Not by Sight (4 page)

“Then you
are
a high-and-mighty rich girl,” Clare said from her bed near Grace’s.

Grace forced a laugh to keep from clenching her teeth. “Just because my father is successful—”

Clare cut her off. “How did you two meet?” She turned to Agnes. “And speak for yourself this time, Pierpont.”

“Well, I met Miss . . . I mean, Grace, near her father’s tea shop.” Glancing down at her lap, Agnes added softly, “She gave me employment.”

“She’s your mistress? I thought as much.” Wearing a plain linen nightdress, Clare rose from the bed and turned to the others. “Girls, it seems we have a duchess in our midst, after all.”

The others laughed. “I am no such thing, Clare Danner,” Grace argued. “I’m just like you.”

“No,” Clare retorted. “I doubt you’re like any of us. But time will tell, won’t it?”

Feeling the others’ appraising glances, Grace was about to reply when Lucy spoke up and the conversation shifted.

“After church this morning, one of the villagers said he delivered groceries to the manor yesterday and got a good g-glimpse of the Tin Man.”

Grace eyed the soft-spoken woman. “Tin Man?”

“The monster living up at the big house,” Becky piped up.
“Lord Roxwood. They say he’s a hunchback with pointed ears and sharp teeth.”

“Such nonsense, Simmons.” Fresh from a bath, Mrs. Vance stood in the doorway in a blue cotton nightdress. “How can you think he has sharp teeth?” To Grace she said, “He’s called the Tin Man because it’s rumored Lord Roxwood wears a metal mask to hide his face.”

“But . . . why must he hide?”

“The villagers say he got burned in a fire,” Becky interjected. “He’s deformed now and has a hunchback. The blaze melted his ears to points, too.” She grabbed at the tops of her ears to illustrate.

“Have you seen him?” Grace was enthralled with the idea of the monster from Mary Shelley’s
Frankenstein
or Gaston Leroux’s Phantom living only a stone’s throw away. What a fascinating character for her new story.

Becky shook her head. “They say his lordship never leaves the house. Edwards, his land agent, runs all the errands in town and gives orders to Mr. Tillman about the estate.”

Clare fingered the flower pendant at her throat and snorted. “I doubt the Tin Man is even at Roxwood. Likely our lord of the manor sits at his club in London, sipping whiskey and wasting money at playing cards, just like his wealthy friends.”

How could such a young, attractive woman be so bitter and angry? “Well, I’d like to see this Lord Roxwood for myself,” Grace said.

“And what would you do, Duchess? Invite him to sip Darjeeling with you at your father’s fancy tea room?” Clare flashed an evil grin. “Or perhaps you plan to unmask him?”

The women broke into fits of laughter. Hands on hips, Grace opened her mouth to give Clare a good setting down, but then she saw Agnes shake her head. Instead she clamped her mouth shut and fumed. Duchess, indeed!

For some unfathomable reason, Clare Danner chose to be her enemy. Why did she feel it a crime that Grace’s father was wealthy? Da had earned every shilling with honest, hard work, and Grace couldn’t help the fact she’d never gotten her hands dirty except to cut flowers from the garden.

Becky moved to dim the lights. As all grew quiet in the room, Grace changed into the ecru silk nightgown she’d brought with her, hoping to avoid Clare’s ridicule over the expensive garment while the others wore simple cotton.

Once she’d climbed under the covers, she lay there a long while, listening to Agnes’s gentle breathing in the bed beside hers, while occasional snores sounded from Becky’s direction.

Finally Grace sat up, too restless for sleep. Writing about her first impressions of Roxwood and the mystery of the Tin Man would settle her thoughts.

She retrieved her journal, along with a candle and matches from her haversack beneath the bed. Her gaze darted toward Clare, and for an instant she feared the termagant might awaken and intrude on her most intimate time. Then she tiptoed to the window.

Due to the warm evening, the sash remained open. The night’s silence was broken by the chirping of crickets, while a near-f moon illuminated the grounds. Grace lit her candle, then opened her journal.

