He rose from his chair to stop her. ‘I don’t think you walked all this way to inquire after my clock, are you still in trouble?’

  ‘Not exactly, but I’m in want of steady work. Mother does what she can but the others are too young for real work. I need to find employment.’

  ‘You want me to find you work?’

  ‘No, no, it’s just . . . if you knew anyone who needs someone good with their hands. I was taught stitchery by nuns. I can goffer and iron and mend and I can read and write, oh and string pearls,’ she added. ‘Well, almost, Mr Abrahams hadn’t quite finished teaching me.’

  ‘I like your honesty, Margaret. As it happens my wife is in need of extra help in the house. I will speak to her and perhaps she might find a place for you . . . Would that help?’

  ‘Thank you. I would be most grateful . . .’

  ‘You would have to live within the household. My wife is most particular. She likes things done the old way but we will see what she says.’ He showed her to the door and then paused. ‘And a word to the wise before you leave, when you meet her don’t bedeck yourself with any adornment such as the necklace you are wearing.’ His eye went to the pendant. ‘Fine as it is.’

  ‘Mr Abrahams left this for me,’ she replied proudly.

  ‘That’s as may be but my wife, Serenity, is of the old school. Quakers live in plain fashion as members of The Religious Society of Friends and follow a very simple way of dressing and speech. Serenity expects her household to do likewise. Uniform will be provided.’

  ‘Thank you, I’ll heed your warning . . . I mean suggestion, sir.’

  ‘Margaret Costello, you are a breath of fresh air. I wish you well.’ Erasmus Blake smiled as she curtseyed. ‘On your way home now.’

  Greta almost skipped down Parliament Street and down Fossgate, pleased that she had taken a chance and it had paid off. This was a fresh start. Good luck had come in threes, she thought, touching the necklace and feeling the cold pearl. If only she could find out the name of the jeweller who had given back her reputation by catching those thieves. She hoped one day she might be able to thank him in person.

  9

  Greta made sure every article of clothing was sponged down and neatly pressed. Her wool coat and grey dress with its starched collar were spotless. Her boots were as shiny as glass, thanks to Tom’s efforts, and her knitted gloves well darned. Her carpet bag was packed with stockings, shifts and a brush but she left her pearl behind as instructed. Satisfied she was presentable, she made her way through the familiar streets of York, crossing the river on foot and heading towards the tall houses on the Mount where the fine dwellings, with their sparkling polished doorsteps, rose in tiers above the town below.

  The Blakes of Mount Vernon were prosperous, the front steps were for visitors not servants, so she made her way to the side entrance to ring the bell. A maid in a pinafore opened the door.

  ‘You the new one?’ she said, eyeing Greta up and down. ‘You’d better come in.’

  Greta followed the girl as they marched up the backstairs to the hall. ‘Wait there. And it’s first names here, not last. I’m told your name is Margaret.’

  ‘Greta . . .’

  ‘No, Margaret. I’m Patience, by the way.’ Greta was ushered to the door of the morning room.

  She hesitated to straighten her hair but there were no mirrors. She knocked with trembling knuckles and was summoned into the presence of the mistress of the house.

  Serenity Blake was standing by the window, tall and poker-straight, wearing a light grey dress with a wide starched collar. Her head was covered in a plain cap which was tied under her chin. Her hair was scraped back from her face and coiled tightly into the nape of her neck making her beautiful features severe.

  ‘Margaret Costello. My husband has recommended thee for an honest worker, loyal to thy former employer and being sole supporter to thy widowed mother. Is that correct?’

  ‘Yes, ma’am,’ Greta replied, bobbing a curtsey.

  ‘We bow to no man but our Maker in this household. We speak plain. Our yay is yay and our nay is nay. As thee will learn we live in frugal fashion, not wasting on fripperies when money can be used to help others in need. We eat simple meals, dress plainly and observe First Day Worship. We are not Friends who have become worldly as they have grown in wealth. What I expect from thee is a practical skill for which we will give thee board and lodging, a half day to visit thy mother and a small recompense for thy labours.’

  She moved closer to inspect Greta, her eyes dark as coals.

