Her Ladyship's Girl Read online

  ‘There’s the Hambone in Denman Street, or the Morgue in Smith’s Court, or the Shim Sham in Brixton, or the Lex near Oxford Street.’

  ‘Hmmm, I think Brixton is a bit off the beaten for me, Anwyn. The Lex sounds nice . . . is it?’

  ‘It’s good. They have proper bands and you can get a drink and something to eat.’

  ‘Excellent! It’s the Lex, then.’

  We got there at about 8:00 p.m. and Miranda whispered something to the doorman on the way in. She gave me some money and asked me to go to the bar for a couple of soft drinks, while she sat at a secluded table on the raised area away from the dancehall. It was a Wednesday night and not very busy, but the band was half-decent and it wasn’t long before my foot was tapping under the table. After about ten minutes, the doorman came with a note and gave it to Mrs Bouchard. She read it and smiled.

  ‘Listen, Anwyn, I have to go.’

  ‘So soon?’

  ‘Something’s come up.’

  ‘I’ll get our coats.’

  ‘No . . . please, you stay here.’

  ‘Oh no . . .’

  ‘I insist!’

  She gave me ten shillings from her purse and told me she’d be about an hour. I should wait until she came back and use the money to buy drinks or food or whatever I wanted. Then she was gone, in a swirl of blue velvet and Vol de Nuit perfume.

  I bought myself another lime squash with the ten bob note and sat back down. Then I noticed the piece of paper the doorman had delivered – it was still on the table. I had to have a look, of course.

  I have a car outside

  Come now!

  W

  I didn’t need to have a degree from Oxford to guess that the ‘W’ might have been William Harding. He obviously knew Miranda Bouchard very well to be able to get her to hire me as her lady’s maid. Did he do it to make up for his wife sacking me? I believed so. And I thought, how romantic! An assignation – a rendezvous – it was the stuff of novels. And I was helping to make it happen. I was a covert chaperone – a silent stand-in to enable the lovers to be together. But then I remembered the library in Hampstead and I wondered if Miranda Bouchard wasn’t making a fool of herself – if indeed it was William Harding who had the car outside the dance club that night. I was almost certain it was, but I couldn’t be absolutely sure. In any case, it was none of my business and I’d promised Miranda I’d never betray her. It wasn’t due to any servile mentality on my part. It was nothing to do with a sense of class or place or obligation – it was just one woman to another. Nothing else.

  Being on my own, it wasn’t long before I attracted the attention of the likely lads who frequented the Lex. After about twenty minutes there were four of them sitting round my table, all wanting to buy me drinks. I told them I had my own money, thanks very much, but I wouldn’t mind a dance or two. They kept me busy, taking it in turns to whisk me round the dance floor with a waltz or a quickstep, and I didn’t notice the minutes of the hours rushing by.

  ‘What’s your name?’

  ‘Anwyn. What’s yours?’

  ‘Mickey.’

  ‘Mickey the mule?’

  ‘I’m no mule.’

  ‘And I’m no fool.’

  But they were a good-natured bunch of boys and, as I didn’t take any drinks from them, I was under no obligation to take anything else either.

  Mrs Bouchard came back at 10:30 p.m., over two hours after she left. Her hair was somewhat tousled and her make-up needed refreshing, but she was in good spirits and even thanked the young men for keeping me company.

  ‘You can go now.’

  She waved her hand imperiously and they melted away, bowing awkwardly and tripping over their toes, as if they were in the presence of royalty. I offered her the change from her ten shillings – I’d hardly spent anything from being on the dance floor so much – but she told me to keep it as a thank you for my patience.

  ‘I think we should leave now, Anwyn, don’t you?’

  ‘Of course.’

  And that was it, the night was over.

  Back at Chester Square, she drank some wine and smoked some cigarettes in her room, while I prepared her for bed.

  ‘I hope you didn’t mind, Anwyn?’

  ‘Mind what . . . Miranda?’

  ‘My leaving you like that.’

  ‘Of course not. I had a great night.’

  ‘Wonderful. We must do it again.’

  But we never did. I don’t know why.

  She didn’t mention the note and neither did I. She obviously forgot about it in the heat of the passionate night – and neither of us mentioned where she might have been for the two hours and fifteen minutes of her absence from the Lex Club.

