The Flight of Swallows Read online

  The four girls were over at what was called the workshop, Violet, Cassie, Edna and Maudie, working on a rug each; not one of the special ones that Jenny designed and made but ordinary cottage-type rugs that the wives of working men spread before their grates. They earned five shillings for each rug they made and were free to go to Wakefield on their day off to buy whatever they fancied and on top of that they had free board and lodgings. Violet was willing, and being adept with her fingers and imaginative, was being taught by Jenny to work at what she called the ‘high-class’ end of the market, producing rugs that were out of the ordinary, meant for those with a bigger income than the cottagers and labourers who in fact could make the rag rugs themselves. She was eager to get on and she and Jenny, their babies both being girls and more or less the same age, had become friendly. They worked hard and were clean, tidy and when they went into town together bought things mainly for their children, now over a year old. Cassie was easy-going, worked diligently on the more mundane rugs and Edna admired her; what Cassie did or said, Edna did or said the same. But Maudie, who was extremely pretty, now that she had got over her initial desperation and terror at finding herself in the family way and was in a safe and comfortable home, could see no reason why she should not be allowed to please herself what she did and when she did it. She made eyes at all the men in the yard and gardens and as Kizzie warned her, if she didn’t behave she’d find herself in queer street again and she doubted if Mrs Armstrong would stand for a second fall from grace. Maudie hadn’t been knocked about by a bullying father or been attacked in the street by a prospective client but had just been careless with her favours. There had been a lad who had been willing to marry her, believing the child to be his, which she couldn’t be sure of, but she had no intention of being stuck in some cottage with a farm labourer for a husband and a baby every year. She loved Jackie, her boy, and unless she left him at the Dower House she could see no prospect of getting away, since she wouldn’t desert him, but she missed the free and easy life of prostitution. She was just sixteen and had not yet met the full horrors of her chosen profession and had grand visions of being taken up by some toff and living the life of Riley.

  She thought she already had but kept it to herself and when she slipped out after dark to meet him she made sure it was without the knowledge of the other girls. He lived in a big house not too far from the Dower House, taking her there to a fancy room upstairs and she had high hopes he might make her . . . well, she didn’t know quite what but it must be better than making bloody rugs! He had some queer ideas though. He liked her to strip naked and then whip her on her bare bum which didn’t matter, though he sometimes left bloody marks on her that she had to keep hidden from the other girls!

  They were all hard at work when Mrs Armstrong strolled round with her babies and though they had children of their own they made the effort to ‘ooh’ and ‘aah’ over them. Neither of them was a patch on Pearl or Pansy or the rest but they knew which side their bread was buttered on and Jenny, whose Rose was already toddling unsteadily about the house, with a sign to her employer, soon had them back at work, reminding them that they were paid by the ‘piece’.

  The children, six of them, were in the care of Megan, Kizzie’s sister, and Kizzie herself when she was not needed at the big house. They were having their morning nap and the two sisters were sitting with their feet to the fire with a cup of tea when Charlotte entered. They both rose respectfully and offered her one but she said she had only come over to check that all was in order. Lucy was awake and at once Megan lifted her from her perambulator and cuddled her, smiling into the dimpled and equally smiling face of the master’s daughter. When she tucked her in again she began to wail so Megan reached for her coat – she had moved on from the working woman’s shawl now she was in this grand job – and asked permission to walk over with the perambulator to her mam’s, which was not far.

  When they were alone Kizzie drew Charlotte to the fire.

  ‘Take tha’ coat off, lass, and let’s thi’ an’ me ’ave a bit of a crack,’ she said airily, and Charlotte knew at once that there was nothing ‘airy’ about whatever it was Kizzie was to tell her. Kizzie was not one for gossip.

  ‘Master seems better,’ she said. ‘’E’ll be out in’t garden afore long. Adam was only sayin’ ’e ’ad an idea fer a chair on wheels. Mind you, us’ll be seein’ ’im walkin’ as soon as nice weather comes. A bit warmer, like, an’ then—’

  ‘What is it you want to tell me, Kizzie?’ Charlotte asked her patiently. ‘We all know Brooke is improving and that he is absolutely against having a wheelchair. I was . . . well, I was hoping to interest him in . . .’

