Hope - Lesley Pearse [84]
‘I expect you’re very glad to be home, m’lady?’ she said to her mistress.
‘I certainly am, Nell,’ Lady Harvey sighed. ‘These past weeks have been such a trial. I feel utterly exhausted.’
There had been a great deal of unpleasantness between Lady Harvey and her sisters after the reading of their father’s will. Sir William hadn’t helped the situation by becoming drunk and abusive, then rushing off and leaving his wife to smooth ruffled feathers.
‘You’ll soon recover now,’ Nell said comfortingly. ‘Master Rufus and everyone at Briargate will be so pleased to have you home again.’
Even before the cab reached the end of the drive, Baines came out with a lantern, quickly followed by Rose. Nell wondered if he had sat by the window waiting, because he surely couldn’t have heard the cab from the kitchen.
Baines and Rose took Lady Harvey’s luggage and as they all went into the hall Master Rufus came hurtling down the stairs excitedly.
‘Mama, I’m so glad you are back,’ he said, throwing himself at her. ‘I was so afraid you wouldn’t get here for Christmas.’
Nell smiled at the happy reunion. Rufus seemed to have grown another inch or two since he went back to school in September, and he was growing into a very handsome young man.
She wondered fleetingly why Hope wasn’t hovering in the background to greet them too. But when Baines said he would bring some supper to the drawing room for Lady Harvey she assumed Hope was helping Martha prepare it.
After Rose had taken Lady Harvey’s fur-lined cloak and her hat, mother and son went towards the drawing room with their arms around each other. Nell hurried out to the kitchen; it was so long since she’d had a drink she felt as though her throat had been cut, and she was perished with the cold.
‘Oh, it feels so good to be in the warm at last,’ she said as she went into the kitchen, making straight for the stove and resting her bottom against it. ‘What I wouldn’t have given for a fur-lined cloak on the train coming home!’
Martha was just putting some finishing touches to the tray for the mistress, and she looked up and smiled at Nell.
‘It’s good to have you back,’ she said. ‘Albert stayed on to wait for you, but it got so late he had to go to his bed. But at least he will have warmed it for you.’
‘Where’s Hope?’ Nell asked as Baines came into the kitchen.
He ignored her question and picked up the tray. ‘I’ll just take this in to her ladyship,’ he said.
‘Is something wrong?’ Nell asked after he’d left the room. ‘Is Hope sick?’
‘It ain’t my place to say anything,’ Martha said. ‘Baines will tell you when he comes back.’
Nell knew then that something was wrong, and this was confirmed when she saw Rose scuttling towards the servants’ hall, presumably because she didn’t want to be questioned either. ‘Rose! Tell me where Hope is,’ she called out.
‘Now, calm down, Nell,’ Martha said. ‘Baines won’t be long.’
‘She isn’t here, is she?’ Nell exclaimed. ‘Where’s she gone? When did she go?’
Martha’s wooden expression and Rose’s extreme nervousness told her that Hope had most definitely gone, but neither of them was prepared to say why or when.
Nell paced the floor, cold and thirst forgotten in her agitation. The kitchen smelled of cinnamon, cloves and other spices, good smells that reminded her of past Christmases when she’d had family all around her here. Even with all the misery Albert caused her, here at Briargate she’d always been able to put that aside. She hadn’t wanted either James or Ruth to leave, but she never voiced this because she knew it was wrong to stand in their way. But without Hope she didn’t know what she would do.
Baines came in and ominously shut the door behind him.
‘She’s gone, hasn’t she?’ Nell said.
Baines nodded glumly.
‘Why so suddenly? Surely she could have waited for me to get