Transcription (34 page)

“I suppose we’re going to work together now,” Sweet said.
 

“What does
that
mean?” Emily asked.

“I’m going to be a housemaid, just like you.”

“I am a
senior
maid. You will be emptying pisspots, and beating rugs. I attend to clothes, makeup, perfume, and hair. We will not be working together.”

“You watch your mouth, Em,” Mrs. Jackson said.

Sweet blushed.

Emily didn’t look down at her feet at the retribution, like Sweet would have. She looked off into the trees, like she hadn’t even heard her mother. She looked away as if the idea of watching her mouth was entirely her own.
 

Sweet didn’t speak again until they reached the house.
 

They turned on the path before the fields and walked the long way around to the back so they arrived at the kitchen.
 

Mrs. Jackson pointed her in the right direction. “You go talk to Miss Riley. You’ll find her through that door. She has gray hair and too much starch in her dress.” Sweet found the woman in the room with stacks of linens. The twins were already in there, collecting their laundry load for the morning.
 

“Miss Riley?” Sweet asked.
 

The woman didn’t look up from her hands. She was folding and re-folding the same shirt, to get the lines just right. It had to be the right woman though. She had the grayest of gray hair. The lines of her dress were crisp, but Sweet didn’t think there was too much starch in the fabric.

“Miss Riley?” she asked again.

The woman spotted her and looked up. When she spoke, her words had a nasal finish to the syllables that sounded peculiar to Sweet.

“Did you say something?”

“No, ma’am. This is my first day?”

“You’re Sweet?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“What a funny name for a girl. Why do they call you Sweet?”

“I don’t know, ma’am. It’s what I’ve always been called.”

Miss Riley laughed. It was a quiet, barking sound. It still wasn’t too late to run, but how far would she get once Miss Riley saw her bolt?

“What are you good at, Sweet?”

“Pardon?”

“What are your skills?”

“I paint,” Sweet said.

Miss Riley nodded. “Not exactly in high demand here, I’m afraid. Can you sweep, Sweet?” Miss Riley smiled. Sweet hoped the woman wouldn’t laugh again. It was a scary sound.

“Yes, ma’am.”

Miss Riley moved to a closet. She came back with a fresh broom and a tin dustpan.
 

“Do you know your compass directions, dear?”

Sweet nodded.

“Good. Go up these stairs and start at the northeast corner. Sweep every room, from top to bottom, and take all your dust out to the dooryard. Can you do that?”

Sweet nodded again. She began to head for the narrow staircase that led up to the rest of the house.

“Wait, Sweet,” Miss Riley said. “You can’t work in those clothes.” She went to another stack of laundry and began thumbing through black dresses. She found one, held it up in Sweet’s direction to gauge its size, and then matched it with a white top. “After a week, you can take in the waist to make it more comfortable. For the moment, let it billow.”

Sweet nodded and took the clothes from Miss Riley’s outstretched hands. She glanced around, wondering where she should change.

Miss Riley read her mind. “You can change right here,” she said. “I’ll stand in front of the door.” She moved to the door and put her back to it. Sweet blushed. She turned away from Miss Riley’s gaze and began to take off her first layer of clothes. If Miss Riley thought it was unusual for Sweet to wear two sets of clothes, she never mentioned it. Sweet folded everything nicely, even her tramp clothes. Without them, she wouldn’t be able to sneak away. Her brain shifted through possible scenarios as she put on her new uniform. At best, she might be able to slip away at the end of the day, when she was allowed to change back into her own clothes.

When she finished dressing, she turned to see Miss Riley’s smile.
 

“Where should I put my clothes?” Sweet asked.

Miss Riley blinked. Her smiled faded. “You can put your clothes on that table. I will tuck them away for later.”

Sweet took her broom and dustpan and headed up the stairs.

The first couple of rooms were easy, because they had low furniture. There was a ton of dust, though. Clouds of it billowed up under her sweeping and Sweet had to dump her dustpan several times before she was through. The third room was just as dusty, but much worse to clean. It had a canopy bed and two tall wardrobes. Sweet had to ask Miss Riley for a stepladder, so she could reach. Sweet was hot and sweaty by the time she finished it.
 

