The Sunday Girls (14 page)

Although I was looking forward to my new job, I was still feeling sad at having to leave Lily and my grandparents – and Dad and Danny.

Granny, as usual, was her practical self as she watched me pack a tiny suitcase with my few belongings. ‘Heavens, lassie, don’t look so sad. It’s just the Ferry you’re going to, not the North Pole. We’ll see you every week.’

Maddie had sent me a home-made card via Hattie and I smiled at the memory of it. On the cover she had drawn an elegant looking maid with a feather duster in a slim white hand with its red painted fingernails. Inside she had also drawn a good likeness of me surrounded by an assortment of cleaning aids at my feet. Needless to say I was minus the red nails or the elegance and the caption read, ‘Ann buzzes through the chores like a busy bee.’ It was signed in her large flourishing style but had a postscript. ‘Wish I could be joining you instead of going back to the boring school.’

On seeing this last night, Hattie had pursed her lips together, disapproval written all over her face. “‘Boring school”, indeed! Imagine saying that about the Harris Academy. Most of the scholars there live in posh houses or in flats with tiled closes.’

Granny and I had been amused at her. Hattie’s big dream was eventually to move to a house with a tiled close. Should this ever happen, it would be the apex of her life.

‘I don’t think Maddie is running down the school, Hattie,’ said Granny. ‘It’s just that she feels Ann and Danny are getting more grown-up than her, even though she’s almost the same age. She’s right of course. The one thing about being poor is that you have to put your childhood behind you and grow up fast.’

She bustled around my suitcase, smoothing down the meagre contents. ‘I suspect, if you were lucky enough to be a pupil at a posh school, you would be delighted, wouldn’t you, Ann?’

She was right. If circumstances had permitted, I would have loved to remain at school with my beloved books.

Still, as I sat on the bus, I knew my schooldays were just a memory. I rubbed the steam from the window and peered out into the darkness, fearful that I would miss my stop and maybe be carried on to Monifieth which was just a name to me.

I didn’t want to ask the conductor where I should get off because his face had turned increasingly sour-looking as the journey progressed. Woe betide any hapless passenger who didn’t have the required pennies ready for their fare.

‘Any more fares?’ he snapped, almost shouting the words as he clumped heavily up the aisle behind each new batch of travellers who scrambled on board with all the finesse and dignity of an invading army.

Thankfully, I spotted a landmark through the morning gloom – a certain shop on a corner. I knew my stop was near. Sleet was falling as I stepped down from the bus and I watched it rumbling away, my head filled with a mixture of emotions. I found myself suddenly wishing I could be back inside my cosy haven at Granny’s house, instead of standing alone on this alien pavement which was very slippery.

Dawn had arrived very grudgingly with a fractional layer of light which was unable to push the darkness away entirely. The sea and sky were the same colour. The horizon was a grey smudgy blur while the swell of the sea pulsated with huge amounts of water rushing towards land and the cold wind pushed massive waves on to the beach with a growling sound. It reminded me of some monster, fiercely rabid and foaming and straining to escape. This flat and overwhelming landscape was a fearful sight. Compared to the overcrowded Hilltown and Overgate, it was like being stranded on the moon or on some vast ocean.

Whitegate Lodge looked even more Gothic and bleaker than I remembered. Its grey stone walls blended so well with the monotones of sea and sky that it was a wonder it wasn’t invisible. It was a perfectly camouflaged backdrop except for the trees which stood like black silhouettes, their bare branches stretching up like pleading arms.

It was a bleak house in a bleak landscape and my heart sank when I saw the rows of windows, the glass glinting like gunmetal steel in the half-light of this winter morning. Granny always said the windows were the soul of a house and, if this pithy saying was true, then I was looking at a pretty depressing and heartless house. Although we had no luxuries at home, our basics at least included cheap and cheerful flowery curtains.

I walked up the drive, wondering if I had got the date wrong but I recalled Mrs Barrie had specifically mentioned the second of January. Because the front of the house was so dark and unwelcoming, I set off along a side path which wound through the shadows of the trees. Thankfully I saw one window showing a rectangle of golden light.

