Page 23

Chapter 23

June 1911

Isobel enjoyed making scones more than almost any other kind of baking.

It was quick, and she felt it required some deftness with the temperature of the butter and the oven.

It wasn’t as easy as it looked, and if pushed she would have said that it made her feel rather clever.

She held the sieve high over the earthenware mixing bowl and shook it gently so the white powder fell in a cascade, gathering air as it fell, mixing flour and baking powder together.

She chopped the butter with a blunt knife against her thumb and began to rub the mixture into fine breadcrumbs.

This was what she enjoyed most, the transformation from one form to another; she had heard Finlay talking to his friend Daniel in the garden about changing states.

He had said it was chemistry, and she supposed that baking was a sort of chemistry, but a lot more genteel than the bangs and smells the two young men had been describing.

He was clever, she thought, the sort of person who would change the world, given a chance.

Ursula appeared in the doorway, interrupting Isobel’s thoughts.

‘Isobel, I need to talk to you.’

‘Yes, Mrs Black.’

‘I have been thinking about something for several weeks, and I need you to be honest with me.’

Isobel stopped mixing the scone dough and rested her hands on the edge of the bowl.

‘Of course.’

‘I want you to tell me your impression of the late Mrs Black.’

Isobel hesitated before replying.

‘Why is that, if you don’t mind me asking?

’

Ursula sat down on one of the kitchen chairs and pointed at the other chair.

‘Just tell me what you think.’

‘I’m not sure I want to do that,’ said Isobel eventually.

She stayed on her feet.

‘Why not?’ Ursula had discovered that it was better to be direct with Isobel.

‘I don’t want to speak ill of the dead.

’

‘There is something ill to be said, then?’

Isobel was trapped by her own words.

‘I’m not sure how it would be helpful.

’

‘It would be helpful to me ,’ Ursula said, emphasising the last word.

‘I’ve been told some things and I want to know if they are true,’ she paused, ‘before I speak to my husband.’

‘I might lose my job.’

‘You won’t.

’

‘I might, if Mr Black doesn’t like what I would tell you.

’

‘Please let me be the judge of that.’

Isobel sighed.

‘Just tell me whatever you want to, or not. And if you really don’t want to say anything, then we will leave it at that.

’

Ursula waited. It would have been easy to pepper the space with more questions, but she allowed the silence to rest until Isobel might be ready to speak.

‘Well, as you know, I came to the house when it was new, almost three years ago,’ Isobel began.

‘Ann was ten and Finlay was fourteen. A little while after everyone moved in, things seemed to be alright. Mrs Black was .?.?. I’m not sure how to describe it.

Shall we say there wasn’t much patience inside her.

And then one afternoon there was a knock on the scullery door, and there was a woman outside, a bit older than me.

She had a message for me.

She told me to be careful.

And I asked her what she meant and she said she hadn’t been able to get another place after she had worked for Mrs Black.

’

Ursula frowned. ‘Did she tell you why that was?’

‘She said that word had been put about that she was unreliable. That she wasn’t clean in her habits and she was loose with her morals.

’

‘And these rumours had come from .?.?.’

‘From Mrs Black. The woman could not prove it, of course, but she said that she’d been offered plenty of positions but as soon as her references were taken up, the offers were withdrawn.

’

‘And had she done anything to deserve these statements?’

‘I didn’t ask.

But I assumed the fact that she was warning me meant that there was no truth in them at all.

She said that the problem had started when she decided not to move to Library Terrace.

She was a small woman and she had a rasp to her breathing.

She said the house would have been too much for her.

She had looked all over the place.

Situations in The Scotsman , and some agencies as well.

In the end she stopped trying and went back to her family.

They have a smallholding near Haddington.

She was up in Edinburgh that day to go to the Infirmary for her lungs and she took it upon herself to come and speak to me, and she left me her address, in case I should need it.

’

‘And then what happened?’

Isobel rubbed her forehead, leaving a floury mark.

‘Nothing.’

‘Nothing at all?’

‘Nothing until a few weeks later. Then one day Mrs Black accused me of eating more food than I was entitled to. She said she had been monitoring it and that I was having more than my share and that the food was hers to give out and not mine to take. And she accused me of improper relations with the postman. She said that it was disgusting how I was carrying on with him.’

‘The same postman we have now? But he must be about fifty years old and you are barely twenty!’

‘I’m twenty-two, it was on the census form.

’

Ursula skimmed past the reminder.

‘This is scarcely believable.’

‘I promise you, it’s all true.

She would give me my portions of food.

I wasn’t allowed to serve myself.

If there was nothing left after dinner, I didn’t get anything.

’

‘Did that happen often?’

