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Copyright jeanne_d_artois July 2011
The author asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.
This is a work of fiction. The events described here are imaginary; the settings and characters are fictitious and are not intended to represent specific places or living persons.
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The laundry of my ancestors' house is now my workshop. I'm a potter and good enough at my trade to make a reasonable living from it.
The main attraction of the laundry room was Martha, the resident ghost. I was aware of her from an early age. I would sit on the scrubbed table and ask Martha to tell me a story. She always did. When I became an adult, she told me about incidents in her life at the Hall. Each time I become Martha and experience the events exactly as she had. This is one of those stories.
I had just loaded my latest work in the furnace, poured myself a glass of chilled Rosé and sat down, when I heard Martha's voice in my head.
"Ready for another of my tales?"
Of course I was. I rarely refuse when Martha offers me a story. She only speaks to me when I'm in a receptive mood.
"This story is from the mid-19th Century. It was high summer and the family had come down from London for August, bringing several friends. One of their friends was Elaine, a distant cousin. Jerome, a closer relation and a younger son, was also staying. He had just finished his degree and was deciding what to do with his life. His eldest brother Henry would inherit the title and estates.
The next eldest, Archibald, had become a minister in the Church of England and was in charge of a Parish church that was in the family's gift. Jerome didn't like the idea of joining the Army, a traditional role for a younger son. All he had decided was that he liked Elaine, but how could he support her? He hadn't been able to seek Elaine's father's formal permission to pay his addresses because he couldn't answer the obvious question: "What are your prospects?"
Elaine was irritated. She wanted Jerome. But she wanted the Jerome who could make up his mind, could DO something, and the Jerome who would approach her father to demand her hand in marriage. She had tried hinting, encouraging, cajoling, persuading, but Jerome couldn't see how he could support the two of them."
"That summer was as hot as this one. You are lucky. Elaine had to wear the appropriate dress for a genteel mid-Victorian woman. Even with her widest crinoline and lightest day dress she would be wearing far more than you are now."
I sipped some more wine. I looked down at my clothes. I was wearing a clay-stained baggy T-shirt over a loose seersucker skirt. My legs and feet were bare. As I looked I felt myself turning into Elaine. As usual when I'm listening to one of Martha's tales, shortly after she started talking in my head I became the heroine of the story and experienced it as if I was that person. Now I had become Elaine. I could still faintly hear Martha's voice but I was in character as Elaine. I knew what Elaine knew. I wanted what Elaine wanted.
As her, my legs were cool inside loose cotton pantaloons. My feet were hot in buttoned ankle boots. My waist and torso were constricted inside a laced corset. My arms and shoulders were bare and protected from the sun by a parasol resting against my shoulder.
As I walked towards the lake my crinoline swayed allowing a slight breeze to caress my legs. I liked that. My hand swung my crinoline back and forth, more than would be decorous, but there was no one else around. As I passed a hedge, there was Jerome. I dropped my skirt quickly.
Without saying a word, Jerome kissed my hand and continued to hold it. I gently removed it from his grasp and tucked it into his crooked elbow. I led him towards the lake. Jerome would never dictate where I should go or what I should do. How could he? He had no rights over me and he was too diffident, or too shy, to insist on anything.
My parasol was protecting me from the mid-morning sun as we walked alongside the lake. Inwardly I was seething with frustration at Jerome's lack of direction. Outwardly, we were making polite conversation about the weather.
"It might be unbearably hot this afternoon," I said.
"I'm sure it will be," Jerome replied. "Look at the labourer in the field over there. He's wearing nothing above his waist except a straw hat. I'm sure he is cooler than either of us."
"Perhaps he is. But we couldn't wear so little. It isn't done."
"Isn't it? Perhaps not for ladies, nor for gentlemen when in mixed company, but if I were alone I might strip right off and bathe in the lake."
"That sounds nice," I replied as brightly as I could in the increasing heat. "Why don't you?"
"I couldn't! Not with you here." Jerome replied.
"And I couldn't either. The only way ladies are allowed to bathe is at the coast using a bathing machine and professional dippers. Even then we wear so many clothes that swimming is almost impossible."
"Can you swim?" Jerome asked with more animation than he had shown for days.
