Poor Little Rich Girl (19 page)

‘That’s the last piece of holly, thank goodness,’ Hester said, balancing it along the top of the big gilt mirror which decorated the right-hand wall, and rubbing her fingers thoughtfully, for the holly was prickly. She and Lonnie had been told to put up the Christmas decorations and had thought it would be good fun, but in fact it had turned out to be very hard work. Mimms had provided the holly, ivy and mistletoe, and Fletcher had brought the other decorations down from the narrow attic room where they spent most of the year, but even so, putting up
such a quantity of stuff had not been easy. Mimms had erected the large Christmas tree and had left them to decorate it with the Hetherington-Smiths’ Victorian beads, baubles and delicate glass novelties, and Lonnie had acknowledged that it had been fun, but when they saw the vast quantity of greenery which must, Aunt Emmeline said, decorate all picture rails, door frames and banisters, their hearts had failed them.

‘Why does she
do
it? It isn’t as if she’s got lots of children or young relatives who will come to the house over the holiday,’ Lonnie had wailed. ‘I believe she’s done it to make sure we work like galley-slaves and have a miserable Christmas, that’s what I think!’

At the time Hester had scoffed, said it was nice of Miss Hetherington-Smith to decorate the place, but a word with Mollie had revealed that though Miss Hetherington-Smith had always put up the Christmas tree and decorated the main drawing room, that had been the extent of her Christmas preparations. ‘She allus goes to one of the neighbours on Christmas morning and they have drinks an’ that,’ Mollie had said vaguely. ‘Then several of ’em comes back here for tea an’ a slice o’ her plum cake. But as for all them twinkly fings, an’ the green stuff everywhere … well, I dare say that is to make Miss Lonnie feel more at home, like.’

But Hester was learning that Miss Hetherington-Smith did nothing without a reason, and so far as she could see the reason was often to ‘put someone in their place’, as their employer herself would have said.

Miss Hetherington-Smith had begun the procedure
within a couple of days of her brother’s going off on his cruise. Hester had gone down to her in her study, as she did each morning, to report on what she and Lonnie meant to do that day, and was told to sit down because there was ‘quite a lot to discuss, this morning’.

The discussion, it seemed, was to be somewhat one-sided, however. ‘The maids in this household are fully occupied, and since the arrival of yourself and the child have been hard put to it to get their work done,’ she had said frostily, eyeing Hester over the top of her little round spectacles. ‘In future, you will keep the attic rooms which you use clean. I have instructed the maids that they are no longer to go up to that floor.’

‘I do most of it already …’ Hester was beginning, but got no further. ‘In future, you will do it all,’ Miss Hetherington-Smith said. ‘You may go.’

Hester, used to the older woman’s abrupt, not to say rude, way of talking, had not replied but had quietly left the room. However, in the days that followed she found that though she went to the study each morning to report on the day’s doings, she was there mainly, now, in order to be given a list of the jobs which Miss Hetherington-Smith had decided she must do. Wash all the picture rails and skirting boards in all the attic rooms with warm, soapy water. Scrub the linoleum in the schoolroom one day and in their two bedrooms the next. On a cold December day she was ordered to get all the curtains down, wash them, and hang them in the garden to dry. When she had pointed out that the curtain material was heavy and unlikely to dry on such a cold day Miss Hetherington-Smith had said, grudgingly, that if she was right, if the weather remained cold
and windless, then she might use the drying rack in the kitchen.

‘You will then have to iron the curtains,’ her employer added, a good deal of malice in her chilly tones. ‘I believe you purchased one of those newfangled electric irons when I told you the kitchen staff could no longer launder for you and your charge. No doubt it will also iron curtains?’

‘Certainly it will,’ Hester had said drily. There had been a good deal of envy and some mutterings from the maids over her purchase of the iron; they were expected to wash, starch and then iron all Miss Hetherington-Smith’s clothing and the household linen the old-fashioned way. As soon as she realised how much easier the electric iron made her tasks, Hester suggested that the maids might borrow it for their own work and the offer was eagerly accepted. Sometimes, Mollie carried the iron reverently down to the kitchen, but at other times she came up to the schoolroom and she and Hester chatted as she worked, smoothing the big white damask tablecloths and the old-fashioned leg o’ mutton blouses which Miss Hetherington-Smith favoured.

