Thornfield Hall Page 8

  A man sat in the armchair by the window contemplating the view that we had hoped would lure Bertha into venturing outside the house. The man rose to his feet to greet me. I could see at once that he was dressed with an elegance seldom found in Yorkshire. He gestured at the landscape beyond the window.

  ‘I am pleased to see that my master has extensive grounds. It is not unknown for gentlemen to exaggerate the extent of their estates when trying to attract one to their service. I do not think I will regret my choice of employer.’

  I cannot describe to you how angry he made me feel. The two words ‘my master’ hit me in the stomach like a blow from a pike. His foreign accent added insult to injury. He is not your master, I wanted to scream. He is my master. He is my third Mr Rochester. I did not choose him as if he were a sweet from a tray. I came with the house; he inherited me. Suffice it to say I simply bid him good morning, introduced myself, and asked the languid creature his business.

  He produced a fine linen handkerchief and sniffed it delicately before he spoke. He claimed he was a gentleman’s gentleman. To be precise he was Mr Rochester’s French gentleman. My face must have shown my incomprehension for he went on to explain his function.

  ‘One sees to the wardrobe. One advises about society. Where to go. Whom to cultivate. My master needed a great deal of help when he first arrived in Paris.’

  ‘Would one like tea?’ I asked, all innocence. One would. I rang the bell. I do not often ring the bell. The kitchen is so close that if I am not in the mood to go for myself, I will open the door and shout down the corridor. Leah arrived in response to the summons. Her pink face and breathlessness were evidence that she had seen Bertha back up the stairs and had run back down again. ‘Ask Sam to bring in tea, please. For me and…’ I looked towards my unexpected guest.

  ‘Monsieur Alphonse.’

  Leah’s mouth opened to protest that she would bring the tea. I raised my eyebrows meaningfully. ‘Sam can do it,’ I told her. ‘There is no need for him to change.’ Sam was not the most efficient footman but he was the most widely travelled of us all. I wanted his opinion of the new arrival.

  Whilst we waited for the tea I quizzed Monsieur Alphonse about Mr Rochester’s plans. ‘My master rests in a town called Manchester. It is a very dirty city. One is come in advance to make preparations for his arrival.’

  My heart turned over. We had grown slack over the last couple of years. It was so long since Mr Rochester had visited and our attention had been focused on the care of Bertha rather than the dusting. A heavy feeling like lead in my stomach told me I should not offer Bertha’s name to Mr Rochester as an excuse for slack housekeeping. He was not interested in her progress or lack of it. I consoled myself with the thought that Mr Rochester, as a man, would not notice the dusting or the lack of it. The consolation was short-lived. The little popinjay in front of me was exactly the kind of person to run his finger along a bookshelf and grimace at the result.

  Sam arrived with his shirt sleeves rolled up and his hair disarranged by the wind. I guessed he had been chopping wood. While he clattered about with the tea things I introduced him to Monsieur Alphonse, as we would have to call him. The days of our informality were over – for the moment.

  ‘Mr Rochester always looked after hisself,’ Sam barked. ‘And his father and his brother before him. We washed their linen. We polished their boots. They had clean clothes. They didn’t need people to fasten their buttons. Not once they were out of nursery.’

  Pain passed through the gentleman’s gentleman. We watched it travel through his slender frame and wince its way across his face. Eventually the power of speech returned to him. ‘Here it might suffice. The capital cities of the world demand a higher standard. Clean linen is not sufficient for society to open its arms to a newly arrived country gentleman. A gentleman with no title, one must point out. One is there to advise on the nuances of fashion and behaviour. How to tie the cravat. Whom to visit, whom to avoid. When to arrive late. When to leave early.’

  ‘Well I visited a lot of capital cities when I were in navy. I managed all right.’ Sam stared at the well-dressed little man. It was clear there would be no meeting of minds between these two so I intervened.

  ‘We shall need a room for Monsieur Alphonse. Mr Merryman’s room is unoccupied. He could have that, could he, Sam?’

  ‘Aye. He could. It’s next to mine. I’ll show him later.’ Sam stomped off.