I considered what to reply. If I admitted that I could he might think me hoydenish and unladylike. If I said that I couldn't, I'd be lying. When I was a child we often spent the summer months at a family house in Cornwall. My nurse was a fisherman's daughter who thought that everyone should learn to swim. She taught me to swim from our private beach. I could swim in calm water and in rough seas -- nude. If there was likely to be anyone around I would wear a light cotton chemise over pantaloons but when wet they were almost as revealing as bare skin. I had been wearing only the chemise when swum in the lake last summer, very early in the morning when only the housemaids were stirring.
"A little," I decided was an acceptable compromise, not wholly true but not a complete lie. "Can you swim, Jerome?"
"Yes. We used to swim in the river when I was at the University. It was colder than it would be in that lake but I could swim a reasonable distance."
"What are you going to do about it?" I asked.
"About what?"
"Swimming."
"This afternoon, when everyone else is lying down complaining about the heat, I'm going to come to the lake and swim."
"You are?"
"Yes."
"I'm told that parts of the lake are dangerous because of the water plants."
I didn't say that I'd had difficulties last year with the water lilies tangling my legs. I pointed.
"Those water lilies, for example. I think they have very extensive roots and aren't always visible at the surface."
"I'm sure I'll manage, Elaine."
Would he? Swimming in a flowing river is very different from a static lake where plants grow vigorously.
"How will you dry yourself?"
"That's easy. I asked one of the maids for some extra towels."
We had reached the end of the lake where a rustic bridge crossed the stream that feeds the lake. The stream tumbled over a tiny waterfall into the lake. We stood on the bridge and watched it. I wanted to shed my clothes and sit under that waterfall, but I couldn't.
"When will you be swimming?" I asked, trying to divert myself from that inviting cascade.
"About five o'clock, I think. Why? Will you be joining me?" Jerome laughed as if that was an impossibility.
I smiled. I wanted to swim too.
"Why so late? Won't people be moving around then?"
"I'd like it to be earlier, Elaine, but I'm meeting my Uncle Jonas at the railway station at two-thirty. He wants to see me before he goes back to Leeds."
"Uncle Jonas? Who's he? You haven't mentioned an Uncle Jonas before, have you?"
"Probably not. He was the black sheep of the family. He went into trade and married a citizen's daughter. He's asked to see me particularly. I don't know why but I'm intrigued. Why should the black sheep want to see me and not my father or one of my elder brothers? It's a mystery. His letter was enclosed in a letter to Henry. Henry was asked to ensure that I received it without the knowledge of my father. Henry did just that. He too would like meet and to know more about Uncle Jonas.
Jonas is quite specific about the time. He has to catch a train to Leeds that leaves at four o'clock by Railway Time. I know that's a few minutes different from local time, but whether earlier or later, I've no idea. I'll be at the railway station at two o'clock just to be sure."
"Is he rich? Has he any sons? Or daughters?"
Jerome laughed again.
"It's no use asking me! I have no idea. Uncle Jonas was barely mentioned in the family. I'm sure that my father would not approve of me meeting Uncle Jonas. Apart from Henry knowing I had a letter, you are the only person who knows. Now you know I'm actually meeting Uncle Jonas in secret. Henry doesn't know that."
I hugged the thought to myself that Jerome had trusted me, and only me, with his secret. What could his Uncle Jonas want? Then I realised something else. Jerome had taken a decision for himself with no prompting and no consultation with anyone. He was defying his family's implied disapproval. Perhaps there was some hope for him after all.
I squeezed Jerome's arm.
"You have to tell me about your secret meeting. Can we meet this afternoon after Uncle Jonas has gone?"
"Of course, but I would like to swim."
Jerome looked longingly at the cool water of the lake. We were at the edge under a willow tree, invisible to anyone else. It was the place I had swum from last year.
"You can meet me, here, at half-past four, and then swim. Here."
I emphasised the 'here'. I knew this part of the lake was free of water lilies.
"As long as you don't peek, Elaine."
"Jerome! Would I do such an unladylike thing?" I protested.
Of course, I might. I might also swim, myself, after Jerome had gone. I wanted to make sure that he was safe. I wasn't confident that his swimming abilities were as good as he thought.
We walked slowly back to the house. The morning was getting warmer. By this afternoon it would be intolerably hot, dressed as I was. The family would be resting in darkened rooms until the evening meal.
No one except me noticed when Jerome took a horse from the stables and rode to the railway station. I was waiting for him when he returned the horse.
