Polly's Story (9 page)

Becky smiled at me across the carriage. I must say, she was a great deal more pleasant to the rest of us when Jemima was not around. When we arrived at the station to find that there was a half hour to wait before either train arrived, she rummaged in her bag and took out a letter she had received from Jemima in London the week before which we could read to pass the time.

18 March, 1890

My dear Rebecca

Well, I am thoroughly ashamed for taking so long to write to you! The truth is, I have had scarcely a minute to myself since we arrived in Eaton Square. We have had quite a stream of visitors. All of London society seems to have come knocking at our door - no doubt to see Miss Eugenie, who must be one of the prettiest girls out this season. If you could only have seen her in the gown she wore to be presented at Court.

Lord and Lady Vye have been invited to several balls at Buckingham Palace and apparently Her Ladyship is becoming quite a favourite with the Prince of Wales. I should think he might well be invited to shoot at Swallowcliffe come the autumn, and won’t that send Mrs Bragg into a state! We have guests to supper nearly every night - not to mention trips to the opera and the theatre, and endless card parties. Of course this means late nights for me also, but I have a fair-sized room to myself and am often able to rest there in the early afternoon, so I do not mind. These tall white houses in Eaton Square are delightful, far more convenient and modern than a rambling old place like Swallowcliffe and so much easier to clean.

Turning to more interesting matters: I must tell you about another of our visitors whom you may eventually come to hear of yourself. She is a young American lady by the name of Kate Brookfield, over here with her mother on a tour of Europe. Lady Vye has been taking particular pains to cultivate their friendship, and I should not be at all surprised to see Miss Brookfield at Swallowcliffe too one day - and maybe as something more than a guest! She is quite beautiful and heiress to a great fortune, so of course she would make a wonderful match for Master Edward. He was down from Oxford last weekend to stay with the family and seemed very struck by her. Miss Brookfield is an accomplished horsewoman so they have been out riding together in the park with Lady Vye, and Master Rory too, whose barracks are nearby. Who knows how things may turn out?

There is no need to ask you for news of Swallowcliffe, because I am sure everything will have been going on much the same! I must admit, life in the country is bound to seem rather dull after the excitement of London, but perhaps I will be ready for a rest by then. At any rate it will be very nice to see you again; I can tell you everything else I am too tired to write now

With fondest affection

Jemima Newgate

The letter made me smile - Jemima’s voice came through so very clearly - although Iris seemed rather put out after she had finished reading. It was easy enough to guess the reason why: she would not have liked to think of Master Rory riding about with a beautiful American heiress. By the time our train came, however, she had managed to recover her spirits and we spent the rest of the journey chatting away like nobody’s business. That day I felt as though my good friend Iris had come back to me, and very glad I was to find her again.

She told me a little about her childhood and her parents, who were both quite elderly and lived in a three-storey terraced house on the outskirts of York. Being Baptists, they had brought up Iris and her two older sisters in a strict, God-fearing household; one which - reading between the lines - did not have a great deal of love or laughter in it. I worried for a moment that Iris might think our cottage very shabby and poor compared to her home, but there was nothing to be done about that now. Before I knew it, we were pulling into the station, and there were my sisters and brother running alongside the train down the platform, and my darling mother waiting to greet us.

‘Why, Polly,’ she said, holding me at arms’ length for a moment, ‘just look at you! You’re properly grown up!’

I had been gone less than three months, and yet I truly did feel like a different person - both inside and out. So much had happened to me since I had arrived at Swallowcliffe, and I suppose Eugenie’s fine clothes made me seem older too. Mother was almost shy with me at first, particularly in front of Iris, who could not help putting everyone else in the shade on account of her looks. She was even more lovely than usual in her Sunday best, if still a little pale from the see-saw carriage ride, and my younger sister Martha took to her immediately. I don’t think she let go of Iris’s hand the entire visit, apart from when we were sitting down to eat. Luckily my other sister Lizzie can talk the hind leg off a donkey, which gave the rest of us time to get used to each other. Iris gave my mother the sunshine yellow flowers she had picked that morning - daffodils, marsh marigolds and colt’s foot, wrapped up in damp moss and tied with ivy - Tom held her other hand and mine in his own, demanding to be swung between us, and by the time we were half a mile down the road for home, everyone felt quite comfortable in each other’s company.

I could hardly believe how tiny our cottage seemed to me now, after Swallowcliffe’s large rooms and high ceilings; we could not all fit in the front room together. Perhaps that was just as well, though, since the kitchen was much warmer and more welcoming. Pots of red geraniums marched in a row along the windowsill, the whitewashed walls were bright and clean, and a colourful rag rug lay on the stone floor. Iris sat at the table with Martha on her lap, perfectly content, and I knew there was no reason to worry. Our house might have been poor, but I had no need to feel ashamed of it.

While the kettle was boiling for tea, Mother told me a piece of sad news: Reverend Conway had died unexpectedly a couple of weeks before. His daughter had already left the village to act as lady’s companion to an elderly widow some twenty miles away, because a new vicar and his wife would shortly be arriving to take over the vicarage. I was sorry not to have been able to say goodbye, but Mother gave me Miss Conway’s address so that I could write and wish her well. Then it was time for church, with a visiting curate in the pulpit instead of Reverend Conway, and the neighbours to greet afterwards. My mother has never been one to puff herself up, but she couldn’t help looking proud of me. After the service we went home for slices of boiled bacon on toast, and then we all rambled through the fields down to the river while Iris and I told Mother about our lives at Swallowcliffe.

‘Now you listen for a change, young Lizzie,’ she said to my sister. ‘If you can do half as well for yourself as our Polly has, I shall die a happy woman.’

