The Downstairs Maid (55 page)

‘I’ve been told I’m not to say.’ Mary bit her lip. ‘I’ll tell Cook, Emily, but I will have to make her promise not to tell anyone else.’

‘Thank you.’

Emily glanced around the hall. She had come to love this house but now that Lord Barton was the master here it was unlikely that she would return to the manor again while he lived.

Distressed by the unpleasant scene with Lord Barton, Emily forgot her promise to leave Lizzie her address. All she wanted to do was to get home, fetch Jack from Vera’s house and hide away from the world – at least the people who lived here in this house.

Emily only remembered her promise to let Lizzie know where she was living three weeks later. She’d posted her latest letter to Nicolas, giving him her love and telling him what she’d been doing. Not once had she mentioned how cruel his father had been to her, because there was no point in distressing him. Emily had mentioned the funeral but not gone into details. Instead, she wrote of a voluntary group she’d joined. It was just a friendly little group of women who knitted scarves and socks for the troops and collected scrap. She’d entered Jack into a kindergarten group and thought he was better for having someone of his own age to play with. Her life was busy if not entirely happy, but how could it be while her husband was away?

The fear that someone would knock on her door with a telegram never quite left her. She knew that Nicolas had sent some money to her bank. He’d promised fifteen pounds every month, which was more than enough for Emily’s needs. So she had no need to work, though the manager of the Temperance Hotel in the High Street had approached her, asking if she would care to work for him. The wage he’d offered her would be sufficient to pay Vera to look after Jack for the hours he wasn’t at his playgroup, and had she not thought it would offend her husband’s relatives she would have taken the job. However, despite Lord Barton’s rudeness, she considered herself bound to take the family into consideration and turned down the manager’s kind offer.

Sending her letter giving her change of address to Lizzie at Sir Arthur’s estate, Emily thought no more of it. If Lord Barton had made his feelings known Lizzie might think it diplomatic to cut ties with Emily – at least until Nicolas returned home.

It was perhaps two weeks after sending her letter to Lizzie that Emily opened her door to see Jonathan Barton standing there. He looked so serious that her heart caught with fright. Her mouth was dry and something told her that his visit boded no good.

‘May I come in please, Emily?’

‘Yes, of course.’

She stepped back, inviting him in. He looked about, frowning as he took in the small rooms, which Emily had decorated with fresh paper on the walls. They were comfortable, a fire burning in the sitting room and the smell of lavender polish everywhere.

‘You’ve made this pleasant, but I thought Nicolas would have found you something better.’

‘He didn’t have time. I’m renting this until he comes home – and then he wants to live in London. I think he has some …’ Her words faded as she saw the look in his eyes and she went cold all over. ‘Nicolas …’

‘I’m so sorry, Lizzie. The War Office sent the telegram to us. Nicolas couldn’t have told them that he had changed his next of kin … he was shot down two weeks ago and is missing …’

Emily felt the room spin around her. She clutched at a chair to steady herself, then sat down with a bump on the wooden seat. He must be wrong. This couldn’t happen to her. She loved Nicolas so much and they’d been so happy … for such a short time.

‘No,’ she whispered. ‘He promised to come back to me. He put some money into the bank for me just this week …’

‘The bank does that every month, Emily, from Nicolas’s pay on his instructions. If need be – if he
is
dead, I shall tell the bank to continue it. I’m Nicolas’s executor and everything he had is for you. He wrote out his will and Mr Hattersley and I witnessed it … so if the War Office stop paying his money, I’ll make certain you still have what you need from Nicolas’s personal account.’

‘Don’t!’ Emily felt sick. How could he speak of money at a time like this? ‘I don’t want anything. I loved him. It wasn’t for the money …’ A sob rose in her throat. ‘I can’t bear it …’

Jonathan reached out, drawing her close to his chest to comfort her as she was taken by a storm of weeping. She felt his lips touch her hair. He was trying to be kind, but he wasn’t Nicolas and she didn’t want him to touch her – she didn’t want anyone but Nicolas to touch her. For a moment she was too weak to move, but then she pushed him away.