  The empty room in the menservants’ sleeping quarters puzzled Monsieur Alphonse. When he learnt that Mr Merryman, the previous butler, had not been replaced, he was shocked.

  ‘A gentleman always has a butler. Who decides on the wine? Who serves it?’

  ‘Well, I expect you will. Is Mr Rochester bringing guests? Will there be a house party?’

  ‘One believes not. Hunting and horses seemed to be foremost in my master’s mind.’ Monsieur Alphonse did not need to add the word ‘unfortunately’. The downturn of his mouth told us what he thought of hunting and horses.

  ‘Has he sent instructions for Old John?’ Monsieur Alphonse appeared puzzled. ‘Old John looks after the horses and the stables,’ I explained.

  ‘No. He said nothing about an Old John.’

  Now here was a puzzle. If there was one thing Mr Rochester was exact about it was his horses. As I took the little man to meet the other servants I pondered on Mr Rochester’s motive in sending him on ahead like John the Baptist. For all his fine talk, he was only what we would call a valet. A valet, that’s what he was. I looked forward to hearing what Sam thought of him.

  ‘He’s a spy. That’s what Monsieur Alphonse is.’ Sam was adamant. ‘He’s here to report on us. Make sure that we keep the great secret and are not drinking the claret.’

  We were huddled in the butler’s pantry whispering to each other. John’s head appeared in the serving hatch, causing us to start guiltily.

  ‘Don’t panic. The French gentleman is out of the house and on his way to the stables. He’s not very happy about the mud. It will ruin the polish on his shoes.’

  ‘Sam thinks he’s a spy.’

  ‘A French spy!’

  ‘Nah. War’s over. A long time since. He’s a spy for Mr Rochester.’

  ‘Then why did Mr Rochester send him on ahead? Why give us warning? Give us time to hide stuff, plaster over the cracks. Much more likely the master would creep up and take us by surprise. Catch us with our trousers down, so to speak. Begging your pardon for language, Mrs Fairfax.’

  ‘That sounds more like master.’ Sam thought for a bit. A smile illuminated his face. ‘I know. My guess is that Mr Rochester’s fed up with him. He’s finding him annoying. He were all right in Paris. Could show him the ropes and speak the lingo. Now he’s back in England he seems a bit stupid, foppish like. I bet master wishes he’d left little chap in Paris. He don’t want to dismiss him. Bit hard to cut him loose, being a foreigner like. But he just wants him out of his hair – literally.’

  ‘So he may not be a spy.’

  ‘Mr Rochester may not have sent him with the intention that he spies on us, but that is exactly what he will do. Valets are sneaky little creatures. Take my word for it, he will spy on us. And he will creep round master dropping poison in his ear. He has to be useful to keep his place. Fastening buttons and brushing hairs off jackets is not enough to earn his keep here.’ Sam pursed his lips and nodded his head up and down as he tested the strength of his theory. Then, apparently satisfied, he turned to John and me.

  ‘We’d best be careful, specially about Bertha. As far as we know he’s not taken his bible oath, like rest of us. Until Mr Rochester hisself says so, we’d best keep mum.’

  John tapped his top lip with his forefinger to show he intended to keep his lips sealed.

  ‘That’s right,’ said Sam, ‘and batten down the hatches.’

  We did not feel it necessary to return to the subject. Here in Yorkshire we are naturally suspicious of strangers. We look askance at visitors if they come from a differen
t county in England so there was little hope for the Frenchman. Especially since he was generally thought to be a spy. The sooner Monsieur Alphonse removed himself from Thornfield Hall the better.

  My last task that day was to visit the third floor. Bertha was asleep. The interruption of her visit downstairs had disturbed her. It took only a ripple in the smooth surface of her life to upset her thoroughly. She’d had a fit of temper that was quickly followed by a bout of weeping. Grace and I decided against telling her of Mr Rochester’s imminent arrival. As Grace said, he was not interested in her, and she was not interested in him. She had never enquired as to the identity of our master or even the name of the house in which she was living. For his part Mr Rochester had made no effort to inform himself about the welfare of his mysterious house guest.

