Yes, Mama. Helen Forrester
of the Reverend Clarence Browning, a gentleman with small private means bent on a career in the church. A divorce between her parents, or even a separation, might put an end to his hopes of obtaining a bishopric one day.
Humphrey loved Florence. She was the only person to whom he showed any real affection. Her marriage portion had been as handsome as he could make it. Though at this moment he itched to beat her mother to death, he knew he would never make a single move that might injure his little Flo. When Alicia’s time came, however, he thought savagely, she would not get a penny out of him.
’isn’t she lovely, Papa?’ cooed Florence.
Humphrey continued to gaze expressionlessly at the crabbed little face, as he said politely, ‘Yes, my dear.’
While Dr Willis went to use the Woodmans’ magnificent new water closet, Mrs Macdonald stood, hands folded over her apron, at the foot of the bed, waiting for the series of visitors to pass. She would stay to nurse Elizabeth for a couple of days, before handing her over to her friend, Sarah Webb, to be cared for during the rest of her ten days’ lying-in.
As Humphrey turned to leave the room, he felt suddenly drained. His anger began to subside and he thought longingly of his Mrs Jakes. Most of his friends had a little woman tucked away somewhere in the town, and Mrs Jakes was his woman. Her well-patronized sweets and tobacco shop, on the corner of one of the crowded streets behind his office in Water Street, offered a fine excuse for visiting her. His need for tobacco for his pipe and the occasional gift of sweets for his children accounted easily for his going there. When the shop was empty of customers, he would slip behind the counter and through the door to her living-quarters. She would send her dull, thick-waisted daughter to tend the shop, lock the intervening door and draw the lace curtains over the window in it. They could be very cosy together behind the lace-draped door, sitting in front of her blazing coal fire; or they could go up the stairs which led to her bedroom above. It was a discreet, mutually agreeable arrangement. Why could not Elizabeth have been equally circumspect? he fumed.
Now, ignoring his wife, he said goodnight to Mrs Macdonald and told Florence to go to bed soon. Mrs Macdonald, much experienced in these matters, drew her own conclusions.
Downstairs, Humphrey waited in his study until the doctor should be shown in. Dr Willis, when he did come, accepted a glass of port and lifted it in a toast to the newborn. Humphrey bent his head slightly in acknowledgement, but he did not raise his glass. As Dr Willis drank from his glass, his eyebrows rose slightly – so his own wife’s gossip about Elizabeth Woodman had a sound basis. Woodman was showing none of the jovial relief at a safe delivery that most men exhibited. He hastily finished his wine, put down his glass and said that he would call again the following morning, to check both mother and child.
II
Upstairs, Mrs Macdonald was deferentially solicitous and wondered privately who would pay her bill. She said, as she fussed round her patient, ‘Miss Webb wondered if you would like a bite to eat, Ma’am?’
Sarah Webb, being a spinster, would not visit her friend until the morning; not having been married, she was supposed, officially, not to know how babies arrived. The following day seemed to her to be a polite time to come up. She had, meanwhile, taken over the housekeeping, and Mrs Tibbs had had a long, uncomfortable evening as Sarah began to cope with a kitchen unused to being visited by its mistress.
Florence reinforced the suggestion of food. She said, ‘Yes, Mama, you should take something to eat. You have to keep up your strength.’ Florence was deadly tired, her bundly body aching in every direction, but she spoke brightly to her mother.
‘Very well, dear,’ Elizabeth responded wearily. ‘Tell Mrs Tibbs to make me a plain omelette and toast – and some Madeira to drink.’
Mrs Macdonald pulled at the bell rope.
Elizabeth continued to talk to her daughter. ‘I have a wet-nurse for the child,’ she told her with a wan smile. ‘I don’t propose to feed her myself. At my age …’
Florence nodded understandingly. She had not been informed of her mother’s pregnancy until a week before the birth. Elizabeth had not felt able to tell a pregnant daughter that she was expecting an infant. At forty, it was indecent to be in such a situation; she herself had not expected it to happen.
As her mother’s figure burgeoned under the flounces and heavy drapery of her elaborate dresses, the situation had been clear to Florence for some time. She was, however, much too well brought up to mention the subject until her mother cared to bring the matter up and she expressed suitable surprise when Elizabeth suddenly blurted out that she would be brought to bed within the month. She had been much alarmed that her mother would not survive and had prayed earnestly each night that she be safely delivered. Now, she thought, she must pray for herself.
As if the midwife divined her thoughts, she turned towards her and smiled faintly, ‘You look very well, if I may say so, Ma’am. You’ll soon know the joy of your own wee babe in your arms.’ There was oily comfort in every word.
‘Thank you, Mrs Macdonald,’ responded Florence graciously, ‘With your help, I’m sure I will.’
In answer to the bell, Maisie, the elderly parlour-maid, arrived and was instructed regarding a meal.
‘Tell Mrs Ford she may now come to remove the baby,’ Elizabeth told the maid. ‘I trust a fire has been made in the nursery – and in baby’s bedroom?’
‘Oh, yes, Ma’am. Fanny’s bin watching both fires ever since atternoon.’
Up in the nursery, Polly, lulled by the heat, had gone to sleep in an old easy chair set by the fireplace. In the glow of the coals, she looked softly pretty, tidier, more clean than she had ever been in her life.
When Fanny clumped in with yet another hod of coal, she woke up with a start.
‘Coom on, now,’ Fanny commanded her. ‘The Missus wants you to take the baby.’ She dumped the heavy coal hod into the fireplace, picked up a pair of tongs and lifted a couple of lumps of coal on to the blaze. ‘Maisie and Rosie’ll bring the cot up.’ She yawned enormously, her stunted little body stretching as she did so. ‘Aye, I’m that tired. Seems to me as if none of us is goin’ to get to bed tonight. And I got to be up at five, ’cos ould Tibbs raises Cain if she don’t have a hot oven by six o’clock, ready to put the bread in.’
Polly got up and stretched. Then she peeked into the mirror over the dresser, to check that her hair was still neat and her cap on straight. ‘Fancy having a mirror,’ she thought to herself gleefully. She picked up the candle from the table.
‘Aye, don’t leave me in the dark,’ protested Fanny. She hastily tipped the rest of the coal into a brass coal scuttle at the side of the hearth. ‘It’s proper ghosty up here, what with Mr Charles and Mr Edward gone away and not usin’ the rooms on the other side o’ the passage.’
Polly waited for the little skivvy and then, carrying the candle, led her down the dark staircase, the coal hod clanking like chains behind her.
On the floor below lay Elizabeth’s bedroom and beside it the dressing-room in which Humphrey had slept for the last year or so. Also on this floor, lay Florence’s old bedroom, a guest room and the main drawing-room; the latter was shrouded in dust sheets, because Elizabeth could not entertain in the last months of her pregnancy; it was not the thing. At the back of the house, on this same floor, was Elizabeth Woodman’s latest status symbol, a brand new water closet and a handsome adjoining bathroom with hot and cold water which belched from shining brass taps.
‘You’re not allowed to use the water closet,’ Fanny warned Polly, as they passed it. ‘You got to come down to the closet outside the back kitchen door – or you can use a chamber-pot and empty it yourself down there. I ’aven’t got no time to be running up and down with a slop pail to clear it for yez. There’s an old slop pail in the nursery cupboard if you want to use it.’
Polly reached Elizabeth’s door at the same time