  ‘What, lass?’

  Charlotte’s face was alive with excitement and for the moment Kizzie forgot the misgivings she had about one of the girls, leaning forward, her own face alight.

  ‘A motor car!’

  ‘A motor car!’

  ‘Well, why not? It will be a while before he can ride but if he had driving lessons and could get out of the grounds it might give him something to interest him until he can climb on Max’s back. So far he is so glad to get out of that bloody bed he seems content to be able to look out at the garden. And of course, he spends time with Lucy and Ellie; honestly, you’d think Ellie was his as well as Lucy. He loves them both and sits with them on his knee talking to them as though they could understand a word. Aisling and Rosie get quite cross as though he is taking their jobs from them. Oh, Kizzie, I’m sorry, you wanted to tell me something and here am I babbling on.’

  She leaned across the lovely rag rug that Jenny had made, a scene of the evening sun just sinking into a rippling blue sea which she had taken from one of Mrs Armstrong’s art books and took Kizzie’s hands in hers, peering anxiously into her face. ‘What is it?’

  Kizzie sighed. ‘Well, they’ve all had a bad time, these girls we have here, and I must say they are on the whole grateful for the chance you are giving them—’

  ‘That’s another thing, Kizzie. If we get a motor car I shall learn to drive it as well then I shall be able to get about, looking for buyers for the rugs and . . . Oh, Kizzie, I’m sorry, there I go interrupting you again when you’re obviously worried about . . . who? Which one is . . .’

  Kizzie shook her head. She had not seen this young woman she loved so animated since her husband had been gored by the bull. That sounded wrong somehow but she had once been filled with plans for ‘her’ girls and the industry she hoped to start, arguing forcibly with her husband on the rightness of it. Then, miraculously, after his terrible injury she had fallen in love with him and could not bear to leave his side. The girls, the Dower House, the rugs and the business she intended to run had been pushed to the back of her mind. Now, it seemed Mr Armstrong was to recover, though how much would remain of the man he had once been was yet to be ascertained. But her enthusiasm at the idea of a motor car and what it would do, not only for him but for her had brought the Charlotte Armstrong Kizzie had once known back into existence. And now she, Kizzie, was to worry her with another problem.

  ‘There’s been a man seen ’angin’ around after dark at back o’t stables an’ Violet, ’oo shares a bedroom wi’ Maudie, told me, reluctantly, mind, that she thinks Maudie slips out after t’ rest are asleep to meet ’im. An’ she ’as money, more than what she earns since she’s that slow, or doesn’t care, more like. Tha’ should see’t new bonnet she wears. An’ she don’t go out wi’ any o’ t’other girls when she’s time off.’

  Charlotte leaned back in her chair and stared in horror at Kizzie. Surely Maudie, who had been through so much but had been given a second chance and finished up in a decent home with a decent job which also housed her illegitimate child, would not go down that road again. Had she not learned her lesson? Her baby was about nine months old now, a lovely little boy who any mother would be proud of, but what was to happen if Maudie should get in the family way again? She must be getting money from someone. Some man! But surely none of the m
en who worked for Brooke would secretively take up with a girl who had once been a prostitute?

  ‘What should we do, Kizzie?’ Charlotte turned to the woman who had got her through so many crises ever since Charlotte was ten years old and Kizzie herself only fourteen.

  ‘Nay, lass, nowt fer’t minute. Us don’t even . . . well, it could be anyone; a man from another . . . tha’ knows theer’s plenty o’ chaps what’d . . .’ Kizzie looked uncomfortable and in a blinding flash Charlotte became aware that Kizzie knew who it was.

  ‘Kizzie . . .?’

  ‘Nay, ’ow can I?’

  ‘Kizzie, tell me at once,’ she ordered her sternly. ‘Brooke will take him to task and have him dismissed or . . . and as for Maudie . . .’

