THAT FIRST WEEK with Aunt Tot was the longest Jane Jerdon had ever had to endure. The work was endless. She’d no sooner cleared away one meal and scoured the dishes before she had to start preparing the next. Aunt Tot roasted the meat on the spit and made pies and pastries but as far as Jane could see everything else was down to her. She fell into her truckle bed far too late at night, too tired to think. And the baby grew heavier day by day.
‘Oh, my little Milly Millstone,’ she said to it, as it wriggled and kicked its feet against her ribs. ‘I’ll be reet glad when th’art out in t’world.’
But when she woke at first light on Monday morning to the realization that her belly was being gripped by an unfamiliar pain, she was caught in a sudden fear and prayed that this wasn’t the baby coming. I’ve eaten summat, she decided as the pain ebbed away. That’s how ’tis. I got the gripes. But the next pain was so strong there was no denying what it was. Oh my dear heart alive, she thought. How shall I make out?
She tried to remember what she’d heard about birthing a baby and it wasn’t very much. I should have asked Mrs Hardcastle afore I left the village, she thought, but it was too late to be thinking of it now. The next pain started before she’d caught her breath from the last one. It was so powerful it made her groan. And so did the next one. And the next. Soon she was groaning as the pains began. She simply couldn’t help it.
After what seemed like a very long time, she became aware that there was a face leaning towards her and that someone was calling her name. ‘Janey! Janey!’ And she made an enormous effort and opened her eyes. It was an oddly familiar face but she couldn’t place it. ‘Who…?’ she said.
‘See if you can sit up,’ the face advised, and it was speaking with Aunt Tot’s voice. But this wasn’t her aunt surely. Not this woman with her long brown hair tumbling out of her nightcap and her eyes looking concerned and her voice gentle. ‘Audrey’s here to help us,’ the face said. ‘Just swing your legs round, like a good girl, and see if you can stand up. Tek your time. There’s no rush. We’ll hold on to you.’
Another face. This time the milkmaid’s. Hands supporting her under the arms. I’ll never be able to stand up, she thought. And stood up.
‘’Tis only a few steps,’ Aunt Tot said. ‘Just down to my room. You’ll be more private there. ’Tis all ready for ’ee.’
‘I’ve not lit the fire,’ Jane panted. ‘The bread wants …’
‘Don’t you worry your head about fires and bread,’ Aunt Tot said as they staggered out of the kitchen. ‘That’s all took care of. You just concentrate on birthing this baby. Just a few more steps. There’s a good girl.’
They were in a quiet bedroom, with a high bed mounded with pillows. They were lifting her into it, easing her onto a thick towel, plumping the pillows to make her more comfortable. And she was more comfortable. The pains were still hard but they were easier to contend with now that she was sitting up and had company.
‘I’ll just nip back to t’kitchen for a minute, to tend to t’fire and t’bread and such,’ Aunt Tot said. ‘You’ll manage, won’t you, Audrey? You know where I am if you need me.’
The room was so quiet that Jane could hear Audrey breathing and a clock ticking somewhere nearby. She wondered what the time was and how long this birth would go on and what would happen next. She seemed to have been struggling through pains for a very long time. And then the next thing happened, with a rush of water that soaked the towel and such an urge to push that she barely had time to recognize it before she was responding to it. She didn’t even notice that Audrey had run off for Aunt Tot.
Half an hour later, her little Milly Millstone was in her arms, red in the face and crying so lustily she was showing the roof of her mouth and her bare pink gums. She had a shock of damp dark hair and the prettiest hands and feet and Jane was instantly enamoured of her. ‘My dear little Milly,’ she said. ‘Don’ ’ee cry. I got ’ee. I won’t let no harm come to ’ee, ever, I promise.’
Audrey was in tears. ‘I never seen a babba born afore,’ she said, wiping her eyes on her apron. ‘I never know’d it was so …’ And then stopped, at a total loss for words.
‘Nor me neither,’ Jane told her, gazing at her baby. ‘She’s the prettiest thing I ever did see.’
‘Where’s her clothes?’ Aunt Tot said. ‘We can’t have her a-lying there naked, even if she is a babe new born. She’ll catch her death of cold.’
Jane was kissing the baby’s fingers. ‘Um,’ she said, ‘they’re in my bag. All ready and waiting. I wouldn’t leave ’ee naked, would I, my precious.’
