Chapter Four #2
But he seemed pleased, took the jar and held it for a moment, before Kitty divined his problem and gently took it back to put it on the bedside locker.
‘How did you come to be on that train?’ she asked.
She knew from visiting other villagers who had suffered less extreme accidents that they liked to tell what had happened.
She would have thought it best forgotten, but she had learned that it relieved them to describe the circumstances.
Feebly, but without reluctance, Weaver told his story.
He had taken the train to visit a widowed aunt in Great Ashenden, his late father’s sister, who had looked after him when his mother died, but was now all alone.
He went to see her about once a month. ‘But lately she’s been struggling, my lady, so Myrt and me – the wife, my lady – decided we’d ask her to come and live with us.
We’ve got the small attic room she could have, and we thought if she threw in her little bit that she lives on – if we pooled our resources, like – well, it’d make all three of us more comfortable.
Myrt and me get by all right, but three can eat as cheap as two, if you know what you’re doing, and Auntie’s mite’d give us a bit of slack.
But I’d only just sat down and the train just started off, and there was a terrible noise like the end of the world, and next thing I was lying under a heap of something and trapped by the leg, no idea what’d happened or how I’d got there.
And now,’ he said, weak tears filling his eyes, ‘God only knows how we’ll get by, Myrt and me, let alone bringing Auntie into it, because I’ll never work again, not with no leg.
I couldn’t even get up on a hayrick to thatch it, let alone a roof.
It’ll be the work’us for us at the end, and they’ll separate us, and Myrt and me’ve never been apart since we was first wed.
The work’us, when we’ve always kept ourselves decent and paid our way, even when it was hard.
The shame of it—’ His voice failed and he swallowed tears and fumbled out a handkerchief with a shaking hand to wipe his face and nose.
Kitty had no idea what to say in the face of such disaster, but Miss Eddowes spoke from her position at the end of the bed in her usual unemotional manner, not unkind at all, but forbidding self-pity.
‘Now you’re not to give in to despair, Weaver, for I’ve an idea that will help you.
When you’re out of bed and can go home, I can arrange work for you. ’
‘Work, miss?’ he said, bewildered, and made a helpless gesture towards the hump under the bedclothes where a wicker cage kept them off his stump.
‘You still have the use of your hands, I suppose? I know you’ve always made those wonderful ridge decorations and figures. You use split ash or withies to reinforce the birds and animals, don’t you?’
‘Yes, miss.’
‘So you’re used to working with those materials.’
‘Yes, miss.’ Weaver sounded bewildered.
‘Well, my man, it’s a small step from that to making baskets.
You’ll learn the knack of it in a day, and I can put you in the way of acquiring the materials, and selling the finished articles.
There’s a ready market for baskets of all shapes and sizes, and if you’re quick about it, as I’m sure you will be, you can earn enough to keep yourself and your wife. ’
‘It’s very good of you to think of me, miss,’ he said, evidently still doubtful.
‘Not at all. You must concentrate on getting well, so that we can get you out of here and started on your new career.’ Kitty saw that the word ‘we’ had had an effect on him.
He was no longer alone in his terrifying slide into destitution.
Someone had taken his hand to help him to his feet.
‘So chin up, and no more talk about the workhouse, d’you hear me? ’
They left him soon afterwards, still pale and feeble, but with a thoughtful expression. How much better Miss Eddowes was at this business, Kitty thought, with her practical help, not just sympathy and calf’s foot jelly.
When they were outside again in the cold, blowy sunshine, she said, ‘You made such a difference to that poor man. Can you really help him become a basket-maker?’
Miss Eddowes looked unexpectedly grim. ‘Oh, that part of it was all right. I have a number of people engaged in the work, and there is a ready market for the finished items. But I’m afraid poor Weaver won’t be one of them.’
‘Whyever not?’ Kitty asked.
‘His chance of recovery is small. I know the look – I’ve seen it before.
Dr Welkes says he lost so much blood, and the shock to his body was so great, that he has only a small chance of surviving.
When the subject is as weak as he is, infection often sets in, or they succumb to pneumonia.
It’s a great pity. He was an excellent thatcher – almost an artist.’
Kitty felt her eyes growing moist, and wondered how Miss Eddowes could remain so cool in the face of such human tragedy.