  ‘Lass, lass, don’t.’

  ‘Who, who?’ thinking foolishly she sounded like an owl.

  ‘It’s . . . it’s tha’ faither.’

  Charlotte froze and her mouth fell open, then, ‘Don’t be ridiculous, don’t be so bloody ridiculous. My father has never . . . would never . . . with a servant girl . . .’

  ‘Tha’ don’t know what tha’ pa gets up ter, what ’e got up ter even when ’is wife – first, tha’ mam, an’ second, while they were alive. Servants talk an’ it passes from ’ouse to ’ouse. Violet ses Maudie . . . ’as whip marks on ’er bum, just like what you ’ad. It seems . . .’

  Charlotte had lost every vestige of colour from her face. She looked haunted, which she was, by old memories, memories of those scenes in the library with herself bending over the chair, naked from the waist down while her father lashed her with his riding crop or a bamboo cane. It was known that he had not been kind to his second wife, poor Elizabeth who had died, so it was whispered, because she was neglected during her confinement. That he had been riding to hounds as she slowly bled to death and now, with as much concern as if she were a kitten from the stables, he had let his lovely little daughter remain at King’s Meadow. Dear God, what was she to do? She could not allow such perverted behaviour to go on under her very nose and say nothing, do nothing. In a way she felt responsible for these girls who had fallen into her care.

  ‘We’d best have Maudie in, I suppose.’ Charlotte’s voice was weary. She wanted nothing to do with her father who had treated her and her brothers so wickedly but it seemed . . . well, who else could it be since the whole thing had his mark on it, not to mention poor Maudie’s behind. Poor, pretty little Maudie.

  Maudie stood before them, a defiant expression on her face. She was not daft and knew at once that the mistress was aware of her nightly excursions but she was prepared to bluff it out. It was her concern, wasn’t it, and the gentleman was very generous and a smacked bum was nothing to what she had often received at the hands of her own father in the past.

  ‘It has come to our notice, Maudie, that you are carrying on a . . . a liaison with a gentleman of the district and we have brought you here to tell you that it must stop at once. Don’t you know that you might become pregnant again and besides—’

  ‘It’s nowt ter do wi’ anyone else but me an’ ’im so what—’

  ‘Is he to marry you, Maudie? Has he promised to make you his wife?’

  ‘Well, no, but ’e looks after me an’ if I get in family way—’

  ‘He will throw you out and look around for another young fool to—’

  ‘’Ere, ’oo are yer callin’—’

  ‘I happen to know the gentleman, you see, and believe me he is not only a cruel and uncaring gentleman but he has a habit of beating those he professes to care about. However if you promise not to see him again I will let you stay and make something of yourself here where you are safe and your child will—’

  ‘Safe!’ sneered Maudie. ‘An’ earnin’ bloody three bob or less a week. Last night ’e give me—’

  ‘Perhaps another child?’

  ‘Well, I’m off ter see ’im an’ tell ’im what yer said. ’E’s an ’ouse bigger ’n this un an’ ’e’ll see me right.’

  ‘No, he won’t, Maudie. I happen to know, you see. He is my father and I lived with him for sixteen years. He is cruel, selfish and totally without scruples where women, or indeed any living creature, are concerned. When he tires of you he will discard you—’

  ‘I’m not listenin’ ter this.’ Maudie turned away. She was not sure what ‘scruples’ were but the revelation that the man who gave her a few bob for doing exactly what he told her to do, who liked hurting her was this woman’s father had come as a shock and she wasn’t sure how this was to affect her future dealings with him. Perhaps she’d do better with the bloody cowman. But would the cowman, or indeed any labouring man, which was all she could hope for, buy her a lovely bonnet like the one Arty, as she called him, had done?

  ‘What are you to do, Maudie?’ the mistress asked her as she was halfway to the door. ‘What are you to do about Jackie? Do you think he will take you in, even as a kitchen wench, with a child in your arms? Are you not aware that Ellie, who lives with us in the nursery with my own daughter, is his child? Yes, Ellen is Arthur Drummond’s daughter. I brought her to live with us when his wife died.’

