Betty set down a silver fork and picked up another. “Oh, fifteen years here, give or take. And eleven at the Langleys’ before that. Started as a scullery maid when I was just a girl, then moved up to kitchen maid, then housemaid. Never had to work the laundry, thank the Lord.”
“Was this your dream, then?”
“Dream?”
“What you wanted out of life.”
“Pfff.” Betty’s hand was in constant motion as she spoke. “Few indeed get what they want in life, and that’s a fact. Look at Fiona.”
Margaret glanced up quickly. “Fiona? What about Fiona?”
“Never you mind. The point is, I don’t think any little girl dreams, as you call it, of working as a scullion all her days, does she?”
“But what would you do if you could do anything?”
Betty pursed her lips. “Nora. I don’t mind chattin’ to pass the time, but it’s foolish to hanker after the past or the impossible. I am content enough. I have been in service since I were fourteen. It’s all I know and ever will, and that’s all right by me.”
Even though the words were spoken kindly, Margaret felt chastised. “I am glad to hear it,” she murmured, fastening her attention on yet another butter knife.
Betty applied silver polish to several serving spoons with vigor and skill, the topic evidently forgotten.
A few moments later, Betty said abruptly, “There is one thing.”
Margaret looked up, not sure what she was referring to.
“One thing I would like.” Betty’s focus remained on the spoons.
“What’s that?”
“I would like to be housekeeper one day. It’s the top rung, you know. And, well, if I reach that, I’ll know I’ve done my best and all I could. I would be proud to wear my mum’s chatelaine heavy with keys, commanding respect from servant and master alike.”
Margaret grinned. “Sending fear into the hearts of all the maids, you mean, when they hear the jingle of your keys.”
A small grin dimpled Betty’s cheeks. “That too.”
“I’m going to tell Mrs. Budgeon to watch her back,” Margaret teased.
“Don’t you dare!”
“Don’t worry, Betty. I won’t say a word about you hankering after her job.”
Betty slanted her a wry look and moved on to the fish forks.
Margaret said, “Honestly, I think you would be an excellent housekeeper, Betty Tidy.”
“Oh, I don’t know . . .”
“I for one would be proud to work for you,” Margaret insisted.
Betty’s eyes sparkled with mischief. “You say that now. But Mrs. Budgeon is a pussycat compared to the housekeeper I’d be.” She tucked her chin and gave a decent impression of Mrs. Budgeon in high dudgeon, “Now get about your work, my girl. We’re not paying you to chat and idle!”
Margaret hauled yet another kettle of hot water from the kitchen into the servants’ bathing room belowstairs. The small, tiled room held a generous double slipper tub, chair, mirror, and a shelf and hooks for clothing and towels. She’d taken a few quick baths since she’d arrived but mostly made do with sponge baths—room temperature water from the basin in her room, a rough towel, and her weekly bar of soap. But she didn’t feel really clean, and her scalp was beginning to itch under the wig. She wanted a real bath. She could hardly wait to wash her hair again.
The kitchen had running water, piped in from a cistern outside. This she heated on the stove in large kettles. The house was quiet. Even the scullery maid had scrubbed her last pot and gone to bed. She ought to be sleeping too. But first, a bath.
How long it took to fill the tub! She had never given it a thought all those times she had told Joan to draw her a bath, regardless if she had just had one a day or two before. Baths relaxed her and helped her sleep, she had justified. How much extra work she had caused poor Joan, though the woman never complained. At least, not to Margaret directly.
Margaret carried her kettles back to the kitchen for one more refill. That should bring the water level up past her legs, she hoped. Then perhaps one more can to rinse her hair. Her arms began to tremble from the heavy load, her hand to feel permanently bent in a clutch. Ah, but the warm water would soon soothe her aches and pains.
She lugged the kettles down the long passage, past the housekeeper’s room, stillroom, storerooms, and around the corner to its end, only to find the bathroom door closed. She was sure she had left it open. She frowned. Surely not . . .
She knocked experimentally. “Hello? Is someone in there?”
No one answered. The door must have swung itself shut. Relieved, she pushed it open and shrieked. Thomas sat in the bathtub. In her bathwater.
