A Woman Undefeated (42 page)

All much easier said than done. She said as much to Mary
Leason, as they stood on the doorstep of Selwyn Lodge, waiting for the wagon to come with the first load of furniture.

The new maid was a slim, light haired woman in her late twenties. She had been persuaded to stay by Betty’s inducement of higher wages than those of her previous employer’s. That and the fact she could go home each night to be with her mother.

“I think Miss Rosemary will probably get round to finding me someone fer Mikey,” Maggie confided. “but, I really wanted Annie to be the nursemaid. She’s the girl who started as an apprentice sempstress yesterday, by the way.”

“Things have a habit of turning out for the best, Maggie,” Mary answered. “Look at me. I hated working away from home, especially now my dad is far from being well. I only got this job because my mother overheard Mr Williams say that Miss Rosemary was looking for a daily maid. I’ve not seen my mother run so fast down our lane, since our Albert was in danger of being bitten by a dog.”

The wagonette duly arrived, driven by Bob, and his assistant, Harry. They left the two brown cart horses with their nose bags on, and brought in the first item of furniture, a mahogany writing desk, which they carried into the drawing room. Betty had given Maggie a diagram of every room and what she wanted in it, so within the first half hour the vehicle was unloaded and the men had set off to Chester again.

“While they’re gone, I think we’ll set to and light the fires in all the rooms,” Maggie said. “I’ve brought a tinder box and Miss Rosemary said there was plenty of kindling and logs in the storeroom. I think she must have got the gardener to chop some the last time he was here. By the time we’ve finished, the men should be back again. So, let’s start in the kitchen, we could do with a cup of tea.”

They worked together very well and by the final delivery of the furniture, they were quite satisfied. They even found time to sit on the paved area and chat, though Maggie made sure she wasn’t too over familiar. Once she and Betty had moved in, Mary would
be the servant and would have to take orders from her as well, or so she presumed. They watered the plants in the conservatory too, Mary being highly delighted with the indoor garden, as she had never seen a conservatory before.

They damped down all the fires before they left, including the one in the living room, though Betty was coming to overlook their handy work later, when the shop had been closed.

Back at the dressmaker’s, Maggie spent a little time with Annie. The girl had been given a corner of the cutting out table to work on.

“Are yer enjoyin’ yerself, Annie?” she asked. “I remember when I started here, I felt all fingers and thumbs.”

“It’s better than scrubbin’ fer a livin,’ Maggie, and Miss Rosemary doesn’t clat yer round the ear if yer make a mistake, like that one did up at the school. She’s a good un’. She bought me a cream bun today to eat with me tea.”

It was the 1st August, Maggie and Mikey’s birthdays. The day started misty over the Welsh hills, but had cleared by the time Maggie had finished breakfast. No present had been sent by Jack from America, nor a message for Mikey, but had she really been expecting anything from him?

Alice fluttered about with little parcels. Mikey was given a stuffed toy, in the form of a little dog with a waggly tail. She had bought Maggie a light fringed shawl, pearl grey in colour, with red tassels. She couldn’t help herself remarking that she was sure, once Maggie had left for Selwyn Lodge, that they probably wouldn’t be seeing her wearing black again! How well Alice knew her, though she must have noticed her new pale blue outfit, waiting to be worn, on the wardrobe door.

In fact, Maggie had decided that she was going to wear the outfit that day. She had been invited to take afternoon tea with Betty, who was closing the shop at four o’clock, in her honour. Time to throw off drab colours and start thinking of blues and greens, or even a deep maroon material that she had seen. And she
had decided to thumb her nose at everyone that day, just because it was her birthday. She would even wear her hair down and go hatless. Let’s see what the gossips of Neston, would make of that!

