The Emperor (46 page)

She had just put her boot into the stirrup for the third
time, when a commotion broke out in the kitchen and the
noise, emerging from the open buttery door, startled Hazel
and made her dance, goggling and snorting like a young dragon. Jemima stood back on the block in exasperation
and said, 'What on earth is going on?' Hoskins and the two
grooms attending her having no way of answering, she
stepped down and bade the younger of the grooms go and
find out what the matter was. It was probably, she reflected,
nothing more than one of M. Barnard's outbursts of
temperament, which afflicted him more frequently in the
spring when the kitchen chimney sometimes would not
draw; but it was an excuse not to mount Hazel for a few
minutes, and to spend them standing in the blessed April
sunshine.

The groom was away longer than she would have
 
expected, and that indication that the trouble was serious
was confirmed when both Oxhey and Mrs Mappin appeared at the door looking anxious and embarrassed.

‘Well, what is it?' Jemima asked.

‘My lady, it is not something I would normally consider mentioning to you,' Oxhey said, casting a nervous glance at
his colleague, who frowned and said, 'I told him it was
nonsense, my lady, to be troubling you, especially as you're just about to go out. Depend upon it, we can deal with the matter without delaying you.'

‘
I beg your pardon, my lady', Oxhey said, 'but I thought,
in the circumstances -'

‘
Well, since I already am delayed, perhaps you had better
tell me what the circumstances are. Hoskins, walk Hazel
around for a few minutes.' Jemima went up the steps into
the great hall, and turned to Oxhey enquiringly.

‘It's a boy, my lady,' he began hesitantly.

‘
A dirty little thief, my lady and that ungrateful girl no
better than he - '

‘
His sister my lady,' Oxhey interrupted as if in excul
pation. Jemima held up her hand.

‘I cannot understand a word you say. Mappin, pray hold
your peace. You may have your turn at my ear later. Oxhey,
tell me from the beginning, if you please, what is going on.'

‘Yes, my lady. Well, my lady - ' he paused lengthily to assemble his words, and Jemima knew better than to hurry
him. 'It seems, my lady, that one of the housemaids has
stole
⁴
quantity of food and clothing, and was caught in the
act of passing it on to - '

‘Her accomplice!' Mrs Mappin cried triumphantly.

‘Her brother,' Oxhey corrected mildly. 'It is not a matter
I would normally trouble your ladyship with, but the girl - '
- the naughty, wicked, ungrateful minx - ‘

- the girl is the orphan your ladyship was so good as to take
_,
in from St Edward's, and her brother was one of those bound apprentice to Mr Hobsbawn.'

‘
Run away, my lady, and wants whipping for it,' Mrs
Mappin interjected.

‘Peace, Mappin. Why has he run away, Oxhey?' Jemima said. He looked more than ever unhappy.

‘My lady, he says he has been ill-treated, and it was on that account - a matter of some delicacy, my lady, in view of - but I thought it best to consult your ladyship before - '

‘
You did quite right, Oxhey,' Jemima said, frowning.
‘Where is the boy?'

‘I shut them both in the end pantry, my lady, when the groom you sent came in,' Mrs Mappin said, 'otherwise no doubt they'd be three counties away by now.'

‘Very well, I'll come,' Jemima said. 'Oxhey, you may take me there. Mrs Mappin, I need you to exercise your tact and authority in putting the servants back to work and ensuring they don't talk about this.'

‘Yes, my lady,' Mrs Mappin said unwillingly, not entirely deceived by the flattery. Oxhey led Jemima away, passing
through the inner court rather than the kitchen so as to
avoid the eyes of the other servants. He began apologizing again as soon as they were away from the housekeeper.

‘I beg your ladyship's pardon for troubling you,' he said,
‘although your ladyship had made an enquiry as to the
upset, but the boy being one of ours, so to speak, and his
condition - well, my lady, I was quite shocked to see him,
and I think - I fear - he may be telling the truth.’

One of the footmen was standing on guard outside the pantry-prison, which had obviously been chosen, Jemima
thought, because it had no window and contained nothing
but rarely-used pans and kitchen implements. Oxhey
unlocked the door, and standing aside, bade the young
criminals come out. The maid Betsey came first, dishevelled,
a red mark on her cheek where she had been struck, and the
marks of freely-shed tears on her face. She looked fright
ened, but defiant and angry too. She blinked after the dark
ness at her gaolers, and then seeing Jemima, she flung
herself on her knees before her.

‘
Oh my lady, my lady, I didn't mean to steal! I wouldn't
do such a thing for myself, not ever, so kind as you've been
to me, but it was for Timmy, my lady, my brother, and if
you knew what they did to him! Oh my lady, don't send him back, I beg you! They'll kill him if you do!’

Now the boy had come out behind her, crawled out, in
fact, and Jemima's eyes widened in shock at the sight of
 
him. She had never seen any living creature so thin. His face
was like a skull, his arms and legs were so thin that his joints
were the thickest parts of them. He was filthy, and his
clothing was in rags, and his bare feet were bruised and
bleeding from his long walk. One hand was wrapped in
filthy bandages. He looked exhausted and frightened, and as
he crawled to her feet he was evidently too weak to speak, but looked up at her with the silent and terrified appeal of a calf about to be slaughtered.

‘
Good God,' Jemima said when she could find her voice, ‘what has happened to you, child? Who has done this? And
what has happened to your hand?’

Betsey began to weep again, and clutched at Jemima's skirt, sobbing incoherently. The footman, outraged, tried to
snatch her away, but Jemima stilled him with a gesture, and
reaching down, unfastened the child's fingers herself quite
gently, saying, 'Be calm, Betsey. It's all right. No-one is
going to hurt you or your brother.’

