Human Traces by Sebastian Faulks Read Free Book Online Page A

peeling and smiled apprehensively. "What's in your cauldron, Miss Brigstocke? What does it look like?" "It looks like what it ought to look like," said Miss Brigstocke, neither smiling nor apprehensive. "If you don't mind me saying so." Like Mr. Midwinter, she had difficulty in adjusting to Sonia's almost-adulthood; after ten years of shooing her and spanking her and telling her to mind her p's and q's, she had not found an idiom in which to defer to the young mistress. "Is there anything I can ' "We're doing very well, thank you, Miss. Aren't we, May? It would be different if we was at Torrington Manor, I dare say, Miss, where, as you know ' "Indeed, I do, Miss Brigstocke. Where you worked as a scullery maid for ten years and then for five as ' "Be that as it may, Miss ' "Before you took the position in our poor house without so much as an under-footman to ' "Be that as it may, Miss," said Miss Brigstocke a little more firmly. "I shouldn't have to pluck and clean the birds myself as well as light the range if I was at the Manor, should I? Do you imagine Mrs. Turney ever dirtied her hands with making a sheep's pluck or a proper pig's fry, with all liver, lights and chitterlings like what I have to when Mrs. Midwinter's having one of her what do you call 'em?" "Thrift weeks?" said Sonia. "Offal weeks, I call 'em. I'm up to my elbows in the cavity of the pig, even if Jenkins has made the cut. Well, you don't have to do that sort of thing at the Manor. They get all their pies and that sent from Lincoln, from Trubshawe's, ready-made." "Ah, the Manor, the Manor," laughed Sonia. "Wouldn't it be splendid if we lived at the Manor instead of the Laceys! Papa would be the Member of Parliament and Mama would be a shadow of herself and wear those pastel satins that are all the fashion in London. And I should be Miss Jane. And Edgar would inherit the village. Wouldn't we all be happy? And you, Miss Brigstocke, should have all the help you wanted. Instead of which we're stuck in the rotten old House!" "And what about Master Thomas? What would he be at the Manor?" said May. "Oh dear," said Sonia. "I'd forgotten Master Thomas. There's no equivalent of him, is there? Why do you ask, May?" May looked back quickly to her potatoes. "Sometimes I wonder," said Sonia, standing on tiptoe and leaning over Miss Brigstocke's shoulder to look into the pot, 'what world Thomas does belong to." May laughed, but stopped when Miss Brigstocke caught her eye. Sonia turned back into the room, wanting to say something, but managing to control herself. "It's very gloomy in here, isn't it?" she said. "These dark days," said Miss Brigstocke. "All the light's gone off by noon. And I did ask for more lamps. We shall have to wash the plates by candlelight." So much of the room was dark, besides the blackened range; the framed silhouettes on the wall, to either side of it, were black, as were the pots and pans on the open shelf of the dresser; the ceiling was stained by years of dark fumes; but it was not a cheerless room. Sonia had spent many afternoons of childhood sitting at the big deal table, drawing, talking to bad-tempered Mrs. Travers, Miss Brigstocke's predecessor, or Elmley, the last butler, and inhaling the aromas of the range, all of which were exotic to her young senses, whether onions frying, cooked apples, melted cheese or the powerful scent of roasting meat that would come with a roar and hiss when Mrs. Travers opened the oven door, and stood up scarlet-faced, flapping her white cloth. "I must leave you to it, I'm afraid," said Sonia. "That man's coming from the village to help. You know. Mr. Fisher, the one who came when Papa had to give that dinner." "Lord help us," said Miss Brigstocke. "I think we're supposed to pretend he's the butler," said Sonia, 'as though he works here all the time." "Well, he'll have to do a better job of knowing where things is kept. And not spill the wine this time." "That's your responsibility, Miss Brigstocke. Don't let him