‘Emily, I’m so sorry. I had to tell you – but missing doesn’t mean dead. We may hear better news …’

Emily wasn’t listening. Her throat was tight and her eyes were burning with the tears that still gathered. ‘Please, leave me. I know I’m not welcome at the manor – but if there is a funeral … Your father told me I wasn’t welcome but …’

‘Father had no right to be rude. I had it out with him, Emily. He was angry that day because he’d learned that Lady Prior had left the manor to me. However, Lizzie and Nicolas are to have some money. My mother has a trust fund and so does my father – but most of it came to me. When we’re certain how things stand, I’ll come to see you again.’

She shook her head, turning away as the numbness started to creep over her. She didn’t want to know about wills or money or anything of the sort. All she wanted was for Nicolas to come home and take her in his arms, to hold her and love her – to tell her it was all a lie. He wasn’t dead; he couldn’t be, because without him the world seemed an empty place.

‘Please,’ she said. ‘I should like to be alone now.’

‘Are you sure? Do you want me to fetch someone for you?’

Emily shook her head. There was no one – no one would, no one could fill the empty place her life had suddenly become.

All she wanted now was to cry this terrible hurt out of her, but she knew it would never go away.

Emily wasn’t sure when she finally realised she couldn’t face living in Ely any longer. She’d waited for news of Nicolas, perhaps for the funeral if his body had been found. She bought the local paper each week, scouring it for any mention of his death or his funeral but there was never anything reported. Several times she was tempted to go to the manor and ask if anyone in the kitchens knew more, but somehow she couldn’t bring herself to go near the house.

She’d settled in her little house, but now she found the sight of familiar things almost unbearable, and she felt she needed to go away somewhere she wasn’t known. Emily didn’t want Jonathan to tell her about Nicolas’s property or his will. The payments into her bank had stopped, which seemed to confirm what Jonathan had told her. Nicolas had been reported missing but because the War Office had stopped her payments, this had to mean he’d been confirmed dead.

Once again, no one had let her know, despite Jonathan’s promise to visit her as soon as he had definite news – and to continue paying money into her account if Nicolas’s money from the War Office was stopped. She should have known, Emily thought bitterly. Even when Nicolas had been alive she hadn’t been welcome at the manor and now they didn’t want to know her.

She’d seen Lord Barton in the High Street in Ely on one occasion and he’d looked through her, clearly refusing to acknowledge that she existed – which she never had for him. It seemed to Emily that she would do better to leave, go away somewhere and try to make a new life for herself and Jack. Before long her money would dwindle and she would need to find work, because she would never ask for a penny for herself from Nicolas’s estate.

Feeling numb, Emily went through the ritual of her days until the morning she woke up and was sick three times before breakfast. When it happened again the next day and the next, she visited the doctor. His news shocked her and she left the surgery with her head in a whirl.

She was carrying Nicolas’s child! Emily’s emotions were a mixture of wonder and delight that she was having her husband’s baby and the despair she felt because Nicolas would never know. Tears trickled down her cheeks as she walked away from the doctor’s surgery.

What ought she to do now? She could not afford to carry on renting her cottage for long, because Nicolas’s money from the air force had stopped when he died and what she’d saved would not last long – and she had to think about when she had the baby and couldn’t work.

Still lost in thought she almost walked past Vera until she touched her arm. Her former employee looked at her curiously.

‘Is something the matter, Emily?’

Emily hesitated, and then told her of her discovery. She explained that she couldn’t afford to stay at her cottage for long and would need to find work.

‘Why don’t you move in with us?’ Vera asked. ‘I know we’re a bit out of Ely, but you could catch a bus in – and Ma wouldn’t charge you much rent. What kind of work were you thinking of?’

‘I thought I might ask for a job cooking or serving at the Temperance,’ Emily said. ‘They did offer me work before but I didn’t need it then.’

‘Lucky you. I tried but they wouldn’t take me …’ Vera looked thoughtful. ‘I could look after Jack, bring him in to his kindergarten school and fetch him home. He’ll be starting school properly in a year or so, won’t he?’

