against the sun before closing the door firmly on Mrs Ottershaw’s protestations. Ella was already at the corner before he caught up with her, puffing and red-faced but determined not to be left behind. The car and the gentleman were as she had left them, although the gentleman had retreated into the small amount of shade cast by the wall of Taylor’s carriage works.
‘You came back.’ There was a hint of surprise in his statement and Ella was stung.
‘Why, yes sir, I gave you my word.’ She handed him the jug and the glass. ‘I thought that you might be thirsty, sir, standing out in this heat all the time.’
There was no ignoring Mr Ottershaw, who was bobbing impatiently at Ella’s elbow.
‘And this is my employer, sir, Mr Ottershaw.’ Ella tried to sound enthusiastic in her introduction.
‘Ottershaw at your service,’ he said, holding out his hand to the gentleman who, having no free hand to take it, had to pass the jug and glass back to Ella.
‘Mr Ward,’ the gentleman replied. ‘From York. I was returning there after conducting some business in the area but it seems my car didn’t appreciate the hills round here on a day like today. The engine appears to have overheated.’
Mr Ward took the glass of water that Ella had poured for him and gulped it down gratefully.
‘Thank you. That was most thoughtful. I hadn’t realised quite how thirsty I had become.’
Ella refilled his glass and held it while he turned his attention once more to the car.
‘Now, if you will forgive me, I will take up no more of your time. I will top up the radiator and be on my way. Would you mind holding the jug a moment?’ He spoke to Ella, as he needed both hands to loosen the radiator cap.
‘Oh, but you must come and take some refreshment with us, Mr Ward.’ Mr Ottershaw was clearly put out that Ella was getting more than her share of this gentleman’s attention.
‘I thank you kindly,’ said Mr Ward, ‘but my family will be concerned at my lateness. And I have been well provided with refreshment thanks to –’ Mr Ward hesitated. ‘I’m afraid I didn’t ask your name?’
‘Ella, sir.’
‘– thanks to Ella.’ Mr Ward took the refilled glass and drained it in one. ‘Now my car is suitably refreshed and so am I.’
Mr Ottershaw could feel the situation slipping away from him. ‘Mr Ward, my dear wife would never forgive me if I didn’t press you to join us. Just to step inside out of the heat, and rest yourself before your journey. We were just about to take tea. Pray, do join us.’
Ella watched the scene unfold with some amusement. Mr Ottershaw may have considered himself a man of some importance in Nortonstall, but he was out of his depth with the likes of Mr Ward. The thought of such a gentleman stepping into the Ottershaws’ parlour for tea was in danger of making her break into unseemly laughter and she had to turn away, setting down the empty jug and glass to hide her expression.
Meanwhile, Mr Ward had climbed back into the driver’s seat and already had the engine running. Ella stepped back in awe – the vehicle was transformed from a broken beast into a growling, noisy monster. It suddenly seemed much larger and more dangerous than it had before. Mr Ward beckoned her to come closer, so that he didn’t have to shout over the noise of the engine.
‘Ella, I am most grateful for your help. I feared that I would be stuck in this god-forsaken place for the night. It seems to me that you work for a fool…’
Ella started and glanced nervously at Mr Ottershaw to see if he had heard, but he was too busy mopping his red, perspiring face with a handkerchief to be paying any heed.
‘Should you ever wish for a change of employment, I know Mrs Ward would be delighted to have a maid with even a modicum of intelligence in our house in York. Take this, and write to her.’
Mr Ward pressed a pasteboard card into Ella’s hand. She glanced at it before secreting it swiftly in her pocket, hoping that Mr Ottershaw hadn’t witnessed the action. Ella stepped back again, Mr Ward put the car into gear, nodded to them both and with a roar and a not-inconsiderable amount of dust, the car and the driver went on their way. The road seemed suddenly very quiet and still.
‘Well,’ said Mr Ottershaw, very put out that he had been side-lined. ‘I must say, he was rather a rude man. Why did he wish a private word with you, Ella? Quite improper, I felt.’
‘Oh no, Mr Ottershaw, he just wished to thank me again.’ Ella was relieved that no mention had been made of the card. She felt very conscious of it, hidden deep in her pocket. Employment in York – could such a thing be possible? Could she go, leaving her mother and Beth behind?
Ella sighed. She didn’t have to ask herself the same question about the Ottershaws. She knew they would make her life doubly hard for the rest of the day: Mr Ottershaw resentful of the attention she had received and Mrs Ottershaw furious with both of them for leaving her alone so long with the children. It would be a hard end to a hot day. But an exciting day, nonetheless. Ella had a secret but, she reflected as she trudged back up the hot and dusty road, it was one that she could do little about. She could neither read, nor write. And she certainly wasn’t going to be able to ask the Ottershaws to help her with either of those things.
Ella hugged her secret to herself. The memory of what Mr Ward had said, and the possession of his card, sustained her through several trying weeks in the Ottershaw household. When the children fell ill one after the other, so that the kitchen was awash with bedclothes hanging to dry and the house filled with the crying or moaning of infants, day and night, Ella stoically carried on. She had some sympathy for the children, even when faced with a succession of permanently running or crusted noses, their seemingly endless capacity for being sick and the often-rude manner, learnt from their parents, in which they summoned and treated her.
Mr and Mrs Ottershaw were another matter. They liked to let it be known that Ella was there on sufferance, out of the goodness of their hearts in employing someone whose sister had, in their view and, it would seem, everyone else’s view, committed a hideous crime. It seemed to Ella that their apparent Christian charity was an excuse to misuse her, to pay her even less than the pittance considered a fair wage (‘as no one else will have you’), to work her all hours (‘you will understand the risk we have borne in taking you in’), and to refuse her the right to visit her family (‘the afternoon off? How could you ask this of us after all we have done for you?’).
It was only when they refused Ella a visit home after she had had word that Sarah, too, was struggling with a house full of sick children – Ella’s siblings Thomas, Annie and Beattie having taken it in turn to succumb, with niece Beth now gravely ill – that she finally snapped. Mr Ottershaw, in his usual pompous manner, had denied the request, citing a concern that she would return bearing yet more illness into the bosom of his family, then buried his head back in the newspaper. Ella had retired quietly to the kitchen. Two pink spots of rage burnt in her cheeks. She stood in the centre of the room, fists clenched, and thought but for a moment or two. Then she undid her apron, folded it and laid it over the kitchen chair, and went into the small room off the kitchen that served as her sleeping quarters. She took her few possessions off the shelf along with the dress that hung behind the door, and wrapped them in a woollen shawl. Then she drew her good shawl around her shoulders and stepped back into the kitchen. After a moment’s indecision, she went to the china pot at the back of the dresser shelf, where she knew that Mrs Ottershaw kept coins to pay the small bills of tradesmen, and took what little lay in there. It would have to do in lieu of the money she was owed for the month just worked, for which she reasoned she was unlikely to be paid. She slipped the coins into her pocket, where Mr Ward’s card still nestled reassuringly, and set off for the front door. In the hallway, she hesitated before knocking on the parlour door, and entering. Mr Ottershaw, irritated, looked over the top of his