| |
“Lovely day,” Clara said to Frederick.
“It is, but not as lovely as you,” he replied.
Clara felt an inner blush at the stable boy's words. She hoisted the basket from one arm to the other. The wet clothes inside of it, freshly wrung and ready to be hung on the line, weighed heavily on her small frame. Her shoulders ached from the cumbersome load.
In her time here, she had taken on more than her share of work. Perhaps, she could have got away with completing half of it, but she knew that she had been taken in out of mercy and she wanted to convince everyone that her arrival had been a good idea.
Frederick certainly thought highly of her arrival. He had made it his personal mission to acquaint her with life in Rosebrim Manor. Often when Emma was showing her where next to go, Frederick would appear as if her very presence had summoned his coming. He was dark and swaggering in appearance and Emma had, on more than one occasion, remarked that he reminded her of a drawing of a pirate she had seen.
Emma herself embodied the quintessential English housekeeper to the point of reliability, but not to the point of tedium. Place settings always sparkled their best when she laid them out. Food, although limited with the blockades, managed to turn out that extra bit tastier when she touched it, even if she had only strained a soup or sliced the bread. Emma was both ubiquitous, overseeing and tending to all areas of life within the house, but also strangely absent whenever Clara needed to consult only her on a matter, when no other face— no matter how cheery or helpful— could provide the needed assistance. Though never married and without children, Emma instantly fell into the role of grandmother to Clara as if such a bond had always existed between the two. She wore a welcoming smile and provided a reassuring word when Clara's memory slipped, as it was still prone to do.
Emma, for all her normality, had eccentricities of her own. Clara soon learned, and then relearned on a few occasions when having forgot, that Emma took her tea always with the tiniest pinch of pepper. Why she did such a thing, Clara could hardly guess and Emma herself could not even explain. It was something that she had started many years before Clara was born and it had become a habit that she had been unable to abandon. And then, there was the humming. Emma would hum a different tune depending on what activity occupied her. When asked what song she was humming while folding the linens one day, Emma replied that she hadn't even realized that she was. With the back of her hand, she had secured a stray graying hair behind her ear and continued humming as she returned to the folding. Clara smiled, realizing that Emma was most likely oblivious to her melodic song.
Rosebrim Manor provided many occasions for a smile to leak from Clara's mouth. With a feather duster in her hand, she became acquainted with the leather clad volumes of gold-edged pages of the books on the library's shelves. With a polishing cloth, she admired the delicately etched flowers and birds on the silver. When she folded the tablecloths, her fingers were caressed by fine linens, silks and damasks. In the kitchen, Emma would often ask her opinion on a sauce or dish. Clara suspected this was more so that she would be subjected to the tasting of delicious food, than that someone with Emma's years of experience really needed Clara's culinary advice. In the garden, she watched with delight as the first shoots from the seeds they had sown began to appear. Overhead, birds gathered twigs to build their nests for spring. It was a gentle life that Clara found herself embarked upon, full of the demureness of the country and the benefit of cheerful friends.
The sea is not without ripple, though, and neither was life at Rosebrim Manor without event. At night, a cold wind blew through the cracks beneath the doors and sent an eerie wail racing down the corridors. Lady Pemblebrooke would often awake, shrieking in a haunting duet with the wind, and waking all others in the house. Clara had shot up in bed, her heart racing like a thousand horses, when she had first heard the noise.
“Clara,” Emma called to her now, as she spoke to Frederick under the decidedly more pleasant, pale sun than the unsettling cries of night.
“Yes?” she said, turning so quickly that the basket tottered and Frederick put out a hand to disrupt its fall.
“Lady Pemblebrooke wishes to see us when her tea is served at four. Come to me when you're finished with that, would you?”
“Yes, Emma,” Clara said.
Though Emma spoke in her usual tone, her face slightly betrayed her calm demeanor and, in that moment, Clara knew that she was not the only one who had come to feel uneasy toward the lady of the house. As if reading her thoughts, Frederick said now,
“I think I have the better deal, on my way to visit the animals rather than Lady Pemblebrooke.”
`”Is she really so bad?” Clara said.
Frederick stopped abruptly in his walking and turned to her,
“You mean you have not even met her?”
“I—” Clara's head began to whirl. She had no recollection of having spoken with Lady Pemblebrooke before, but now she realized that surely she must have spoken to her at some point during the month, two months, oh how long had it been? As her nerves heightened, her memory's reliability deserted her. A great unsteadiness swooped down upon her, like a hawk circling it prey. Frederick took note of her paling complexion and panic-stricken face.
“What is it, Clara? Are you unwell?”
“I— I can't remember,” she said, quietly.
“You can't remember what?”
She swallowed. Her stomach hung heavy within her, from the tangled mess of knots it had succeeded in tying itself into. Feeling very ashamed and exposed, she said,
“I can't remember, if I have met her before.”
Frederick blinked and she could not tell if it were in disbelief or if the sun had irritated his eyes.
“Frederick?” Emma reappeared, calling to him this time.
“Yes?”
“Come and help me move this chest, will you?”
He disappeared to help Emma, leaving Clara holding the laundry and their conversation unfinished.
“Have I met her before? I've been here awhile. Surely, I must have met her,” she said to the sheets and towels, as she hung them on the line. The stark white fluttered easily in the breeze, billowing out like sails of a boat. The beauty and purity of white disappeared in the emptiness Clara saw there. The vast whiteness mirrored her mind- one blank and open abyss. Others may have seen such a situation as an opportunity for possibility, but for Clara it was a desperate reality of isolation and separation. A bird broke into her thoughts with a cheerful song as if he had taken it upon himself to bolster her spirits.