He didn’t even have the shame to appear sheepish. In fact, he waggled his eyebrows at her by the light of a candle lamp—the one she had lit. Fortunately the tub hid all but his head and upper torso from her view. She was torn between the desire to flee, shielding her eyes, and the urge to throw him bodily from the tub.
“What do you think you are doing?” she fumed. “I hauled all that hot water for my own bath.”
He smirked. “I did wonder who left it. Awfully kind of you.”
“It was not kind,” she said between clenched teeth. “It was for my own bath. Why would you presume someone filled it for you?”
His eyes narrowed. “How high and mighty you speak all of a sudden.”
She felt her cheeks burn. “Well, I’m angry!”
He gripped the sides of the tub and made as though to rise. “Then I shall get out straightaway if you like.”
“No! Not with me standing here. I shall wait outside.”
She stepped out and closed the door. Five or ten minutes later he finally emerged, hair slicked back, skin still glistening. “It’s all yours, love.”
“I trust you’re going to help me refill it?”
“No need. It’s perfectly good water. Still warm. I shall even come in and scrub your back, if you like.” He winked at her.
“Not on your life. How selfish you are.”
He lifted his square chin. “Well, I shall definitely not fetch and tote for you after that.” He turned away, whistling to himself as he walked jauntily down the passage, her towel around his neck.
Jackanapes!
The tub, at least, had a drain pipe, or she would have had to haul away the dirty water before she could refill it. While the tub drained, she began the whole process all over again, refusing to bathe in water used by the boorish Thomas. She retrieved a clean towel from the servants’ linen cupboard, and laid it over the chair. This time she closed the door when she returned to the kitchen, hoping to mark her territory.
Finally, an hour after she should have, she shut the bathroom door behind her, levered the chair beneath the latch, and disrobed. She removed her spectacles, extracted the anchoring pins, and peeled off the wig. Lifting a foot over the tub edge, she tested the water. Just right. She stepped in and sat down, knees bent. How good the hot steamy water felt on her back and bum. She released a long, satisfied sigh.
Reaching up, Margaret unpinned her hair from its tight knot, then leaned over to pile the pins on the shelf. She combed her fingers through her hair and massaged her scalp. Ahh . . . She sank lower in the tub.
Margaret washed her body and lathered her hair, relishing the relief and pleasure of the scrubbing. Then she poured the remaining water from the kettle over her head to rinse, careful not to spill any onto the floor, which she would have to clean up. She leaned back against the high back of the tub once more. Her eyes began to droop. If she wasn’t careful she would fall asleep.
Eventually the water began to cool, and the parts of her above its surface grew chilled. She stood, toweled off her body, and stepped from the tub. She slipped into her night dress, wrapper, and slippers, unplugged the drain, and gathered up her pins. Too exhausted to comb out and repin her hair and replace the tiresome wig, she instead wrapped her head in the towel, careful to be sure all her hair was covered. She rolled the wig and pins into her dress and tucked the bundle under her arm. At the last minute she remembered her spectacles and picked up the foggy lenses from the shelf. Her towel was too tight to allow her to slip the earpieces on, so she simply carried them. The passageway would be dark but for her candle lamp, and she was unlikely to meet anyone this time of night.
Checking to make sure she had gathered all of her belongings and left no blond hairs in the tub, Margaret stepped from the bathroom, hands full with wadded garments and spectacles in one hand, and the candle lamp in the other. She had made it to the foot of the basement stairs when she was startled by footsteps coming down, directly toward her. She looked up in surprise only to quickly wish she had kept her head down. Nathaniel Upchurch was descending the stairs, carrying his own candle.
She was naked. Suddenly naked. Without floppy cap, wig, dark brows, and spectacles to shield her face, her self. What was he doing belowstairs?
“Beg pardon, sir,” she mumbled, forgetting she was to be mute unless spoken to. She moved to the other side of the stairs, head ducked, and climbed quickly from view. She didn’t risk a look back to see what expression might reside on that strong, haughty face: shock that she had spoken to him, shock at her state of dress, or the shock of recognition? Heaven help me either way.