  Maudie burst into tears, leaning against the door jamb. Yes, she had known that Ellie was Mrs Armstrong’s half-sister but she had not been aware that Mrs Armstrong was Arty’s daughter. She stood for perhaps thirty seconds, weeping desolately then, amazingly, she stiffened her back and turned to face her mistress and Kizzie, who had said not a word during the interview. Her face, though wet with tears, was still pretty, for Maudie was one of those fortunate women who could cry without the swelling eyes and running nose that afflicted others of their sex.

  ‘Well, I’m off. I’m not stoppin’ ’ere in this bloody convent where a lass can’t even ’ave a bit o’ fun or speak to a lad without—’

  ‘A lad! Arthur Drummond is hardly a lad, Maudie. If you had been . . . been meeting one of the gardeners or a stable lad, a decent man, I would do all I could to see that you were . . . well, see you married with a cottage and—’

  ‘A soddin’ kid every year. No, bloody thanks. I’ll fetch Jackie an’ me things an’ get over ter Arty’s. ’E’ll see me right, will Arty, an’ yer can all go ter ’ell, especially that bitch Violet ’oo no doubt told yer all about me.’

  With that she flounced from the room and they could hear her upstairs crashing about collecting her ‘things’, which were barely worth the carrying. They heard Meggie’s protesting voice as Maudie apparently snatched the bawling Jackie from his comfortable little bed, then footsteps clattering down the stairs, along the passage and out of the back door.

  It was the talk of the kitchen that night so that even Brooke, who had lived in a quiet, peaceful world where all he cared about was getting back on his feet, making love to his wife who loved him as he loved her, and being a proper father to the lovely child she had given him, was aware of the buzz that seemed to circulate about him. He and Charlotte had dined as they always did in front of the fire in their bedroom, a small table between them while Nellie served them. Mrs Groves believed that only by eating her well-cooked, delicious and nourishing food would the master recover his strength. With the spring and summer before him, her good food inside him and the wound in his thigh healing so well, by autumn he should be back in the saddle. They had eaten hearty vegetable soup, the vegetables picked only that morning, the stock come from the shin of beef that had been simmering for many hours, saddle of spring lamb, again with fresh vegetables, followed by a baked apple custard. They were drinking coffee while Charlotte searched her mind for the best way to bring up the exciting prospect of buying a motor car when Brooke broke through her reverie demanding to know what was wrong with Nellie who had twice dropped cutlery and seemed to be seething with some inner emotion.

  ‘I’m that sorry, sir. We’re all of a doo-dah in’t kitchen what wi’ that lass goin’ off an’ . . . well . . .’ She glanced at her mistress, for they all knew where she had ‘gone off’ to and could she, a servant, bring up the sub
ject of their mistress’s shameless father?

  Brooke looked at his wife, then back to Nellie. ‘Thank you, Nellie, you can go now. Mrs Armstrong will pour the coffee.’

  ‘Well?’ was all he said.

  She sighed and shook her head. ‘It’s true, my darling. I have had a failure at the Dower House. One of the girls has gone off the rails and . . .’

  He leaned across the table and took hold of her hand. ‘Come.’ Just the one word and in an instant she was nestled on his knee, the only way they could ‘love’ one another at the moment. The only way they could get close, even fondle one another. They slept in the same bed now, for the nurse, no longer needed, was gone but when they were alone he often cradled her on his knee. Though he could barely move one leg his old ‘John Thomas’, as he often called it, still stirred at her closeness and somehow they managed a sort of love-making which they were prepared to make do with until he was more mobile.

  ‘Tell me.’

  ‘It’s Maudie. She’s been . . . well, I can hardly call it dallying, but she has been sneaking out to meet her lover. Dear God, what a word, for if there is one man who is incapable of loving it’s him. She left this morning with the mistaken idea that he would take her in and well, I don’t know what is in her silly mind but since he is a so-called “gentleman” he will have sent her off with a flea in her ear as the saying goes and God knows where she will finish up.’