It Happened at Christmas Read online

  ‘Well, I must say you have a great deal to say for yourself for a person who arrives at my door looking like a half-starved cat. You are not from ’round here.’

  ‘No, sir.’

  ‘So what brings you here, then?’

  ‘I need work. I saw that this is a big house, and I thought that maybe…’

  ‘I’d be mad to take on another housekeeper to pick my pockets and attempt to either starve or poison me. And why should I when I can rack up at a hotel and oversee my mills from there?’

  ‘A man needs his own roof over his head,’ Marianne told him daringly, drawing courage from the fact that he had not thrown her out immediately. She was pretty certain that this man would want to stay in his own house, and would not easily tolerate living under the rule of anyone else.

  ‘And a woman needs a clever silken tongue if she is to persuade a man to provide a roof over hers, eh, little cat?’

  Marianne looked down at the floor, sensing that his mood had changed and that he was turning against her.

  ‘It is work I am looking for, sir—honest, decent work. That is all,’ she told him quietly. She could feel him weighing her up and judging her, and then putting that judgement into the scales to be weighed against his past experience and his cynicism.

  ‘And you reckon you can set this place to order, do you, with this honest, decent work of yours?’

  Why was she hesitating? she thought. Wasn’t this what she wanted—why she had come here? The kitchen might be untidy and chaotic, but at least it was warm and dry. Where was she to go if she was turned away now? Back to where she had come from? Hardly. Yet still she hesitated, warned by something she could see in the arrogant male face with its winter-sky-grey eyes. His gaze held a hint of latent cruelty, making her feel that if she stepped over the threshold of this house and into his domain she would be stepping into danger. She could turn back. She could walk on into the town and find work there. She could…

  A gust of wind rattled the windows and the door slammed shut—closed, Marianne was sure, not by the force of the wind but by a human hand.

  ‘Yes.’ Why did she feel as though she had taken a very reckless step into some dark unknown?

  She could still feel him looking at her, assessing her, and it was a relief when he finally spoke.

  ‘So, tell me something of the cause of such an urgent need for work that it has brought you out on such a night and to such a place. Got turned off by your mistress, did you?’

  Although his voice had a rich northern burr, it was not as strong as that of the departing housekeeper. She could hear the hostility and the suspicion in it, though.

  ‘No!’

  ‘Then what?’

  ‘Beggars can’t be choosers, sir,’ she replied quietly, looking not at him but down at the floor. It had taken more than one whipping before she had known that it was not her right to look her betters in the eye.

  ‘Beggars? You class yourself as such, and yet you are aspiring to the post of a housekeeper?’

  ‘I know the duties of a housekeeper, sir, and have carried them out in the past. On this occasion, though, I was not in any expectation of such an elevated post.’

  ‘Elevated? So you think that working for me as my housekeeper would be a rare and juicy plum of a post, do you?’

  ‘I had not thought of it in such terms, sir. Indeed, I had not thought of taking that position at all—you are the one who has done that. All I was looking for was the chance of work and a roof over my head.’

  ‘But you have worked as a housekeeper, you say?’

  ‘Yes, sir.’ It was, after all, the truth.

  ‘Where was your last post?’

  ‘In Cheshire, sir. The home of an elderly lady.’

  ‘Cheshire! So what brings you to Lancashire?’

  The baby, who had fallen asleep, suddenly woke up and started to cry.

  ‘What the devil?’ He snatched up a lantern from the table and held it aloft, anger pinching in his nostrils and drawing down the corners of his mouth into a scimitar curve as he stared at them both. ‘What kind of deceit is this that you try to pass yourself off as a servant when you have a child?’

  ‘No deceit, sir. I am a respectable widow, forced to earn a living for myself and my child as best I can.’

  ‘No one employs a woman with a child as a servant.’

  It was true enough. Live-in domestic staff were supposed to remain single. Housekeepers might be given the courtesy title of ‘Mrs,’ but they were certainly not supposed to have a husband, and most definitely not a child.