  Grace agreed with the general view that Monsieur Alphonse posed a threat of an unspecified nature. We decided it was safer, while the little Frenchman was here, to keep Bertha confined to the third floor and to put a stop on her little expeditions. We did not think she would protest or complain. She was happiest leading a very quiet life with a regular routine.

  The valet was to sleep in the old butler’s room in the men-servants’ corridor. Although this was on the third floor it was at the back of the house, well away from Grace and Bertha, whose rooms were at the front. It was possible to prevent his seeing them during the day as long as he did not go exploring in the night.

  We worked very hard for the next few days. We cleaned and dusted, polished and waxed. The beds were stripped and the sheets were boiled. The meat was ordered and the vegetables were pickled. The extra hands I had recruited from The George to help with the cleaning ate their meals with us in the servants’ hall. We had to go back to our formal ways – and highly uncomfortable it all was. We had to call each other by our official names as we went about our duties.

  I entertained Monsieur Alphonse to dinner in my room as etiquette demanded. Mary obliged by sending us the worst food she could create in the hope of encouraging him to leave. We fed him porridge, boiled mutton, cabbage and the coarsest bread we could find. Whilst he struggled to swallow the tasteless slops and chew the hard tack we offered him, Grace slid secretly down the back stairs for her bread and cheese and a pint of porter.

  To keep our monsieur busy we set him to sorting out the clothes accumulated by two generations of Rochester men. He tutted and fussed something shocking. He ran the garments through his fingers lamenting the old-fashioned styles and the heavy material. He made the mistake of criticizing the locally woven broadcloth that had clothed the Rochesters for generations. His biggest mistake was to do this in the hearing of Old John. The coachman promptly joined with gusto in the unofficial campaign to make life as unpleasant as possible for poor Monsieur Alphonse.

  ‘Master’ll want you to ride with him when he goes to hounds,’ Old John informed the valet with malice aforethought. ‘Now he’s got his own gentleman he’ll want him out in the field with him. All the gentry bring their personal servants. Case they’re needed. Help carry them home if they breaks their necks.’

  The little man blenched so thoroughly he was positively transparent.

  ‘We’d better be thinking of a mount for you.’ Old John was relentless in his torture. ‘Nothing too big, but able to handle the hedges. A good jumper. I’ve got a nice little filly would just suit you. A bit young and frisky but she’ll soon learn. Come round stables this afternoon and give her a try.’

  By the end of the week I was beginning to feel sorry for Monsieur Alphonse, especially when John the young footman told his story to me and Sam. There’d been a knock on his door at night. He’d opened it to find the little Frenchman on the threshold. For some reason Sam chose this moment to slap his forehead as if he’d forgotten to tell us something very important.

  ‘I don’t know why he came to me,’ John continued. ‘Except I’m the only one as hasn’t been actively nasty to him. I’ve not spat in his food or terrified him with horses. Anyway he wanted to know where he was. Poor chap didn’t seem to know. I told him Yorkshire. I had to explain to him it was a whole big county. All he wanted to know was how far he was from London. And how soon could he get there. From London he wants to go to Dover. Apparently there’s a boat that’ll take him back to his own country.’

  We looked to Sam for enlightenment. Sam had sailed the world. He would know where London was.

  ‘Must be several hundred miles. Old master used to do it by post chaise in two days, but that were pushing it. He’d be black and blue from the shaking about. And it costs. Specially for a seat inside. It’s not so much to ride on top but it’s cold and wet up there. I’m beginning to feel sorry for the poor little beggar.’

  ‘If only the railway had got to York. They say them steam trains can go at thirty miles an hour.’

  ‘If wishes were horses then beggars would ride,’ I told John. I was brisk with him as I felt bad about the way we had behaved to Monsieur Alphonse. He had come to us as a stranger and we had not welcomed him in. It was time to offer him a friendly hand. ‘Tell the little chap, if he has the fare, he can get the stagecoach from the turnpike road. We’ll find a way to get him there.’

  ‘There must be a chaise or a cart going to the turnpike road soon. Stands to reason. Someone from round here must be going.’

