Easterleigh Hall
Authors: Margaret Graham
Contents
When Evie Forbes starts as an assistant cook at Easterleigh Hall, she goes against her family's wishes. For ruthless Lord Brampton also owns the mine where Evie's father and brothers work and there is animosity between the two families.
But Evie is determined to better herself. And her training at the hall offers her a way out of a life below stairs.
Evie works hard and gains a valued place in the household. And her dream of running a small hotel grows ever closer.
Then War is declared and all their lives are thrown into turmoil.
Margaret Graham has been writing for thirty years. Her first novel was published in 1986 and since then she has written a further thirteen novels, and is now working on her fourteenth. As a bestselling author her novels have been published in the UK, Europe and the USA.
Margaret has written two plays, co-researched a television documentary â which grew out of
Canopy of Silence
â and has written numerous short stories and features. She is a writing tutor and speaker and has written regularly for Writers' Forum. She founded and administered the Yeovil Literary Prize to raise funds for the creative arts of the Yeovil area and it continues to thrive under the stewardship of one of her ex-students. Margaret now lives near High Wycombe and has launched Words for the Wounded which raises funds for the rehabilitation of wounded troops by donations and writing prizes.
She has âhim indoors', four children and three grand-children who think OAP stands for Old Ancient Person. They have yet to understand the politics of pocket money. Margaret is a member of the Rock Choir, the WI and a Chair of her local U3A. She does Pilates and Tai Chi and travels as often as she can.
For more information about Margaret Graham visit her website at
www.margaret-graham.com
After the Storm
(previously published as
Only the Wind is Free
)
Annie's Promise
Somewhere Over England
(previously published as
A Fragment of Time
)
Margaret Graham
For the âgrands', Mabel, Josie and Megan
Easton Colliery Village, Durham Coalfields, Saturday 3rd April 1909
âD'YOU WANT IT
down your back or all over your big head?' Evie Forbes asked, grinning as she dragged the heavy pan of hot water to the edge of the kitchen range.
âNow, now, I was just asking if it was ready yet, lass.' Jack could hardly talk for laughing, set her off again as she refolded the cloths she had wrapped around the handles to protect against the heat. âYou scrub your brother's back, pet,' her mam had said, âwhile I do guard duty. It'll seem less suspicious.'
Her mam would be on the front doorstep of their terraced miner's cottage, her shawl wrapped tight against the early April breeze. She would be pretending to watch for young Timmie as he clattered home in his boots from his surface shift at Auld Maud, Easton's pit. In reality she was waiting to intercept Evie's employer, young Miss Manton, who was likely to come barging in upsetting the apple cart with the news mother and daughter were waiting for. She'd said nearer three forty-five, but timing wasn't her strong point.
Evie snatched a look around the room. Her father was already in his Saturday evening clothes, sitting in the armchair to the left of the range, reading one of the out-of-date
Times
newspapers he collected free from the Reading Room every Saturday. Jack was standing calf-deep in the tin bath, waiting â for her. The two men seemed to suspect nothing.
âReady, is it?' Jack called. Evie gripped the handles. âJust right for boiling lobsters so you'll be good and pink, but screaming's optional. And you just think on, lad, as to what lass'll want to be seen with a pink miner on a Saturday night.'
She eased the pan over the edge of the range, feeling the weight of it in her shoulders, arms and back. The steam not only hurt her eyes but it messed her hair, stripping it of curl. She'd look like the woman with snakes in her hair at the Easton and Hawton Miners' Gala later this evening, but there was no time to sort it out now with Jack insisting, âHurry it up, Evie. I've places to go, people to see.' He was grinning, his teeth white in his blackened face. The tin bath was only a couple of steps from the range but it was far enough.
âDon't you hurry, Evie lass,' Da called. âTake your time and be careful.' He sounded quieter than usual, even more weary.
âI will, Da,' she said as she staggered under the weight but then Jack reached out and took the bath from her as though it was as light as a feather, his pitman's hands impervious to the heat. âHere, give it to me, our Evie.'
He tipped it into water already slecky from her father's bath. Around his waist was a gathering of sacking hiding his crown jewels. âAye, well,' her mother always said, nodding towards his modesty, âwe must be thankful for small mercies.' Jack always replied that there was nothing small about his mercies and then he'd be slapped with the rag which could, if one was an optimist, be called a flannel.
Aye, these things were what she loved â the family, the continuity, the fun. Could she bear to leave them if it came to it? Would Miss Manton come? What news would she bring about the interview for Assistant Cook that Evie had attended at Easterleigh Hall?
Jack returned the pan to her before whipping the flannel off the clothes horse that was propped alongside the bath. He was such a bonny lad and he was more than her brother, he was her marra â her close friend, in other words â and she loved him more even than she ached for Simon Preston, and she knew that what she'd done could alter their relationship. But she wouldn't think of that, couldn't think of it.
