The Letter, page 6
‘How nice to see you again, Alice and Bella,’ she said, not looking as if she thought it ‘nice’ at all. ‘Please put those wet umbrellas in the corner where they won’t drip on owt. And please leave your shoes on the mat before you tread outside in, and put your coats on the hooks.’
She stood over them while they did this, leaving their fashionable young women’s shoes next to three other pairs, two large and one smaller and slimmer, then beckoned them into the front room where a tea set, which had the shine of infrequent use, was laid out on a low table, with some Rich Tea biscuits on a plate.
‘Sit yourselves down and I’ll just go and make the tea,’ said Mona, and went to do so, leaving them alone. Frank had disappeared, too.
Bella and Alice sat down on the hard and shiny horsehair-padded sofa and looked at each other. The house felt cold – there was no fire in the grate – and Bella shivered in her stockinged feet, thinking she had felt more at home in a dentist’s waiting room. Her relatives hadn’t even asked how the journey had been.
‘I wonder where Millie is,’ she said. She lowered her voice. ‘It’s not very … homely, is it? Apart from the coat and shoes, I don’t see any sign of Millie’s things, either – no games or books. It’s almost as if she doesn’t exist.’
Alice was looking unhappy. ‘It feels all wrong,’ she said. ‘I think I’ll go and have a little chat, see what I can find out. You could have a quick nose around while I do that.’
She got up and went out, leaving Bella looking about the room, searching for any evidence that her young cousin lived in this unwelcoming place.
Above the mantelpiece, on which stood two moulded glass vases and a hideous pottery figure of a fat cherub, was a text embroidered in cross-stitch, the kind of thing Bella had learned to do at school when she was hardly more than an infant, although hers had been a joyful undertaking, a neatly embroidered alphabet, in bright colours, ringed with garlands of flowers. This was quite different from that. He that covereth his sins shall not prosper, read the black stitching within a heavy frame. Just the kind of proverb to cast a dampener over a tea party, thought Bella, turning back to the obviously ‘best’ china. Her stomach rumbled – it had been hours since breakfast – and she wondered if she could just take one of the dry biscuits now, but she felt sure helping herself uninvited would be regarded as stealing, and for that sin she wouldn’t prosper.
She padded out to the cold tiles of the hallway to try to hear what was going on. The muffled sound of voices came from behind the closed door at the end, obviously the kitchen. Bella could hear Alice’s tone, even and reasoned, but not her actual words. Alice was not one to back down, even if outnumbered.
Suddenly Bella knew what she must do. Silently she ran up the stairs. At the top were two bedrooms, the doors closed. She guessed Millie’s room would be the one at the back. She tapped on the door.
‘Millie?’ she called as quietly as she could. ‘Millie? It’s Bella. Alice and I are here to see you. We got your letter. Are you coming down? You’re not ill, are you?’
She heard the sound of feet stomping across the floor to the door. Then a voice just the other side said, ‘No. But I can’t get out. I’m locked in.’
Bella saw the key in the lock then, turned it and opened the door. There was Millie, standing with a mixture of anger and defiance on her face. She was thin and pale, as if she hadn’t begun to fill out, and small for her age, the strongest-looking thing about her the determination in her face. She was dressed in an odd combination of what looked like a slightly too-short pink summer dress with a frill at the hem, with black stockings beneath, and two black cardigans, both too big, over the top. Her long dark hair was awry, as if it had been tied back and she’d roughly pulled it loose.
The room was cold, the daylight dim and bleak through the small window, but sufficient for Bella to see that her young cousin had her suitcase standing beside her bed.
‘Millie, what’s happened?’ asked Bella. ‘Are you all right? Why were you locked in? Have you done summat you shouldn’t have?’
‘Yes, I have,’ said Millie. ‘But you see, I wanted the money – I needed it, for today – and they don’t give me pocket money, so in the end I just helped myself. I had no choice. It wasn’t very much, but I had to have the train fare. I couldn’t be sure you and Alice would have enough for my ticket, you see. I hoped Aunt Moaner wouldn’t miss it, but she jolly well did and got in the most awful rage. Of course, I couldn’t tell her why I’d really taken it, so instead I said I wanted to buy some sweets, and she went a bit mad.’