  ‘I was in service before my marriage,’ she answered his charge, speaking the truth once again.

  ‘So you’re a widow, are you? What happened to your husband?’

  ‘He died, sir.’

  ‘Don’t bandy words with me. I don’t have the temperament for such women’s ways. There’s no work here for the likes of you. You might have more luck in one of the bawdy houses of Manchester—or was that how you came by your brat in the first place?’

  ‘I am a respectably married woman.’ Marianne told him angrily. ‘And this child, my late husband’s child, was born in wedlock.’

  ‘I’m surprised you haven’t had the gall to farm it out to someone else, or left it outside a chapel door to add to the problems of some already overburdened parish. Without it you might have convinced me to give you some work.’ He was walking towards the door, obviously intending to force her to leave.

  It was too late now for her to wish that she had not allowed her pride to overrule her caution.

  ‘Please…’ She hated having to beg for anything from anyone, but to have to beg from a man like this one was galling indeed. However, she had given her promise. A deathbed promise what was more. ‘Please let me stay—at least for tonight. If nothing else I could clean up this kitchen. Please…’

  She hated the way he was looking at her, stripping her of her dignity and her pride, reducing her to nothing other than the miserable creature he perceived her to be.

  He gave a mirthless bark of derisory laughter.

  ‘Clean this place—in one night? Impossible! What is your name?’

  ‘Marianne—I mean Mrs…Mrs Brown.’

  Something too sharp and knowing gleamed in his eyes.

  ‘You don’t seem too sure of your surname, Mrs Brown. Could it be that you have forgotten it and that it could just as readily be Smith or Jones? Where were you wed?’

  ‘I was married in Cheshire, in the town of Middlewich, and my name is Brown,’ Marianne told him fiercely.

  ‘Aye, well, anyone can buy a cheap brass ring and lay claim to a dead husband.’

  ‘I am married. It is the truth.’

  ‘You have your marriage lines?’

  Marianne could feel her face starting to burn. ‘Not with me…’

  He was going to make her leave…

  ‘If I turn you out, you and the brat will no doubt end up on the parish, and the workhouse governors will have something to say about that. Very well, you may stay the night. But first thing in the morning you are to leave—not just this house, but the town as well. Is that understood?’

  He had gone without giving her the opportunity to answer him. Which was just as well, given the circumstances that had brought her here.

  For tonight at least she and the baby would have the warmth of this kitchen. A kitchen she had promised to clean in return for its shelter, she reminded herself, as she rocked the baby back to sleep and prayed she would be able to find some milk for him somewhere in the chaos.

  Her arms ached from carrying both the child and their few possessions, and her ankle was still throbbing. She limped over to an empty chair and placed the silent swaddled bundle down on it. Her heart missed a beat as she studied the small waxen face. She turned towards the fire glowering sullenly in the range. Ash spilled from beneath it, suggesting that it was some time since it had been cleaned out properly, and she would need a good fire burning if she was to heat enoug
h water to get this place properly clean.

  Picking up the lantern, she walked slowly round the kitchen. Half a loaf of bread had been left uncovered and drying out on the table, along with some butter, and a jar of jam with the lid left off, causing her mouth to water at the sight of it. But she made herself resist the temptation to fall on it and silence the ache of hunger that tore at her insides. Everywhere she looked she could see filthy crockery, and the floor was sticky with dirt.

  A door opened off the kitchen into a large pantry, in which Marianne was relieved to find a large pitcher of milk standing on a marble slab. Before she did anything else she would feed the baby. Another door opened down to the cellars, but Marianne decided not to bother exploring them. A good housekeeper would keep a domain like this well stocked and spotlessly clean, and it would be run meticulously in an ordered routine, to provide for the comfort of its master and mistress and their family. If the kitchen was anything to judge from, this house did not provide comfort for anyone.