It was lovely to be home! I hated saying goodbye at the end of the day, but I’d be coming back in the summer for a whole week which cheered me up a little. I’d given my mother almost three pounds (including Lord Vye’s sovereign), Tom was so pleased with his new boots he would probably be sleeping in them, and the same with Lizzie and her dresses - Martha even managed not to be jealous since she knew they would be coming to her in the end. It had been a lovely day, all in all, made perfect by the fact that Iris and I had shared it together. Now we were going back to the Hall to start on the spring cleaning, summer was on its way and, with a bit of luck, she would soon forget about Rory Vye.

Eight

Many illnesses are carried and caused by the accumulations of dirt, even of light dust, which are overlooked by careless housekeepers! Every particle of dust is a particle of danger. Never forget this, and you will save yourself much trouble and grief.

From
Advice for the Laundry and Spring Cleaning
, 1893

What a deal of work, spring cleaning is! I soon began to feel that I knew every inch of Swallowcliffe Hall, from top to bottom, and every single thing under its roof. Mr Wilkins and William (who had been left behind to help us while Mr Goddard and the other two footmen went to London) brought out huge ladders from the stables and held them steady for us while we took down all the curtains in the house and unhooked the bed hangings. With the family was away, at least there was no need for them to wear livery; William spent most of his time in a
 
waistcoat and shirt sleeves, that thick brown hair of his curling down over his collar. He did look handsome. Just as well we were so busy and that he was probably sweet on Iris anyway, or I might have been quite distracted.

We covered everything with dustcloths before the chimney sweeps came, then Mary and Mrs Henderson put away the ornaments (including one particular figurine with a spider’s web of cracks over it that was only too familiar to me), and we washed down the furniture with vinegar and scoured it with fine sand before a new layer of beeswax could be applied.

‘Rub until the wood is warm!’ Mrs Henderson ordered, so we polished away until our arms ached. The carpets were taken up and dragged outside for the gardeners to hang over a clothes’ line and beat as hard as they could, and all the wooden paintwork was scrubbed. Every speck of dust and soot from the countless fires that had burned over that long winter was sent flying, and we threw open the windows to let fresh air come flooding through the house.

We worked hard but it was a happy time. With most of the upper servants away, the atmosphere in the servants’ hall became a great deal more free and easy. Mrs Henderson mostly ate in her room, and Mary and Mr Wilkins did not mind us chatting at meal times - so long as we were careful not to gossip in front of them. Because Mrs Bragg was not there to cook for us, we were being paid board wages: a little extra to make up for not having proper meals. But Iris was still baking bread and rolls for the household, there were lettuces and tomatoes fresh from the greenhouse, butter and cheese in the dairy, and the butcher called three times a week so we could buy ham and sausages. We did not suffer over much, and I was delighted to think of the extra money I could pass on to my mother.

The other wonderful thing was that a new piano had been ordered for Miss Eugenie, and Lady Vye sent word from London that the old one could be taken down to the servants’ hall for our entertainment. It turned out that Mr Wilkins could play very well, and we had some merry sing-songs in the evening. Miss Harriet and Master John took to having their supper with us and then staying on for a while afterwards to join in. Master John had become particularly special to me since his accident (what a long time ago that seemed now!) and he would often come and sit on my lap, which made me feel very comfortable and motherly.

Things would have been perfect - if only I hadn’t been so worried about Iris. She seemed to become sadder and more withdrawn as the weeks went by; as though she had retreated inside herself to a place where I couldn’t follow.

‘Come for a walk with me,’ I coaxed her one Sunday afternoon. ‘There are still a few bluebells left in the woods, and Miss Harriet says the swallows are here. Let’s go down to the lake and see them!’

But she only shook her head and turned back to her book. ‘You go, Polly. I’m not up to much today.’

Iris hadn’t been up to much for some time, I thought. She didn’t want to go anywhere or do anything, and the sad fact of the matter was, we were drifting apart. It’s hard to stay close to someone when there’s a secret sitting between you like a rock, no matter how hard you try to pretend it’s not there. How could I help her if she wouldn’t talk to me?

There was one time when I thought Iris came close to opening up. Once the spring cleaning was over, there was not much to do around the house until the family came back, so Mrs Henderson told me to work with Iris in the still room, making marmalade. The gardeners had brought in baskets full of plump, sour oranges from the hothouse: they had to be boiled for a good two hours and then cut into tiny chips before being boiled up again with sugar. A tall white sugar cone sat on the table, hard as marble, which we would have to break into chunks.

We had been talking about Miss Eugenie, who was apparently being courted by the Duke of Cheveny’s older son, the Earl of Hitchingham - or so Becky had heard from Jemima. Iris told me that she didn’t think much of this young man. When he had visited Swallowcliffe with his parents the previous autumn (they only lived in the next county), he had followed her down a passage and tried to kiss her. ‘He had his hands all over me too,’ she added, laying down the nippers. ‘Ugh! It was horrible.’

I was shocked to hear it. ‘Whatever did you do?’

‘I pushed him away, good and hard, and told him I’d scream the house down if he didn’t leave me alone. That frightened him off pretty quick, I can tell you.’

‘But we should let Miss Eugenie know what he’s like! What if he ended up proposing to her?’

Iris smiled, rather sadly. ‘Do you think anyone will believe me if I say what happened? The whole thing would end up being my fault, you can be sure of that. They’d say I led him on and then made a fuss when he took me at my word.’ She started to attack the sugar cone again. ‘Anyway, just because he did that to me, doesn’t mean he’ll treat Miss Eugenie the same way. Some of these gentlemen will try things on with a maid that they wouldn’t dream of doing to a lady. You get the odd one who’ll treat us both the same, but they’re few and far between.’