Clara's hands trembled, as she draped a tablecloth over the line. Her conversation with Frederick had rattled her nerves and unseated her confidence. She finished the task and hurried back inside to help Emma with the tea. Glancing at the carriage clock on the mantel, as she entered the foyer, she saw that it was only half past three. Perhaps, she could find Frederick and finish their talk. Just then, though, Emma hurried down the stairs.
“Oh good, you're here. Lady Pemblebrooke has requested that we serve her tea now. She says she does not wish to wait until four and that we are to bring it to her presently.”
Emma's face reddened in her haste of movement and a handful of curls had come unpinned and bounced rambunctiously around her ears. Clara had never seen so much of Emma's hair before and hadn't realized it was curly. If Lady Pemblebrooke could send Emma, so calm and steady, into a fluster then she must be a very stern woman indeed. Clara opened her mouth to ask if she had met Lady Pemblebrooke before, but Emma was already rushing from the room toward the kitchen. Feeling like a duckling running after its mother, when a seagull is in pursuit of the two, Clara followed Emma who promptly pushed a tray into her arms. Clara held the tray as Emma bristled about, filling it with teacups and saucers and then changing her mind and switching the teacups with those locked in the china cabinet.
An uneasiness spread through Clara, as she watched Emma turn to the table and cut sandwiches she had prepared earlier into quarters. Emma, who was never without a song for a chore, was silent. No humming slipped from her lips. Clara stood silently as well, unsure of what to say or how to say it. The tray, weighted down by the teacups, saucers, teapot, creamer, sugar bowl and now sandwiches, pulled on Clara's already strained arms. When she had just begun to warm to the idea of leaving the kitchen to go to Lady Pemblebrooke, so that she could at least put down the tray, Emma took the teacups off once again and replaced them with those originally present. For a moment, Clara wondered if she weren't the only one with a faulty memory. The thought, however, was dismissed when Emma said,
“She likes those cups better.”
Clara nodded not so much in agreement, for she had no idea which tea service Lady Pemblebrooke preferred, but out of acknowledgment. Somehow, she felt that this woman who had been her anchor of memory so often now needed the same steadiness of companionship from her.
“Right, we'll go now then,” Emma said and turned to leave.
“Emma?”
“Yes? What have I forgot? The milk?”
“No, you've not forgot anything. It's just that your hair slipped free.”
Emma's hands hurried to her hair, lifting the pins and tucking the curls back into place.
“My heavens! So it has,” she said, as she did.
When complete, Emma turned to leave the kitchen once again with Clara at her heels. They were halfway up the stairs, when Emma turned abruptly. Clara steadied herself against the sudden halt, so as not to drop the tray.
“When we get inside, I'll serve. I know how everyone takes their tea.”
“Everyone?” Clara asked, weakly. She had thought she would soon be face-to-face with the formidable Lady Pemblebrooke, but she had not envisioned others present with her.
“Albert, she always was a devoted servant of Queen Victoria, and Mary, named for our present queen.”
“And they are— friends?”
“Oh no, they are Lady Pemblebrooke's children.”
“Oh— yes, of course,” Clara said. The uneasiness, which had begun to abate, returned with a new vigor. She had never seen children here and why should they be hidden? Or, if they were not, then she perhaps had not only forgot Lady Pemblebrooke but two other persons as well. Either predicament was chilling, but there was no time to think about it any longer. They had reached the top of the stairs and Emma's hand stood poised to open the door. Before doing so, she turned her head over her shoulder to ensure that Clara was ready. Clara nodded and Emma opened the door more slowly and tentatively than Clara had seen her open other doors.
Clara followed Emma inside and was surprised to be met by so dreary an interior. The plush curtains were drawn closed, though the sunlight still filtered through the windows in the rest of the house. The colors of the furnishings were darker here than in other rooms and more muted, as if even pigment feared seeming too ostentatious in front of Lady Pemblebrooke. The oaks and maples Clara polished in the other furniture of the house were absent here and instead the darker and more somber mahogany almost entirely outfitted the room.
Emma rushed forward to prepare the tea and from the shadow Clara saw the prim and diminutive Lady Pemblebrooke. She lacked all the harshness that Clara thought she would embody and seemed more like a frightened child than the beneficiary of so grand a manor. And as for the children, Albert and Mary lacked all the regalia of their names and instead flitted like nervous birds around their mother's skirts. Lady Pemblebrooke spoke hardly a word but looked up, startled at Clara's presence as if she had suddenly appeared having materialized from the dust beneath the floorboards. Quickly, the event was completed and Clara's anxiety had been supplanted by confusion.
“Let's have our tea now, Clara,” Emma suggested. As they descended the stairs, a song once again whispered from her lips in that pleasant hum that Clara had missed earlier. When they'd entered the kitchen, the humming changed and yet another tune issued forth as they sat to tea. Emma's humming was really rather comical to watch, because as soon as her hands switched to a new task the notes followed. On many occasions Clara had found herself humming along in her head, only to have the next note lurch horribly off key because Emma had drifted into another song entirely.
The steam rose tantalizingly from Clara's cup, bathing her face in its warmth. Emma dropped the habitual pinch of pepper into her cup and sat back against the chair. For awhile they enjoyed the break in their routine without words, but a question pressed against Clara's mind and had its way at last, as she said,
“Who is Lady Pemblebrooke in mourning for?”
“England,” Emma said, without further explanation and then continued in her humming.