  ‘We expect thee in return to be discreet in thy manner, work in silence, observe the First Day as we do, repair linen and laundry and support any charitable occasions that might arise here. Does thee understand?’

  Greta swallowed and nodded, bowing her head. Why did she talk like the Bible?

  ‘There are just the two of us in residence but my sons will return from their boarding schools, bringing with them, no doubt, much to be laundered, such items as vigorous boys manage to wear and tear. That will be thy responsibility too. What skills does thee have at thy fingertips?’

  ‘I can darn and turn collars and cuffs, reshape garments, embroider, goffer lace . . . I was taught by the nuns and I can string pearls.’

  ‘Enough, show me those hands.’

  Greta removed her gloves, holding out her fingers for inspection.

  ‘Good, thee’s the rough palms of someone used to hard work and the fingers of a seamstress. There will be no fancy stitchery required in this house but sheets do wear and need turning, collars likewise. We prosper because we exercise frugality in all things.’

  How could a face be so striking, with its arched eyebrows, thick lashes and bow lips, yet be so fierce and stern? Greta felt the power of those eyes peering into her as if to read her very mind. She daren’t hold the woman’s gaze.

  ‘Thee will work alongside Cook and Patience and do whatever tasks they set you. No one sits idle. There is always something to be improved. That is all. Thy room is on the top floor with the other girl. And, Margaret, remember thee cometh without a character reference. Thee’s here solely at my husband’s recommendation so don’t let him down.’

  ‘I won’t, thank you, ma’am.’

  She climbed the stairs with Patience, she wasn’t sure what she felt about the interview. It was done and dusted in minutes with no time to dare ask a question. Now she must find her place in this quiet household, with its white walls and bare rooms. There was none of the usual clutter of ornaments to be dusted, just rows of photographs on the walls. Everything looked of the best quality, to her untrained eye, but the emptiness was scary.

  Her room in the eaves had a washstand, an iron bedstead with a firm mattress, a pull blind and a line of peg hooks along the wall next to a small chest of drawers. There were no pictures in the room, not even an embroidered Bible quotation for inspiration. She sat on the bed looking across at Patience’s half of the room.

  Mr Blake seemed so warm and open but his wife was cool and closed. Suddenly Greta felt homesick for all the noise and clutter of Walmgate. Although she was still in the same city she felt like a stranger in another country with a whole new language to be learned.

  The following week it was the afternoon of the York Friends sewing meeting. The mistress was entertaining at home; tea, scones and fancy cakes were to be served in the drawing room to the gathering of ladies and their daughters who made ‘benevolent objects’.

  ‘What are they?’ Greta asked her room-mate and Cook, who she dare not call Ethel.

  ‘Useful garments they sew for the poor, like clothes for orphans and abandoned children and burial gowns for dead babies. They sew a fine seam. Not a scrap of cloth is wasted as long as it’s black, white, grey or dark. Old clothes are cut down and remade.’

  ‘Why is there no colour in this house?’

  ‘It’s our mistress’s way. She likes to be colourful in her garden, as nature intended, but for herself there’s no adornment, not that she needs it with such porcelain skin and her hair the colour of polished oak. The master is fair smitten with her beauty. Her sons take after her like that, handsome specimens. I’ve never seen a woman so taken with her children. They be her one indulgence, I reckon. But here’s me gossiping.’ Cook scuttled off to finish her duties.

  ‘When will they be home?’ Greta asked Patience.

  ‘Any time now. Master Edmund is at college in Manchester, young Hamer boards at Ackworth. You’ll soon know when they’re back, the house fair rings with noise.’

  Greta was getting used to the household’s strict ways. She glimpsed Serenity, true to her name, gliding across the hall like a shadow, never rushing, greeting guests with a nod of the head while Greta and Patience received coats and gloves, dressed in their afternoon uniform of grey and white striped dresses with stiff collars and cuffs and starched caps that scratched.

  No one wore their hair loose. Certainly the mistress kept her dark locks covered and Greta imagined it tumbling down past the mistress’s waist when it was released from its tight bun. There was no crimping or curling with tongs. Hair must be as nature intended, but Greta’s had the habit of coiling into tight corkscrews in the damp mist, much to her annoyance.