I rang the bell on the solid wooden door and its sound reverberated like a chiming gong in a cavern. I could well imagine this bell echoing right up to the attics. There was a moment of silence. I was wondering whether I should ring once more when the door was suddenly yanked open by a tall, thin woman, annoyance deeply etched on her face. She wore a bottle-green sleeveless pinny over a mud-coloured dress, a combination of colours that, even to my untrained and unfashionable eye, was depressing.

She wiped her hands on a cloth and glared at me. ‘Well, what do you want?’ she snapped like a whippet chasing a rabbit and angrily realising the rabbit was winning.

This must be the housekeeper, I thought, forgetting, in my confusion, her name.

‘I’m Ann Neill,’ I said, trying to sound cheerful and competent but obviously failing miserably on both counts. ‘I start my new job today as a housemaid.’

This admission was met with a bad tempered grunt. ‘Well, I suppose you’d better come into the kitchen.’ She turned away and walked down a long corridor towards a patch of light that shone as a yellow square on the dark but highly polished linoleum.

Before we reached the door, a putrid smell of burning toast wafted out to meet us in a blue hazed cloud. The housekeeper darted forward with a howl of rage. ‘Look what you’ve made me do, now!’ she shouted, pulling the grill pan from the gas flame. Two pieces of toast lay on the rack, their black shapes not so much burnt as cremated.

She turned to me with a snarl. ‘If you hadn’t arrived at this unearthly hour, then this would never have happened.’

I almost apologised but instead I said quietly, ‘I was told to report for work today at 8 a.m. and I’m just doing what Mrs Barrie told me to do.’

She looked at me, her pale, fishlike eyes summing me up and I knew without a doubt that I had made an enemy.

Wonderful, I thought, ten minutes into my new job and I had already antagonised Miss What’s-her-name.

Her summing-up complete, she snapped again, ‘Well, young madam, you can start by cleaning out all the fireplaces – there’s one in the lounge and another in the morning room. Then, when Mrs Barrie has finished her breakfast and I mean when …’ she drove home the point by slapping another two slices of bread on the pan, ‘you can clean out her bedroom. Then light the fire in the bedroom and the morning room but just set the one in the lounge.’

My head was spinning with all these rooms and I suddenly wished I was back at the Overgate. I was thinking that living in a house with one room and a converted cupboard was perhaps no bad thing.

She handed me a heavy housemaid’s box filled to the brim with polish, Brasso, Zebo black lead, emery paper and dusters. ‘The grates all get black-leaded before you light them and all the brassware gets cleaned. Now away you go and I’ll be along later to inspect your work because there will be no slacking here, girl.’

She picked up a massive wooden tray but turned as she reached the door, a self-satisfied smirk on her face. ‘Oh, by the way, I will be deducting the price of the burnt toast from your wages.’ This remark seemed to cheer her up and she smiled to herself. Her thin lips were clamped together in a straight line but the smile failed to reach her eyes. ‘Yes, indeed, my girl.’

I watched as she made her way down the passage. A cold feeling grew in the pit of my stomach. I had seen a smile like that before in one of my library books – on a shark.

The passage led on to a large hall that I remembered from my earlier visit and I was able to find the morning room as this was where I’d had my interview. The room was in darkness and I pulled the thick chenille curtains apart but little light penetrated this dismally dark room. I saw the ugly, leafless trees through the rain-streaked window and I thought they held a hint of menace in their wet branches that were encrusted with a creeping green moss.

The fireplace was a small one and I worked quickly – after all, it was a job I had tackled hundreds of times. I did notice the brasses were brown and dingy with the accumulation of smoke and, if the housekeeper said these were cleaned every day, then she was lying.

After finishing my chores in that room, I went in search of the posh-sounding lounge. Maddie’s parents had a lounge as well and it seemed that only the rich people had this superfluous room in their houses. The rest of us spent our lives in one room where every human need took place – sleeping, eating, washing and laundering, also cooking and recreation – all within twelve feet or sometimes even smaller.

There were two other ornately carved doors in the hall and a grand staircase that swept upwards in a positive delight of russet-coloured carpeting and deep brown polished banisters. I poked my head round one door only to discover it was a large dining room. It had a fireplace but a huge ugly embroidered fire screen, with enormous claw feet, stood on the tiled hearth. It looked like it was guarding some hidden treasure.