Audrey was sent to fetch them and returned carrying them reverently in her rough hands and weeping again because they were so small and delicate.
‘So I should think,’ Aunt Tot said. ‘We can’t wrap our precious in linsey woolsey. That’d never do. Tha’s got to give thought to materials, when it comes to a baby.’
George Hudson was giving thought to materials at that moment too but in his case it was red brocade. Now that he’d impressed his new employers by showing them that he had a wealthy relation, he was going to make capital of it. He hadn’t seen Mrs Bell since he started work that morning but he’d kept himself occupied by planning exactly what he would say to her when she finally appeared. The thing was to catch her eye before she could say um and disappear.
She smoothed in at a thoroughly inopportune moment, when he was serving an elderly man who couldn’t make up his mind. Damned woman. And she stood and watched him as he tried to make a sale. He had to keep a smile on his face even though he was inwardly fuming, while the old man dithered and changed his mind and finally said he’d think about it and come back later. He was so cross he could have kicked the counter. But he stayed in control. ‘Mrs Bell, ma’am,’ he said, ‘I been thinking.’
‘Not to any – um – purpose, seemingly,’ she said, ‘else you’d have made a sale.’
‘Now that, ma’am, is precisely why I was thinking,’ he said, pressing on despite her disapproval. ‘’Tis my opinion of it that the gentleman would ha’ bought the cloth if he could ha’ seen it in t’window and made his mind up afore he came into the shop.’
‘Aye,’ she said. ‘Lizzie told me you wanted to put – um – cloth in the window. Well, let me tell ’ee. It wouldn’t do a happorth of good. People never look in t’windows.’
He decided to change tack slightly. ‘I been considerin’ our red brocade,’ he told her seriously, ‘and seems to me ’tis just the sort of cloth my uncle would buy, if he knew t’was on offer, so to speak. ’Tis quality is that an’ he’s a man for quality.’
‘Well,’ she said slowly. ‘As to that, I’m sure I don’t know.’
‘It might be worth a try,’ he urged. ‘I could put it all up for you in no time and glad to do it. ’Twould be an experiment. That’s all. And if it don’t come to any good, I’ll tek it down again in a day or two and no harm done.’ Then he gave her the benefit of his earnest grey eyes and waited.
She was tempted. He watched her as she dithered, fingering the lace on her sleeve. Oh come on! he willed her. Just say yes. That’s all you’ve got to do. I’ll do all the rest.
‘Well,’ she said at last. ‘Happen there’ll be no harm in it.’
He started work as soon she left. By the end of the afternoon the shop was transformed. There were shelves in both windows to hold the rolls of cloth and long swathes of the boldest designs and the prettiest colours were draped over the chairs he’d purloined from the kitchen, brocades and broadcloth in one window and cotton prints in the other. Better than that, he’d gathered a crowd as he worked and when they smiled and nodded at him through the glass, he’d held up the cloth for their inspection. So much for people never look in t’windows, he thought, as his happy audience gazed and talked. If they walk into the shop too, I’ll have made my point.
His first customers came in half an hour later, three very well dressed ladies in splendid bonnets, a mother and her daughters who’d come to see the new cottons. They bought three dress lengths, which he wrapped with a ribbon and a flourish, and departed well pleased with him and themselves.
‘Well, I never,’ Lizzie said when they’d gone. ‘Who’d ha’ thought it?’
‘This is just the start,’ he told her happily. ‘You wait and see.’
Two days later he bought two curtain poles, gave the chairs back to Mrs Norridge and changed the window ready for the Saturday trade. He was charged with energy and full of ideas. If he went about things the right way he could get himself a new suit of clothes. Then he could have some visiting cards printed, which would put that snooty butler in his place, and go visiting his rich uncle. He meant to cultivate that worthy gentleman, now that he knew how rich he was, and he thought he could see the right way to do it. All he needed was the right moment.
It didn’t come for nearly a month but it was worth waiting for. Mrs Bell walked into the shop after work on his fourth Saturday and actually sought him out. She had an official-looking paper in her hand and was smiling at him. Well, there’s a wonder!
‘If you will – um – just step into t’back parlour,’ she said, ‘I have your – um – articles for you to sign.’
He’d forgotten the apprenticeship. ‘Yes, ma’am,’ he said and smiled back.