Needless to say, however, Hester said nothing of this to her employer, but merely left the room without another word. To mention that she lent the iron to the staff would have been asking for trouble, she knew. Fletcher had told her that when Mr Hetherington-Smith had made a hasty visit to Britain on business some five years earlier, he had been shocked by the inconvenience of the old house.

‘This will never do, my dear,’ he had said to his sister. ‘I will have the house wired for electricity and the gaslighting done away with, and I’ll have running water piped to the bathrooms and to the servants’
quarters in the basement. You’ll find the house runs a great deal more smoothly, I assure you.’

Unfortunately, it had not occurred to him that the attics would ever be occupied, so though she and Lonnie had the advantage of electric light they had to cart their water up from the floor below … though at Hester’s insistence they took baths twice weekly in the guest bathroom on the lower floor. When Hester and Lonnie had first arrived in Shaw Street, Miss Hetherington-Smith had told her that she and her charge might use the guest bathroom and since she had never rescinded the offer they continued to take their baths there, though Hester always cleaned every inch of the place as soon as they had finished with it in order to pre-empt any grumbles from her employer.

But now Hester stood back and regarded the hallway with considerable satisfaction. Whatever Miss Hetherington-Smith’s reason for insisting that they decorate the whole ground floor of the house, it certainly looked a good deal more festive than it usually did. The Christmas tree looked particularly beautiful, for Miss Hutchinson had provided them with a number of tiny candles, and when these were lit every flame would be reflected a dozen times in the delicate glass baubles, making the tree seem alive and alight. Hester knew just how wonderful it would look because the previous evening, after Lonnie had gone to bed, she and Miss Hutchinson had lit the candles and Hester had seen the older woman’s eyes fill with tears at the beauty of it.

‘I don’t know what’s got into her,’ Miss Hutchinson had whispered. ‘I suppose it’s because the child is living here now, but oh, I’m glad! I’ve never seen anything so beautiful!’

‘Hester, do you think we might go out and do some last minute shopping?’ Lonnie said, bringing Hester abruptly back to the present. ‘After all, we’ve spent a whole day – and most of yesterday – putting up the decorations, so surely we might have a little time to ourselves now?’

‘Yes, I think we might,’ Hester said. ‘Now that your aunt gives us so many tasks to perform, she is less interested in how we spend our spare time.’ She laughed, then clapped a hand to her mouth and headed for the stairs, with Lonnie close on her heels. ‘Come to think of it, we don’t
have
much spare time any more, do we? So I see no reason why we shouldn’t put on our warmest coats, boots and scarves, and go shopping. Thank heaven the snow’s all gone, so we aren’t likely to get soaked – and you haven’t bought your present for Aunt Emmeline yet!’

The schoolroom felt pleasantly warm after the icy hall and stairwell, though Hester noticed that the fire needed making up. The servants were very good and often sneaked a scuttleful of coal or a bag of logs up to the second floor, but Miss Hetherington-Smith had insisted that Hester should perform this task, so the maids could only bring fuel up when their employer was engaged elsewhere. Since the scuttle and log box were both full, Hester guessed that Mollie had been up whilst Miss Hetherington-Smith was paying afternoon calls. Quickly, she put a couple of lumps of coal on to the small fire, then closed down the damper and covered the grate with coal dust so that it would not burn up whilst they were out. Then she and Lonnie got into their outdoor things and clattered down the stairs, not troubling to go quietly.

‘When the cat’s away the mice will play,’ Lonnie said cheerfully, as they let themselves out of the front door. ‘As for giving that horrible old woman a present, how about a feather duster? Then
she
could clean the beastly picture rails and the chandelier in the hall instead of making poor Mollie risk her life on a rickety stepladder.’

Although it was still only mid-afternoon, the cold took Hester’s breath away as they stepped on to the pavement and began to walk to the nearest tram stop. ‘I don’t think a feather duster would be tactful,’ she said. ‘Though it’s very tempting, I admit. How about one of those boxes of embroidered handkerchiefs? I dare say she would prefer gloves, but they are much more expensive.’ She giggled. ‘If either of us were any good at embroidery, we could buy plain lawn handkerchiefs and embroider her initials on each one. Oh, dear. I don’t suppose she will buy us anything we want because she doesn’t understand us at all, does she?’