She caught a glimpse of Emily once, trailing behind one of the Longley girls. Emily looked neat as a pin and incredibly beautiful as she glided down the hall. In contrast, Sweet felt like a perspiring pig as she pushed dirty hair out of her face. Up on the stepladder, she dried her tears on her apron and pretended that they were only drops of sweat that happened to be leaking from her eyes.

Of course, she was at her worst when she saw him. She had sweat and tears mingling on her face, dirty hair in her eyes, and a pan full of dust that she was carrying towards the stairs. He came up the main flight, wearing tweed, but looking cool and calm in the useless October heat.

She almost dropped the pan. This was the very moment that she hoped would never come.

Geoffrey Longley, the man of the house, barely spared her a glance. His eyes made contact with hers, he turned, and he walked away. Sweet was so shocked that she almost dropped the dustpan. It took her several seconds to collect herself, gulp down a breath, and continue on her way. When she got outside, it was all she could do to not burst into full sobs.

Instead, she shook the pan in the door yard and waited for her heart to beat regularly again. As she climbed the stairs to resume sweeping, it felt like there was a chicken bone caught in her throat. No matter how hard she swallowed, the pain wouldn’t go away.

Miraculously, she didn’t see Geoffrey Longley again until the midday bell.

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She ate quickly, standing at the table near the twins. They had an inscrutable game that they played as they ate. Each one would pull a clothespin from her pocket, hold it up to her eye, and then hand it to the other. Sometimes, they giggled, and returned their clothespins to their own pockets, un-traded. Sweet watched the game for several minutes, but couldn’t figure out the objective or the rules.

When she was through eating, she tracked down Miss Riley for her next assignment.

The instructions were terse, spoken between mouthfuls of biscuit. “Bucket. Rag. Soap. Water. Windows.” Each word was punctuated with a gesture, showing her where to find the objective.

Sweet got the idea. She glanced up at the second-story windows. She didn’t know how she would wash the outsides of the windows, but she had no doubt that those were part of the assignment. She would figure something out.
 

She assumed that she was to start in the northeast corner again, and she headed up to work. She decided to tackle the outside first, since that would be the hardest. With the lower sash raised, she could sit on the sill and reach the outside of the upper sash. With her ladder, she then lowered both sashes only to discover that the lower sash was still blocked. There was no way to get to the outside of the lower sash. The best she could do was reach the bottom panes by closing the window halfway.

Sweet puzzled over the problem for minutes, dreading the idea of asking for more instruction.
 

She had a thought, and decided that there was only way to test the idea. She opened the window, brought a rag, and stepped out. She slid her toes to the edge of the sill and managed to close the window. With one hand hanging onto the upper sash, she washed the window properly and smiled at the result.
 

The only problem was getting the window back open without dirtying the glass again. It was impossible. She managed to get it open with only minor smudges and crawled back through to the safety of the floor. When she turned around, she called the adventure a success. With the inside wiped down too, the window was crystal clear.
 

Sweet moved on.

Again, it was that third room with all its tall furniture that made life difficult. The window was hard to manipulate and the sash rattled downwards as she clung to the outside of the house. Once washed, the window opened a few inches and then jammed in the frame. It wouldn’t budge. Sweet looked down. Far below, the land sloped away from the house. A rock garden decorated the slope. It was too far to jump even if she would land on springy turf. The rocks would surely break her ankles.

Sweet jerked on the window trying to open it. It only jammed harder. She dropped her rag and it slopped down onto the rocks below. That would be her brain soon, if she didn’t figure something out. Her head would crack on the rocks and her brain would slip out and leave a stain, like the wet rag.

She could yell. It would be embarrassing, but someone would hear her. Her legs felt hot, and began to vibrate with the effort of holding her in place. Her fingers felt like they were about to cramp. When she saw the shape pass by the doorway of the room, her heart jumped with hope. There might be a way out of this.