  We sent word round the servants in the big houses. Every delivery man passed the message on with the laundry, the wine or the hay for the horses. The groom told the agent, the butler told his master, the dressmaker told the mistress. By the time Mr Rochester was due to arrive information was filtering back to us. We knew not only who was going to the turnpike road, but also that young Lord Ingram was to be sent on the Grand Tour. A younger son of Lord Clifford’s was also ready to undertake the journey. The two were to travel together with a tutor appointed by Lord Clifford. There was, it seemed, a chance for Monsieur to return to the continent.

  ‘We have Martha to thank for telling us about young Lord Ingram,’ Old John told me. ‘She sent to say that she misses Thornfield Hall. The Ingrams are hard taskmasters.’

  ‘Send her my thanks. Is she a lady’s maid yet?’

  Old John sucked on his pipe. ‘Not quite. She still has hopes.’

  ‘Mmmm. We’d best work on the Cliffords. The Ingrams are such cheese-parers. Who rules the roost in the Clifford household?’

  ‘By all accounts, she does.’

  That evening I visited Grace to keep her up to date. Bertha was sleeping and Grace was puffing contentedly on her pipe by the fire. They had not been too lonely. Leah had come in the afternoon and they had done some sewing. Grace showed me the nightdress they had finished. Bertha had embroidered it with strange flowers and exotic birds – the like of which we had never seen before. We decided she must remember them from her own country, Jamaica. The work was exquisite, the stitches neat and the colours and the design well-chosen.

  ‘It is a shame she cannot meet the Frenchman. He is good with colours too. And he dresses very smart. Not really suitable for here in the country, but you can see he has a knack.’

  Grace and I exchanged meaningful looks. ‘I am sure Lady Clifford would want her son to be a credit to her in the capitals of Europe,’ I told her.

  Mr Rochester’s arrival caused us less consternation than Monsieur Alphonse’s had. We had gone into training with the valet and were battle-ready for the master. When he arrived Mr Rochester strode across the gravel to greet us as we waited at the door. It was clear he was in the peak of health and high spirits. There was an indefinable gleam to him that we had not seen before. His black hair was glossy and his eyes sparkling. His clothes fitted him to perfection and his linen was snowy white. I looked at Monsieur Alphonse with increased respect.

  I was standing with my back to the house as Mr Rochester greeted me. I saw him glance up at the third storey. ‘Everything is in good order here,’ I told him and gave him a significant look straight in the eye. ‘Absolutely everything. The house is ready if y
ou wish to entertain your neighbours.’

  ‘No doubt the whole county is agog to see the returning prodigal.’

  He gave me his winning smile, which emboldened me to answer, ‘You could say that, indeed you could say that, sir.’ As I followed him in I felt the house come alive to welcome its returning master.

  The plan fell into place as we hoped it would. A word here, some gentle pressure there, a whispered suggestion, a subtle promise and people will do what you want as long as you work with the grain of their characters. The French valet wanted to go home; Lady Clifford wanted the best for her son. Mr Rochester wanted to enjoy his wealth and position and not be reminded of his responsibility for a deranged woman. The ingredients for our plan to work were there; all we needed was some luck.

  Our master spent his days hunting or dealing with business matters. Once Monsieur Alphonse discovered that Old John had been playing a joke on him and that his attendance on the hunting field was not obligatory he languished with nothing to do but clean muddy boots. The unhappy valet must have felt completely marooned on a hostile island. We consoled him by dangling before him the prospect of accompanying a sprig of the grand and noble Clifford family to France. If only Mr Rochester would hold a great dinner party. If only the chosen tutor could be removed.

  Help with our plan arrived in the unlikely person of Carter, the surgeon. ‘A hunt dinner at Thornfield Hall,’ he roared. ‘Haven’t had one for years. Time we did, Rochester. Landowners’ responsibility to host the event.’ Even if he had wanted to Mr Rochester could not have evaded what the whole county was united in wishing into existence.

  ‘This is your chance to shine,’ John and Sam told Monsieur Alphonse. ‘Show us how things are done in Paris. Show us what proper footmen do.’