Summerset Abbey (10 page)

Her only relief of the day had been helping Rowena and Victoria into their walking suits, but even that had a pall on it because they were going to say good-bye to their father and she wasn’t allowed to go, despite her own immeasurable grief and longing to bid him a final farewell alongside her sisters.

Now Prudence stared at the rag, unsure of what she was being asked to do. She’d never had to clean the pots and pans. Katie had always done that. Susie grabbed her arm and pulled her back to the scrub room, a dingy, windowless room with two more giant sinks. “Here, I’ll show you. The work will go so much faster with two of us.”

Susie wore her mousy brown hair pulled back into a tight bun. The sleeves on her blue-and-white-striped shirt were rolled up, showing strong arms in spite of her small size. She stood smaller than Victoria, and Prudence thought she couldn’t be more than fifteen, but her motions were quick and competent.

Susie grabbed a small bowl and mixed together silver sand, salt, vinegar, and a little flour. Once she’d stirred it into a paste, she took a pot with one hand and a scoop of cleanser with the
other. “Then you scrub like this.” She worked the paste into the pan with a quick rubbing motion.

Screwing up her face, Prudence scooped up a small handful of paste. Susie nodded encouragingly. “That’s it. Now scrub.”

The vinegar and salt stung Prudence’s hands, but she scrubbed, tentatively, until Susie reached out and pushed her hand hard against the pan.

“No, you have to press harder. That’s why you can’t do it with rags, see?”

So Prudence scrubbed.

The pots were so tarnished, she thought it would never come clean, but when it finally did, she found a certain satisfaction in taking a dull pan and making it look shiny and bright.

“Do you have to do this every day?” she asked.

“Every bleedin’ day,” Susie said grimly. “Look at my hands.” She held out a hand for Prudence’s inspection. They were small and capable, but the skin was chapped red and the knuckles swollen.

“Language!” Cook yelled from the kitchen.

Susie rolled her eyes and continued scrubbing.

“Do you like your job?” Prudence asked.

Susie snorted, “I’m the scullery maid. What do you think? I’m the lowest of the low.” She leaned closer and whispered, “But I’m hoping to be a cook someday.”

Prudence couldn’t imagine a life where being a cook was the highest of one’s aspirations. But then were hers any better? She just wanted to take care of those she loved. Maybe have a family someday. What she wanted in life didn’t seem nearly as important as what she didn’t want: to be facing everything alone. But Susie didn’t seem intimidated by the thought of a solitary life,
because cooks never married. “What’s so great about being a cook?” Prudence asked.

“Much better pay. And you get to order other people around all day!” Susie yelled this last part over her shoulder.

“I heard that!” Cook yelled back from the kitchen, and Prudence and Susie giggled.

“I’ve worked here for about eight months. It’s not a bad job. The food is good. I have a roof over my head and I’m working for an earl, which lets me lord it over my sisters on my days off. They just have day jobs in town.”

“Do you like the Earl?” she asked.

“Oh, I’ve never met him. I met the Countess once, when she hired me. She said I looked a likely gal and I got the job. I was so nervous!”

Prudence frowned and scrubbed with renewed vigor. How odd to take such pride in working for an earl when he hadn’t even bothered to meet someone in his own employ.

Though Susie said the work would go faster with the two of them, it seemed to take forever. Then the bells started ringing on the bell board and everyone snapped to attention.

“They’re back from the service.” Cook grabbed some silver salvers from the china closet. “They’ll be wanting their tea.”

Hortense came hurrying down the narrow stairs. Prudence had seen her only once, in passing. She noticed
she
didn’t have to wear an ugly uniform. Instead, the statuesque black-haired Frenchwoman wore a smart black-and-white-checked twill suit that couldn’t be anything but couture.

“Miss Rowena was asking for you. She is in her room.” Hortense clapped her hands.
“Rapidement!”

Prudence wiped her hands on the apron Susie had lent her and started up the stairs.