‘Yes, perhaps.’ Emily sighed, because she never mentioned it to anyone but she wondered whether Jack would be able to go to school. At the moment he was still a little slow, though he’d improved vastly from when Emily had found him dirty and wet. People told her he would grow out of it, but Emily wasn’t sure he would; she would face that when the time came. ‘That might be a good idea, Vera. Are you sure your mother would want us all there? I mean there’s Jack and there will be a baby in a few months.’

‘I’ll ask her and then come and tell you this evening,’ Vera said. ‘If you get the job you can pay me a bit for looking after Jack – and the baby too. I like children and it isn’t easy finding a job that Pa will let me do. He doesn’t want me to go to a factory, because he needs me sometimes on the farm.’

Vera was a sensible girl and a good worker. Emily had trusted her when she worked at the pub and she realised it was probably the best solution. She hadn’t wanted to stay so close to the manor, but if she was working all day in the kitchens and living out near Stuntney, which was in the opposite direction to Witchford and the manor, she was unlikely to see anyone from the family. The last thing Emily wanted was for them to know that she was having a child.

She didn’t want Jonathan’s pity or his money, and she knew the idea that she was carrying his son’s child would anger Lord Barton. It would be better to just disappear and let them forget her.

Vera came to Emily’s cottage that evening. Her mother was delighted with the idea of having her as a lodger. She could do with a little extra money coming in and would be happy to have Emily stay until she was ready to move on again.

Emily thanked Vera and told her she would come the next day. She decided that this time she would sell her furniture rather than putting it into store. The money she raised from selling her things would help her through the first months after the baby was born and she couldn’t work. She hoped to have her own home again one day, but for the moment she was content to stay with the kind people who had offered her somewhere to live.

She found an advert in the local paper and made a telephone call from the new red box on the corner. The man came the next day and agreed to clear the house. He offered her twenty-five pounds for everything, which Emily knew was too cheap, but it would make her that little bit more secure – and she would start again when she was ready. When she packed her things to move into Mrs Green’s house, she had only her and Jack’s clothes and a few of Pa’s trinkets, all of them chipped and valueless according to the second-hand dealer. Of course she had Nicolas’s ring and the diamond pendant he’d given her, but she would have to be desperate to sell those.

The manager of the Temperance Hotel had been eager to give her the job. He’d tasted her food at the pub and said she was the best cook he’d come across in a long time. Emily smiled and thanked him. Ted Jackson was a pleasant man, not good looking but generous and easy to get on with – and the wage he offered her was very acceptable. She was to start at three pounds a week, which was twice what the women earned in the munitions factories, doing dangerous work.

Emily had been honest and told him that she was expecting her late husband’s child, but instead of turning her away, as she’d feared, he was sympathetic and concerned. He would he said be glad to give her leave when the time came and to take her back when the child was born.

‘If you want to bring the baby in with you, I dare say we could find a space for him or her during the day. Your brother needs to be at school, but a baby is no bother to me.’

Emily smiled to herself, reflecting that babies cried a lot and needed changing at inconvenient moments, but she would not return to work until the baby was old enough to be left with her friends.

The Green family lived in a large old-fashioned farmhouse along the lonely country road to Stuntney. They had three sons who had grown up and moved out when they married, which made plenty of room for Emily and her family. Vera’s mother was a plump, bustling woman, who always had time for a chat and a cup of tea. She reminded Emily of Mrs Hattersley. She’d made it clear from the start that she was looking forward to a bit of company and the rent she charged was so small that Emily tried to make up for it by helping with chores when she could and baking sometimes.

Emily had known as soon as she moved in that she’d done the right thing. Her bedroom was large and airy and Jack had the small one leading through from hers – what they called a Jack and Jill room. It was just right because he couldn’t go running off without her seeing him and she was close enough to comfort him if he cried in the night, but he settled in instantly, enjoying being taken for a ride on the great lumbering farm horses by Mr Green. Seeing him toddling round the yard by the side of the large but gentle man, Emily’s mind had been set at rest. Mr Green was very like her father had been when he was young and strong, and she soon felt at home with the family.