‘Crikey,’ said Bella. This was a lot to take in. She felt as if she was watching a film but had arrived late and missed the first hour. ‘So you took Aunt Mona’s money for the train fare to go home with Alice and me?’
‘Yes! I thought I’d ruined the plan at the last moment, getting locked in, and it was all going so well up until then.’
‘Plan?’
‘To escape, with you. I wrote, and here you are, and now we’re going to escape.’
Millie had no trace of a northern accent, for all her mother was Thomas and Frank’s sister, but then she had been brought up largely in Cornwall and her father had been from London. She had hardly spoken when she was brought to London, so Bella had not noticed this before.
‘We did get your letter,’ Bella said again, ‘and we’ve come to see what’s happening. Come down with me and let’s hear all about it.’
‘They won’t let me tell you what it’s like here,’ said Millie. ‘If I try to, they’ll just say I’m a liar and give their own version. That will be the lies. And if you question them or disagree, they’ll just ride roughshod over you. But I’ve got my case packed – see? – and now you’re here, and you’ve unlocked the door, I’m ready to go. It was all going well until Aunt Moaner discovered the missing money and locked me in my room. I did think about escaping out of the window, but it’s too high and there’s nothing to break my fall.’
‘Good grief, Millie, I’m glad you didn’t attempt that,’ said Bella, her stomach turning at the thought.
For a moment, Bella was torn between the madness of making a run for it with Millie, and doing the sensible, grown-up thing of finding out exactly what had happened. Sensible Bella won out, of course: there was Alice to consider, possibly still in reasoned debate with their aunt and uncle in the kitchen. She would never abandon Alice, and she ought not to believe everything that Millie said when there was, perhaps, another version of events to consider. Certainly, it had been wrong to try to steal the money, but the girl must have been desperate.
‘Come on,’ said Bella. ‘Let’s go and find Alice, hear what they’ve said to her.’ Already, she noticed, she had slipped into referring to her aunt and uncle as ‘they’, like Millie had done.
‘All right, then, if we must. I’ll bring the suitcase,’ said Millie, and hefted it through the doorway, where Bella took it from her and carried it downstairs.
By now, Alice, Frank and Mona were back in the front room. Bella deposited the case in the hall near the front door and ushered Millie before her. Mona was pouring tea into the precious china cups and Alice was sitting on the hard sofa again, opposite her uncle.
‘Here’s Millie,’ Bella said brightly, leading the child to the sofa to sit down between Alice and herself. ‘She’s come down to say hello.’
‘What are you doing down here, young madam?’ said Mona. ‘I told you, you would stay in your room until I came to let you out. Bella, this is your doing, isn’t it?’
‘Yes, of course it was me, Aunt Mona,’ said Bella. ‘We came to see Millie, too, and I found her imprisoned in her room.’
Alice silently put out a hand to hush her sister’s impassioned words, but it was too late.
‘Imprisoned!’ gasped Mona, affronted. ‘That child needs some discipline. She should reflect upon the error of her ways, or she’ll surely end up in prison, all right!’
‘I gather there was some money stolen … for sweets. I’m sure Millie is sorry.’
‘I’m sure she isn’t, the lip she was giving me,’ retorted Mona. ‘And it was a lot more than just pennies she took, too.’
‘You had no right to undermine us, Bella, or to wander about our home uninvited,’ said Frank angrily. ‘Millie’s a wicked girl, and she was being punished as she deserved. We told her of your visit, but she still couldn’t behave herself, and so she has to forgo the treat.’
‘Wicked? Punished? Those are strong words to apply to a child,’ said Alice evenly. ‘What else has Millie done to deserve them?’
‘I’ll tell you what she’s done, young woman,’ said Mona. ‘She broke a window in the scullery. She broke it on purpose.’
‘Did you see her breaking it deliberately?’ asked Alice.
‘No … but I know she did because she admitted it. I could have been injured by the flying glass. It was a dreadful mess.’
‘But you weren’t injured?’ asked Bella.