  The Blakes’ house seemed so far away from Walmgate, from the foetid stench of the cesspits in the back courts, but Greta longed for the hurly-burly of the Saturday markets and Friday nights and as for Sunday, she sighed. How would she ever get used to them here?

  When Erasmus Blake took morning prayers, they sat in silence. You spoke only if the spirit moved and none of them dared open their mouth. Greta tried not to grin, thinking about how the spirits moved the men in Walmgate, yelling and fighting on a Saturday night till the small hours. Here they listened to Bible readings and then sat still, trying not to fidget, until the master decided it was time to begin the day.

  Everything changed a few days later when the silence was shattered by the arrival of Hamer Blake, home from school. There was a thunder of boots on the stairs, laughter in the kitchen as he pinched a biscuit. Cook made double portions of everything and Greta’s mending basket was full of sporting shirts, torn britches and a mound of darning.

  She heard the piano in the morning room being played for the very first time. It was as if a breeze of fresh air was blowing right through the house. Serenity smiled as she hustled her son into her bedroom to hear all his news.

  The atmosphere erupted again when Edmund arrived home too and the household was complete for the summer. There were meetings for Young Friends in the garden, tennis parties to be arranged, outings to the seaside for the boys’ friends and more washing and mending.

  Edmund was introduced to Patience and Greta. He was tall and dark like his mother, with the same penetrating eyes, but there was a sparkle in them. He was polite and asked after their families and then retreated to study for his examination. He had the beauty of his mother and warmth of his father, thought Greta. His mother hovered by his door and ordered them to tiptoe past his room.

  ‘Thee must do the fires early and no noise to distract him, Margaret. He must be left to study,’ Serenity told Greta. She noticed, however, that Edmund was never in his room and when she knocked on the door to tidy, the window sash was wide open. Somehow he’d scrambled down the pipes and away out of the house to goodness knows where. That was none of her business until a letter arrived in the post that sent the Blakes into a turmoil. Cook said Edmund had failed his law exams and was in disgrace.

  The calm surface of the household rippled with a coming storm of arguments and doors slamming. Patience and Greta couldn’t help overhearing the quarrelling from the top landing where they were polishing the banisters.

  ‘Law is not for me, Mother. I don’t have the qualities needed to concentrate.’

  ‘But it is thy father’s dearest wish for thee to continue in his practice.’

  ‘I know, I’m sorry, but it won’t do. I want to work with my hands like my Grandfather Blake before me. You should see some of the work that William Morris’s Company are producing: tables, chairs of sturdy oak and natural woods. I’ve been attending carpentry classes. That’s what I want to do, not sit at a desk all day listening to people’s grievances.’

  ‘Don’t ever let thy father hear thee say such things.’ For once the mistress was losing her composure. ‘My family have never stooped to manual work but brought trade and prosperity to this district. Thou must do the same.’

  ‘There’s no shame in manual work, Mama. This is not cheap furniture cobbled together, it’s part of a whole movement towards rediscovering those ancient skills we’re in danger of losing: stained glass, fine jewellery, wonderful tapestries. It is uplifting work.’

  ‘Thou was not brought up to value those worldly things, Edmund. It is not our way,’ his mother argued, her voice raised again in despair.

  ‘It may not be your way, Mother, but I see the hand of God in the artist’s brush and pen and chisel.’

  ‘Those are the devil’s words, son. Who has lead thee astray to talk as the worldly do? Who has defiled thy mind with such ideas?’

  ‘No one, I went to an art gallery and fell in love with what I saw. It touched something within me that has always been there. I was always the first to saw wood, to help the gardener or watch my father’s father at his bench. I’ve attended lectures and seen the workshops of carpenters. This is what I want to do . . .’

  ‘We do not mention that side of the family, as thou well know. Thy father saw the light of truth when he joined the Fellowship of Friends. He abandoned all those worldly pursuits when he married me.’

  ‘You made him choose between his family and you. How many times was I stopped from visiting grandfather before he died?’