Lonnie was beginning to reply when a tram came roaring down the street and drew to a halt beside them. The two girls hopped on board and presently hopped off again outside a large store. ‘Here we go!’ Lonnie said gleefully as they pushed their way into the huge emporium. ‘I do wonder what Daddy has sent us, Hester. Mollie told me that several lovely big parcels had arrived for us with Daddy’s writing on the labels.’

‘I’m sure whatever he gives you will be delightful,’ Hester said. ‘Shall we go to hats and gloves first? I think they sell hankies as well.’

It was Christmas Eve and Dick was finishing work in the captain’s cabin of the
Fearless
, a destroyer being
built for the Royal Navy. The sideboard was of walnut, which Dick always enjoyed using, and now he ran his hand appreciatively over the softly gleaming surface. He had made this particular piece from scratch, starting with the bare wood, and now that he looked at his creation he felt justly proud of it.

‘Well, old Dick? If you’ve finished a-gloatin’ over that there bit of furniture, then how about comin’ up on deck for a quick sup of cold tea and a mouthful of hot bacon sandwich? Sammy Wills is doin’ the necessary for everyone – a sort of Christmas treat – so you’ll not want to miss out.’

Dick turned round and grinned at the speaker. Joey Frost was a small, cheery little man, almost as broad as he was long. He had small, bright blue eyes and a rosy face and though his hair was grey it was no indication of his age, for he had once told Dick that both he and his father had been grey as badgers before their twentieth birthday. He had been a joiner foreman at the shipyard ever since Dick had come to Laird’s as an apprentice, and since they both lived in the same area of Liverpool and caught the same tram and ferry to work they had speedily become good friends, despite the fact that Joey was ten years Dick’s senior.

Joey would have been the first to admit that, though he was capable enough, Dick was his master as regards fine furniture, for the younger man enjoyed the fiddling, precise work needed for such articles. Joey, on the other hand, could knock up a companionway or a large article of galley furniture in half the time that it took Dick to lovingly carve the decoration of leaves and fruit which embellished each drawer of the captain’s sideboard. Both men admired the other’s abilities, and because Joey was
a well-liked and trusted foreman he was able to make sure that Dick was responsible for the finer furniture whilst he and others like him undertook the more straightforward joinery so necessary on any class of ship.

‘Yes, I reckon it’s finished,’ Dick said now, in reply to Joey’s question. ‘And I could do wi’ a bite to eat and something to wet my whistle.’

Joey produced his pocket watch and held up the face so that Dick could see it. ‘It’s high time we wasn’t here,’ he said breezily. ‘Norreven the boss would expect us to work over on Christmas Eve.’ He sighed gustily. ‘Tomorrow’s the great day; me kids look forward to it all year, I reckon, and they wakes long before it’s light and start badgering me to tell ’em if Santy Claus has come and if it’s time to have their stockings.’

‘I shall have a real lie in,’ Dick said, as the two men gained the deck. ‘I’ve gorra little sister – and a younger brother as well – but they both know breakfast comes first and stockings next. It’ll be a good Christmas for us this year, now that Ted’s been took on as apprentice plumber at Laird’s and young Ben is part-time at Madison’s – you know, the pet shop on Heyworth Street.’

‘Aye, it won’t be so bad for us Frosts,’ Joey remarked, seizing a large tin mug full of tea and a hot bacon sandwich from the skinny lad who was handing them out. ‘Ta, Freddie.’ He turned back to Dick, who had also been provided with tea and a bacon wad. ‘Doin’ anything special on Boxing Day? Wharrabout that young woman you met up with a few months back? The one who come from India, I mean.’

‘Hester Elliott,’ Dick said wistfully. Whenever he spoke her name, a picture of her appeared in his
mind. The smooth oval face, the long-lashed dark eyes, the dimple in her cheek when she smiled. At first, he had thought about Hester constantly but he had not seen her now for weeks and he supposed, ruefully, that he was unlikely to do so over the holiday. He said as much to Joey, admitting for the first time that the girl was really a young lady, a governess in a large household, and unlikely to cross his path again.