"His lordship says his bed has not been made properly," the dour old housekeeper told me, with something in her eyes akin to pity.
I knew what this meant. At least, I had a vague idea. I had seen the other girls returning from having "fixed" his lordship's bed. They could barely walk, and would cry out in their sleep weeks after the lash marks had healed. I wasn't afraid, though. My mum's second husband had made a sport of beating me within an inch of my life. I could take anything his lordship could give me.
"He's awfully bloody picky about his bed, now isn't he?" I retorted tartly. I didn't need her pity. I wasn't like the other girls. Through all the beatings I had taken in my life, I had learned to remove myself from the pain. It was an easy enough trick once you learned it. It made the beatings at worst almost tolerable, and at best almost enjoyable. At times, they could become an escape from the hard reality of our one room house, with its dirt floor, and only a curtain separating me from the sound of my mother and that man grunting like two animals.
The housekeeper gave me a look, as if there was something I was missing, but left saying, "You'd best go up and fix it. I imagine his lordship will want to have a talk to you about this."
I made my way up from the lower floors to his lordship's bedroom. With each room I moved away from the kitchen, they became more sumptuous. I reflected on the nature of my employer as I climbed the stairs. He had more control over his staff than anybody I have ever worked for. He hired us all himself, carefully interviewing each of us. If he felt our speech or vocabulary wasn't up to par, he provided lessons for us to learn how to speak properly. I heard him tell a friend once that he loathed anything low or common, even among his staff. In fact, I had been rather surprised to learn that he beat his maids. He hadn't seemed the type, but then again, I suppose they never seem the type.
I had reached the main part of the house now, where his lordship and his wife lived. His wife was rarely in the house. She preferred to spend most of her time in London, attending numerous balls, and if the below-stairs rumors were true, collecting numerous lovers.
I stood outside his lordship's bedroom, and quickly checked that my clothing was straight as he always requested. Our uniforms were actually much less revealing than what most employers had asked me to wear. I had expected my uniform to show as much cleavage as I had to offer (which was considerable), but instead, it was modest to the point of restriction. There were so many layers of tight fabric that I found it hard to breathe on warm days.
Everything seemed to be in order, so I knocked on the door, loud enough to be heard, but not so loud as to be startling. Receiving no reply, I opened the door and made my way in.
I knew the room was huge, but for the most part it remained in shadow. Only the bed was bathed in the gray mid-morning light of an English winter. Beyond it all I could see were the shadows I took to be the other furniture of the room.
I made my way over to the bed and inspected it. There was no doubt that it was rumpled, but it was clearly rumpled from having been slept in.
"Well," I muttered to myself, "If his lordship wants me to remake his bed because he slept in it, I supposed that is what he pays me for. Bloody git!"
"I'm sorry. I must have misheard you. Did you just call me a 'bloody git?'"
I started at the voice coming from the shadows. Now that I knew where to look, I could see the outline of a man's form leaning against one of the back walls. I tried not to show that he had surprised me. I knew I would be beaten and probably fired, but for the moment there was no going back. There would be time enough for regrets when I was out on the street.
I raised my head high and addressed the shadow, "Yes, I did my lordship."
"And why would you do a stupid thing like that…ummm…what is your name again, girl?" He was slowly moving into the light.
"Name's Mary, your lordship. And I called you a bloody git, because only a bloody git would complain about his bed linens being in disorder after he has just slept in them. I know what you do to the other girls, and I'm not afraid of you. You can fire me, but you can't intimidate me."
"Oh, Mary, you're wrong on so many accounts. Firstly, you have no idea what I've done to the other girls. Only the guesses of an innocent creature. And believe me when I tell you that I can and will do more than intimidate you. When I'm through with you, you will be on your knees before me." His handsome face finally came into the light. Looking at him was a common guilty pleasure among the female (and some of the male) servants. His brown hair just reached his shoulders, but was always kept back in a neat queue. His face spoke of his birth, with a strong aristocratic nose and a chin that was anything but weak. He had the body of a man who spent the day at hard manual labor, but he was always dressed in the finest clothes. All that, I could handle with ease. But it was his eyes that unsettled me every time. They were a startling blue, an eye color I had always thought weak, but on him, they showed only his power and his passion for life.