“
Non
! Take her some tea. Idiot!”

Prudence turned back and Cook handed her a tray with a teapot and cups. Then she hurried up the steps while Hortense muttered in French below.

The servants’ stairway had inconspicuous doors that opened up on each floor, so they could move about the house without their presence being known. It seemed odd to Prudence to have a small army of silent, invisible workers keeping the house running in tip-top shape and not even be aware of them. Did Elaine ever wonder about the fire that warmed her room in the morning when she awoke, the never-ending supply of biscuits in the jar next to her bed, or how her slippers and dressing gown were heated and waiting for her to crawl into after she bathed? Prudence wasn’t sure she would like that kind of luxury at all.

Even if the rules hadn’t stressed being quiet at all times, Prudence would have tiptoed. The inside of the house, with its exquisite art, plush carpets, and the wide, gleaming staircase that seemed to stretch on forever, required a certain decorum. Besides, the last thing she wanted to do was rouse the ire of Mrs. Harper, who already seemed to have taken an instant dislike to her.

She found Rowena in her room, looking out the mullioned window. Ivy had been allowed to grow up the walls on this side of the house and it surrounded the window, making it look as if Rowena were peering out into a secret garden. “I brought you some tea,” Prudence said stiffly. Even though she loved Rowena, a part of her smarted at being maneuvered into this situation by her own sister.

“Thank you, Pru.” Rowena turned her face away from the window and Prudence’s heart melted at the sadness on her face.

She set the tray down on a small table near the window, then put her arms around Rowena.

“It was so sad. He loved Summerset, but I kept thinking that he wouldn’t want to spend the rest of eternity here. He loved our home as much, if not more, and he loved to travel so.”

Prudence’s arms tightened. “Just don’t think of him stuck here. He’s in a better place, you know.”

“I know.” Rowena sighed. “Has Victoria come home yet?”

Prudence frowned. “What do you mean? I thought she was with you.”

“She was, but then she couldn’t bear it anymore and went for a walk. I tried to call her back, but you know how she gets. I felt it would be disrespectful to shout or follow her. One of us needed to be there.”

Alarm kicked Prudence’s pulse up a notch. “But it’s so cold outside. Do you think she’ll get lost?”

Rowena shook her head. “Remember, Vic has been here every summer since she was born. She should be fine as long as she gets in before dark.”

“We should go look for her.” Prudence turned away from the window, but Rowena grabbed her arm. “No, look. There she is now.”

Prudence spotted Victoria’s slight figure coming up the walkway through the formal rose garden. The roses had been cut back for the winter and looked shorn and disgraced.

A light knock on the door startled both girls.

“Come in,” Rowena called.

Prudence swallowed as Lady Summerset gracefully glided in. Her ladyship hesitated for a fraction of a second when she saw Prudence, but then continued her elegant approach toward Rowena. Lady Summerset wore an ivory lace and tulle tea gown with a simple tunic top and softly gathered sleeves that ended at the elbow. Silver threads wound their way haphazardly through
her abundant brown hair and one would have to be cruel to call them gray. As she came closer, Prudence detected the pink scent of talcum powder and flowers, as if her ladyship were concealing a hidden bouquet of dusty roses.

Prudence wasn’t sure if she should curtsy or disappear behind the draperies, so she stood perfectly still and tried not to stare.

“I wanted to make sure you were doing all right, my dear. Has Victoria returned?”

“She’s coming in now, Aunt Charlotte.”

“Oh, good. I was hoping to speak to you alone.” She paused and both girls caught her meaning at the same time.

Prudence edged away, but Rowena caught her arm. “Aunt Charlotte, I don’t think you have met my dear friend, Prudence. She has lived with us since we were both young. Prudence, this is my aunt Charlotte.”

For a moment it looked as if the grace and superb manners Lady Summerset wore around her like a cloak would fail, but at the last moment she tilted her head slightly and acknowledged Prudence’s presence.

