A Mother's Courage (6 page)

'Let me hold the baby, miss. I know how. I've
got six younger brothers and sisters at home and
me older brother, Ted, is stable boy here. I
daresay you met him last night. He usually goes
out with Mr Riley, the coachman, since the old
fellow's rheumatics play him up in winter
something terrible.' Mabel held out her arms and
Eloise allowed her to take Beth. Almost immediately
her screams quietened and she gazed up
at Mabel with apparent interest.

'She likes you,' Eloise murmured, not knowing
whether to be pleased or hurt by the way her
baby daughter took to a stranger.

'She's a little flower, that's what she is.'

Joss seemed to sense his mother's distress and
he climbed onto her lap. Smiling, Eloise dandled
him on her knee, tickling his tummy which
always made him chuckle. He obliged her with a
deep belly laugh. 'You're such a good boy, Joss.
And I won't allow them to shut you up in their
horrid old nursery.'

Mabel shifted Beth to her shoulder and rocked
her gently, patting the baby's back with a gentle
hand. 'They've had the maids scrubbing it from
top to bottom, miss. It's not such a bad place
really, and I've heard tell that's what the gentry
do. Grand ladies give their children over to
nursery maids the moment they're born.'

'Well, I'm not a grand lady, and I've no
intention of allowing strangers to bring up my
children.'

'If you don't mind me saying, miss, you won't
have much choice in the matter. If Miss
Braithwaite and the mistress want it that way,
that's the way it shall be.'

'We'll see,' Eloise said grimly. 'They might be
able to bully the servants, but I won't stand for
it.'

'You're very brave, miss. I shouldn't like to
cross Miss Braithwaite.' Mabel pulled up a stool
and sat down at Eloise's side. 'It's common
knowledge that she hasn't been the same since
she was jilted at the altar. You won't let on that I
told you, will you?'

'No, certainly not.'

Mabel glanced over her shoulder as if afraid
that someone might overhear her words, and she
lowered her voice. 'Well, it weren't exactly at the
altar, but as good as. He were a right handsome
devil, so our mum said, but it turned out that he
already had a wife in Whitby, and they say he
had another in York, although I can't say for
certain. Miss Joan were a good-looking woman
then, according to our mum, and she were all set
up to inherit the butcher's shop when their father
passed on.'

Momentarily diverted from her own problems,
Eloise was intrigued. 'Go on.'

'Well, Miss Joan thought she was too good to
work in the shop and so she stayed at home, but
her sister, her that's the mistress now, was not so
proud. She served in their father's shop
alongside Mr Cribb, who was only a butcher's
boy then. When old man Braithwaite died of a
heart attack all of a sudden like, Mr Cribb took
over the business but he married Miss Hilda
Braithwaite and not her sister Joan. They lived
above the shop and Miss Joan went off sudden-like
to stay with her aunt in Bridlington – to mend
her broken heart, they say. Anyhow, the master
made enough money to buy the shop off Miss
Joan, and when she returned from Bridlington a
few years later, the master built this fine house
and she's been living here ever since.'

The sound of footsteps outside the door made
Mabel suddenly alert and she leapt to her feet.
'I'd best get on or I'll be for it.' She laid Beth back
in her cradle before going to the door and
peeping out. She turned to Eloise with a worried
frown. 'I won't be a moment, miss. There's
summat I must see to before I finish off in here.'
She slipped out of the room, closing the door
behind her.

Eloise waited for a moment, half expecting
Joan to erupt into her room and scold her for
keeping a servant from her duties, but the sound
of footsteps grew fainter and it seemed that
Mabel had been called away. Eloise thought no
more about it, or of Joan Braithwaite's personal
tragedy that had blighted her life. She could feel
little sympathy for a woman who had shown her
nothing but hostility. Joss jiggled about on her
knee, reminding her to play with him, and she
obliged, but her mind was racing as she tried
desperately to think of a way to escape from
Cribb's Hall. She had no relations to whom she
could appeal for shelter; both Mama and Papa
had been only children and their cousins had
either emigrated or were long dead. She had no
money of her own, and no qualifications other
than that of a reasonably good education.

