooden door and into the majestic splendour of the Abbey proper. She was standing on a long carpeted gallery with one wall panelled in polished wood and carrying a row of ornately framed portraits. Pieces of heavy furniture lined the wall for sitting on or supporting a decorative vase or small sculpture. The opposite side was taken up by a railed banister which curved down a wide wooden staircase descending to the ballroom below her.

It was magnificent. She traced her fingers over the handrail and gazed at three glass chandeliers sparkling before her eyes.

‘Stop staring, Daisy, and keep close to me.’

Daisy started on the landing, dusting and buffing until her arms ached. At one point she heard a door open and footsteps echoing on the marble floor beneath her, and the black-gowned housekeeper came into view.

‘Who is up there? Announce yourself immediately.’

‘Brown, madam, to finish the stairs.’

‘You’d better hurry. The footmen will be here to polish the floor in an hour.’

Daisy heard the swish of silk skirts and caught sight of black lace ribbons streaming from her dainty cap. ‘I wish I could be here to see the dancing,’ she whispered.

Annie put her finger to her mouth. ‘Me too. The parlour maids sneak in to watch.’

‘Can we do that as well?’

‘It’s not for the likes of us. We belong t’other side of yon door. Come on, you two. Look sharp. I’ll give you a hand with the staircase.’

Daisy glanced at the number of carved wooden rails stretching away and bent to her task. From time to time, a liveried footman would walk across the ballroom below carrying folded linens or a piece of furniture. She could hear their footsteps quite clearly and even heard one of them curse as a chair slipped in his grasp.

When they reached the bottom Annie sent them scuttling back upstairs while she checked every last nook and cranny of the carved gilded woodwork for a speck of dust. Daisy was sitting on the landing carpet peering through the banisters when two gentlemen entered the ballroom and lingered just inside the door. They were speaking urgently to each other and even Annie moved out of sight along the landing. But Daisy stayed to listen, putting her fingers to her lips as their conversation floated upwards. It was Master James and an older gentleman, quite portly with a florid face.

‘Keep your voice down, Pater. Does Stanton know you’re here?’

‘I haven’t seen him. Where is he?’

‘He’s helping the butler with the reception. I should be
there with my uncle. Not that he’ll notice. They had to carry him downstairs in his Bath chair and he won’t be at luncheon.’

‘He can’t hold out for much longer. When I am Lord Redfern, life here will be very different. I’m surprised Stanton doesn’t realise that.’

‘He follows orders, Pater. He’s a good steward for the estate.’

‘Well, I’ll need you by me, son, not him.’

‘Will you bring Mater to live here?’

‘She is too sick to travel.’

‘I wish you’d tell me where she is so I could visit her sometime.’

‘You’ll make her worse. She doesn’t know you.’ He gesticulated circling movements in the air around his head.

‘Tell me honestly. Is she in an asylum?’

‘Not yet. Forget her, James. I have asked you not to speak of her.’

‘She is my mother, sir.’

‘Shut up about her! I wish I’d told you she was dead. She is to me!’

‘You sound like his lordship. At my quarterly interviews he does not allow me to ask questions or even speak of you or Grandmamma. The headmaster at school told me when Grandmamma died.’

‘She should have had longer. She should have lived to see me installed at the Abbey. Well, her uncle will be dead and buried soon and it is your future that concerns me. I have no other sons and we must secure the bloodline as soon as possible. Your grandmamma knew how important it is and she said you ought to marry as soon as you are one and twenty.’

‘But I am to do the Grand Tour as soon as I finish my
university education. I shall be travelling in Europe for three years. Stanton has advised it.’

His father’s agitation increased. ‘Damn Stanton! He is not your father. I am.’

‘He is Lord Redfern’s closest advisor here. He runs this estate. Do calm yourself, Pater. Remember what your physician has told you.’

There was a long silence and Daisy thought they must have left, although she had not heard footsteps. Finally, Master James said, ‘I cannot be absent from the reception any longer. Where did you leave your horse?’

‘He’s inside that folly, the one across the park on the way to the stables. No one will notice me as there is tree cover quite near and the stables are busy with all the extra carriage horses.’ The older gentleman paused before asking, ‘Have you spent all your allowance yet?’

‘I shouldn’t think so. Lord Redfern is very generous towards me.’ There was another silence, a shorter one this time. ‘How much do you want, Pater?’

‘Two hundred guineas would do.’

‘As much as that?’

‘You think a sheep farm in the Dales provides for a future lord?’

‘Well, doesn’t it?’

Master James’s father grunted. ‘Your grandmamma mortgaged it before you were born to pay for my education. The bank has owned it for years and any income it makes goes directly to them.’

‘Then what did Grandmamma live on?’

‘The same bank that has been funding me since Lord Redfern’s lawyers acknowledged me as heir. I owe them thousands, but they know that the Redfern estate will be
mine one day.’ He gave a harsh laugh. ‘Even they did not expect my great-uncle to live so long. Dear God, I wish he would hurry up and die.’

‘Pater!’

Daisy shuffled quietly along the landing to get a better view of Master James. Her eyes were drawn to him. She didn’t know why and she knew she shouldn’t but she couldn’t stop herself. What was it about him? He was very handsome in a formal suit of grey clothes with a high-collared white shirt and necktie, but there were plenty of other handsome fellows at the Abbey. There was something about Master James that attracted her; his voice, the way he moved, she didn’t know what it was but it wasn’t because he was the young master, for it was only when she remembered who he was that she pulled herself together and told herself to stop being foolish. A door opened and closed and Daisy glanced up at Annie and raised her eyebrows. Annie whispered, ‘Some family feud or other. Don’t you two repeat any of it. The gentry are full of them.’