If You Were the Only Girl

Lucy nodded. ‘Yes, my lady.’ She had no intention of doing anything to upset the woman she was already nervous of.

‘Now, as for uniform,’ Lady Heatherington said, ‘you will be given a grey dress and apron that you will wear at all times, and any we have will have to be altered to fit you. Can you sew?’

‘Oh, yes, my lady.’

‘Good,’ said Lady Heatherington. ‘Then you will attend to your uniform immediately in your spare time, for I will not have anyone slovenly attired in my household.’

‘No, my lady.’

‘All right, Cassidy. You may return to the kitchen.’

‘Thank you, my lady,’ Lucy said, bobbing another curtsy before she made for the door. She was glad to find Clara outside ready to escort her back. Lucy told her what had transpired in the library and she nodded.

‘You’ll soon settle in,’ she said, ‘and if you work hard you and Cook will soon be the best of friends. Now, first things first,’ she continued as they reached the kitchen again. ‘Young Jerry here will take your case up to the attic you will share with Evie and Clodagh.’

Lucy remembered what Clara had said about Jerry Kilroy and so she wasn’t surprised when, catching her eye, he winked at her. A man had never winked at Lucy before and she blushed slightly and was suddenly glad she had a decent case for she would have hated to have been shown up in front of this cocky footman.

Clodagh, though, was different altogether. She was sixteen and Lucy thought she looked really pretty with tight brown curls framing her face and a smile of welcome shining out from her brown eyes, and she was glad that she would see a lot of her. She had come from Ballintra, outside Donegal Town, a place not that much bigger than Mountcharles, which made another thing they had in common.

Evie, who was seventeen, came from the Donegal Town itself and she was just as pleasant as Clodagh, and as pretty, with her dark blonde hair and eyes of deepest blue.

‘You won’t see quite so much of me because my duties are in the house, you see, and so I don’t need to come into the kitchen much,’ she explained to Lucy. ‘I came in today to meet you when Mrs O’Leary told me you had arrived.’

‘You’ll see her at mealtimes,’ Clodagh said. ‘All the servants eat together.’

‘Yes, and we will all share the attic, though I don’t suppose that will bother you.’

Lucy shook her head, for she had never had a room or even a bed to herself in the whole of her life. ‘No. Not at all.’

‘Well, there you are, then, and in no time at all I’m sure we will be the best of friends.’

Lucy hoped so, for she had never really had a friend before and after meeting both girls she felt far more positive about working in Windthorpe Lodge.

Even Cook spoke to her far more civilly when she said, ‘Clara was saying that your father died six months ago, but she said he had been bad for some time.’

Lucy nodded. ‘Ages. He had TB.’

Cook knew about TB, that insidious illness that could wipe out whole families. Clara had told her of the poverty the family lived in because Seamus hadn’t been able to work for some years before he died, and certainly, Lucy Cassidy didn’t look as though she had ever had a decent meal in her life. So Cook said, ‘Well, though we will all eat later, I will not put anyone to work on an empty stomach. So how about-you go to the attic with Clodagh and put your uniform on, for all it will drown you for now, and I will cook you some eggs and bacon to keep you going?’

Eggs and bacon! Lucy’s mouth watered at the very thought of it and she nodded vigorously. ‘Yes, oh, yes. Thank you.’

The cook smiled at Lucy’s enthusiasm, and Clodagh said, ‘Come on, then.’

She led the way up the back stairs and as she did so she said, ‘Your face was a picture when Cook mentioned cooking you bacon and eggs.’

‘That’s because I can’t really remember what either tastes like,’ Lucy said.

Clodagh stopped on the stairs and looked into Lucy’s face. ‘Honestly?’

‘Honestly,’ Lucy answered. ‘When Daddy was first sick, Mammy turned the garden over to grow vegetables, and we have hens as well, but the eggs are not for us to eat. Mammy needed them and the surplus vegetables that she barters at the shop in exchange for flour, oatmeal, candles and other things she couldn’t grow.’

‘Oh, that’s awful,’ Clodagh said. ‘Well, you needn’t worry here. Cook keeps a good table and now she probably sees it as her life’s work to feed you up because that’s the type of person she is. She is much kinder than she appears. But now we’d better get you dressed up properly for the kitchen or, despite what I just said, if we take too long we’ll get the rough edge of her tongue. She can’t abide slacking.’

Suddenly Clodagh stopped on a sort of landing. ‘Our bedroom is up those stairs,’ she said, indicating another flight. ‘This is the linen press where our overalls and uniforms are kept.’ She opened the door set into the wall as she spoke, and Lucy saw the overalls folded in piles and uniforms hung on hangers at the back. ‘Cook says the Mistress is a stickler about uniform if you are ever to be seen by the family, and even more so if they have guests for dinner, but I doubt we have a uniform to fit you.’ She held aloft a light grey dress as she spoke and went on, ‘This seems to be about the smallest. Let’s pop upstairs and you can try it on.’

Lucy was agreeable to that because she was anxious at any rate to see what the room was like, and in that, too, she was pleasantly surprised. It had whitewashed walls, which Lucy thought a good idea when the only light came from the skylight, and though the room was small, good use had been made of the available space, which housed four iron bedsteads, a dressing table, rag rugs on the floor and a small wardrobe behind the door.