‘That’s hardly the point,’ snapped Frank. ‘We took in this child to bring her up as our own, and now we find it’s too late. She’s gone to the bad already. She lacks discipline and respect; she steals and lies.’
‘She’s all cheek and backchat,’ Mona added. ‘And then there’s her refusal to help with the chores and her moping in her room.’
‘I expect she’s feeling sad because she misses her parents,’ ventured Alice. ‘The accident … the suddenness of it … such a big and awful thing for her to have to cope with, especially when she’s so young.’
‘What do you know?’ said Mona, completely forgetting that Alice and Bella knew all too well what it was like to lose an adored parent. ‘Anyway, that was months ago,’ she went on. ‘She’s made no effort to fit in with us at all.’
Bella had never liked her aunt and uncle very much, and she was liking them less with every passing minute. Were they really so stupid? She looked again around the horrible room and wondered if it had occurred to them that Millie would need someone to cuddle her, to mop her tears and to listen to her memories of Nanette and Harry. No wonder Millie had plotted to escape from here.
‘Perhaps your expectations of Millie are a bit, er, unrealistic. She is still little more than a child and has been through such a lot in her life already,’ said Alice with quiet dignity, clearly thinking exactly the same as Bella.
‘Well, we have to start as we mean to go on,’ said Frank. ‘No point spoiling her and then trying to impose discipline when it’s too late.’
‘But who does Millie play with, and where are her things?’ asked Bella.
‘Things?’
‘Her games and books? She must have some things of her own to amuse herself with, and some friends to share her spare time.’
‘We don’t like the children who live around here very much,’ said Mona, a look of distaste on her face. ‘They’re not really “our sort”, if you know what I mean.’
Bella opened her mouth to reply, but Alice’s hand shot out again and grabbed her arm in warning.
‘So no friends. And no things with which to amuse herself either?’ asked Alice.
‘I kindly lent her one of my own books, but she hardly made any effort to read it,’ said Frank. ‘So I took it back, only to find she’d drawn and coloured a picture on the blank pages at the back.’
‘Then you do have coloured pencils, Millie?’ asked Bella, deliberately missing the point.
‘I didn’t, so I borrowed some from school and they didn’t miss them,’ Millie said.
‘Stole them, you mean, you wicked child!’ said Frank, and with surprising speed for such a big man he stood, reached over the tea things, and delivered a stinging cuff to Millie’s ear.
‘Ow!’
At once, Bella was on her feet. ‘Stop that! It’s not right to hit people. And Millie’s far smaller than you.’
‘Don’t you take that tone with me, Bella Marchant,’ Frank snarled, while Alice hugged Millie to her, cradling her red ear. ‘Or you’ll find yourself on the end of summat similar.’
‘You will not threaten us,’ said Alice. She did not raise her voice but her eyes flashed with fury.
‘You’ve got far too much cheek, the pair of you,’ shrilled Mona, ‘coming here, telling us what to do. Bella, sit down and be quiet.’
‘They hit me all the time – they’re always beating me and locking me up,’ said Millie, her lower lip trembling. ‘Look what they did to me.’ She pulled the cardigans off one shoulder and displayed a large purple bruise at the top of her arm.
Bella gasped and turned back angrily to her aunt and uncle. ‘This looks awful. How could you assault Millie like that?’
‘We don’t have to answer to—’ yelled Frank.
‘And starved me, too,’ interrupted Millie, holding up her skinny bruised arm.
‘Oh, poor sweetheart,’ said Bella, pulling the cardigans back over Millie’s thin, sleeveless dress.
‘Now look here …’ Frank said.
‘We’re trying our best, but that child is a bad ’un and I doubt anyone could control her,’ Mona said.
‘I blame Nanette and that husband of hers,’ said Frank. ‘She was far too flighty, far too lax. Too busy gallivanting about, never a proper day’s work between the pair of them, to bring that young hoyden up respectably. The child has been allowed to go wild and now we’re reaping the consequences.’
‘My mum and dad were good people,’ said Millie, suddenly tearful. ‘It’s you who are the bad ones – starving and beating, shouting and locking—’
‘You see what we have to put up with?’ said Mona. ‘Backchat, lies and impudence.’