She’d just begun to write when a shrill cry in the night brought her up short. Grace shivered. Was it a fox? She’d read about them, how the vixen’s scream sounded more human than beast. Blowing out the candle, she scanned the grounds below for any sign of the creature. Her attention soon drifted toward Roxwood Manor, and she forgot all about the fox. Even from this distance, the white stone apex and columns of the front porch held an iridescent glow in the moonlight. Her eyes trav
eled to the rear of the house, where a second-story balcony in the same white stone jutted out . . .

A movement caught her attention. Grace leaned out the window, straining to see.

A man stood on the balcony. Lord Roxwood?

She squinted, trying to make out the hunched back, but even the moon’s brightness didn’t offer that kind of detail. He did seem tall, at least in proportion to the railing he leaned against. Grace watched him several seconds before another animal’s cry sounded to her right, and she instinctively turned.

When she looked back to the balcony, the man was gone.

Had
she seen someone . . . or did the moonlight play tricks on her imagination?

Closing her journal, she returned to bed and burrowed beneath the blanket, still musing over the man she thought she’d seen. Then she rolled onto her side, and her thoughts went to Clare and her earlier taunts.

Grace punched at her feather pillow. She was determined to start afresh the next day. She would show Clare Danner she was made of sturdy stock. Despite a more refined upbringing, she could work just as hard as the rest of them.

She thought of all Patrick Mabry had achieved through the sweat of his brow, building up a lucrative tea empire, owning Swan’s, and the planned expansion of several tea rooms throughout London. She and her father may have their differences in convention, and both were more strongheaded than either cared to admit, but Grace
was
his daughter. And Mabrys did not give up.

3

Grace had never been so miserable in all her life.

She was sorely tempted to return to the gatehouse and pack her bags for London. She straightened instead, stretching her screaming back muscles, then pulled away her hat to wipe at the perspiration beading along her brow.

Digging ditches hadn’t been advertised in the leaflet. Grace recalled her tour of the fields with Mrs. Vance the previous day. Seeing how the sun gleamed against the ripening fields, she’d imagined herself gently leading a horse-drawn team across verdant pastures, feeling the day’s warmth against her shoulders. Not breaking her back manning a shovel!

Becky was supposed to have helped her, but she got called away at the last minute to mend fences—Clare’s assignment with Agnes. Grace fumed, wondering if Miss Danner had removed Becky on purpose.

She replaced her hat and then removed her gloves. As she flexed her fingers, she noted the blisters already formed against her reddened palms. Her poor hands had never ached so much. The heat beating down on her managed to scorch her exposed skin, and she could feel the sting of sunburn against her nose
and cheeks while sweat trailed down the side of her face. And the mud . . .

It covered her from head to toe. Grace shifted, trying to ignore the feel of her dirty, sweat-soaked uniform clinging to her skin. Da would be shocked to see her in this condition, and in fact might not recognize her at all.

She leaned against the shovel and stared out at the acres of grass. This kind of work was a far cry from driving ambulances or packaging tea bags at Swan’s, she thought morosely. Soon they would begin harvest. Agnes had warned the workload would be much heavier than at the training farm.

Had Grace been fooling herself to think she could succeed in this endeavor? It wasn’t even noon and she felt ready to collapse. She looked at the ditch where so far she’d dug only a few feet of trench. Closing her eyes, she tried to swallow past the knot in her throat. She wanted desperately to do her part, to help Colin, but maybe she
was
completely out of her element.

The mere thought roused her determination. She replaced her gloves and grabbed up the shovel. With her jaw set she resumed digging at the muddy earth, praying for strength with each shovelful. She would do this, she told herself. “For God, King, and Country.” For Colin . . .

And because the last thing she wanted was to admit Clare Danner was right.

The next morning Grace thought she might have died, except that Agnes again shook her awake at the unholy hour of five a.m. Rolling over, she groaned with the knowledge she would have to repeat yesterday’s dirt shoveling today. Everything hurt. She’d been too exhausted to write in her journal last night, or search out the silhouette of the mysterious stranger standing on his balcony.

Instead she’d collapsed onto her bed in her dirty uniform and fallen asleep.

