The Promise Read Online Free PDF Page B

flesh? Not for a moment did Chrissie expect it to be easy to bring about this reunion. Would Georgina Cowper live up to the horror stories she’d heard about her? Why had mother and daughter not spoken, not even seen each other, for most of Chrissie’s own lifetime? Vanessa’s father had apparently died in 1924 as a result of being gassed in the First World War. Maybe things would have been different had he lived. As a young girl Chrissie had envied her friends theirfathers and grandparents, their normal family life. How badly she had longed for one of her own. But would she even like the woman when finally she got to meet her, let alone feel the love and respect she should?
    Chrissie rested her chin on her hand and mused on the mysteries of life.
     
    ‘That girl, the new guest in the loft, where did she come from?’
    Mrs Gorran frowned as, later that morning, she set a plate of sandwiches on the table before her employer. ‘London, I think.’
    ‘What I mean is, how did she find us? How did she make contact, by letter or telephone?’
    ‘She rang up a week or two back, said she was desperate to get away for a break and liked the sound of our advert. That was the one you put in the Westmorland Gazette , wasn’t it, Sam?’
    ‘Could’ve been,’ her husband mumbled through a mouthful of ham.
    ‘What treasures you both are,’ Georgia remarked with feeling. ‘I really don’t know how I would go on without you. But that girl looks so familiar. Has she ever been here before?’
    ‘Not that I know of.’ Mrs Gorran took a large bite out of a cheese-and-pickle sandwich. The three of them always took lunch together in the kitchen these days, Mrs Cowper not being the stand-offish sort. But then they’d known each other a long time, Hetty having been housekeeper at Rosegill Hall for almost forty years, ever since the twinswere born in 1912. She’d been fourteen then, and this her first job as under-nursemaid. Sam too had been just a lad, a humble apprentice gardener learning his craft. Now he was the only one, also doubling as handyman-cum-chauffeur.
    Apart from a cleaner coming in twice a week, three times in the summer when they were busy, that was the extent of the staff these days. Hetty could remember when there used to be a cook, butler, several housemaids, parlour maids, skivvies and a whole regiment of gardeners back in those glorious days before the Great War, let alone this last one. All gone now.
    ‘When do you reckon Mrs Cowper herself came here?’ Hetty asked Sam as she washed up the few cups and plates after lunch while he sat on at the table, sharpening his shears. ‘She talks so rarely about the old days, and never gives those sort of details. Was it sometime around 1910?’
    ‘Mebbe earlier, I reckon.’
    ‘When exactly?’
    ‘I dunno, do I?’
    ‘How did they meet, those two? Did you ever hear?’
    Sam shook his head. ‘Mr Cowper never did say, kept things very close to his chest, he did.’
    Hetty sighed. ‘They didn’t spoil a pair in that respect. I heard it was in America. Do you reckon that might be true?’
    Sam looked up, his old face creased into deep frowns, as he contemplated this notion. ‘Old Mr Cowper did go a-venturing to sea, I do believe, when he was young. Imind once telling him how, as a boy, I used to catch eels, not that I ever fancied eating them. Then later we lads promoted ourselves to char, pike and perch, and they were real tasty. Said he loved fishing too, that he used to do a bit himself off Fisherman’s Wharf when he lived in San Francisco.’
    ‘There you are, then.’ Hetty wrung out the dishcloth and draped it over the tap to dry. ‘Mrs Cowper must be American, don’t you reckon, with a name like Georgia? Although she doesn’t sound it, does she? Course, she’s lived here a long time, so the accent will have softened. Was that where they met, I wonder, in America?’
    ‘You ask too many questions, girl. That’s their business, not ours.’
    ‘I dare