“Yes, ma’am.” And Elise, though she never spoke of her.
“I know what it is to mourn. I lost my husband to fever in India twenty years ago, and there isn’t a day that passes that I don’t miss him. Millicent was six when I brought her home. I wonder sometimes if she remembers her father or India with all its exotic scents and sounds.” She laughed sadly. “We rode together on an elephant more than once, and she loved to watch the local snake charmer.”
“No one would ever forget such things, Lady Daisy.”
“Not unless they wanted to forget.” Lady Stockhard smoothed the blanket covering her legs. “We grieve for those we’ve lost, but it’s the living that cause us the most pain. Poor Millicent. I don’t know what will become of her.”
Marta didn’t know how to boost Lady Daisy’s spirits.
“Don’t worry about Lady Daisy,” Enid told Marta that evening. “She gets like this sometimes after Miss Millicent leaves on holiday. She’ll be herself in a few days.”
“Why doesn’t Lady Daisy travel with her daughter?”
“She did for a while, but things never worked out when our lady was along. Miss Millicent prefers going alone. She sees the world differently than our lady. And who’s to say who’s right. The world is what it is.”
None of the staff had any fondness for Miss Millicent, especially Welton, who stayed to the garden as much as possible whenever Lady Daisy’s daughter was home. The air grew colder in the house when Miss Millicent was present. When summoned, Marta went quickly to wherever Miss Millicent might be, curtsied, received her instructions, curtsied again, and departed to do what she had been told. Unlike Lady Stockhard, Miss Millicent never addressed a servant by name, asked how she felt, or discussed anything.
After six months in Lady Stockhard’s employ, Marta had learned enough English to follow whatever instructions might be given.
She disliked Miss Millicent almost as much as she liked Lady Daisy. The young woman treated her mother with contempt. “One might think you prefer the company of servants to that of peers, Mother.”
“I like everyone.”
“Everyone is not worthy. Did you have to talk to the gardener in the front yard?”
“His name is Welton, Millicent, and he’s part of the family.”
“It’s about time tea arrived!” she complained. “The point is, everyone in the neighborhood saw you. What will people think?”
“That I’m talking to my gardener.”
“You’re impossible.” Miss Millicent treated her mother like a recalcitrant child. Leaning forward, she looked at the tiered dishes and groaned. “Egg and watercress sandwiches again, Mother. Cook knows I prefer spicy chicken and currant brioches. And it would be nice to have chocolate
Marta positioned the trolley and set the silver tea service on the table, closer to Lady Stockhard than her daughter, turning the handle so her lady could easily grasp it. She felt Miss Millicent’s cold glare. When Marta put the tiered dishes within easy reach as well, Lady Daisy smiled at her. “Thank you, Marta.”
“The girl doesn’t know how to set a table.” Miss Millicent rose enough to reach across and grasp the teapot. Pouring herself a cup of tea, she returned the pot to where Marta had placed it. Then she proceeded to fill her plate with sandwich wedges, sponge drops with jam, and cream-filled strawberry meringues. “No one needs to talk to a gardener for longer than a few minutes, Mother, and you were outside for the better part of an hour. Do you have any idea what people will say about that?” She sat and put an entire sponge drop into her mouth. Her cheeks bulged as she chewed.
Lady Stockhard poured her own tea. “People always talk, Millicent.” She added a bit of cream and two scoops of sugar. “If they have nothing to talk about, they’ll invent something.”
“They won’t have to invent a thing. It doesn’t even occur to you how I feel, does it? How can I show my face outside the front door when my mother is the scandal of the neighborhood?”
Fuming, Marta returned to the kitchen. “Miss Millicent wants spicy chicken sandwiches tomorrow.”
“If I make spicy chicken, she’ll want something else. There’s no pleasing her.”
“I’m surprised Miss Millicent receives so many invitations.”
“She can be quite charming when she has reason to be. And I understand she can be quite pleasing to young men.” Enid shrugged. “I’ll be needing more carrots and another onion. Why don’t you go on out to the garden? You look like you could use a breath of fresh air. But don’t be long. Her Highness will be wanting the tea things removed from the parlor. She’s invited guests for dinner.”
Miss Millicent stayed home for two months, then left again.
“She must love to travel.”
Enid gave a snort. “She’s gone hunting. And I don’t mean foxes.”
“What, then?”
“Miss Millicent is off on another one of her husband-hunting expeditions. It’s Brighton this time because she heard a friend has a brother who’s eligible. She’ll be home in a few weeks, disappointed. She’ll be moody and disagreeable, and she’ll stuff herself with scones and marmalade, cakes and spicy chicken sandwiches. Then, she’ll start writing letters again, and she’ll keep writing until someone invites her to come for a visit on the Continent or in Stratford-upon-Avon or in Cornwall. She meets people everywhere she goes, and she keeps their names and addresses.”
Enid’s prophecy proved true. Miss Millicent came home after two weeks, and she stayed in her room for another, demanding that all her meals be brought to her. Marta would find her propped up in bed, reading Jane Austen romances. After exhausting the staff with constant demands, she went off to Dover to visit a sick friend.
“I heard her tell Lady Daisy the lady must be on her deathbed,” Marta told Enid. “The vicar comes to visit several times a week.”
“A vicar, you say? Well, maybe Miss Millicent is beginning to see the light and lowering her standards. But if the man has a lick of sense, he’ll heed the apostle Paul’s advice and remain unmarried!”
Miss Millicent returned in a foul temper.
Lady Daisy ordered beef Wellington. Enid clucked her tongue as she iced a chocolate cake. “Things must not have gone well in Dover. No big surprise there. Miss Millicent will be off again soon enough, to Brighton or Cambridge.”
Millicent didn’t spend a week in her room this time. She lounged in the conservatory, regaling her mother with complaints. “It’s a perfectly horrid place, Mother. I don’t know why anyone would want to live in that cold, dreary place.”
“Did you attend church with Susanna?”
“Of course, but I didn’t like the vicar at all. For all his kind attention to Susanna, he was quite dull.”
Back in the kitchen, Enid sighed. “More likely she tossed out her line and didn’t even get a bite.”
Another letter came from Rosie. She had married Arik, and she expected to be blissfully happy for the rest of her life. She wished the same to Marta, who felt a sense of loss and envy. Ashamed she could resent such happiness, Marta prayed God would bless them and spent a month’s salary on white lawn, Irish lace, satin ribbons, silk embroidery thread, needles, and a hoop. While others slept, Marta sat in an alcove with a candle burning and made a dressing gown fit for a princess. It took two months to finish it.
Marta folded the letter away and added it to the growing bundle. Love could be a two-edged sword. What guarantee was there that it would be returned? Solange and Rosie had been blessed by the men they loved. Mama had not been so fortunate. Marta began work on a christening gown and bonnet.
10