Agnes gave her another gentle shake. Grace opened her eyes. “Oh, Agnes, I wish Mrs. Vance would let you work with me today. I surely need help.”

“Are you all right, miss?” Concern lit her brown eyes. “Breakfast is ready. Shall I bring you something?”

“No, I’m fine, really.” Grace rubbed at her eyes. “You go ahead.”

“All right, but don’t go back to sleep,” Agnes warned.

“I’ll be down presently,” Grace said. Once her maid had left, she rolled over and closed her eyes. Just another minute, she told herself.

She’d nearly dozed off when a voice sounded from the doorway. “Up with you, Mabry, or you’ll miss breakfast.”

Blinking, Grace sat up as Mrs. Vance entered the room looking spry in her clean and pressed uniform. Self-conscious about her own dirty, rumpled state, Grace swung her feet over the side of the bed, grateful Agnes had thought to remove her boots and her gaiters last night.

The supervisor read her thoughts. “You slept in your uniform,” she stated, shaking her head. “You look an absolute fright, Mabry. I hope you plan to change. In the Women’s Forage Corps, we take pride in our appearance.”

“Yes, ma’am.” Grace quickly rose and retrieved her other uniform from the portmanteau beneath her bed. How she longed for a bath! But last night she’d slept through her chance to get clean, as well.

She was smoothing the wrinkles from her fresh garments when Mrs. Vance asked, “Mabry, did you perform any actual field drainage work during training?”

Grace looked up and shook her head. “We received a lecture, with photographs,” she said slowly. “Why?”

“Mr. Tillman isn’t pleased. He inspected your work last evening. You barely made progress on the ditch, and you left your tools lying half buried in the mud.” Mrs. Vance eyed her sternly. “He didn’t notice the shovel until he’d tripped over it and took a spill.”

Mortified, Grace asked, “Is he injured?”

“His ankle is sprained, but not broken, thank goodness.” She took a deep breath. “I’m assigning you a different task today. The Army ordered more sacks, and a shipment of tarpaulins needs mending. Lucy Young is overwhelmed. While I catch up on my reports, you’ll work with her.” She paused. “You
can
sew?”

Relieved to be excused from digging, Grace recalled many afternoons spent mastering petit point
.
“Of course,” she said, confident she could mend a few sacks. “I’m happy to do it.”

———

The morning air felt chill when, after breakfast, Grace and Lucy ventured into Roxwood where they would do their mending in a back room of the shop owned by Mr. Horn, the village cobbler. Each woman in the WFC had been assigned a bicycle; Grace and Lucy parked theirs in front of the building and went inside.

“Good m-morning, Mr. Horn,” Lucy called to the cobbler as they entered.

An aged man in leather apron and black bargeman’s cap waved his cobbler’s hammer as they continued to the rear of the shop.

The back room was spacious and a bit austere, with a trio of gaslight fixtures mounted above the rustic pine wainscoting. Two wooden chairs and an enormous pile of white tarpaulins took up one half of the room. At the opposite wall stood a treadle sewing machine. A mound of burlap fabric cut into rectangular sheets lay on the floor beside it.

“You’ll work there.” Lucy pointed at the sewing machine.

Grace chewed on her lip while she studied the contraption. She’d seen one at Selfridges in London, but wasn’t familiar with how it worked.

“I’ll show you,” Lucy said, reading her hesitation. “It’s already been threaded, so you c-can start sewing.” She moved to sit in the chair facing the machine and retrieved two precut squares of burlap from the floor. Once she’d matched them together, she slipped an edge of the fabric beneath the needle and flipped some kind of metal guide into place.

“Just like this,” she said, and began working her feet back and forth against a metal square bracket beneath the machine. The needle came to life, penetrating the burlap. Lucy guided the fabric forward as tiny even stitches followed in its wake. “Now, you give it a try.” She rose and made way for Grace to sit down.

Lucy Young had patience in abundance, guiding Grace through the steps until she’d completed her first sack.

“You’ve got it,” Lucy said. Then she crossed the room to begin the task of mending tarpaulins. Companionable silence followed, interrupted only by the noisy treadle.