  Next day, I had to take some items of clothing over to the menders in St Martin’s Lane and I was told to wait and bring them back with me. The seamstress said the work would take about an hour or so and she gave me a cup of tea while I was waiting. I was content enough, reading the magazines that were laid out for the customers, when a group of other maids came into the shop. They were chattering between themselves until they saw me, then they fell silent and started giving me sideways looks. I remembered Mrs Bouchard’s instructions, that the most important of my duties would be to circulate with the other ladies’ maids whenever I came into contact with them and extract as much information as possible about their upper-class households. So I thought now was as good a time as any to start snooping.

  ‘Hello, girls.’

  Nobody answered. They just sat there in silence.

  ‘Nice day out.’

  More stony silence. I wondered why they were giving me the cold shoulder. Was it because I was younger than any of them, or was it because I got the job at Chester Square over some of their friends?

  Finally, one of them gave me a haughty look and said with a kind of sneer –

  ‘You’re Miranda Brandon’s girl, aren’t you?’

  ‘I’m sure you must mean Mrs Bouchard.’

  ‘Oh yes, Mrs Bouchard.’

  She said this with a faux French accent and the others all giggled like epileptic geese.

  ‘And who might your lords and masters be?’

  One of them was a lady’s maid for a Mrs Heathcote-Forbes of Chelsea and another for a Belgian woman who lived in Mayfair. There was a parlourmaid from the house of the Dowager Duchess of Glamorgan and a nanny from Mrs Leopold Mercier’s house in Belgravia.

  ‘And how is Mrs Bouchard these days?’

  ‘She’s in the very pink of her prime, thank you.’

  ‘Is she seeing anybody at all?’

  ‘Seeing? In what way?’

  ‘You know what way.’

  I told them Miranda was living her life without the familiar attention of any gentlemen and had been for as long as I was at Chester Square. They didn’t believe me and one of them mentioned Mr Harding from Hampstead, with a sly inflection in her voice, as if she knew something no one else did. I told them I’d worked for Mr Harding and he was happily married and a perfect gentleman at all times.

  ‘That’s not what his parlourmaids say.’

  ‘Well, I wouldn’t believe everything that comes out of a parlourmaid’s mouth.’

  That upset the parlourmaid in the company and she fell into a sulk. But the others had loosened up a bit now and they gabbled on about the goings-on in their various households. I made mental notes of it all to relate to Mrs Bouchard over dinner that night.

  ‘Well done, Anwyn. Did anyone mention me?’

  ‘Your name came up.’

  ‘In connection with?’

  ‘Nothing specific.’

  ‘Anyone specific?’

  ‘William Harding.’

  She smiled in a sultry kind of way, and explained that she and Mr Harding were friends from way back, before either of them got married. She didn’t offer any more information on the subject and it wasn’t my business to ask.

  ‘And how did you respond, Anwyn?’

  ‘I told them
you were totally celibate.’

  This made her laugh out loud.

  ‘Good girl.’

  I avidly read the newspapers Miranda had delivered each day. Earlier that year, Iceland became the first country to legalise abortion and women were finally allowed to vote in Turkish elections. Amelia Earhart had flown non-stop from Honolulu to California and Karoline Mikkelson was the first woman to set foot on the continent of Antarctica. Women around the world were starting to become independent. Most of the time Miranda didn’t even bother to read the papers herself – but I did. Here in London, from a woman’s point of view, less spectacular things were happening, but I was happy with my position in life and hopeful for the future. I was also beginning to be accepted by the other servants. I kept Mrs Bouchard happy and, if she was happy, Mr Biggs was happy and, if he was happy, the rest of the staff were happy.

  One evening, I was coming back in the dark after visiting a late-night chemist for some painkillers to relieve Miranda’s wine headache. It was very foggy, like it could get in London in the mid-thirties. A pea-souper they used to call them, because you could hardly see five feet in front of you. The chemists was located on Pimlico Road and I had to make my way back through Holbein Place and past the old brooding church in Graham Terrace. All the little streets in the area were dimly lit at the best of times, but that night I could barely make out where I was going. I suddenly got the feeling I was being followed, but every time I turned round I couldn’t see anyone behind me. Yet, when I walked on, I could hear footsteps again. I quickened my pace, trying to stay in the lamplight as much as I could, keeping out of the shadows and carefully negotiating the corners. Then, suddenly, a huge shape loomed up out of the fog in front of me. I almost ran straight into it. I screamed. It grabbed me by the shoulders.