The dress swamped Lucy’s frail frame and the skirts reached nearly to her ankles, as did the coarse apron that Evie tied around her waist. ‘You’ll have to turn them up, that’s all,’ Clodagh said, surveying her critically. ‘Can you sew?’

When Lucy nodded, Clodagh said, ‘And me. Mammy taught me. She said every housewife should be able to sew. So we’ll do it together. It would be quicker and it wouldn’t do me any harm to get some practice in.’

‘Oh, that is kind of you,’ Lucy said. ‘Are you sure?’

‘Course I am,’ Clodagh said. ‘Now, let’s put your hat on. We’ll need to put your hair up. You got any Kirbigrips?’

Lucy shook her head.

‘Never mind,’ Clodagh said. ‘I have tons, and a band to gather it altogether. You’ll have to have it piled up on top of your head somehow, see, or the hat won’t go on.’ She coiled up Lucy’s hair as she spoke. ‘Golly, Lucy, you have got lovely hair. It’s like a reddish-brown colour.’ In fact, Clodagh thought if Lucy were to put more meat on her she would be a very beautiful girl. Her eyes were large, a lovely colour and ringed by long black lashes, and she had a classic nose, high cheekbones and a beautiful mouth. Even her neck, she noticed with a stab of envy, was long and slender. It was a shame that the skin on her face was a muddy-grey colour and her pale cheeks sunken in slightly.

‘That will have to do,’ Clodagh said, stepping back from Lucy and surveying her handiwork. ‘Come on, let’s go and see Cook. I can almost smell the bacon and eggs sizzling.’

THREE (#ulink_6d437f33-e2dc-586a-8bfb-104d9fe4c19d)

By Sunday, 1 December, Lucy had been at Windthorpe Lodge for four weeks and was ready for her first full Sunday off. She had hardly slept the night before because she had been too excited, but though she had the whole day to herself she had to rise earlier than anyone, as she did every morning, to clean the range, then light it, fill the large kettle with water and put it on the range to heat for the tea.

She would not be staying for the servants’ breakfast because she would be taking communion that morning and, if she caught the rail bus at seven, she would be at Mountcharles in plenty of time to make nine o’clock Mass, the one her family always went to. She was so excited to be seeing them all again and to tell them of her new life.

She wouldn’t mention the fact that there was always plenty of food because Cook always maintained that no one worked well on an empty stomach. She had porridge every morning with plenty of sugar and as much milk as she wanted to pour over it, followed by bread and butter and jam, and several cups of tea. On Sunday mornings she would go with Evie, Clodagh and Clara to early Mass in Letterkenny, and Cook would have porridge ready for their return, followed by bacon and eggs. Then at midday they would sit down to a meal of roast or boiled meat and vegetables, followed by something sweet, usually with custard, and there was similar fare taken just before the family dinner. Since she had come to work in the house the only time she had been the slightest bit hungry was before Mass on a Sunday morning.

Lucy wrote to her mother every week but she never told her any of this because she didn’t think it would help. It was enough for her mother to know that she was being adequately fed and she resolved she wouldn’t go on about it when she got home either. There were plenty of other things she could tell them about and she fair rattled through her jobs that morning.

Lucy only wished she had something to take to cheer the family, for she knew she wouldn’t get to see them over Christmas. She could spend hardly any of her wages because her mother needed every penny and she had retained only two shillings for herself, and one and six of that she spent on the fare home so she would have thirty shillings to give her mother. She had that ready, wrapped in a little cloth bag and pushed right down to the bottom of the big bag that Clara had loaned her.

Clara had called Lucy into her quarters just after she had finished scouring the pots used for the family dinner the previous evening, and asked her to wait a moment in the housekeeper’s snug and well-furnished parlour as she had something for her.

Lucy was pleased to be asked to wait because it gave her a chance to look around. She had never been asked in here before. She noted the brightly coloured rugs covering most of the floor, and the small beige settee and two chairs, covered with soft brown cushions, which were drawn up before the fireplace where a small fire burned in the grate. There was also a small table drawn up between the chairs, with a matching sideboard against the wall, full of pretty ornaments that she would have loved to examine.

Clara came in at that moment, carrying a big bag in one hand and holding a pair of boots in the other, a collection of garments draped over her arms.

‘Now,’ she said as she began to sort through the garments, ‘these are just some old clothes your mother might find a use for.’ Lucy smiled, for she had never seen Clara wear any of the things she was packing away neatly in the bag.

‘What’s wrong with the boots?’ Lucy said as Clara put them on top. ‘They hardly look worn. Mammy will go on about pride.’

‘Well, let her,’ Clara said. ‘Pride doesn’t keep a person’s feet warm.’ And then, as Lucy still looked apprehensive, she continued, ‘Look, Lucy, if the boot was on the other foot, your mother would be the first to stretch out a helping hand, I know she would. She is my oldest friend and if I can make life a little easier then I feel I should. I would think myself less of a person if I didn’t.’

Lucy couldn’t think of a reply to that and Clara added, ‘There is an envelope there, too, with a Christmas card in it.’

‘Won’t you get home at all before Christmas?’