The paper was spread out on the parlour table and held in position with a floral paperweight. He did as he was told and read it thoroughly. Articles for an apprenticeship with Nicholson and Bell Quality Drapers to the trade of draper to last seven years from the date of signature. I shall be of age afore this is served, he thought as he signed, but it was good to know that he’d passed muster. He watched as Mrs Bell added her signature. Now, he thought, for the next thing.
‘One of your customers has given me an idea, Mrs Bell,’ he said.
‘Oh yes,’ she said. She was still smiling. ‘What – um – customer was that?’
‘Mr Ramsbottom,’ he told her. ‘He was thinking of buying a length for a new jacket and he said what he really needed was to see how ’twould make up.’ It wasn’t strictly true. What had really happened was that Mr Ramsbottom had discussed the cloth and it was George who had wondered aloud if it might be helpful to Mr Ramsbottom if he could see it made up. But there was no need for her to know all that. It was much too complicated.
‘We’re not tailors,’ she said and now her face was stern again.
‘No indeed, ma’am,’ he agreed. ‘We’re not. But it gave me an idea. How would it be if I were to buy a length of one of our most popular lines and have it made up – at my own expense naturally – and then we could put it in t’window as part of the display, so to speak. I would need it on Sundays to wear to church and when I go to visit my uncle.’ And he looked a question at her and waited.
She was so flabbergasted she didn’t know what to say. She certainly wasn’t going to let him have his own way. That would do him no good at all. ‘Well, as to that,’ she said. ‘’Twill need a deal of – um – consideration. ’Tis not a thing to be rushed.’
‘No, ma’am,’ he said, trying not to show her what a rush he was in. ‘Course not. But happen you’ll think on it?’
‘How would you – um – pay for it?’ she asked. ‘Our cloth don’t come cheap.’
He had the answer to that at once. ‘It could be took out my wages,’ he said.
The boldness of it took her breath away. Really, there was no end to this boy. He had an answer for everything. ‘It would take months.’
‘Yes, ma’am, I know,’ he said. ‘But then if we get any sales as a result, what I can’t promise – we can’t know, can we? – but if we do there’ll be profit from that, what we could split half and half, on account of ’tis my idea an’ I’ll be taking the risk of it.’
That was such a preposterous suggestion she didn’t know how to answer it at all. ‘I will give it – um – thought,’ she said, eventually, and went upstairs to the safety of her nice quiet living room before he could say anything else.
‘That boy has the cheek of the devil!’ she said to her brother and sister as they sat at supper that night.
‘What’s he done now?’ Richard asked, grinning at her.
She told him, her voice querulous with disbelief, and was annoyed when he laughed. ‘It’s nowt to laugh at,’ she told him. ‘He wants to use our cloth and put a jacket in t’window for everybody to see, as if he hasn’t put enough things there already. Mr Bell must be turning in his grave. He signed the articles quick as a flash and now this. In the very next breath. I thought I were hiring a workhorse – someone strong and dependable and willing and – um – obedient and so forth – but he’s more like a stallion, allus goin his own way.’
‘Give him his head,’ Richard said. ‘That’s my advice. If it works, we’ll get more trade, which ain’t a bad thing, if it don’t, he’ll learn the hard way and serve him right.’
‘But ’tis our cloth Richard.’
‘Aye, so ’tis,’ Richard said. ‘Let him earn it and wear it. He might have the cheek of the devil, I’ll grant you that, but he’s handsome enough in all conscience. ’Twill look well on him. And what looks well will sell. He’s got the right of it there.’
So George got his cloth, which was a bold sky blue in a lightweight wool and found a tailor to make it up at a fair price – bein’ as ’tis a good advertisement for you, sir. He put it in the window as soon as it was ready to wear, carefully arranged on one of the tailor’s borrowed dummies and, sure enough, it attracted interest and trade just as he’d known it would. And the next Sunday, having borrowed a new white cravat from the stock and prevailed on Mrs Norridge to wash his best shirt for him when she had a copper full of hot water, and iron it ready for the occasion, he took his coat from the window and wore it to church.
It was much admired, especially by the maidservants in the back pews, and there was much smiling and bobbing of heads and eye-signalling in his direction. And then just as he was beginning to wonder whether his illustrious uncle was actually going to come to church that morning, there he was, striding down the aisle with that quiet wife of his holding his arm and a new grey silk hat on his head.
