Page 17 of A Gentleman Never Keeps Score
“Alf,” Hartley said, coming to stand beside Sam. “This is Mr. Fox. He’s come for supper. I take it this is your friend who is to be the new help?”
“Yes, sir. Sadie Russell.” The girl managed an awkward curtsy and jabbed the lad in the side. “You could have told me he’d be in the kitchen, Alfred,” she muttered.
“The housekeeper’s room is down that corridor,” Hartley said. “I’ll leave you alone while you get settled.”
Sam was suddenly conscious once again that Hartley was a man with servants. It had been easy to forget this essential fact when Hartley had been on the bare stone floor playing with a mongrel. But it was dangerous for Sam to have a damned thing to do with Hartley. “You can’t trust them to look out for you,” had been his father’s constant refrain during Sam’s childhood.Themsometimes meant white Englishmen and sometimes meant rich people, and Hartley was both.
They came from different worlds, and while tonight had been cozy and familiar, that would only make it more jarring the next time Hartley chose to look down his nose at him. Sam had to figure out a way to keep a safe distance from this man, otherwise he’d only wind up getting hurt.
Even though they were once again alone in the kitchen, their earlier intimacy was gone, and Sam finished his ale and bread in a hurry while Hartley kept up a stilted, one-sided conversation. When Sam got to his feet, announcing that he had to go help close the Bell, he headed straight for the kitchen door.
Chapter Eight
When Hartley returned from a long early morning walk in the park, he found the house in an unprecedented state. All the curtains were open and the floors and furniture polished to a satiny shine. He followed the aroma of roasting meat and buttery pastry down to the kitchens.
In the scullery he got his first good look at the new maid. She was a young woman in a faded brown frock, up to her elbows in dishwater. Upon seeing Hartley, she wiped her hands on her apron and executed an awkward curtsey. When she straightened, Hartley perceived what he assumed was the reason her parents had cast her out: a significantly rounded belly. He looked carefully at her face. She was about Alf’s age, which was to say no more than eighteen.
“I beg your pardon,” Hartley said, trying not to stare at her belly and calculate how much longer before the blessed event. “I wanted to thank you myself for the work you’ve done. The house hasn’t looked so fine in years. Did you do it all yourself?” It had required a staff of five to keep the house reasonably presentable, and he recalled his godfather having had at least eight servants.
“No, sir,” she said, not taking her eyes off the floor. “Alfred helped.”
“Nah,” Alf said, emerging from the coal cellar. “I only did what Sadie told me. She knows how things are meant to be done.” He spoke with an audible note of pride.
“You’re not from London, are you?” Hartley asked. He thought he heard a bit of a burr in her voice.
“No, sir. Was born near Exeter, sir.” Yes, a distinct country burr. And also a hint of refinement that made Hartley’s ears prick up. Her father had most likely been a gentleman. Hartley felt distinctly uncomfortable by the idea of a young gentlewoman, indeed one who was in a delicate condition, toiling in his kitchen.
“And how did you learn to cook?” he asked, because she was too young and too genteel to have risen from the ranks of kitchen maids.
“Sometimes we had a cook who would let me help,” she said, “but when we had no cook I’d have the fixing of the meals to myself, so I learned.”
Hartley pursed his lips. In the girl’s words he heard an echo of his own childhood: unpredictability of household arrangements, servants coming and going, children pressed into service as unpaid help. But if her family had a cook, however sporadically, they had certainly been well-to-do. She oughtn’t to be scrubbing floors and washing dishes. This was what Will would call reactionary twaddle, but Hartley couldn’t quite rid himself of the notion that some people scrubbed floors and other people paid them to do so. Complicating matters was the fact that his own background placed him more comfortably in the former group than in the latter: his family hadn’t had servants or even a functional roof until his older brother was old enough to take things in hand.
“Have you found your work and your quarters to your liking, Sadie?”
“Oh, yes, sir.” Another curtsey.
“That’s enough with the ‘sir’ and the curtseys.” He was afraid she would pitch forward if she attempted it again. “I assume Alf has told you about my situation, so you know that I’m fortunate to have you.” Her face reddened beneath her cap, which he took as confirmation. “If there’s anything you need, please tell me. I want you to be comfortable here.”
Later, when Alf cleared the supper dishes, he said, “I didn’t know you had it in you.”
“Had what in me?” Hartley asked.
“You were right sweet to her.”
Had he been? He wasn’t certain whether it was proper to be sweet to one’s servant, or indeed whether he had ever been sweet to anyone in his life. “She’s a very capable cook and housemaid, and I want to keep her.”
“She’ll be relieved to hear it.”
Hartley sat back in his chair. “I don’t like that her parents turned her out. Do you know anything about how she got—” He mimed a round belly, then felt foolish for not being able to speak the suitable words.
“Uh, the usual way, I reckon,” Alf said.
Hartley pressed his lips together. “I mean, does she wish to marry the father?”
“She won’t talk about it,” Alf said, confirming Hartley’s worst suspicions.
“Alf, she was raised to be a lady. She shouldn’t be cooking my supper.”
