I blinked at Mrs Briskett in alarm.
‘Don’t look so fearful, Hetty Feather. That was in the bad old days. Little servant girls are treated with kid gloves now. I won’t be throwing any saucepans, so long as you try hard, keep quiet and mind your p’s and q’s.’
I nodded, though I wasn’t at all sure what my p’s and q’s might be. Problems and queries? I seemed to have a lot of both.
I stared out of the sooty train window as the train chuntered its way out of London. At first I saw ugly great factories spouting thick smoke, then mile after mile of terraced rows of dark little dwellings – but soon these started to thin out. Now I saw green fields and trees all about us.
‘Is this the country?’ I asked, wondering if I might possibly be near my dear foster home.
‘No, no, we’re only in Wimbleton – it’s a while yet. We’ve a few stations to go through before we get to Kingtown. That’s where Mr Buchanan has his establishment. It’s a big fine house too, though not quite as large as Waterloo Station.’ Mrs Briskett chuckled at my foolishness.
‘Is Mr Buchanan a kind man?’ I asked timidly, wondering if I might somehow cause offence again by my mild enquiry.
Mrs Briskett remained relaxed, undoing her bonnet strings and giving her grey hair a good scratch. ‘Excuse me, dear. My best bonnet’s very fine but it certainly sets me itching. Mr Buchanan? Oh, he’s kind enough, though he has his little ways, of course. He’s a very important writer, you know. You’ll often see his articles on education in the newspapers, and there’s a whole shelf full of his books in the best bookcase.’
‘Might I be able to read one?’ I asked.
Mrs Briskett looked at me, her head on one side. ‘Can you read then, missy? Proper reading, great long sentences? I’ve worked with several little girls from the workhouse and they couldn’t read to save their lives.’
‘I’ve been reading fluently since I was four years old,’ I said proudly. ‘My brother Jem taught me.’
I shouldn’t have mentioned his name. I felt my lip quivering.
‘Well, I’m not sure it’s suitable for you to be reading Mr Buchanan’s books, though they are all written for children, I believe. It will tickle him to know you’ve asked – but I don’t think there’ll be any time for book-reading, Hetty Feather. You’ll be helping Sarah and me from six in the morning till ten at night.’
I didn’t like the sound of this work regime at all!
‘I do so love to read. Could I not read when I go to bed?’ I said.
‘I’m not having you ruining your eyes and wasting candles,’ said Mrs Briskett. ‘And if you’re doing your job properly, you’ll be fast asleep the moment you clamber into your bed.’
‘Perhaps I could read during my recess?’ I said.
‘Recess?’ said Mrs Briskett, as if she didn’t understand the word.
‘My playtime,’ I said.
The hospital had divided our days rigidly – mostly work and very little play, so it was always particularly important.
‘Playtime!’ Mrs Briskett chortled. ‘Oh, Hetty Feather, you’re going to be the death of me! You’re not a schoolgirl now. There won’t be any playtime for you, my girl. It will be work work work, seven days a week, with Sunday afternoons off if you’ve been a good girl.’
I listened, chastened. It was upsetting to to discover how little I knew about everyday life. The matrons had told me they were preparing me for work, but they had only taught me to darn and scrub floors. These did not seem very useful accomplishments. An hour’s darning or scrubbing had seemed interminable. How was I going to keep going all day long? I so wished I could ask Mama’s advice. She had tried to prepare me. She had even taken to sending me her best recipes in her weekly letters, just in case they came in useful.
‘Do you happen to know if Mr Buchanan likes game pie or beef pudding?’ I asked hopefully.
‘I dare say,’ said Mrs Briskett. ‘The master’s partial to all kinds of pies and puddings.’
‘Then perhaps I could make him one specially?’ I suggested. ‘I have a very fine recipe.’
But Mrs Briskett was laughing again. ‘You – cook? Whatever will you come out with next? I’m the cook, missy – you’re just the little maid of all work.’
I stared out of the train window again, dispirited. I didn’t want to be the maid of all work. There were bigger houses built right up close to the railway track now, so I could spy straight into their back gardens. I saw a girl about my own age in a bright blue dress swinging in her garden. Why couldn’t I be that girl, kicking up her heels without a care in the world? Why did I have to be the maid – and Mama too. Oh, if only we could live in a little house together – our home.