Oxhey, much distressed, said, 'As he's 'prenticed, my
lady, we're bound to restore him under the terms of the indenture.'

‘
Oh my lady, don't send him back, please don't send him
back!' Betsey wailed, and Jemima patted her hand.

‘He shall not go back to the people who have permitted this to happen to him, I promise you. Get up now, there's a good girl, and dry your tears, and see if you can't be useful to me and your brother.'

‘
Yes, m'lady,' Betsey said, much steadied by the calm
and practical tone of Jemima's voice.

‘Run upstairs to Jenny as quick as you can, and bid her send all the children into the day-nursery and keep them there, and ask one of the maids to make up the end bed in the night-nursery with clean sheets, and put screens around it. Joseph, go and find Mrs Mappin and tell her I want hot
water for bathing in the night-nursery, and some warm
bread and milk. Now, Oxhey, you take one side of this poor boy, and I'll take the other. Be careful of that hand: I expect
it is very painful.’

Stripped of his rags, the boy looked even more pitifully thin, and there were a great number of bruises and stripes
 
on the grimy skin, some quite fresh, others old.

‘See how he has been beaten,' Jemima said.

Boys had been beaten since the world began, and it
would be a bad thing for the world if the time ever came when they weren't beaten; but this particular specimen did seem to have a surprising number of marks on his skinny torso. 'Probably he had a bad disposition, my lady,' Oxhey whispered.

Jemima did not reply, but began taking off the bandage.
The boy cried out in pain when she touched his hand, and
the bandage proved so stiff with filth, blood and pus that she
had to resort to scissors and cut it away little by little. When
the hand was revealed, it proved to be lacking two fingers. The wound was partly healed, but was oozing and swollen, and when Jemima saw the red streaks running along the forearm, she said, 'Oxhey, you had better send someone at once for Doctor Swindells.’

Jemima washed the child with her own hands, and when
Oxhey came back, he helped her. It was far below his
dignity as butler, but if her ladyship could do it, he
reasoned, so could he. Then they dressed him in a clean
nightshirt and put him to bed, and Jemima fed him the
bread and milk from a spoon. At first he ate avidly, and she
had to restrain him; but his famished appetite soon sick
ened, and he turned his head away. Jemima put the bowl
aside and felt his forehead, and found it very hot. With such
a wound, he would be likely to be feverish she thought.

‘My lady,' Oxhey murmured discreetly in her ear, ‘Mr
Edward is desirous of knowing what has happened, and Mrs
James has sent to ask if she can assist you in any way.’

Jemima frowned. 'Not yet, Oxhey. I want to get to the bottom of this. Please tell Mr Edward that I will speak to
them all later, and pray do not let anyone — anyone at all —
come into this nursery without my permission.’

The doctor came, and examined the hand, shook his
head gravely, and dressed it, and drawing Jemima aside
said, 'I'm afraid the wound is infected. There is little I can
do at this stage beyond dressing it. One can only hope that his own body will cure him.'

‘How much hope?' Jemima asked.

 
‘Well, Lady Morland, you know that recovery depends a great deal on the state of the individual. This boy is weak and famished, and I fear may lack the strength to fight the infection.’

When Swindells had gone, Jemima returned to the boy's side, and sat staring at him unseeingly for a while. Then a movement drew her back from her thoughts, and she saw that the boy was looking at her. She smiled.

‘
Do you think you could eat a little more now?' she
asked. He nodded, and she propped him up and fed him a few more spoonfuls, and when she laid him back on the pillows he sighed and gave her a feeble smile.

‘Thank you, ma'am,' he said.

‘How do you feel?'

‘Comfortable,' he said after a moment. Jemima made up her mind.

‘Timmy, my dear, I very much want to know what has happened to you since you went away to Manchester.' A shadow crossed his face. 'I know it must pain you to think about it, but I believe it is very important that you tell me
your story. If I asked you questions, do you think you could
answer them?'

‘Yes, ma'am,' he said, his eyes fixed on her face. She
stroked his rough hair back from his brow and said, 'You're
a good boy. I'll be back in a moment.' And she went to the door and passed the word for Father Thomas to come, with pen and paper.

*

It took a long time. Jemima sat to one side of the bed, holding the child's skeletal hand, and occasionally breaking off to feed him a little pap or give him a sip of barley-water; while Father Thomas sat to the other side, taking down
Jemima's questions and Timmy's answers. He was very
weak, and Father Thomas once or twice hinted that they should leave him alone and come back another time when
he had rested; but he had not seen the wounded hand.
Quite soon, Jemima thought, the boy would become too feverish to know what he was being asked, and quite soon after that he would die. It was important, she believed, to
get his story down on paper while there was time.
So, painfully, by question and answer, it was told.

*

'We all lived in the Prentice House, sixty of us boys, and
seventy girls. The Prentice House is built on to the side of
the mill, with a door between them, so we could pass from
one to the other without going outside. There was a
common room below where we ate, and two chambers
above for sleeping, one for the boys and one for the girls.

‘The beds were in two tiers, the upper ones fixed by a square frame above the lower ones, all along the walls. We slept three in a bed. There was a door between the two chambers but it was not locked. Sometimes the older boys would go into the girls' room at night.

‘
We got up at five in the summer and six in the winter
and went into the mill. Then we worked until eight or nine,
when breakfast was brought to us. A bar would be put
across the door to the house, and we would go up in turn to
fetch our breakfast, which was porrage flavoured with onions.
We had ten minutes to eat it, except when the mill was busy,
and then we had to eat while we worked as best we could.