Gradually, lulled by the rocking movement
and the warmth from the fire, Joss fell asleep in
her arms. Eloise rose slowly to her feet and laid
him in the middle of the bed, with pillows on
either side to prevent him from rolling off and
hurting himself. There was an old-fashioned
escritoire placed beneath the window, and on
further investigation she discovered a bottle of
ink and a quill pen. She unpacked her leather
writing case, which had been a twenty-first
birthday present from Ronnie, and she settled
down to compose a letter to her mother. The
simple act of putting pen to paper brought
Mama suddenly so close that Eloise felt her
presence almost as if she were in the room. She
wrote slowly and chose her words carefully. The
harsh truth would only upset her mother and
Eloise made light of her trials, omitting entirely
the harsh way in which she had been received by
her mother-in-law and Joan. She was so intent on
her task that she did not hear the door open
behind her.

'So, I take it you are writing to your sainted
mother.'

The sound of Hilda's strident tones made
Eloise jump and a large blot of ink splattered
across the sheet of paper. She put the pen down,
controlling the urge to snap back at her mother-in-law. Taking a deep breath she rose to her feet,
facing Hilda with a defiant lift of her chin. 'Yes,
ma'am. I was writing to inform her that we had
arrived safely.'

'And to complain of your treatment too, no
doubt.'

'No, ma'am. I would not want to distress my
parents by telling them that I was an unwelcome
guest in your home.'

Hilda inclined her head slightly. 'You have
that much backbone at least.' She went to sit in
the chair by the fire. 'I admit that I was not best
pleased when your father wrote informing us
that you and the children would be coming to
stay. He might be a man of God, but he assumed
a great deal when he foisted you on us in our
state of grief.'

'I realise that it is very hard for you, Mother-in-law,
as it is for me. I believe that we both loved
Ronnie equally, and suffer a great deal from his
loss.'

Hilda's tight-lipped expression did not falter.
Her eyes were like cold steel as she regarded
Eloise with an unflinching stare. 'I'm a plain
woman, Ellen. I speak my mind, and I am sure
you would not want it any other way. I neither
know you, nor do I care about you, but I do care
about Ronald's children and I will do my duty by
them. Young Ronald and Elizabeth will have the
best of care and the finest education that our
hard-earned money can buy. As Ronald's widow
you have a right to stay in our home, but the
children will be raised as we think fit. You may
see them as much as you please, providing that
you do not spoil them. They will have the
upbringing suited to their situation in life.'

Eloise gripped her hands together behind her
back so that Hilda would not see how they
trembled. She dug her fingernails into her palms
to keep the tears of anger and frustration at bay
and she controlled her voice with difficulty. And
what is that, pray?'

'Don't take that hoity-toity tone with me. I
know that you and your folk look down on us
because we're in trade. Well, we might have
made our brass from selling sausages and meat
pies, but our fortune was gained through honest
toil. Young Ronald and his sister will be looked
after by a nanny until they are old enough to be
sent away to school. Ronald will learn to be a
gentleman as well as a man of business, and the
girl will be educated like a proper young lady.
You should be grateful to us, Ellen. We could
have turned our backs on you, as your parents
have done, but I know my duty. So long as you
abide by my rules, you will get on well enough in
this house. Go against me, and you will find out
that Hilda Cribb can be a hard woman.'

'I do not want my babies to be looked after by
a nanny,' Eloise said through gritted teeth. 'I will
not allow it.'

Hilda rose majestically to her feet. 'You won't
allow it? Listen to me, young lady. While you are
living under my roof you will do as I say, and I
say that the little ones will be raised in the
nursery. Of course you will have to be there to
feed the girl child, until she is weaned, and they
will be brought down for an hour or so at
teatime, just like they do in the best of houses.
We have come up in the world, Ellen. Harcourt
and I are no longer mere butchers, we are the
new gentry, and we have standards. If you don't
like it, you know where the door is, but Ronald's
children stay here. Do I make myself plain?'