The person backed up, to confirm what they had seen.

Of course, it was him. Geoffrey.

Her hope evaporated and turned to fear.

He entered the room and crossed to the window slowly, as if he had seen a hummingbird and didn’t want to spook it. He leaned down to the window opening and spoke.

“You look like you need help,” he said.

“Yes,” Sweet said. Her heart begged to change the answer, but her brain wouldn’t comply. It kept thinking about that rag and how it slopped down on the rocks.

Geoffrey looped his fingers under the window and jerked it upwards. She almost fell anyway. Not ready for the sudden movement, the sash pinched her gripping fingers and she nearly lost her balance. She regained it and he grabbed her arm. He helped her inside and she took a deep breath.

“You don’t need to clean the outsides,” Geoffrey said. “That unfortunate boy uses the ladder and cleans them from below in November and April.”

“Oh,” Sweet said. She lowered her eyes to the floor. She hoped that if she didn’t engage with him, he would simply go away. There were no rocks to fall to now. There was no escape from Geoffrey until he released her.
 

He didn’t say anything for a while.

“I haven’t seen you lately. How long has it been?”

It had been three-hundred and forty-two days. Sweet knew the answer, but she didn’t volunteer it.

“I like you in this,” he said. His soft fingers reached out and fondled the collar of her shirt.
 

Sweet didn’t raise her eyes. She didn’t reply. She hid inside herself, hoping that he would lose interest and go away. She knew from experience that fighting, and slapping, and screaming didn’t help. Maybe playing possum was the right answer. The tug at her collar and the sound of his fingers on the fabric were maddening. She didn’t know how long her sanity would maintain under the assault.

Geoffrey let her collar drop. He turned for the door. Her heart began to beat again, and she allowed herself to take in air as he moved, step by step, towards the door. His hand found the door and swung it shut.

Her heart stopped, and then fluttered back to life, beating at a pace too fast to sustain.

Geoffrey turned to her again with the door at his back. She was trapped in the room with the tall wardrobes and canopied bed. She was trapped with a monster. She locked eyes with him and willed him to keep his distance. There was a weight to his gaze. She couldn’t hold it. When she lowered her eyes, she heard someone’s footsteps march down the hall. The next thing she heard was the click of the door handle, as he turned the knob again.
 

“I’ll come find you this afternoon,” he said.

He left her there.

She finished the rest of the windows with a burning ball of fire in her stomach. After dumping the bucket in the dooryard, she retrieved the rag from the rocks and gave it with the rest to the twins. One of them stuck out her tongue at Sweet and she nearly burst into fresh tears. The mountains were still in the same place on the horizon but they looked much farther away.

Sweet found Miss Riley in the kitchen having a cup of tea with Mrs. Jackson.

Sweet folded her hands and waited for more instruction.

“Did you really try to wash the
outside
of the windows?”

Sweet nodded.

Miss Riley and Mrs. Jackson both laughed at her.
 

Sweet blushed.

“You’ll have to clean yourself up for your next job,” Miss Riley said. “Wash your hands carefully first. You will strip each bed, fold the sheets, flip the mattress, and then make the bed again. If you’re careful, you won’t rumple my creases. I’ll be through to check on your work.”

Sweet knew something about making up those giant beds. It wasn’t a task that one undertook alone—not if the result was important. With a partner, she might be safe from Geoffrey. She seized on the idea.

“Miss Riley? If one of the twins might help me, I would be able to do a much neater job at making up the beds,” Sweet said.

Miss Riley turned to Mrs. Jackson.

“Don’t think you can tell my girls what to do,” Mrs. Jackson said.
 

Miss Riley nodded. “That’s right. You will find a way to do it on your own. And don’t climb around like a spider on the outside of the house when you do it.”

Sweet turned and left while they laughed at her again.

She didn’t make much progress on the first bed when she heard the door close behind her. Sweet turned and saw Geoffrey’s back. He turned a key in the lock and then slipped it in his pocket. This time, she really was trapped in there with him. The bedroom was now a locked door at the end of the hall. They would have no interruption.