Not to be outdone, Prudence curled her lips into a semblance of a smile and curtsied. “Pleased to meet you, my lady.”

She turned and touched Rowena’s shoulder. “I am going to go see to Victoria. She’s sure to be chilled and in need of a hot cup of tea.”

As Prudence left the room, she caught a look that the Countess directed at her before her lashes were quickly lowered. Unlike her husband, who looked at Prudence as if she were a worm, in a purely impersonal way, Lady Summerset looked at her with a malevolent expression in her blue eyes, and, it seemed to Prudence, it was very, very personal.

“
I
t’s only been a week and Uncle Conrad just left for London. What was I supposed to have accomplished in a week?” Rowena consciously kept her tone light, but she could feel herself losing patience. Victoria kept hounding her about Prudence, about going home, about the house,
about everything,
and she didn’t know what she expected her to do about any of it.

“But you haven’t done anything!” Victoria stood in the middle of her bedroom with her hands on her hips. “It is
intolerable
that Prudence sleep in the attic, that she has to wear that horrid uniform, and that she isn’t allowed to read in the library! I have to
sneak
her books!”

Victoria’s eyes flashed and a feverish color stained her cheeks. Rowena was afraid she was going to work herself into another episode.

“I don’t know what to do about it right now. Remember, we just buried our father! Now is not the time to throw fits! Would you please calm down?”

“I know we just buried our father! I also know
he
would have never stood for this. And I will not calm down until you tell me what you are planning to do about it.”

The fact that she had no plan only made Victoria angrier. Rowena knew Prudence was miserable. She knew it was her fault.
But she couldn’t just defy her uncle. Every time she tried to bring it up, he would become taciturn and grim and she would back down.

And hate herself for it.

Victoria kept on, rubbing salt in the wound. “You don’t have an answer for that, do you? You’re doing the same thing you always do—wait for someone else to make your decisions for you.” She sat abruptly on the bed and crossed her arms.

For the first time in her life, Rowena wanted to slap her little sister. She kept her voice controlled with great effort. “I’m not even going to dignify that with an answer. I’m going to go riding so I can think without someone haranguing me.”

Prudence came into the room, her green eyes wide. “What is going on? I could hear you out in the hall.”

Seeing Prudence just made her feel guiltier. “Fetch my riding habit. I’m going out.”

The hurt in Prudence’s eyes made her cringe. She hadn’t meant . . . Oh, forget it. Shamefaced, but unable to back down, Rowena marched into the bathroom, her eyes smarting with unshed tears.

*   *   *

The wind coming over the hills whipped through the netting covering Rowena’s face, but she didn’t care. Her lips were becoming chapped and her cheeks stung, but those discomforts didn’t even come close to the tangled emotions inside.

Why did all this have to fall into her lap? When did she become responsible for everything?

When her father died.

Rowena turned her horse toward the Buxton family cemetery. Carefully keeping her mount to the perfectly groomed
walkways, she read the names of the Buxton women who had either lived at or resided over Summerset. She paused at her mother’s grave and tears filled her eyes. She only had hazy memories of the small, golden-haired woman who had been confined to a bed for a good portion of Rowena’s life, but she would never forget the love shining from her eyes or the sweet smile that lit up her face whenever Prudence’s mother set baby Rowena on the bed.

Next to her mother’s grave was a statue of a cherub. Halpernia’s grave. Halpernia, the change-of-life baby who died at three years old the year Rowena was born. Whose death so affected everyone in her family that they refused to speak of her at all, as if she’d never existed.

Rowena looked past the gravestones and toward the berm where her father was interred. The pain hit her low in her center and she turned away. What had she been thinking to expose herself to such pain? She urged her mount into a cantor, taking a dirt track up over Briar Hill. Keeping her horse to a leisurely pace, she skirted hedges, outcroppings of rock, and dense thickets of flaming red thimbleberries. She loved riding. She rode in London, of course, but riding sedately in Hyde Park could not come close to riding through the forest and fields of Suffolk’s countryside.