It was all too plain, and Eloise soon discovered
that she was powerless to prevent her mother-in-law
from carrying out her wishes. A girl had
been found in the village and next day she was
ensconced in the nursery as the nanny, and the
children were put into her care. No matter how
much Eloise railed against the decision, no one
paid her any attention. Even Harcourt brushed
aside her complaints when she cornered him
after supper that evening. He was not as brutal as
his wife, but he put Eloise's anxiety down to
nerves and the fact that it was not so long since
she had given birth to Beth. He patted her on the
arm and with a kindly smile told her that she
would soon get used to it, and even enjoy the
freedom that she would have with her babies
cared for by another.

By way of a slight concession, Eloise was
allowed to have her possessions moved to a
room adjacent to the nursery, and Hilda only
sanctioned this for practical reasons as Beth
could not yet go through the night without being
fed. 'But,' she had added, having given way just
an inch, 'you will not find the room as comfortable
as the one you were given in the first place.'

This was patently true, as Eloise found her
belongings had been taken to a room half the size
of the previous one, situated at the back of the
house, overlooking the stable yard and outbuildings.
There was a single bedstead with a
plain white coverlet, a deal washstand, tallboy
and a wheel back chair which would have been
better suited to the kitchen than to a lady's
bedroom. A rag rug by the bed was the only
splash of colour on the brown linoleum which
covered the floor. Eloise realised that she might
have won the last battle but she was rapidly
losing the war. Hilda might have appeared to
have given way but in reality had consigned her
daughter-in-law to a servant's room. However,
that was the least of Eloise's worries. She cared
for nothing as long as she was close to her babies,
and she made herself as comfortable as possible
in the austere surroundings of her new room.
The one advantage was that she would be able to
hear the children if they cried in the night, which
was just as well as it turned out that the new
nanny, a hefty country girl with a bovine expression
and, Eloise suspected, very little between
her ears, was an extremely heavy sleeper.

On the first night away from her children,
Eloise had just only just fallen asleep when she
was awakened by the sound of Beth's wailing.
She leapt out of bed, not stopping to put on her
wrap or even to snatch up a shawl, and she
hurried into the nursery to find both children
awake and sobbing. Nancy Thwaite was sound
asleep, lying on her back and snoring. Eloise
picked up the children and took them into her
room. The fire had gone out and the room was
bitterly cold. The curtains barely met in the
middle of the window and the sashes rattled as
the wind howled round the house, hurling
handfuls of sleet at the glass. Eloise scrambled
into the bed, holding the children close to her
until their sobs quietened. Beth fed hungrily and
Joss snuggled up against Eloise's side and was
soon asleep.

Eloise had intended to take the children back
to the nursery, and she had certainly not meant
to fall asleep, but she was awakened suddenly
by someone shaking her shoulder. She opened
her eyes to find Nancy standing over her
holding a lighted candle in her hand which was
shaking so much that melted wax was dripping
onto the coverlet. 'What's wrong?' Eloise roused
herself with a feeling of panic, which subsided
as soon as she realised that Beth was sleeping
peacefully in the crook of her arm and Joss was
breathing softly at her side. 'What's the matter,
Nancy?'

'I saw her, mistress. She were leaning over the
cots. I thought she'd taken the babes.'

Eloise could barely understand what she was
saying, as Nancy's teeth were chattering together
and she was shaking from head to foot. Eloise
raised herself on her elbow, speaking softly so as
not to frighten the children. 'As you see, they
were with me. You must have been having a bad
dream.'

'Nay, mistress. She had come for them, the
ghost of Cribb's Hall. I seen her with me own
eyes. She were six foot tall at least and she had
eyes like burning torches. I tell you, I seen her,
mistress.'

'Nonsense, girl. There are no such things as
ghosts. You must have had a nightmare.'

'I were warned about the wandering woman,
mistress. They told me below stairs that she
roams the house by night. I tell you I seen her just
now.'

Eloise chuckled with sheer relief. 'They were
teasing you, Nancy. It sounds to me very much
like a joke, a rather cruel one, but a joke nevertheless.
Go back to bed, like a good girl.'