I gritted my teeth. I vowed there and then that I would make it come true some day. I knew I could never achieve such a thing on a meagre maid’s wage. Even Mrs Briskett could not afford her own establishment. Was Miss Smith really right when she said my memoirs were unpublishable?
‘Don’t frown, child, it makes you look disagreeable,’ said Mrs Briskett, tapping me on the forehead. ‘Gather your things up now. We alight at the next station.’
I had hoped that Kingtown would look a little like the country village of my early childhood, but when we emerged from the station I saw we were in a smart town of big emporiums, very much like London itself.
I stared around curiously, startled anew by the noise and bustle, the rattle of the carriages and cabs, the clatter of the folk in the street, the blinding colour of everyone’s clothes, when I was so used to the drab brown of our foundling uniform. Even Mrs Briskett’s extraordinary dress seemed muted and ordinary amongst the purple and peacock-blue and emerald-green gowns and bonnets.
I whirled round, staring after this lady and that, with their great long skirts swirling about their boots, rows of flounces cascading down their behinds at the back. I had thought my own new dress bright enough, but now it seemed drab in the extreme. I caught a glimpse of myself in a shop window and saw what a scarecrow I looked, my sleeves so long they hid my hands, my skirts skimped and unadorned, my cap bizarre.
‘I’m not dressed at all fashionably, am I, Mrs Briskett?’ I said forlornly.
‘Of course you’re not, Hetty Feather. Servants don’t follow fashion! You just have to look neat and serviceable,’ said Mrs Briskett, but she couldn’t help glancing admiringly at her own reflection.
A horse-drawn omnibus went past quickly, the wheels sending a mound of horse dung spraying up in the air, perilously near us on the pavement. Mrs Briskett jumped nimbly aside, mindful of her red skirts.
‘That’s a bus, Hetty Feather,’ she announced, as if I were a toddling child.
‘I know, Mrs Briskett. I journeyed in one once,’ I said. ‘Will we be catching a bus now?’
‘No, it’s only a shortish walk to the master’s house. This way!’
I trotted along beside her, looking all around me. I passed several buildings with comical names: the Dog and Fox; the Wheelwright’s Arms; the Three Fishes. They all had the same strange, pungent smell. I hung back, peering curiously through the coloured-glass windows.
‘Come along, child. You don’t want to go peeking into those dens of iniquity,’ said Mrs Briskett, giving me a firm tug.
‘Dens of iniquity?’ I repeated.
‘They are public houses. Gin palaces. Wicked places where foolish men waste their money on strong drink and weak women lose their self-respect,’ she told me, twitching up her long red skirts, as if she could not bear to share the same pavement with such people.
These horrific dens looked rather cosy places to me, but I knew better than to argue. I was conscious of another even more pungent smell emanating from a huge brick building. I wrinkled my nose. It smelled worse than the hospital privies. Could it possibly be a huge public convenience? I buried my nose in the cuff of my sleeve.
‘It’s just the tannery, Hetty. Step lively and we’ll soon be past,’ said Mrs Briskett.
A tannery? When Matro
n Pigface Peters had been really angry, she’d say, ‘I’ll tan your hide for you, you cheeky varmint.’ Was the tannery a grim place of correction? I shivered.
‘You don’t know what a tannery is, do you, Hetty Feather?’
‘I know it’s something dreadful,’ I said.
‘What? It’s where they tan the cow hides to make your boot leather, silly child.’
I peered down at my stout boots. I had had no idea they were made out of dead animals. I felt my toes wiggling in disgust. There was so much I didn’t know about the outside world. The hospital had always boasted that they were giving us an excellent education, but now I realized I was as ignorant as a newborn babe where most things were concerned.
I trudged along in my strips of withered cow, breathing more freely as we left the tannery and crossed a large green field. The grass felt soft and springy, so different from the hard pavement. I remembered stamping across fields barefoot when I lived in the country. I felt a pang again, thinking of Jem.
I was distracted by a beautiful grey building with a tall spire and lots of little archways and a grand gothic door. It looked very much like a palace I’d seen pictured in my precious fairy-tale book, a gift from Mama. It had a curious garden, planted with weathered grey slabs of stones instead of flowers and fruit and vegetables.