  In the back scullery Marianne found a sink piled high with dirty pots. The pain in her ankle had turned into a dull ache, so she found a small pan, unused and clean enough to need only rinsing under a tap before she put some milk in it to heat up for the baby. He was so very, very frail. Tears filled her eyes.

  Ten minutes later she was seated in the rocking chair she had drawn up to the range, feeding the baby small pieces of bread soaked in the warm milk into which she had melted a teaspoon of honey and beaten a large fresh egg. He was so weak that he didn’t even have the energy to suck on the food, and Marianne’s hand shook as she gently squeezed so that the egg and milk mixture ran into his mouth.

  It was over an hour before she was satisfied with the amount of nourishment he had been able to take, and then she removed the swaddling bands to wash him gently in a bowl of warm water in front of the range. After she had dried him, she used a clean cloth she had found to make a fresh clout for him. He was asleep before she had finished, and Marianne put him down in a wicker basket she had found in the larder, which she had lined with soft clothes she had warmed on the range.

  Was it her imagination, or was there actually a hint of warm pink colour in his cheeks, as though finally he might begin to thrive?

  Marianne turned her attention to the range, ignoring the aching misery of her ankle as she poked and raked at the old ashes until she had got the fire blazing brightly and the discarded ash swept into a bucket ready to be disposed of. An empty hod containing only a couple of pieces of coke told her what the range burned, but whilst in a properly organised household such a hod—and indeed more than one—would have been ready filled with coke, so that the range could be stoked up for the night, in this household no such preparation had been made.

  There was no help for it. Marianne recognised that she was going to have to go out into the yard and find the coke store, otherwise the range would go out.

  The wind had picked up during the time she had been inside, and it tore at her cloak, whipping it round her as she held a lantern aloft, the better to see where the coke supply might be. To her relief she found it on her third search of the yard. But again, just like the kitchen, the store was neglected, and without a cover to keep the rain from the coke. The handle of the shovel she had to use to fill the hob was gritty, but she set her jaw and ignored the discomfort.

  She had just finished filling the hod when she felt something cold and wet slither against her ankles. She had lived in poverty long enough to know the creatures that haunted its darkness, nor did it surprise her that there should be rats so close to the house. Instead of screaming and running away, she gripped the shovel more firmly and then raised it, ready to despatch the too-bold vermin.

  ‘Miaouww.’

  It was a cat, not a rat. Half wild, starving, and probably infested with fleas. Marianne tried to shoo it away, but as though it sensed her instinctive sympathy for it the cat refused to go.

  Perhaps she would put out a saucer of milk for it if it was still there in the morning, Marianne decided, as she shooed it away a second time. She started pulling the hod back across the yard, but its weight forced her to rest several times before she finally reached the back door. She leaned against it, then pushed it open and dragged the hod into the kitchen. Her ankle was still swollen and aching, but at least she had not twisted it so severely that she could not walk, she reflected gratefully.

  First thing in the morning she intended to find out if the Master of Bellfield employed an outside man to do such things as bring in the kindling and fuel to keep the fires burning. If he didn’t, then she was going to insist that he provided her with a wheelbarrow, she decided breathlessly as she opened the range doors and stoked up the fire. Properly banked down it should stay in until the morning.

  She stood up and stepped back from the fire to check on the baby, who thankfully was still sleeping peacefully. When she looked back towards the fire she saw to her bemusement that the cat was sitting in front of it, basking in its warmth. It must have slipped in without her noticing when she had brought in the hod. Its fur was a silky soft grey, thick and long, and beautifully marked. Marianne stared at it in astonishment as it looked back at her with an unblinking gaze. She frowned, remembering how long ago, as a child, her aunt had taken her to visit a friend of hers. She had been entranced by the cat that lived there because of its beautiful long coat. It had been a special and very expensive, very aristocratic breed, she remembered her aunt’s friend informing them.