‘Getting on, I see, young George,’ he said as he reached his nephew’s pew. ‘That’s the style.’
‘Yes, sir,’ George agreed. ‘I do my best, sir.’
‘Good lad,’ his uncle said and made a heavy joke. ‘Now all you need’s the breeches, eh?’
‘Yes, sir,’ George said again, but he was thinking and the hat and the boots and a calling card. Oh, he’d a fair way to go yet.
It took him till the beginning of July and it needed all his skills as a salesman and considerable manipulation of Mrs Bell’s profit figures before he’d amassed enough money to be kitted out as he wished. And then he had to wait a week for the next early closing day before he could wear it. But the result was so satisfactory he was preening all the way to Monkgate. And what a happy moment it was when he handed his card to that snooty butler and told him that Mr Bottrill was expecting him. Now sneer if you dare, he thought.
This time he was admitted straightaway and led in due and proper style to the drawing room on the first floor, where his uncle was waiting for him.
‘We’ll have our coffee now, Joshua,’ he said, and when the butler had bowed and left them. ‘Still doing well, I see, young George.’
‘We’ve trebled our trade in the last two months,’ George told him happily.
‘Aye. I don’t doubt it,’ his uncle approved. ‘I’ve been watching. And all your doing if I’m any judge.’
‘Yes, sir,’ George said, trying to look modest and making a poor fist of it.
‘You’re a good lad,’ his uncle said. ‘A worker. Which is more than can be said for the others. Been here with their begging bowls only last week, so they have. Not that it’ll do ’em any good. I’ve got their measure, don’t you worry.’
George had no desire to hear about the others but there was no stopping Uncle Matthew once he’d started and his complaints against his avaricious family went on and on until the coffee was borne steaming into the room and he had to pause from his diatribe to drink it. George watched his disagreeable face as he scowled and sneered, and those bony hands clutching the cup and that long nose dipping towards the coffee, and decided that he would endure being bored and try to look as though he were interested. If this was the price he had to pay for being the favoured nephew then he would pay it. He’d be rewarded in the long run.
He stayed with his uncle for nearly an hour and parted with him in apparent good humour, even though he was inwardly twitching to get away. But it was a job well done, he thought, as he walked back to Goodramgate and he was eased and pleased when he began to gather admiring glances again.
‘Well, bless my soul,’ a familiar voice said as he emerged from the crowded arch of Monkgate, holding onto his hat. ‘If it’s not George Hudson. You do look well. Quite the swell.’
‘Mrs Hardcastle, ma’am,’ he said, giving her a courteous bow. ‘I trust I see you well.’ It was always sensible to keep in with the local gossip.
‘Visiting my cousin,’ she said.
‘Ah!’
‘Do ’ee work hereabouts?’
‘At the drapers,’ he told her. ‘Nicholson and Bell’s.’
‘And doing well, I see.’
He laughed at that. ‘Aye, ma’am, but give me a year or two and I shall do even better.’
She gave him her shrewd look. ‘Aye,’ she said. ‘Happen so.’ They were heading in opposite directions or she would have walked with him and discovered more.
‘Pray give my regards to my family,’ he said as he turned to stride away from her. And that was such a happy moment he was grinning all the way back to the shop.
Mrs Hardcastle went straight to Home Farm as soon as the carter had set her down by her own gate. This was too good a piece of gossip not to be spread and besides she wanted to see how Philadelphia was because the poor girl had been quite ill these past few weeks.
She was sitting in her chair by the kitchen fire darning stockings and looking extremely pale and tired but she greeted her visitor in her usual gentle way and when Mrs Hardcastle asked her how she was she smiled and said she was ‘fair to middling’ even though it was plain to the midwife’s experienced eye that she was no such thing. But she was visibly cheered when she heard how well her brother was doing.
‘Fallen on his feet, sithee,’ Mrs Hardcastle told her. ‘Allus knew he would. Great strong boy like that.’
Philadelphia covered her mouth with a kerchief and coughed into it for a worryingly long time. But her mind was still on her brother and when she’d recovered her breath she questioned her visitor again. ‘He looks well, would ’ee say, Mrs Hardcastle?’
‘Blooming,’ Mrs Hardcastle said, but she was thinking, which is more than can be said for you, poor girl. ‘Great strong boy!’