The River Folk (17 page)

Mary Ann stared back at the woman unflinchingly. Far from being daunted by the cook’s animosity, she saw it as a challenge.

In the last year or so since the tragedy of Waterman’s Yard, as it had been headlined in the local newspaper, Mary Ann had changed. Welcomed into the Ruddick family household, she had been spoiled and petted by them all. Bessie and Bert had immediately treated her as their daughter, as if she had been born to them late in life, the gift of their dreams.

For the boys, she had been a younger sister to be teased and spoiled and protected and each, in their own way, had done so. The extended family, the other inhabitants of the Yard, had shown her nothing but sympathy, and Mary Ann had blossomed in the warmth of their affection like a flower under the sun’s warm rays. Her life would have been perfect if it had not been for the dreadful shadow of her father’s crime. There was not a person in the town who did not know all about it and who she was. Whilst the residents of the Yard might be kindly, other people were less understanding. There was no escape unless she went right away, but that would mean leaving Dan and the rest of his family.

‘The best way,’ Miss Edwina had counselled, ‘is to hold your head high and live through it. I know it’s difficult, especially when you’re so young, but it’s the only way. You can’t run all your life, Mary Ann. Wherever you go, however far away from here, people have a habit of finding out about you, and you would have to run again and go on running.’

Mary Ann had agreed. ‘I don’t want to leave here, Miss Edwina. You and Auntie Bessie and everyone in Waterman’s Yard have been so kind to me,’ she said winningly. But the real reason why she wanted to stay in Elsborough Mary Ann had kept to herself.

During the time that the trial of Sid Clark and the impending death sentence upon him were constantly in the news, there had been no respite from people’s interest in her. Not until the sentence had been carried out could Mary Ann begin to build her new life.

‘I want to go, Auntie Bessie,’ she had declared the day before her father was due to be hanged at nine o’clock in the morning at Lincoln prison.

Bessie had looked at her aghast. ‘Oh love, whatever for?’

The girl had shrugged. ‘I just need to go. I need to be there.’

‘You mean . . .’ Bessie had faltered, for once completely lost for words. ‘You want to see him once more before . . .?’

At this, Mary Ann had shaken her head vehemently. ‘Oh no, I never want to see him again.’ Her dark eyes had held Bessie’s and her mouth had hardened as she said, ‘I just want to be there to know he’s really dead and never coming back.’

Bessie had put her arms around her and tried to draw the girl’s rigid body close. ‘Aw love, he’s been found guilty. Even if he was to get a last-minute reprieve and they didn’t hang him, he’s never going to get out of jail again. I promise you, he’s never coming back.’

It had been Dan who had taken her, very early the following day, to Lincoln. They had stood in the grey, dank morning outside the grim walls of the prison on top of the hill. There was a small gathering and Mary Ann caught brief snatches of the murmured conversations around her.

‘They reckon he’s not shown a scrap of remorse at what he’s done.’

‘The bastard!’

‘Aye, well, he were a conchy, weren’t he? What can you expect?’

‘Too cowardly to fight the enemy, eh, but he could batter his poor wife to death . . .’

‘There’s a kiddie, isn’t there? A girl?’

‘Aye, poor wench. She’ll be an orphan after this morning’s work.’

‘’Spect it’ll haunt her for the rest of her life.’

Mary Ann stood stolidly silent. Not so much as the twitch of a muscle or the flicker of an eyelid betrayed the fact that she had overheard. Only Dan, squeezing her hand in comfort, knew.

The words went on, floating around her head.

‘He’s not long now. It’s gone eight. The chaplain will be with him now.’

‘Then he’ll be taken from the condemned cell to a room right next to the scaffold,’ one man said, and added, almost with a note of pride, ‘I’ve seen the place.’ Then he gave a dramatic shudder. ‘By heck! I wouldn’t want to be in his shoes at this moment.’

Now Mary Ann’s fingers tightened on Dan’s hand, although neither of them spoke or even glanced at each other.

At a quarter to nine, they heard the distant tolling of the prison bell and then, just as the hour of nine o’clock struck, they saw a black flag being hoisted on the prison tower.

‘That’s it, then,’ a voice behind them said. ‘That’s him done for. And good riddance, I say.’

The murmuring amongst the crowd seemed to grow louder and when, a few minutes later, a warder appeared at the door and attached two notices to a board on the wall outside, the onlookers surged forward. The declaration, signed by the Under Sheriff of Lincolnshire, the Governor and the Chaplain of the prison, stated that ‘the judgement of death was this day executed on Sidney Clark’. Beside it, another notice announced that a surgeon had examined the body and pronounced the said Sidney Clark dead.