Right, I thought, it must be the other door so I carried the heavy box towards it. Years later and long after Whitegate Lodge was just a memory, I was always able to recall my delight at my first sight of this wonderful room. Whilst the morning room was dark and sinister, this room was all light and beauty. The large bay window overlooked the sea and a large ornamental mirror which stretched from the skirting board to the picture rail on the opposite wall reflected this seascape. It was like being on an ocean liner. The assorted settees and chairs were all covered in a fabric riotously printed with huge cabbage roses in a kaleidoscope of colours ranging from pale pink to deep crimson. The matching crimson carpet felt thick and luxurious under my feet and I had never seen such luxury before. Even Mrs Pringle’s lounge faded into insignificance compared to this splendour.

A compact baby grand piano stood in one corner, its dusty surface covered with silver-framed photographs. The best part of this room however was the bookcase which filled one entire wall. It was filled with lovely leather-bound books. There were none of the usual dog-eared books in this collection and I thought of old Mr Jackson who owned the second-hand bookshop on the Hilltown. How his eyes would have brightened at this display.

I walked towards the bookcase, my footsteps muffled by the thick carpet but thankfully I heard the clatter of the breakfast tray outside the door so I hurried over to the very ornate fireplace with its cold-looking marble mantelpiece. I was scooping the dead ashes into my pail when she appeared. Pretending I hadn’t noticed her, I carried on with my chore. She stood for a moment then left, closing the door silently behind her. I had the impression that this would be the pattern of my work here with her creeping up behind me, checking and watching. At that moment I was grateful for my acute hearing. It had always been a family joke, this ability to hear the slightest sound and this talent, if that is what it was, had got better since Lily’s birth. It was as if my ears had become finely tuned to the baby. She only had to give the slightest whimper and I would hear her. I was happy to sit up at night and feed her with her bottle of milk – it enabled Granny to have a well-earned rest.

Suddenly I felt homesick as a surge of misery swept over me. I missed our small kitchen and the warm presence of my grandparents. How would they cope on their own? Still my financial help would be a blessing and I knew that everyone in life had their ups and downs.

The good side of this job, apart from the money, was Mrs Barrie, Mrs Peters the cook and this lovely book-filled lounge. The bad side was definitely Miss Hood. I wondered where the cook was as I hadn’t seen her but maybe it was her day off.

Rising from my knees, I was about to leave the room when I saw a blackbird reflected in the mirror. Almost fainting from fright, I wheeled round to see it standing with a cheeky expression on the windowsill. It peered at me briefly before flying away. Although I hadn’t worried unduly about Ma Ryan’s warning at the time, it now came back to me with such clarity that I was transfixed to the spot. This is stupid, I thought, giving myself a mental shake. It was only a small bird, for heaven’s sake, and not a man-eating tiger. Still the warning niggled me, lying in my mind like a dormant seed only to explode into a panic-filled moment on seeing the bird.

The spectre of Miss Hood forced me to move and I met her in the kitchen. To my immense relief I saw Mrs Peters in her bright flowered overall which stretched over her ample girth. She was standing at the sink, humming a cheery tune.

She smiled when she saw me, much to Miss Hood’s annoyance. ‘So you’ve started then, young Ann?’ she said as she busied herself with a collection of pots.

This clattering noise almost drowned out her singing and this mixture of sounds obviously irritated the housekeeper. She pursed her lips tightly and her whole face screwed up, turning the fine lines into deep wrinkles.

It was clear she wanted to be out of the kitchen so she called me over to another smaller sink which was full of vegetables. ‘You can peel these then, afterwards, come and report to me. You have your lunch at midday and your supper at six o’clock. After washing the mistress’s dinner dishes at eight o’clock, you will be free till six o’clock tomorrow morning.’ She turned on her heel and took her colourless personality away.

Mrs Peters made a derisive snort, like a pig searching for scraps. ‘Heavens, she’s got your day mapped out for you, hasn’t she?’

I turned towards the sink, a dull feeling of hunger making me feel sick, and I now wished I had eaten the bar of chocolate that had been Danny’s goodbye gift to me. This hunger was made worse by the smell of toast and the sound of the kettle boiling, sending waves of steam in my direction.