Mrs Briskett saw me staring, and this time seemed pleased by my interest. ‘Yes, Hetty, you will be attending St John’s on Sunday afternoon. There’s a splendid vicar there. Sarah and I find his sermons very uplifting.’
It wasn’t a palace at all. It was a church. I had attended chapel every Sunday of my hospital life, but it had looked very different to this.
‘Why does the vicar have such a strange stone garden?’ I asked
‘What?’ Mrs Briskett stopped in her tracks. ‘Are you being disrespectful, child?’
‘No, ma’am.’
‘Oh dear Lord, have you never heard of a graveyard? Those stones mark the graves of all the dead people in this parish.’
‘Dead people?’ I echoed, shocked.
‘Don’t you know anything, Hetty Feather? When you die, you’re put in a coffin and buried in a graveyard.’
This was the answer to a long-time puzzle of mine. From time to time children at the hospital had died. My own foster brother Saul had died from influenza. He had simply disappeared overnight. Nurse Winnie told me he’d gone up to Heaven, but I wasn’t so sure. Saul had a poorly leg and couldn’t walk properly. How could he have journeyed all the way up to Heaven? I’d seen his bony little back enough times when we were bathed together as small children. I knew there were no wings folded away for future use. Besides, I wasn’t so sure they’d let Saul into Heaven. He’d certainly never behaved remotely like a little angel.
So this is what happened to dead people! They were planted in the garden like potatoes. I stared over the churchyard fearfully. I did not care for this new world at all, with dead animals on my feet and dead people lying all around me. I hoped they stayed safely underground. We had frightened each other at the hospital, telling ghost stories when we went to bed at night. In fact I had done most of the frightening – recycling tales of murder and mayhem from the Police Gazette. I’d thoroughly enjoyed myself whispering about poor Minnie who stalked the corridors, a knife stuck in her heart, leaving bloody footprints across the linoleum. What if the dead didn’t stay dead? They might start growing in the night, heads bursting through the earth, then shoulders, arms, till they were free of earthly clay and could walk the world again.
‘Is Mr Buchanan’s house near the churchyard?’ I asked fearfully.
‘We have several streets to go. So come along, child, step out briskly.’
I was happy to do that, even though my arms were aching from holding my box and I was longing to set it down. A boy ran up to us, whistling loudly, carrying an immense laden basket with seeming ease. He was very small, barely my own height, but there was a knowing glint in his brown eyes, and I guessed he was about my age.
‘Watcha, Mrs B!’ he cried out, walking along with us.
‘Mrs Briskett to you, lad,’ said Mrs Briskett.
‘Who’s this, then?’ he said, ogling me.
‘Don’t you be so nosy,’ said Mrs Briskett.
‘Is she your long-lost daughter, then?’ the boy said, chuckling.
‘Stop that nonsense! She’s Hetty Feather, our new maid. Master thought it time Sarah and I had a little help, seeing as we’re getting older and creakier. We were hoping for a big strapping lass – but look at the size of this one!’
‘She’s little all right,’ said the boy. ‘I hope you got her half price because she’s only half size!’
‘Talk about the pot calling the kettle black!’ I said, sticking out my chin. ‘You’re a little runt yourself.’
‘Oooh, she speaks – and with a temper to match her flaming hair!’ he said, grinning at me.
I pulled a hideous face at him. He stuck out his tongue at me, waggling it vigorously.
‘I’ll tell Jarvis about your cheek!’ Mrs Briskett threatened, but he just laughed and ran off with his huge basket, the muscles in his skinny arms popping.
‘Who’s that boy, Mrs Briskett?’
‘Oh, take no notice, that’s just Bertie, the butcher’s boy,’ she said. ‘He delivers all the meat to our neighbourhood. He’s not a bad lad, but you have to be firm with him.’
I decided I would be very firm. I did not care for silly lads cheeking me. All the same, I could not help marvelling at his strength. I wondered if my own muscles would get stronger now I was out at work. I ached all over and my boots were rubbing my feet sore. I wasn’t used to such long walks.
We started trudging up a hill, which made matters worse. I had to lean against a gas lamp to steady my box and get my breath back. But at last, at the summit, Mrs Briskett pointed.
‘See the big white house with the stained-glass set in the door? That’s your new home, Hetty Feather.’