Thinking it and doing it was an entirely different matter, so she compromised and pinned her hair up, though she didn’t wear her bonnet and covered her new dress with her birthday shawl. For the sake of her young son, she had to nod to some convention. Getting a reputation as a hoyden wouldn’t do for her future business, or do her son any good in the long run. And wasn’t she glad, when she got to the Lodge, that she had changed her thinking? Because Ezra had been invited too and he wouldn’t have approved of her appearance!

Mikey and Maggie stood in the doorway of Selwyn Lodge, while Betty fussed around, patting Mikey on the head and saying how clever he was to be walking at one year old.

“Come in, don’t stand on ceremony. Remember, you’ll be moving in here soon. Happy Birthday to the both of you. Wasn’t that clever, timing Mikey’s birthday, so you could share it forever. Come through, we have a visitor, Maggie. Our first one!”

They followed Betty through the dining room, then into the conservatory and there standing beside a tall potted palm was Ezra. Dressed in his best suit, his face full of smiles and two little presents on the table at his side.

“What have you two been plotting?” Maggie asked, feeling that, since it was her birthday, she could be a little cheeky to these two good friends.

“Nothing, we just thought it would be pleasant if the three of us were together on your special day.” This came from Betty, who had also brought two parcels and placed them at the side of Ezra’s.

“May I say, Maggie, you are looking exceedingly well today, not that you don’t always look your best. But a great improvement from when I first met you, nearly two years ago.” Ezra took her hand and bowed over it.

Whew, they must have both been at the sherry, she thought.

“Can we go out into the garden, Betty?” she asked. “It looks lovely out there today and I’m sure Mikey would love to run around. He’ll tire himself out and then I can put him in his pram’ and he can have a little sleep.”

“Yes, but let him open his presents first,” smiled Betty.

Both Betty and Ezra knelt down, to be on the same level as the wide eyed little boy. He ripped open the paper from the present excitedly, to find a solid silver rattle in one box and a wind up clown in the other. Ezra took the clown from him, wound the key and they watched it walk up and down.

Mikey was delighted, but then saw the open door of the conservatory. He tottered unsteadily through it, then proceeded to toddle round and round.

“Come Maggie, open your presents,” Betty said. “I’ll watch
Mikey while you’re opening them. I don’t want him falling in the stream.”

Betty had bought her a dressing table set in heavy cut glass. It had a jewellery tray and a matching kidney shaped bowel. They must have been in collusion, because Ezra had bought her a small vase to match and produced a little bunch of pretty flowers to go in it. She couldn’t thank them both enough. She would keep them forever, she said. The sherry was produced and a toast made to “Maggie’s eighteenth birthday.” It was a day for her to remember. A very memorable one.

“I was thinking, Maggie,” said Betty, as they sat out later on basket weave chairs, enjoying the sun.

Ezra was playing hide and seek with Mikey, so he wasn’t there to hear.

“There seems to be no point in delaying our removal, now that we have the staff to help us, and Mr Arlington won’t want all my possessions around him when he starts his job on Monday. What do you think? Would it inconvenience Alice if you were to move your belongings in here?”

“No, it shouldn’t put Alice out, she’ll welcome me getting’ out of the room. Mr Dickinson will have his bags ready and waitin’ as soon as she lets him know. It’s just that I’m goin’ to have to leave Mikey behind, because we didn’t get a nursemaid, like yer said yer would.”

“Maggie, I didn’t want to get just anybody to look after Mikey. It’s important that we find the right type of young lady. Remember, these are his formative years. At the moment he is happy in the care of Alice. If you want, you can visit him every morning, before you come to the shop. That way you will have only left him overnight and probably by now he’s sleeping the night through, so he wouldn’t even notice that you have gone.”

“I’ll notice,” she remarked sadly. “I won’t be able to listen to his breathing and know him to be safely asleep.”

“I’ll be going into Chester next Wednesday, Maggie. I have some business to do with Mr Arlington and I’ll call into a domestic agency and put our name down with them.”

“Oh yes?” Maggie said, suspiciously. “Why are yer goin’ to Chester with Mr Arlington then? I thought anything to do with business was between you and me?”