“Lucy, you mentioned you’d seen my father’s tea room,” Grace said finally, hoping for a bit of conversation while they worked. “Are you from London, then?”

When Lucy didn’t respond, Grace glanced up and caught the woman’s wary look. “I’m sorry,” she said quickly. “Da’s always telling me it’s not ladylike to be nosy.”

“He’s probably right.” Lucy softened the rebuke with a wan smile. “We all have our secrets.”

Grace’s face grew warm. “I’d just like us to be friends.”

Lucy’s caution eased. “Me too,” she said. “I am from London, but I grew up a long way from Sterling Street. In Deptford, near the d-docks.”

Grace stared at her while Lucy bent her head to make another
perfect stitch in her canvas. Deptford was among the poorest slums in southeast London. “Did you . . . attend school?”

“For a time, but then my mum got sick. I had to g-go to work at the slaughterhouse.” She grimaced. “I hated it, but I had six brothers and sisters all younger than me. We needed food.”

“What about your father?”

A shadow crossed Lucy’s expression. “When he wasn’t working, he was at the pub. Those were the good days,” she said. “Days he was g-gone.”

Grace couldn’t imagine feeling that way about her father. They did often frustrate each other, she with her modern ideas and “improprieties” that might jeopardize the tea room’s reputation, and he with his conventional views on marriage and how young ladies should comport themselves. Yet Da would never sit in a pub, getting drunk while she starved.

She was grateful he had always taken such good care of her and Colin, even after their mother’s death. “Is this your first time away from home?” she asked.

Lucy wet her lips. “No, I left home at seventeen. My youngest brother could f-fend for himself by then. I went to work in the city . . . here and there.”

“Did you enter into service?” Grace hoped she wasn’t stepping on another verbal land mine as she had with Mrs. Vance about her husband. But writers did have to ask difficult questions in order to gather research for their stories.

“Service . . . yes.” Lucy’s voice held an edge. “For a time anyway, before I had the chance to get out of the city. M-my health,” she added. “I heard they were looking for women to help on farms in the Women’s Forage Corps.” Her turquoise eyes brightened. “I wasn’t sure they would take me, but I’m glad to be here.”

“I feel the same way.” Relieved to change the topic, Grace noticed Lucy stammered only when she was anxious or upset.
The sewing machine treadle rocked beneath her feet as she stitched another seam and said, “My brother, Colin, joined the cavalry, and I wanted my chance to serve in some way. Since both our horses are now Army property overseas, I’m happy to work with the WFC to make food for them.”

“I didn’t have such grand ideas,” Lucy said. “I just wanted to escape.” A desolate look swept across her features and tore at Grace’s heart. “I learned early on that women are p-powerless to the whims of the world, and to men. To f-fathers . . .” She bent her head and began to stitch furiously.

While Grace couldn’t decipher Lucy’s words, she felt their insidious meaning—horrible imaginings that didn’t bear contemplation. She must help her new friend. “Lucy, have you ever heard of the suffrage movement?”

“Only on the streets . . . and the pictures of marching women I saw on the front page of the
Times.
I heard men say t-terrible things about them. Why?”

“Because being a suffragette is wonderful.”

“You’re a suffragette?” Lucy gaped at her. “Do you know Emmaline Pankhurst?”

“I am,” Grace said, smiling. “And I do know her. I’ve attended rallies she and her daughter, Christabel, have held.” She added earnestly, “Men don’t like suffragettes because they want to keep us under their thumbs.”

Grace recalled for an instant Da’s desire to marry her off to Clarence Fowler. “They’re afraid we’ll change the world as they know it—and they’re right.” She rocked the treadle at her feet and sewed another straight seam, warming to her subject. “Many women work outside the home for a living, but only as domestics or factory workers. Yet we consume goods and make purchases and read newspapers. Why shouldn’t we be allowed to vote? The laws of this land affect us as well as men. Once women get the vote, we’ll be able to enter colleges, obtain any
profession—doctor, lawyer, scientist, veterinarian—even Parliament! One day it will happen, and sooner than you think. We’ll wear them down and then we
will
change the world—Ow!”