IT WAS A new, large, three-storeyed house, very grand and imposing.
‘It’s very fine,’ I said.
‘Yes, indeed it is,’ said Mrs Briskett proudly.
She opened the painted iron gate and we walked up the red-tiled path. I put one foot on the snowy white steps, but Mrs Briskett tugged me back by the hem of my skirt.
‘Not the front steps, girl! We never, ever go in the front door!’
I stared at her. How were we supposed to get into the house – climb through the windows?
‘We go down the area steps at the side!’ She grabbed me and steered me towards them. I glimpsed a garden at the back with a great green lawn and an ornate white iron sofa padded with cushions – but I knew enough now to realize I’d never be reclining there.
Mrs Briskett whisked me through the basement door. Suddenly I felt almost at home. The corridor was dark, painted cream and brown. I smelled familiar scents of soda and black lead. I walked into a large kitchen very similar to Mama’s old domain at the hospital. I stood there, quivering, because it was so very like, with its scrubbed table and shining pans, and yet not like at all, because Mama wasn’t there. There was just Mrs Briskett and a strange pale woman in a print frock, who was sitting at the table eating an enormous hunk of bread and cheese.
‘Ah, here you are at last!’ she said, springing up. ‘Let’s have a look at her!’
She seized hold of me, dragging me downwards towards the window so she could get a proper look at me. She pulled a comical face, as if she did not like what she saw. I was tempted to pull a face back, but decided I had better be cautious. She didn’t look as cheery as the butcher’s boy. If Mrs Briskett reminded me of meat, then this new woman was definitely potatoes. She had a pale, lumpy face with little warts here and there, like eyes in a potato. Her figure resembled a whole sackful of them. Mrs Briskett’s whalebone stays kept her figure solid, but if this creature wore corsets, they had long given up attempting to contain her.
‘This can’t be the new maid!’ she
said, prodding my face with a finger, turning me left and right. ‘She’s just a child. She can’t be old enough, Mrs B.’
‘She’s fourteen, believe it or not. I know she’s a skinny little thing, but we’ll just have to fatten her up. Her name’s Hetty Feather, though she tries to call herself something outrageous. What was it again, child?’
‘My name is Sapphire Battersea,’ I announced firmly.
The two women started chuckling as if I’d cracked a joke.
‘Oh yes, and I’m the Queen of Sheba,’ said Potato Woman, bobbing a mock curtsy. ‘Sapphire Battersea indeed!’
‘It isn’t a comical name at all. I don’t know why you’re laughing,’ I said indignantly.
This made them laugh even more.
‘Hoity-toity! Still, what can you expect with that hair? Well, we’ve been lumbered with a right dud, but I suppose we’ll have to make the best of it. Now, listen to me, missy. I’m Sarah, the parlourmaid. Mrs Briskett rules the kitchen, and I rule the rest of the house. You’re to do as we say – do you understand? Now, come and have a bite to eat and then I’ll take you to meet the master.’
I sat down at the table between the two great women. I stared in astonishment at the food. It was simple enough – cold meat and cheese and bread – but the portions were huge. Mrs Briskett cut me a huge slab of meat that would have fed five foundlings for a week, and buttered me a slice of bread so thickly that my teeth made dents in the yellow when I took a bite. There was strange lumpy brown jam too. I tried a spoonful and spluttered, my eyes streaming.
‘What’s up, girl?’
‘This jam tastes very sharp, ma’am,’ I said.
‘Jam? It’s pickles, you ninny!’
‘Don’t she know what pickles are?’ said Sarah.
‘This one don’t know anything. She’s so quaint in her ways I’m starting to wonder if she’s simple.’
I was too dispirited to argue with her. I had always been the cleverest in my year – well, perhaps first equal when Polly was at the hospital. I was used to thinking myself bright and sharp-witted. Even Matron Pigface Peters and Matron Stinking Bottomly remarked on my intelligence, saying I was as sharp and sly as a cartload of monkeys. But now that I was out in this new topsy-turvy world, I realized I had to start learning all over again. I did not know the simplest things. As a child I had longed to visit the pink and yellow and green foreign lands on the geography map hanging on the classroom wall, but now I realized that my own country was a totally foreign land to me. I did not know the language, the terrain, or any of the customs.