Mrs. Engels Read Online Free PDF Page B

least be able to look upon it as a hobby to take up and leave down as I please. But for us, Lizzie, it is a matter of life and death, because for our husbands it is so, and I fear it has to be the same for our children. This is our cross to bear.”
    I say naught. Thoughts and memories come vivid, of old desires and chances lost, and though there’s regret in them, and mourning, it’s not unpleasant to have their company. We walk on.
    â€œBut we must be optimistic, mustn’t we, Lizzie? Rather than dwell, we must look forward to better things. And I do think we are entering a new phase, a happier time for all of us. Your move to London marks a change. I believe great things will happen now that Frederick is here. Karl has been so looking forward to it.”
    â€œFrederick also. He’s overjoyed to be out of that job. Only a month wanting till he’s fifty, and he’s like a young drake again.”
    â€œHa!” She hugs my shoulder. “And it is about time. Frederick’s talents were wasted in that dusthole. It is true there was pleasure to be gained from taking money out of the enemy’s pocket, draining it from the inside, so to speak, but enough is enough; the real work has to begin, and Frederick is essential to it. He really is a genius. Are you following his articles on the war?”
    â€œNot myself, nay.”
    â€œOh, but you must, they explain—” She sucks in her breath. “Oh, I do apologize Lizzie, I wasn’t thinking. I’ll read them to you one of these days. Or better, I’ll have Nim do it. She wouldn’t mind. She likes to keep abreast.”
    Up ahead, Frederick has stopped at a coster’s cart to buy ginger beer for the Girls. I wish he wouldn’t. I’ve seen it done in Manchester, the ginger boiled in the same copper that serves for washing, and it’s not healthful. Jenny halts us in order to keep our distance from the others. She bends down and picks some flowers from the verge.
    â€œWhat are these?” I says when she puts a posy in my buttonhole.
    â€œSnow-in-the-summer,” she says. “It’s rare to see them still blooming this late.”
    â€œThey’re lovely,” I says.
    She gives a vague smile and, seeing that the others have moved off, starts us up once more. “I realize I have been talking only of myself.”
    â€œThat’s all right, Jenny.”
    â€œWell, I do not want to talk anymore. It is only boring you and upsetting me. And distracting us from the other matter.”
    The other matter is, of course, the house. She reminds me that the maid, Camilla Barton, is due to arrive in a fortnight’s time, and gives me advice on how to keep her, which is harder than I might think, for things aren’t like they used to be, in sixty-eight and the crisis years, when the good families were letting go of their help and the registries were brimming with girls to be had for the asking and for a price much closer to their worth. Nay, things have changed and a girl will walk if she finds a better situation, and it’s often not even the mistress’s fault, for it’s difficult to define in exact terms what’s owed a girl and what she herself owes, and not everyone can learn the art of leaving the servants alone.
    â€œI recommend a second girl,” she says. “Frederick instructed me to find only the one, and I followed those instructions, but my true feeling is that you will need two. Everything works better with two. The girls are happier because they have company and get to sit down in the evening, and you are happier because the work can be divided out and gets done. You do not want to be a slave with your apron never off. London is your retirement. If I could afford it, I would get another.”
    â€œCan’t Nim manage? Has she ever threatened to leave?”
    â€œNim? Oh, she’s different. We’ve had her for so long she’s like