Bound to Serve (7 page)

She’d already thought about this. She had one good dress, a green linen frock that her mother made for her. It was decent, with a little brown collar and brown trim.

“I’ll wear my best,” she said.

“Bring it to me for inspection,” he said.

She faltered. “Now?”

“Yes. Now.” His tone brooked no disobedience. Elspeth made for the stairs, her face burning with humiliation. She as an adult. She could dress herself. And besides, what should it matter to God what she wore?

She fetched the dress from the trunk and returned. Holding her breath, she presented the dress to him. He took it and held it up by the collar before handing it back.

“It won’t do,” he said.

“It’s my best dress,” she said, trying to keep the hurt from her voice.

“Perhaps when in the company of your family, but you’re in the company of my family now Elspeth. As I said, it won’t do.”

She stood holding the dress, looking down at it. She could feel her Irish temper awaken and uncoil itself like a little cat that had been curled up and waiting, waiting.

“I don’t have another,” she said. “It will have to do.”

He looked at her with annoyance. “My wife left plenty of dresses behind. I will pick one of those.”

“No.” The word was out before she could stop it, and more followed before she could check them. “You tell me not to try and replace your wife, sir, and then you try and dress me in her things?
That
will not do.”

Her eyes flashed with determination and Clifford Harker looked at her in disbelief.

“Tell me, Elspeth,” he said. “Do you enjoy being lashed?”

She shook her head. “You know I do not?”

“I’m beginning to wonder,” he replied, taking a step towards her. “Why else would you defy me?”

“I defy you when you ask me to do something that is unfair,” she said, trying not to show her fear as he began to roll up his sleeves.

When he said nothing, she continued. “What should your good Christian friends care how I dress? Am I not going to commune with their God after all? Or are they so shallow that they put material adornment before faith?”

She didn’t pull away when he took hold of her. She knew it would do no good.

“Is this how you intend to greet the congregation this morn, Elspeth? With arrogance and disdain? Will you lord your heathen demeanor over them, as if it were a badge of honor?”

He was squeezing her arm now, his voice and eyes full of angry mockery. She returned his glare.

“I will only do as you ask,” she said evenly, although her heart was pounding wildly. “I will remember my place, and not try to pretend to be something other than what I am.”

Their eyes remained locked for a moment more, until the sound of small footfalls could be heard coming down the stairs. Both looked away before looking back at one another.

“Very well,” he said. “But remember, Elspeth. While you may be clever, it won’t always save you from correction. Do you understand?”

She nodded, but a smirk played on the corner of her mouth.

“Well you should,” he said. “Well you should.”

He released her arm then, and she stepped away. The boys were running towards the kitchen now.

“One more thing,” he said before they entered. “You will wear a dress that I pick for you, whether you like it or not.”

And then the boys were in the room, and it was too late for her to react to having been defeated – again - by her Master’s will.

Chapter Six

As Clifford opened his late wife’s wardrobe, he found himself regretting his latest attempt to demonstrate his authority to Elspeth. He’s expected her to balk when he told her he’d pick something for her to wear, but had not counted on the flood of emotions he’d feel when he actually had to do it.

It had been many months since he’d opened Caroline’s wardrobe, and when he did the subtle scent that clung to her clothing hit him like a hammer. For a moment, he tried to hold his breath as he sought to untwist his heart from the pain of memories that rushed back at him like a flood unleashed by a smell.

He finally exhaled painfully, the colors of her clothing swimming before him in a haze of tears he rapidly blinked back. But the knot in his throat remained as he gazed at each dress, unable to stop himself from associating them from the moments he’d last seen her wear them. There was the pale linen frock she’d worn on their last picnic together. The blue silk gown she’d been wearing the first time they’d met; after three sons she could still fit into it, and he’d find her trying it on from time to time in front of the looking glass, spinning happily as she asked, “Do you remember how we danced?” There was the light blue frock she wore for everyday tasks; how many times had he seen her sitting on the floor amid the skirt’s sea of pale fabric, the boys sitting on it like a blanket. Her wedding dress was there, too. After their third son she’d commented that their next child would have to be a daughter so there would be someone to wear it, all the time unaware that she was holding her own son, that both of them would depart the world sooner than anyone thought.