‘Come on, love,’ Dan said softly. ‘Time we went home.’

Mary Ann slipped her arm through Dan’s and turned her back on the place where her father had died. She would never, she vowed silently, think of him again.

‘Well,’ Nellie Goodrick said, ‘I suppose Clara had better take you up to Miss Edwina’s room.’

Mary Ann smiled her best smile and even dropped a tiny curtsy. ‘Thank you, Mrs Goodrick,’ she said prettily.

Clara Dobson was as sour-faced as the cook and took no pains to conceal her resentment of the newcomer. ‘Miss Edwina’s never had a maid before. What she wants to bring you here for, I don’t know. I’ve always done everything for her.’

For the moment, Mary Ann kept her mouth tightly shut, even pressing her lips together to stop them mouthing the retort that sprang to her lips.

The other girl grumbled on. ‘You needn’t think yourself above the rest of us. You’ll have to muck in and help with the housework, like everyone else has to.’ Mary Ann felt her belligerent glance. ‘We’re not exactly overloaded with servants here. It’s a big old house and takes a lot of looking after.’

She’s right there, Mary Ann thought, as she followed the girl. It is a very old house.

They passed through the great hall, which was the very centre of the medieval house. There was little furniture in the room, but the vast timber arched roof was awesome. Each roof-truss was cut from a naturally curving oak tree and carved by craftsmen long since gone.

Mary Ann gazed about her. For a brief moment, she felt strangely in awe of the room’s size.

‘Through here,’ said her unwilling guide sharply, leading the way up a wooden spiral staircase towards the east wing, where the furnishings gave the old rooms a more modern appearance, along passages that nevertheless still creaked with age, until Clara opened a bedroom door and stood aside for Mary Ann to enter. ‘Here you are, then. You’d best get busy being Miss Edwina’s personal maid. And don’t ask me what you’re to do, ’cos I aren’t helping you. Not ever. So don’t ask.’

Mary Ann passed close to her, entered the room and looked about her. Whilst the walls and ceilings could not hide their age, the furnishings were pretty and feminine, indicative of the young woman who slept there.

Mary Ann turned and, with a smile that dimpled her cheeks and lit up her eyes, said in response to the sullen maid’s statement, ‘I won’t, Clara. Believe me, I won’t.’

‘How’ve you got on, then? Everything all right?’

Bessie was waiting at the door for her on the following Sunday afternoon, just like any anxious mother awaiting the return of her daughter for the first time since starting work.

Mary Ann gave a little skip and ran the last few steps across the yard to throw her arms around the woman she thought of as her mother now. ‘It was all right. I don’t see much of Miss Edwina because she’s at school all day. But I clean her room from top to bottom, just like you’ve taught me. And I sort out all her clothes and tidy all her drawers.’ Mary Ann laughed and the merry sound echoed around the yard. ‘For someone who’s so good at needlework, there’s a lot of her things need mending. Miss Edwina might have shown me how to do pretty stitches, but you’ve shown me how to darn and mend, Bessie, and that’s going to be a lot more use to me now.’

Bessie hugged the girl to her. She had missed her. Even though she was only a street or two away, the house where Mary Ann now lived and Bessie’s home in Waterman’s Yard were worlds apart. But Bessie knew every inch of the inside of The Hall and she had been imagining Mary Ann’s every move during the days she had been away.

‘What were the rest of the staff like with you? And the master and the mistress?’

‘I only saw the master striding through the great hall,’ Mary Ann began as Bessie drew her into the warm kitchen and fussed over her. ‘The mistress came into Miss Edwina’s room once to see what I was doing. She seems a nice lady, but she always looks so sad and . . . and vague, somehow. As if she’s not quite aware of what’s going on around her.’

Bessie’s face was sober. ‘She’s lost her boy. Her eldest son. Her firstborn. Think how I’d feel if I lost Dan.’

Mary Ann’s eyes were horrified. ‘Don’t, Auntie Bessie. Don’t say such a thing.’

‘It’s all right, love.’ Bessie patted the girl’s arm, angry with herself that she had touched on even the thought of a personal tragedy. Mary Ann had already had more than her share of trouble without imagining more. Swiftly, bringing the conversation back to safer ground, Bessie said, ‘What did the mistress say to you?’