âSo, are you meeting young Si?' Jack teased, settling down into the bath.
âNo, don't be daft. I hardly know him.' Her voice was crisp. She busied herself taking the pan to the scullery, hoping that she'd see Simon but it would depend on whether Lord Brampton, his high and mightiness, was letting his servants out of their cage. Hang on, lass, she urged herself, because it might just be that she'd be in that same cage next week if she'd passed the interview. She shook her head. No, she mustn't even imagine that, in case it didn't happen.
At the thought she felt almost relieved, for if she didn't get the position she could stay here with her family and continue to cook for her wonderful employer, Miss Manton, who explained so many things, and took her to the Suffragette meeting every month, and who was so eager for her to improve. She shook her head at that thought. To really improve she
must
become the cook she, her mam and Miss Manton longed for her to be, the cook who could earn enough to help her family as well as carve a future for herself in the hotel world.
She wiped around the pan. It was cold and damp in the small back scullery and Jack was calling, âCome on, Evie, stop dreaming. I'm in a right hurry. I've things to do before the Gala. I've a life to live, you know.'
She spun on her heel, hurrying back into the warmth, her hands on her hips. âI haven't, I suppose. I'm just here to scrub your back and clean up you and me da, not to mention Timmie, am I? That's it, is it? Well, you just wait and see.' She was smiling, keeping her eyes fixed on Jack, ready to dodge.
There, she was too quick for him as he flicked water at her. âBy, lad, you'll have to be quicker than that.'
She heard her father laugh along with them, heard the laugh turn into a hack of a cough and for a moment she and Jack stared at one another, but what was the point of letting the sudden tug take hold? They broke eye contact at the same time. Evie reached for the carbolic soap on the stand. It was still slimy from her father's wash.
Sitting in the bath Jack hung his head, his knees up. The sacking floated in the sleck. She bent, he gave her the flannel and she washed his back. She hated the smell both of the coal and the soap, and though the carbolic shifted the greasy dust the scars remained, the deep dark blue of twilight too deeply engrained to ever fade. It was like the damned pit shadow that never left them, as potent as the glowing stinking slag heaps and winding engines and gear that loomed over the village.
She rubbed more fiercely; be pink, damn you, she thought. Her brother eased his shoulders. âHang on, lass, leave me some skin.' She saw she had knocked off some of the button scabs which formed when the miners scraped their backbone on low seam roofs. The blood was a dirty red. Her father hacked again. Blue-ridged scars, black lung, dirty blood. But no, Da hadn't got it yet, though he would unless she could get them out.
She ran the rag gently now. âSorry, Jack.' Over the ridged skin, gently round the bleeding sores, fear clutching ever tighter at her heart.
Every single day she wanted them out of the pit, and one day
she
would make it happen. Miss Manton and her friends at the Suffragette meetings said women could do anything they set their minds to, and Evie's first meeting a few months ago had opened up a whole new world.
The water was cooling again and would now have a greater depth of muck. Poor Timmie, but that was the hierarchy of a mining house â father first, eldest next, youngest last. At least Timmie was busy on the surface sorting the shale from the coal, so there was no need to worry about him yet awhile.
Jack was singing, slurping the water over his chest and his legs where the past cuts left their twilight trail. There was a fresh one across his thigh. It looked red, blue-black and angry. Well, they were all damned angry, weren't they? Her da hacked again into what passed for a handkerchief. She snatched a look. It was like a nervous tic, this pitman's look, when anyone coughed. But there was no black phlegm, not yet. âWhat's your mam doing on the step?' he asked.
âShe's waiting for the bairn.' Jack rubbed his face, removing the coal dust.
âAye, standing on the step talking to her next door more like. She knows he'll come in from the back alley as usual.' The two men laughed.
âHow're the pigeons, Da and what's in the paper?' Anything to move the conversation on. It did. Her father said, âYou'll read it yourself in a moment but as for the birds, I'm right worried about Alfie.' He droned on, and her shoulders sagged with relief. She slapped Jack on the back. âYou're done.'
Every day her mam insisted the bath came out. It meant heaving in full buckets from the communal back-alley tap when Evie came in from her work, but it saved on the bedding. Her mam was not about to put up with any nonsense such as ânever wash the back or you'll let the strength out'. âBugger that,' she'd say, âand into the bath with you.' Evie grinned at the thought. Her mam also made them read the newspaper before passing it to their neighbours, and agreed wholeheartedly with Miss Manton that education and training were the way up. She wrung out the flannel and draped it on the side of the bath.
âNow you're as clean as a whistle so you can get yourself ready for whatever it is you're up to at the Gala, my lad. Which poor girl will go on the swing boats with you tonight?'