“It is. Now don’t you start getting all excitable and jumpy. Someone has to go to Chester and do the banking and that will be one of his jobs.”

“How do we know we can trust him? You’ve never complained of doing the banking and travellin’ to Chester before.”

“Has anything ever gone missing from Seagull Cottage? Have his previous employers caught him with his hand in the cash box? No, because he is an honest man and it will leave us free to concentrate on the dress making side of the business. I will introduce him first to Mr Hughes at the bank and then we’ll see Mr Hawkins, as well.”

“I suppose that will be to do with the bounty vouchers. I remember yer saying we had to get the wordin’ of the agreement right.”

“Yes, that is true. If we don’t get the wording right, regarding where and how the voucher can be spent, you can guarantee someone will find a way of defaulting. Now, here comes Ezra and little Mikey. I think that’s enough talking about business, especially today!”

“You know, Maggie, I think that colour of gown really suits you,” said Ezra looking at the birthday girl, appreciatively. “Don’t you think so, Betty?”

“I do indeed. I think, Maggie, that convention would allow you to relax your colours, now that it has been nearly six months since Jack departed. Of course it goes without saying, that you couldn’t wear bright shades. and I like the way you have toned down the size of your crinoline by not wearing the under cage. Now, I had a special cake made at the bakery, a treat for you and Mikey. Come, I’ll put the kettle on to boil and we’’ll have a slice with our afternoon tea.”

Ezra lent a hand to remove Betty and her possessions on Monday, just as the morning sun was beginning to light up the
sky. He and a local man pushed the grocer’s handcart with the bed frame, mattress and headboard on board. Another trip carried a small wardrobe, chest of drawers and personal luggage belonging to Betty. They had finished in time for “Miss Rosemary”, to welcome Mr Arlington to his new job at the Sheldon Loan and Property Company, its existence now advertised on a placard placed in the window of the shop’s first floor.

Maggie arrived at her usual time, to see Betty and Arlington disappearing together out of the front door, looking very friendly.

“Annie will let you know where we are up to, Maggie,” Betty said, as she brushed past her. “We have to go out on business, we’ll be back later, around half past four!”

“Do yer know he’s ’ad me up and down them stairs all mornin’,” Annie complained, once the new manager had gone up the High Street. “Annie, could you fetch my client and me a tray of tea? Would you be so kind to fetch me a pie from the bakery for my lunch?”

She put on a deep man’s voice and walked around the shop acting like Mr Arlington.

“I’m goin’ to suggest to Miss Rosemary that we give him a little bell. Even she seemed annoyed with him, ‘cos he was takin’ me away from what I was doing.”

“And where’ve they gone now? Any ideas?”

The trip to Chester was supposed to be on Wednesday, so she wondered what the pair of them were up to now.

“No, they seemed to be doing a lot of talkin’ upstairs in his office. She told me to tell yer, ter finish off the hem on that red dress over there and I’ve to carry on with the seams on this one here.”

“Have yer had many people passin’ through this morning and goin’ upstairs to see “His Nibs?”

“I saw the man who has the tailor shop and one or two women that I’ve seen around the village. Why, was there someone yer wanted ter see in particular? ‘ Cos, except fer him and his shouting, I’ve had me head down, yer see?”

So, it seemed that Mr Arlington was already beginning to earn his money, with clients and customers coming in all morning, and now he had taken Betty off somewhere. It was probably regarding some property if she hadn’t taken Maggie.

And so it was. When Betty came back later, minus her new employee, she had the details of several properties and shops up for sale. She looked flushed and excited and Annie was again requested to bring up a tray of tea to the office, but this time for Betty and her business partner, while they pored over all the unfamiliar words in the available property lists.

“There’s something here about which shops and houses they want a quick sale on,” Betty exclaimed. “What do you think, Maggie, shall we go for shops or some of these houses? See, there are some here on the High Street and one or two down Parkgate Road.”