  But, no matter how aristocratic its coat, the cat couldn’t possibly stay inside. Marianne went briskly towards it, scooping it up. Beneath its thick coat she could feel its bones and its thinness. Surely that wasn’t silent reproach she could see in those eyes? Marianne hesitated. It wouldn’t hurt to give it a saucer of milk and let it stay inside for a while. It would be company for her whilst she set to work cleaning the kitchen.

  Telling herself that she was far too soft-hearted, Marianne returned the cat to the hearth and poured it some milk.

  Even the way it lapped from the saucer was delicate and dainty, and when it had finished it set to immediately cleaning its face, before curling up into a tight ball and going straight off to sleep.

  Lucky cat, Marianne reflected, as she covered the baby’s basket with some muslin netting, just in case the cat should be tempted to climb into the basket whilst her back was turned. Marianne had never forgotten hearing her aunt’s cook telling the most dreadful story of how in one place she had worked the mistress of the house had gone mad with grief after her pet cat had got into the nursery and lain on top of the baby, smothering it to death.

  The pans of water she had set to boil whilst she had been out filling the hod were now bubbling and spitting with the hot water she needed to start washing the dirty crockery that seemed to have been left where it had been used. Marianne had no idea how anyone could tolerate so much disorder.

  It took her the best part of another hour, but at length the crockery was washed and dried and put back on dresser shelves that she’d had to wipe down first to remove the dust and grease.

  She was so tired—too tired now to want to eat the bread and jam that had made her mouth water so much earlier. But she could not sleep yet. There was still the table to scrub down and bleach, and the floor to be cleaned, the range to be stoked up again for the morning, and the baby to be fed again—if he could be coaxed into taking a little more bread. Refusing to give in to her own exhaustion, Marianne set to work on the table.

  The mixture of strong carbolic soap and bleach stung her eyes as she scrubbed, and turned her hands red and raw, but there was still a sense of accomplishment and pleasure in being able to stand back from the table to survey her finished handiwork.

  The glow from the oil lamps was now reflecting off a row of clean shiny pans above the range, and the air in the kitchen smelled fresh instead of stuffy. The baby gave a small thin cry, signalling that he was waking up, and the cat, no doubt disturbed by the sound, uncurled itself an
d stretched.

  Washing her hands carefully, Marianne headed for the pantry—and gave a small shriek as she opened the door to see three or four mice scattering in the lantern light, a tell-tale trail of flour trickling from one of the many bags of foodstuffs stacked on the larder floor.

  A streak of grey flashed past her to pounce on a laggard mouse, before despatching it with swift efficiency and then padding towards Marianne to drop the small body at her feet.

  ‘So, you’re a good mouser, are you? Well, then, between us we should be able to get this kitchen into a proper state. That’s if the Master of Bellfield will allow us to stay,’ she warned the cat, which, having accepted its due praise, retrieved its trophy—much to Marianne’s relief.

  The baby’s basket would be safer tonight placed up on the table, she decided a few minutes later, watching in relief as the baby fed sleepily on his milk and egg bread. Marianne thought he was already a little bit heavier and stronger, and she prayed that it might be so. There had been so many times during the dark days since his father’s death when she had feared that he too might slip away from her.

  Fed and changed, the baby was restored to his cosy bed, now safely elevated away from any wandering mice daring enough to creep past the cat. Marianne ignored her own tiredness to set to work on the kitchen floor, which she could see needed not only rushing but a good scrubbing as well…

  Marianne had no idea what time it was when she finally emptied away the last bucket of water and squeezed out the mop. All she did know was that the kitchen floor was now clean enough for even its master to eat his dinner off, and that she herself was exhausted.

  The baby was still fast sleep, and so it seemed was the little cat—who for a while had sat up to watch her whilst she worked, as though wanting to oversee what she was doing. She felt so very tired, and so very dirty. Marianne stretched out in front of the fire, her too-thin body greedy for its heat. In the hallway, beyond the green-baize-covered door that separated it from the kitchen, a clock chimed the hour—but Marianne was already fast asleep and unable to hear it.