  ‘How dare thee talk to me like this? I won’t have it. Go to thy room and pray for forgiveness for such disrespect. I won’t have thee corrupting Hamer. Thy father will speak later.’

  ‘Have you forgotten the Carpenter of Nazareth, Mama? Would you show Him the door too?’ Edmund stormed out of the morning room with a face like thunder and left the house with a slam of the door that made the walls shudder. Patience stared at Greta. ‘What do we do now?’

  ‘Nowt, it’s none of our business, is it?’ Both of them heard the sobs coming from the other side of the door. The mistress mustn’t know they had heard any of this or there would be trouble. Greta sensed this would not be the last upheaval. The peace of this gracious house was shattered. Poor Mr Blake would have to take sides, but she already knew whose side she was on.

  One morning a few days later after yet another family argument, Greta went to put the laundry in the linen press. She saw Edmund standing on the landing, staring out at the garden where his mother was pacing along the path.

  ‘I suppose you all know I am in disgrace. Voices echo up this hall.’ He sighed.

  Greta bowed her head not wanting to be involved in family matters.

  ‘Such a lovely day out there.’ He sighed again.

  ‘It’s a good day for a walk, sir,’ she replied.

  ‘No sirs here. I’m Edmund . . . A walk around the city ramparts would clear the air, before the next battle.’ He was looking at her. ‘It’s such a beautiful city, isn’t it?’

  ‘It’s an old city, I give you that.’ She paused. ‘But not so beautiful where I come from in Walmgate.’

  ‘I suppose we’re spoilt up here but on a day like this anywhere is better than—’ he broke off. ‘What do you do after a long day’s work?’ he asked, changing the subject.

  ‘Visit home when I can, but it’s the Gala soon in Bootham Field. I’m saving up for the fair and I’ll take my sister Kitty. It’s the best day of summer, isn’t it?’

  ‘I wouldn’t know. I’ve never been.’

  ‘Why ever not? Everyone goes,’ she said, shaking her head in surprise.

  ‘Friends don’t attend things like that but I’m not sure why. Mama says you can catch diseases but it sounds fun.’

  ‘Then you ought to go, just the once.’ She hesitated knowing she shouldn’t be giving such advice. ‘To make your own mind up, like,’ she added as more of a challenge, knowing the mood he was in now and wanting to encourage him to defy his mother.

  ‘You’re right, of course, but it’s not that simple, not now.’ He turned to look down at the garden. ‘We are supposed to set an example and at the moment I’m . . .’

  ‘But everyone needs time to be jolly, to sing and dance with all the fun of the fairground. You have to see it.’

  ‘I’m supposed to be studying but—’ She could see him glancing at her sideways. ‘I’m making excuses, aren’t I?’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘Edmund, please.’

  ‘Perhaps you could go and take Master Hamer as a treat. He’d like to go on the coconut shy and the helter-skelter. It’s only for a day, after all.’

  ‘You know, Margaret, you’re right. Just one day can’t cause any more trouble than I’m in now.’ He smiled and looked at her with those bright eyes. She didn’t know where to look as her cheeks flushed. They were peering out of the window together as Serenity walked back, glancing upwards she had spied them deep in conversation. Her thunderous look said it all.

  10

  ‘Where shall we go next?’ shouted Kitty as she jumped off the carousel, excited by the choices. ‘How much have you got left?’

  ‘Enough for an ice cream but we’ll have to share.’ Greta smiled at her sister as they caught up with Patience and her friend. ‘Have you seen them yet?’

  ‘Seen who? Oh yer not going on about Edmund bringing his brother. Is that why you’re all dressed up like a dog’s dinner?’ teased Patience.

  Kitty and Greta were dressed in starched cotton dresses cut down from Adah’s precious materials and wearing battered straw boaters which sported crisp stripy ribbons. The sky was blue and crowds thronged the Gala field to the sound of the steam pipe organs and the hurdy-gurdy man. All the pennies in her purse were nearly gone but Greta still hoped that the Blake boys would come even though the atmosphere in the house was tense and gloomy. Would Edmund be forced back into his cage to do what he was told or would he stand up for himself?