‘Right,’ said Bella, ‘I’ve heard enough.’
‘How dare—’
‘I dare, Aunt, because I see how things are. I wanted to believe all was well with Millie, but now I see that’s far from the case. Come on, Alice, we’re leaving.’
Both sisters stood up to go.
‘Don’t leave me!’ shrieked Millie desperately, grabbing Bella round her middle.
‘Of course not.’ Bella freed herself from Millie’s arms and sidled out from behind the table of tea things, taking Millie’s hand to bring her out, too. ‘Go and put your coat and shoes on. Quickly!’
Millie ran out to the hallway to do as she was told.
‘We’ve tried our very best,’ said Frank. ‘That child needs discipline. Her bad behaviour would try anyone’s patience. Why can’t she just sit down and be quiet? Why can’t she behave herself? Because she’s never been taught, that’s why. It’s too late now. She’s spoiled for good and if you take her home with you, you’ll rue the day. You’ll see what we’ve had to put up with. You’ll be here again before a month is up, begging Mona and me to take her back, you’ll see.’
‘She’s sly and untruthful,’ spat Mona. ‘We took her in out of the goodness of our hearts, and look where it’s got us: vandalism, petty crime, rudeness … We even had the police round once! They had found her wandering around town in the dark one evening when we thought she was in her room. I nearly died of embarrassment. There had never been any trouble here before Millie came. We’re respectable folk, with some standing in the neighbourhood.’
‘Well, Aunt, you may comfort yourself that there will be no more near-fatal embarrassment for you,’ said Alice, following Bella out of the room.
By then, Millie had her coat and outdoor shoes on, her suitcase in her hand, and was waiting on the front step.
Frank and Mona crowded into the front-room doorway, continuing to berate their nieces as they pulled on their shoes and coats, not bothering to button them in their hurry to leave, and grabbed their umbrellas.
‘You’ll learn …’
‘Not just naughtiness, but wickedness …’
‘Mark my words, you’ll be sorry …’
‘Goodbye,’ said Bella, following Alice and Millie out, and she pulled the front door to behind her. She half expected her aunt and uncle to wrench it open and continue their tirade, but the door remained shut and the quietness of the street, and the gentle rain, fell around them like a blessing. Bella had noticed, as she took down her coat, that the crown of Aunt Mona’s hat had been stoved in, but she decided to keep that observation to herself.
‘Here, give me your case,’ she said, relieving Millie of it. ‘Come on, let’s go and get the train home.’
‘Yes,’ said Millie. ‘I’m so glad you came for me. They’re so strict and cross all the time – they don’t know any other way. There’s no fun in that horrible house. Living there … well, it couldn’t be less like it was with Mum and Dad.’
Bella and Alice looked at each other over Millie’s head. Oh, but that whole visit had been awful. Bella could see that Alice was upset but trying to fight it down, and she knew her own face showed the same.
She took a deep breath to steady herself. ‘Well, Millie, Alice and I aren’t generally very cross about things, so I expect we’ll get along all right,’ she replied, making a huge effort to put the last half-hour behind her and sound carefree. ‘And our father, your uncle Thomas, is not a man for moods either … or at least not angry ones.’
‘In that case, I’m twice as glad to get away from those two,’ Millie said. ‘With my parents … with them gone, it feels like I have no home and no place in the world. I don’t belong anywhere now.’
‘No, you’re wrong about that, Millie,’ said Bella. ‘You’ve got us.’ She made an effort to smile, trying to put all thought of that horrible confrontation out of her mind. ‘And we’ve got you.’
‘I’m so pleased you believed my letter and came for me so quickly. I wasn’t sure you would.’
‘Well, we couldn’t do nowt, could we? And, don’t worry, we’ve got the money for your train fare home.’
Alice, too, was making an effort to gather herself. She reached out to squeeze Millie’s hand in reassurance. ‘Cold hands and no gloves,’ she said. ‘Or hat.’ She removed her own knitted beret and gave it to her cousin. ‘Here, I’ve got the umbrella so you have the hat.’ But she held the umbrella over them both.