  ‘Are you all right, Miss?’

  Then I saw the uniform – and the helmet. It was a bobby on the beat.

  ‘You gave me a start, officer.’

  ‘I’m sorry, but you shouldn’t be wandering about on a night like this . . . young girl on her own.’

  ‘I’m almost home.’

  I told him I was in service in a house in Chester Square. He offered to escort me to the corner of Gerald Mews and I was grateful for his protective company. Then he continued on his beat down Elizabeth Street. I quickly turned into Chester Place and up to the front of number 24. I was just about to bang on the door for tailcoat Jacob, when I heard a soft voice from somewhere behind me.

  ‘Anwyn . . .’

  I whirled round, but could see very little through the thick fog.

  ‘Who’s there?’

  ‘Is that you, Anwyn?’

  ‘Who is it? Who are you?’

  A figure approached out of the murk. I was about to scream again, when I recognised a familiar face.

  ‘Bart?’

  ‘It’s me, Anwyn.’

  ‘What are you doing here? Have you been following me?’

  He said he had, but he wasn’t sure if it was me or not in the dark gloominess.

  I asked him what he wanted and he said he had a note for me.

  ‘A note? From who?’

  ‘Mr Harding.’

  He handed me a sealed envelope with my name on it.

  ‘He made me swear I’d give it to nobody but you.’

  ‘Did he now!’

  ‘What’s going on, Anwyn?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  His expression told me he suspected the worst. I couldn’t believe it.

  ‘Nothing’s going on. You don’t think . . .’

  ‘You’ll only get yourself hurt, Anwyn.’

  ‘Listen, Bart, I’m not . . .’

  But he was gone, turned back into the foul London pea-souper. I opened the envelope to find another one inside, addressed to Miranda Bouchard. Mr Harding obviously didn’t care if people believed he was having some kind of intrigue with me as long as they didn’t know he was having a liaison with Mrs Bouchard.

  I handed the envelope over to her along with the painkillers, and she smiled and thanked me.

  Next time I was over in the seamstress’s shop in St Martin’s Lane the other maids giggled even more dementedly than before. Bart had obviously told Nora and Nora had obviously told someone else and now the word was out. But it was drawing attention away from Miranda Bouchard and I suppose that was also part of my job – along with everything else. I wondered why two people who seemingly had everything would still want something they couldn’t have. I wondered if William Harding loved Miranda Bouchard or if he was a philanderer like everyone said he was and she was just another of his conquests, to be discarded when someone new came along. I wondered if Miranda loved William Harding, or was she just bored and he was something to fill her idle days and nights? I thought of all the poor people like my family and Lucy’s family who didn’t have the time or energy for such shenanigans. But it wasn’t for me to judge. Mrs Bouchard was paying me to do a job and I’d do it to the very best of my ability. And, anyway, I liked her, even if she was rich and spoiled – she had a mind and a will of her own, like Mrs Reynolds, and I admired women like that who weren’t afraid to go up against a man’s world.

  I hoped I could be like them one day – like them, but not like them, if that made any sense. I hoped I would grow up to be a strong, independent woman, with my own income and my own life. I didn’t envy Mrs Bouchard either, who was conditioned by her status in society, or Mrs Reynolds, who was the wife of a rich and powerful man and was viewed as an extension of him. I didn’t want to be an extension of anyone. I wanted to be my own woman. Big dreams for someone who was merely a maid, you might say, someone’s lackey – but dreams were the same as aspirations. And I was sure someone, somewhere, at some time, said that aspirations were the building blocks of achievement.

  Chapter Ten

  Mr Peacock came to see me a couple of weeks after I started. He asked to see me alone in the music room.

  ‘How are you settling in, Miss Moyle?’

  ‘Very well, Sir.’

  ‘Excellent. I’m glad to hear it.’

  He looked uneasy, calculating what he was going to say. I already knew what that was, as Miranda had briefed me. But he didn’t know that and I wasn’t going to make it easy for him.