Clifford felt a sense of panic. How could he don a simple serving girl in any of these beautiful memories? His eyes wandered to the empty space and he remembered now the day he’d had to pick the last dress she would ever wear. He’d picked the yellow one, although he knew the women who prepared Caroline’s body would disapprove. But once, when the weather was stormy, she’d come downstairs wearing it and commented that the dress always made her feel sunny. And he wanted to give her that, even if she wasn’t entirely sure that her spirit was truly around to appreciate the gesture.

For Clifford tried to adhere to the teachings of church that told him the soul was immortal, that the godly ones would continue to live on in the bosom of Christ, forever watching over their loved ones. But try as he might, he could never feel Caroline. If she were there, reaching out to him, the curtain of his own grief was too thick for his beloved wife to reach through.

Looking away, he pulled forth the light blue dress, deciding if it were good enough for Caroline’s every day wear then it would be sufficient for a governess to wear to church.

Then, slamming the door of the wardrobe he turned his back again on the clothing and the memories that clung to their folds.

***

Elspeth did not want to wear it. Clifford had said nothing as he’d handed the dress to her and walked away, leaving her to stare down at the garment that lay limp in her hands. He’d been right; this workaday dress was still finer than anything Elspeth had ever donned and in another circumstance she would have squealed with delight over the chance to wear something so fine, for she was – after all – just a girl.

But she knew – could feel – the presence of the last person to fill this dress, to animate it. And Elspeth felt like a trespasser at the mere thought of putting the dress on. She stood there, holding it up in front of her before the looking glass and it felt like a sacrilege to put it on.

“I won’t,” she said to herself. “I won’t do it.”

But Elspeth knew even as she said the words that to refuse would to be to risk punishment. And she realized with a sudden surprise that she didn’t care. It would be impossible to please Clifford Harker who sought to contain and control her as he sought to contain and control his emotions.

Tossing the dress on the bed, she went to her trunk and pulled out her best dress- the frock Harker had told her was not good enough for church. Hastily, she removed her work dress and donned the green one she’d chosen. And then, fastening her hair into a bun and checking her reflection, she went to the nursery and dressed the boys.

“You’re coming to church with us?” Colin nearly bounced up and down with excitement when she told him.

“Yes, now hold still,” Elspeth replied, laughing. “And we both must sit very, very still and be on our best behavior or else your father will be cross with us.”

“I will,” the child chirped. “I promise.”

“I’m going to hide a book in my coat,” Harry sulked. “Church is boring. The Reverend talks forever.”

“Indeed you will not.” Elspeth turned to take the book Harry was holding away. “It’s only an hour or so. Surely you can sit quietly for so little a time.”

But she knew that for a young child, an hour might as well be an eternity, and smiled in sympathy as she knelt down beside the lad and sighed.

“Your father would think it rude if you didn’t at least pretend to listen,” he said. “So I shall give you a book no one can see.”

“A book no one can see?’ Harry looked at Elspeth doubtfully, his expression a mirror of his father’s.

“That’s right,” Elspeth said. “And do you know why no one can see it?”

“Why?”

“Because it’s in your head.”

“That’s silly,” declared Harry.

“Is it?” Elspeth asked. “I have the same copy inside my head. In fact, I can ready you the first line. Once upon a time there was an angry king who lived by the sea…”

She turned back to Colin and, irritated, Harry sat up. “Go on..”

“No,” Elspeth said. “It’s your book. Read it yourself.”

Harry was about to protest when the door to the nursery opened. Clifford Harker looked at his sons then at his servant. His eyes narrowed.

“Elspeth, why aren’t you dressed.”

She stood. “Boys,” she said. “Would you please go outside and play by the steps. If you stay clean, I’ll make you both a berry tart tonight.”