Miss Eddowes looked at her as if she read her thoughts.
‘The thing is to concentrate on what one can do,’ she said.
‘Lady Stainton, now we have met in this fortuitous way, may I hope I can interest you in some of my schemes? I sense that you have a desire to be useful to your fellow man – am I right?’
Kitty had an idea that this woman could swallow her up if she once let her in. She pulled herself together. ‘Don’t we all want that? I shall be glad to give you as much help as I have time for. Naturally, running the house takes up a great deal of my day—’
Miss Eddowes gave her an understanding look that was half a smile. ‘I know exactly what you mean,’ she said. ‘I shall consider how your valuable time can be put to the best possible use. I shall be in touch, Lady Stainton – and may I count on your help in the matter of Axe Brandom?’
Kitty was glad she could at least assent to that.
Frederick brought the message up to Kitty in the Peacock Room, where she was smocking the bodice of a dress for Alexander.
She was wondering why she had ever begun it: smocking was difficult, slow work, and she wanted the dress finished as soon as possible, because he would not have long to wear it.
He would be two in August, and by tradition would be breeched, and leave off dresses for ever.
It was a moment of great triumph in a boy’s life, but with an edge of sadness for her.
It was the first step to his joining the striding, shouting, rough-and-tumble, scab-kneed brotherhood of boys, who wanted to be off and away to the horizon.
Soon he would have no more time for cuddles and kisses and Mama’s knee.
She looked up as Frederick came in, and could not help the little shock of noticing how handsome he was, with his thick dark hair and his sculpted features.
She had worried at first that he was too handsome, and might cause trouble below stairs, but fortunately he didn’t seem at all interested in the maids, though they were in a constant flutter over him, according to Mrs Webster, who relayed the information at their daily conference with an air of amused tolerance.
‘So long as the work gets done, my lady – I can’t help what they dream about in bed at night.
But he never seems to notice them at all, which is a blessing. ’
‘A person has called, asking to see you, my lady,’ he said.
She frowned at the designation. ‘A person?’
‘A Mrs Perkins, my lady.’
‘I don’t know the name. Didn’t she send up a card?’
He permitted himself one of his rare smiles, and Kitty was quite glad he didn’t do it often. ‘I don’t think she is the kind of person to have a card, my lady. She is Josh Brandom’s sister.’
‘Is he ill?’ He was one of the grooms.
‘No, my lady. I took the liberty of enquiring and he is at work as usual.’
‘I suppose I had better see her,’ Kitty said, putting aside her work with a sigh. Her mother-in-law would have told her not to encourage encroachment, but people like the Brandoms did not customarily call at the house, so it was probably something important.
‘She is waiting in the hall, my lady.’
‘Put her in the ante-room, and I’ll be down in a few minutes.
’ It was a sign of Mrs Perkins’s lowly status that she had been left in the hall, not shown into the drawing-room or the library, but Kitty could not interview her with other servants crossing back and forth and no doubt listening from behind every door.
The ante-room was a sort of buffer state between the hall and the drawing-room, and contained nothing much apart from a few hard chairs and a console table on which a Chinese vase stood, at this time of year bereft of flowers.
The visitor was standing in the centre of the room, very upright.
Her hat was a wide-brimmed black glazed straw with a bunch of artificial cherries on it, her coat had a bit of dyed rabbit fur on the collar, and she was wearing black cotton gloves.
Kitty had been Lady Stainton for long enough to know a Sunday-church-and-weddings outfit when she saw one: Mrs Perkins had obviously put on her best for the interview.
She looked familiar – someone Kitty had probably seen at church, though never spoken to.
‘Mrs Perkins? How can I help you?’ she enquired politely.
The woman had an angular face that must once have been, if not pretty, at least handsome. She didn’t smile. Her eyes were sharp and direct.
‘I’m Josh’s sister, my lady, Ruth Brandom as was. Joe Perkins, my husband, is a tiler and roofer. He did the new roof on the Royal George last back-end.’
She was giving her credentials, Kitty understood. ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘Would you like to sit down?’
‘Thank you, my lady, I prefer to stand, if you don’t mind. It’s very kind of you to see me and I know you must be busy so I’ll come to the point. It’s about Axe, my brother. We’re a big family and I’m the eldest girl, my lady, so I’ve always been a second mother to them all. You know how it is.’