‘She just asked me if I was all right and that she hoped I’d be happy with them.’

‘That was kind,’ Bessie murmured and added, ‘and the rest of the staff. What was Nellie Goodrick like with you?’

Mary Ann laughed. ‘I reckon her face’d turn milk sour.’

Bessie chuckled. ‘Poor Nellie. She came as a kitchen maid just before I left to marry my Bert and she was a poor scrawny thing then.’

‘And,’ Mary Ann went on, ‘Clara Dobson reckons I’ve taken her job so she’s very unfriendly.’

‘Oh dear, that’s a shame.’

Mary Ann shrugged and there was a tight determination to her mouth. ‘She doesn’t bother me.’

‘What’s your own room like?’

Mary Ann, like all the other servants at The Hall, was obliged to live in. She pulled a face. ‘All right, except that I have to share with Clara and neither of us are happy about that.’

‘And, er . . .’ Bessie seemed hesitant now. ‘And what about Mr Randolph? Have you met him yet?’

‘No. He’s away.’

‘Ah. Now, you just be careful of him, love. He’s got a bit of a reputation where pretty young housemaids are concerned.’

‘Don’t worry about me, Auntie Bessie. I can take care of myself.’ Mary Ann put her head on one side and listened. Hearing no other movement in the house except for the sounds in the kitchen, she said, ‘Where is everyone?’

‘Bert’s upstairs on the bed, snoring his head off after the big Sunday dinner I’ve just given him. By the way, I’ve saved you a plateful if you want it, love.’

‘And the others?’

‘They’re off out somewhere. Don’t ask me where.’

‘And Dan? Where’s Dan?’

‘So you’re the new little maid?’

Mary Ann, sitting in a window seat, her back to the latticed, leaded window, her head bent over her needlework, looked up to see a man standing a few feet in front of her. Without doubt, he was the most handsome man she had ever seen. Handsomer, even, than Dan, she had to admit. He was tall with smooth fair hair and a broad forehead. His nose was long and straight and his jaw strong and square. Indeed, his features were so well balanced they could have been carved by an artist’s chisel. His mouth curved in a mocking smile and he held his head slightly on one side, one fair eyebrow raised in a sardonic question.

He moved closer. His voice was rich and deep as he asked her, ‘And what is your name, young lady?’

She stood up, laid her work aside and bobbed a little curtsy. ‘Mary Ann, sir. You must be Mr Randolph.’

He laughed softly. ‘So you’ve heard about me?’

‘Miss Edwina has spoken of you, sir.’

This was quite true, for Edwina had said only that morning before leaving to go to her school, ‘My brother returns today.’ She had smiled and added, ‘He’s a handsome devil, Mary Ann, and unfortunately he is only too well aware of it. He’s also a shameless flirt with pretty young girls. You, my dear, fall into that category, so please be warned.’

Her words had been spoken with humour and yet there had been an underlying caution in them and they had echoed Bessie’s earlier warning. Standing before him now, Mary Ann could see why. Young though she was, she could see the interest sparking in his eyes as his glance travelled slowly and appraisingly up and down her slim body. Mary Ann returned his stare steadily, not in the least fazed by his interest in her.

‘You’re a bold one,’ he murmured. ‘New maids usually blush and simper on meeting me.’

Mary Ann smiled, knowing that her own brown eyes were full of mischief.

He moved closer still and reached out, touching her chin with his forefinger. Nearer now, she could see that his eyes were a startlingly bright blue.

‘We shall have to become better acquainted, Mary Ann.’

‘Randolph.’

He let his hand fall away as they both heard Edwina speak behind them. She entered the long room and came towards them smiling. ‘Now, now, you leave my little Mary Ann alone. Besides, unless I’m much mistaken, Mary Ann has eyes for no one but Dan Ruddick. Isn’t that right, Mary Ann?’ Without waiting for confirmation or denial, she continued, holding her face up to Randolph for his brotherly kiss, ‘And he’s a big burly skipper of one of Mr Price’s keel boats that goes up and down the river. So you’d better beware.’

She patted her brother’s chest playfully and then moved to pick up Mary Ann’s needlework.

‘That’s very good, my dear. Excellent, in fact.’ She looked up and smiled. ‘I think you’ll achieve your dream one day of being able to embroider a banner for the church. What do you say, Randolph?’ Edwina held out the circular embroidery frame, which held the stretched piece of peach-coloured satin upon which Mary Ann had been working in coloured silks.