Colin and Harry grinned at one another then ran from the room.

Clifford Harker watched his sons go then turned back to Elspeth. “I asked you a question. Why aren’t you dressed?”

“I am dressed, Master,” she said.

“You are not,” he said. “I told you to wear the blue dress I brought you.”

“I decided against it,” she replied, lifting her chin up a bit. “This one will do.”

Clifford sighed and shut the door. He turned back to Elspeth, his expression stern. “No,” he replied. “It will not.”

Silence hung between them.

“Are you refusing my order then?”

Elspeth hesitated for a moment and then swallowed and nodded.

“Very well.”

Clifford Harker walked to the window and looked down at his sons playing in the yard. Then he closed the shutters and walked back over to Elspeth, who knew what was coming but was too scared to run.

Taking her harm, he pulled her across the room, sat down and hauled her over his lap, reaching down as he did to remove the leather-heeled slipper she wore on her left foot.

Tears squeezed from between Elspeth’s tightly closed eyelids as she felt him raise the hem of the dress she’d so stubbornly insisted on wearing. The air of the room was cool as it hit the bare skin of her now-uncovered bottom.

But the heat of the first fierce, stinging smack of her own shoe quickly replaced the chill and as much as Elpeth tried not to cry out, she could not help but to yelp as Clifford Harker wielded the shoe with fierce accuracy.

He struck her repeatedly on the lower part of her bottom, targeting the area that would make contact with whatever she sat upon over and over. Elspeth felt cries forcing themselves from between her lips as he worked the slipper from the under curve of each cheek down to the tops of her thighs and back up again. She didn’t want to cry out loudly, worrying that if she did the boys might hear, so when the pain reached the point she could bear she bit down on her knuckle and sobbed around it.

“Will you, or will you not don that dress? Clifford Harker stopped several times to put the question to her, but when she did not answer he continued spanking Elspeth until the reddening skin became covered in deep, purple ovals.

And then, without explanation, he stopped.

Elspeth felt herself tipped from his lap and Clifford stood, dropping the shoe on the floor at her feet. Straightening his coat, he looked down at her.

“You were right, I should not have offered,” he said. “It was with great personal pain that I even opened that wardrobe. To have done such a thing for you was clearly a mistake.”

He turned then and walked away, leaving Elspeth with a new kind of pain she could not quite comprehend or explain.

She remained rooted to the spot as she listened to his footfalls retreating down the stairs, heard his voice ordering the children to hurry lest they be late.

Turning, she limped to the window and cracked the shutter. He was loading the boys into the carriage, and she could hear Colin asking over and over where his governess was before his father curtly replied that she wasn’t going to attend services with them after all.

Elspeth wanted to run down the stairs, to go after them. The urge was so strong, in fact, that she had to grasp the window sash to stay in place. And as she watched the carriage roll down the path leading away from the house, it occurred to her that on this occasion, her Master had given her a spanking she’d richly deserved.

She’d not stopped to think what it must have taken for him to go through his late wife’s belongings to find something suitable for her to wear. His motivation had not been selfish or cruel; as a member of the community he cared about their reputation and had wanted her to be presentable as a member of the household.

Walking from the nursery, she returned to her room and picked up the blue dress from the bed, inhaling the same scent that Clifford Harker had inhaled – a faint perfume the boys had smelled, a smell that likely brought them comfort because they associated it with the one person who loved them more than anything in the world.

Laying the dress back down, she unfastened the garment she was wearing and removed it, turning for a moment to survey her injured backside in the mirror. It looked bad, and felt worse – like a blister that would pop any minute. The idea of sitting in a hard wooden pew nearly made her nauseous with dread. But she knew the time had come to make atonement, not just in words but in deed.

Turning from her reflection, Elspeth slipped the blue dress over her head and fastened it. Facing the mirror again, she gasped at her reflection. The garment fitted her to a tee, and accentuated a figure she didn’t realize she had. She looked not a servant now, but a lady, and even moreso when she redid her hair into a bun and cleaned her face.