A Russellian Vignette

by Maer, aka 'merely a whim'

It was late August of 1915 and I had just completed my first stint in bringing in the harvest with the local girls and women of the Land Army. I had donned my Army smock and work boots with the dawn, wolfed down the heel off a loaf of bread with a cup of tea, and had gone to join my work group. It was now well into the afternoon, teatime, and I trudged home hot, sweaty, and ravenously hungry.

The presence of fresh baked bread this morning presaged pies and cakes and other such delicacies: our cook preferred to do the week's baking all at once, and afternoon tea on baking day was a thing of beauty. Piled high with iced biscuits, petit fors, éclairs, cream scones studded with currants, and a fancy layer cake or two, the tea cart positively groaned under the weight of all that food, a veritable gothic cathedral of pastry in all its mouthwatering glory. Even I, who normally eschewed sweets, found myself eagerly awaiting baking day for the sake of that tea cart. Baking day was also the one day of the week that my aunt was less likely to notice what (or how much) I ate, as she was too preoccupied in entertaining an important visitor with the lavish hospitality afternoon tea on baking day offered. Currying favor with the local bigwigs was of higher priority with my aunt than counting the scones to be certain I hadn't managed to actually eat any without her leave. So it was with high hopes that I crossed the lower yard and made for the kitchen door of the farmhouse.

Patrick Mason, our farm manager, was in the yard sharpening a small hand scythe and even though I was fifty yards distant, I could see the pained expression on his face. Patrick had always felt I, being my mother's daughter, should be above manual labor. It violated his sense of rightness to see me in such a state. No doubt the War, and the extra work and sacrifices it imposed on everyone, did the same and to a greater degree, such that Patrick bowed to practicality and restricted himself to just a pained look. Anything else he thought or felt about the matter he wisely kept to himself. I paused at the kitchen door, met his eye with a wave and a nod, and passed inside.

I should have stayed in the yard with Patrick. Sitting at the table and conferring with the cook was my aunt. My hopes for sustenance evaporated the second she saw me.

"Do be a dear and close the door, Mary. You're letting in the flies." Her voice was sweet and my guard went up. That dulcet tone was a warning sign. My aunt was in an ugly mood and was looking for a convenient target on which to vent it, and despite my hunger, despite my fatigue, I was damned if I was going to give her what she wanted. I bowed my head meekly and quietly closed the door as she'd asked.

"I apologise, Aunt," I said, turning to face her with what I hope was a contrite expression. "I came this way thinking only to save the front carpets."

A combination of incredulity, wariness, and anger swept across her face before she regained control of her emotions and slammed her customary mask of cool superiority into place. I had scored a point: there was nothing she could find fault with in my reply. I immediately stooped to remove my filthy boots and had to resist swooning as my vision greyed. I simply kept pulling the laces loose by feel alone until my sight returned.

I must have wavered a bit on my feet, however, for the stout and doughty Mrs. Morrison, our head cook and pastry baker, stood up from the table and reached for the bread. I saw all this from the corner of my eye as I straightened and brushed off my knees.

Quick as a flash, my aunt lashed out with, "That won't be necessary, Morrison. Mary has already taken her breakfast and since she saw fit to miss luncheon, I shall assume she is content to wait until supper."

"Oh, but Ma'am, she's been out harvestin' all da-- "

"And didn't see fit to come home at the noon break for her midday meal. Obviously she didn't want or need it. She'll simply have to wait, the same as the rest of us." Aunt's chin lifted in triumph as she saw the effect her words had on me and she smiled that supercilious smile that I loathed. She turned a steely eye on Mrs. Morrison. "I am mistress here and I say until Mary shows due respect for the household by showing up for meals at the proper hour, she is not to pilfer between times. Have I made myself perfectly clear?"

Mrs. Morrison offered a subdued, "Yes, Ma'am."

My aunt rose from her chair with a rustle of taffeta and brocade, tugged her dress front straight, and swept out of the kitchen, victorious. The stillness of the scene erupted into the cacophony of suspended tasks suddenly resumed as the rest of the kitchen staff, who had stood transfixed during this entire nasty little exchange, remembered where they were and what they should be doing. Under cover of the din, Mrs. Morrison murmured, "Miss Russell, I-- ."

"No need, you tried." I forestalled the woman with an upraised hand, all too aware of witnesses. Her heart was in the right place, I knew, but just now I didn't feel up to accepting her pity. I'd already deprived my aunt of a row at the cost of my pride, a Pyrrhic victory at best, and was simply too tired to explain or be fussed over. I merely grabbed the boots I had so recently vacated, shoved back into them, and took to the yard with the laces trailing.

I could just envision my aunt in the parlour burning up the telephone exchange in a search for yet another cook - I did not think that Mrs. Morrison was long for this household, not after her show of partisanship this afternoon. My blood began to boil.

This shall make it, what? Seven cooks so far? That must be some kind of record. And Aunt will certainly turn her out without a character or severance pay. And all this an entire month before Michaelmas! I descended into the yard again, morosely kicking up the dust as I went. My allowance, which I had scrimped and saved for a leather-bound set of Shakespeare, would find its way into Mrs. Morrison's pocket before she'd left for good. I would make sure of that. Holmes had been teaching me the various ways pickpockets plied their trade and it took no great feat of imagination to reverse the process and deposit something on someone without their knowledge. This is all well and good for the conscience, Russell, but it does damn all for filling your stomach. If you wait much longer, it will have chewed its way free of you to search for food on its own.

"Went well, did it?"

"What? Oh, Patrick, I'm sorry. I didn't see you there." I pulled myself out of my black mood and acknowledged him. He put the strickle down and put the scythe away carefully in the toolshed attached to his cottage.

"Come inside, then, Miss Mary. Tillie'd come by earlier. She's left enough for three."

I stood still in my tracks, tired, dusty, and torn. I looked up at the main house. The parlour curtains were tightly drawn against the afternoon glare. Noises from the kitchen drifted on the air along with the contented clucking of the chickens scratching in the hen yard. Patrick showed no sign of impatience at my dithering, but simply stood in the doorway of his cottage and waited.

"We can't lose you, too," I hedged.

"Her Majesty knows that. Don't worry about me, Miss Mary. Your mother wouldn't look kindly on me if I stood by and did nothing."

Well, since he put it that way...

"Thank you, Patrick."

After that day, not a word was spoken on the subject. It was understood: I would never be turned away hungry should I miss a meal due to my wartime duties or my aunt's caprice. I gratefully quit the yard and entered Patrick's tidy kitchen...

"Miss Mary," Patrick said, in the way of someone patiently repeating himself.

"Oh, I'm sorry, Patrick. I didn't mean to be rude." I came back to the present, chagrined at my inattention. Outside was another August day, much like the one I'd remembered three years ago. "I was woolgathering. What did you say?"

"It's been a long day," Patrick allowed, graciously waiving my lapse in manners. "More tea?"

"Thank you, no. I've got to get going."

Patrick nodded and cleared away the remains of the substantial meal I'd silently inhaled. "Off with you, then."

Off I went to sluice away the dust of another stint in the fields and thence to Holmes.