Hope - Lesley Pearse [6]
The main rooms were spacious, but not so big that they couldn’t be heated adequately. The dining room was close to the kitchen, so food arrived at the table hot. There was even a contraption in the kitchen where large pails of hot water could be sent upstairs for baths and washing just by pulling on a rope. Bridie laughingly called it ‘The Maid’s Saviour’ and pulled up her sleeve to show a burn on her forearm which she’d got as a young girl from hauling a pail of boiling water up the stairs.
Hearing the baby cry out as she neared the kitchen, Nell didn’t stop to put her boots on, but as she turned the corner of the hallway which led to the kitchen, she was horrified to see Bridie leaning over the baby’s basket with a cushion in her hands.
There was no doubt as to what she was intending to do for she was crying and muttering something through her tears that sounded to Nell like an apology or even a prayer.
‘No, Bridie!’ Nell called out, dropping her boots with a clatter and running towards the older woman. ‘You mustn’t – it’s wicked, and she’s a fairy child.’
Bridie wheeled round, her old face stricken with guilt. ‘But it’s the only way, Nell. If she lives it’ll be ruin for m’lady, she’ll be cast out of Briargate.’
Later that day it was to strike Nell that Bridie had watched indifferently as a maid was ordered out of the house because she was with child. If Lady Harvey was cast out she could go back to her own family, but that poor girl had nowhere to go but the workhouse.
But Nell didn’t think of that then – all she had on her mind was the prevention of murder. ‘You can’t kill a baby,’ she insisted, getting between Bridie and the makeshift cradle. ‘It ain’t right and you know it.’
For a second or two Nell thought Bridie would strike her and carry on with her plan, for she could see the desperation on her face. But instead she suddenly sagged, sank down on to a chair and covered her face with her hands. ‘Heaven knows I don’t want to hurt the babby, but what else is there to do?’ she asked imploringly.
‘I don’t know,’ Nell said, and put her hand on the older woman’s shoulder. ‘But it ain’t never right to kill her. It ain’t her fault she were born, and like I said she’s a fairy child. Just look at her!’
The baby had her eyes open now, and had stopped crying, almost as if she knew the danger had passed. Her eyes were not the usual blue of a new baby’s, but dark as night, looking up at Nell as if thanking her for the reprieve.
‘Maybe we could take her to the church and leave her there then?’ Bridie said in desperation. ‘Reverend Gosling would find a place for her.’
Nell shook her head. She knew infants left in the church went to the workhouse, and few of them survived beyond a few weeks. She snatched up the baby and cradled her protectively in her arms. ‘You know what that means,’ she reminded Bridie, and as the sweet smell of the newborn baby wafted up to her it triggered her own tears.
For some minutes neither woman spoke. Bridie remained with her head in her hands, sobbing, and Nell paced up and down the kitchen with the baby in her arms.
Nell felt a surge of anger that Lady Harvey should be sleeping peacefully now, while she and Bridie had somehow to find a solution for a problem which was none of their making. Lady Harvey had been born into wealth, she’d been pampered, dressed in the finest clothes, schooled by governesses, and then married at eighteen to a man who everyone had said was the finest catch in the West Country.
Nell could remember how as a little girl she’d stood with the other village children in St Mary the Virgin’s churchyard to throw rose petals at the couple. No queen could have looked more beautiful than Lady Harvey did that day, her golden hair tumbling around her shoulders. Her white silk dress with its twelve-foot train must have cost more than Nell’s father had earned in his whole life. And Sir William wasn’t just wealthy, he was handsome too, slender and