‘Often enough. I learned very quickly to put a slice of bread in my pocket during the day, just in case, and to eat when she was out, make extra soup, that sort of thing. In the end I just made the meals a bit bigger so there was always something left over. Not so much more that she would notice, but enough to be sure I could have something.’

‘Why didn’t you leave?

I mean, I’m very glad you didn’t, but why not?

’

‘Because of the children.’

Ursula put her head in her hands.

Isobel was now quite unable to stop.

‘It was alright when Mr Black was in the house. Everything was quiet and respectful. But when he was at work, she shouted at me. Now, I understand that maids get shouted at sometimes, but when the children came in from school, she shouted at them too.’

‘Often?’

‘Most days. If their rooms were untidy, or a book was left out of place or there was a mark on a coat, or even if they weren’t feeling well.

It was like a tap being turned on and off.

You didn’t know who you were getting or what would make her shout.

It wasn’t something you could guess in advance.

Master Finlay was at high school by then.

He made sure he was in every sports team, in the debating society, in the chess club and in the choir.

Anything that meant he was out of the house until after Mr Black came in from work at six.

I saw him in the evenings when he came back from all these activities and I could have sworn he had been standing on a street corner to avoid coming into the house; he was so wet and cold sometimes he could hardly undo the buttons on his coat.

’

‘And Ann?’

‘Miss Ann just hid. She hardly came out of her room unless it was necessary. She said she had headaches. She had so many of these mystery headaches that Mr Black took her to see a doctor at the Sick Children’s Hospital.

Of course, there was no headache when she was not with Mrs Black.

It all feels like a long time ago now.

Ann was so quiet. She barely spoke.

I think she thought that if she didn’t say anything then she couldn’t be wrong.

It probably went on for about a year, with loud shouting almost every day.

And then Mrs Black got more ill.

She didn’t have the breath to shout because of the disease in her lungs.

The sickness sort of stole her voice.

After that there wasn’t real out-loud shouting, but shouting in whispers.

Sneaky shouting that no one can hear unless they are up close.

I still call that shouting.

Miss Ann couldn’t hide in her room any more because her mother needed her to fetch things and be her errand girl.

And that was when Ann used to come to me in the kitchen.

And she would tell me things.

’

‘Things?’

‘About how she was an idiot, and how she would never marry because she was an ugly girl. And I realised there was no point in telling her she was wrong, because I was just the maid and she was being told these things by her mother who was much more important.’

‘So what did you do?’

‘I just listened to her. I would ask her about school and just let her blether away. And I taught her about things, things that make you clever because other people don’t know them.

’

‘I don’t understand.

’

Isobel walked over to the window.

‘How many kinds of birds do you think we have in the garden?’

‘I don’t know.

I’ve never thought about it.

’

‘Try.’

‘Starling, blackbird, blue tit, sparrow, maybe a pigeon or two.’

‘Next time you see Miss Ann, ask her. There are eighteen. Probably more. And ask her about the mosses and the lichens on the walls. We know all the names.’

‘How do you know these things? Were you brought up in the country?’

Isobel laughed.

‘In the country? No. I’m from Gorgie.

I went to the library when I was out doing the shopping and borrowed a few books for her.

We learned them together, here at the table in the kitchen.

Mrs Black didn’t know because she was in her bed by then and too poorly to be down here.

Noticing things is a skill, my teachers at school told me that.

Miss Ann knows about a lot of things, much more than people imagine.

’

‘But why doesn’t she talk about all this?

’

‘Because talking about things that matter gets you into trouble. Or at least it used to, when Mrs Black was here.’

‘You taught her to be curious.’

‘I suppose. She discovered it was a good feeling to find things out.’

‘And then Mrs Black died.’

Isobel nodded.

‘And Mr Black was very sad for a long time.’

‘From your voice it sounds as though there is more to say about that.’

‘No one else was sad. No one.’ Isobel folded her arms. ‘Why are you asking me all this?’

‘Because I needed to know. Mr Black wants the children to call me Mother, but Ann is refusing to do it. He is cross with her and thinks she is being stubborn for no reason. Ann wants to call me Ursula.’

‘If you don’t mind me saying, Mrs Black, I think that’s a great compliment.

It’s possible that, in her mind, Mother is not a good word.

’

Ursula nodded. ‘That’s what she said and I didn’t fully understand why.

’

‘What are you going to do now?’

‘I want to speak to Finlay. And after that, I need to talk to my husband.’ She paused.

‘Are you making fruit scones?’

‘Cheese.’

‘Good. I’m hungry.

’ She took a plate down from the dresser.

‘Eighteen different birds? Perhaps I need to go to the library too.’