  ‘This is quite delicate. Mrs Bouchard has had, how should I say, quite a colourful past.’

  ‘Really, Sir?’

  My innocent expression would have convinced a magistrate.

  ‘Yes, really. Now, I would like you to be on the lookout for . . . anything out of the ordinary.’

  ‘Out of the ordinary, Sir?’

  ‘Yes . . . rendezvous . . . strange men . . . assignations, that kind of thing.’

  ‘I’m not sure I know what you mean, Sir.’

  He was becoming exasperated with his inability to express himself and he started pacing up and down the room, looking for the right words.

  ‘Look, you’re a plain girl, Anwyn, so I’ll speak plainly. I want to know if Mrs Bouchard entertains or meets privately with men. I want you to take note and describe them to me.’

  ‘Oh dear, Sir, the lady does nothing of the sort. Why, she barely leaves the house, except to shop and go to the theatre, and I’m always with her when she does.’

  ‘Good. But keep your eyes open. I shall make it worth your while . . . for information. Do you understand?’

  ‘Worth my while, Sir?’

  He explained that Miranda’s family were very well-connected and they considered Miranda to be their most valuable ‘asset’ – that’s how he put it, as if she was a piece of property or a stock option or a racehorse. I couldn’t believe it. After all the things that had happened over the past twenty years or so, some of these aristocrats still believed they were living in the eighteenth century. Mr Peacock was an educated man, I wondered if he agreed with this outdated estimation of women, or if he was just obeying orders. But I had to pretend I was going along with him, otherwise they’d get rid of me and replace me wit
h someone else – a woman who would spy on Mrs Bouchard like a snake in the grass.

  ‘Do you understand, Miss Moyle?’

  ‘I understand, Sir.’

  That evening at dinner I told Miranda what he said and we laughed and knew we could feed him just whatever we wanted and he’d be none the wiser.

  Over the course of the London season, myself and Miranda Bouchard were almost inseparable, apart from the rare occasions when she had guests and other company. Apart from William Harding, there was no one who could remotely be identified as ‘a man in her life’ of the kind that Mr Peacock was so anxious about. So my occasional reporting to him was mainly truthful and only based on a single lie. I learned the duties of a lady’s maid avidly, soaking up everything like a sponge, watching and observing, listening, taking instruction, asking questions, conversing with other ladies’ maids at the seamstress’s shop or the cleaners or in the places that were set aside for us at events and functions, and finding out what was going on in the circles of high society so I could report it back to Miranda. And I became that rare and curious commodity – a really good lady’s maid.

  I became more competent as each day passed. I began to understand the intricacies of hairdressing, the craft of dressmaking, how to pack for journeys, how to make arrangements for dinner parties and balls. I acquired ‘good taste’ and added it to my other attributes. I learned how to take care of Mrs Bouchard’s every need. I was honest, trustworthy, quick-witted, eager to learn, impeccably clean, methodical and patient, and I even began to learn French so I could converse with Miranda in front of the other servants and they wouldn’t know what we were talking about.

  The months were a whirlwind to me and my feet barely touched the ground as I accompanied Mrs Bouchard here, there and everywhere. The first event after I started was the Cheltenham Festival in March – which was happening at the same time as Adolf Hitler was invading the Rhineland, but none of that social circle seemed to care. A car came and collected us at Chester Square and drove us to Lodge Park in the Sherborne Estate, Gloustershire, which was converted into a dower house for the wife of the 4th Baron Sherborne. I stayed in a room in the rear wing and wasn’t introduced to the other guests with Miranda. I spent my time with the other ladies’ maids, gleaning the gossip, when I wasn’t attending to Mrs Bouchard, and we travelled over to the Festival by car on the Friday for the Gold Cup, which was won by Golden Miller, a horse that had won the race the last four years in a row and set a record that would never be equalled. Mrs Bouchard’s company had a course-facing box with a dining area. I didn’t attend her in the box, but waited with the other maids in the paddock area. Afterwards, we returned to Lodge Park and I didn’t get to bed till 3:00 a.m. because Miranda drank quite a lot of champagne and I had to ensure her safe transference from the evening’s banquet to her bedchamber.