Daisy broke the seal and opened the letter carefully, a smile curving her lips, but as she read the contents her hands began to tremble and the words blurred, running together until they made no sense.
Oxford
December 1867
My darling Daisy,
You can’t imagine how difficult it is for me to find the words that will inevitably break your heart, as it is breaking mine when I put pen to paper. The truth is that I cannot marry you. There, I’ve said it and it cannot be undone. I still love you dearly, but I realise that for us to wed would be a dreadful mistake. My parents will never accept you as one of the family and I will be cut off without a penny. I cannot hope to earn enough to make a proper home for you and any children we might have, and to marry you under such circumstances would be irresponsible, if not downright cruel. I love you too much to see you brought down by poverty and disgrace, therefore I am breaking our engagement, even though it has remained a secret and was never an official obligation on my part.
I will return home for my birthday party, but afterwards I will be leaving for Paris, where I have been fortunate enough to obtain a very junior position in the British Embassy.
Please keep the ring as a token of my undying affection and esteem, and I pray that you will find someone more worthy of you than myself.
Your loving friend,
Julian Carrington
Daisy crumpled the letter in her hands and clasped them to her bosom. She was trembling from head to foot with shock, but tears would not come. Pain, sadness, despair and finally anger flooded her with emotion, but still she was dry-eyed. Jilted – the word would be engraved on her heart for ever.
A timid knock on the door preceded the appearance of a housemaid. ‘I’m sorry to interrupt, miss, but the master is getting impatient. He sent me to fetch you.’
Daisy tucked the crumpled sheet of paper into the pocket of her plain grey woollen dress and she rose to her feet. ‘I’m coming.’ Even to her own ears her voice sounded strained and edgy, but she had her feelings under control. Whatever it was that the master had to say could not be as earth-shattering as the contents of Julian’s letter.
The drawing room on the first floor was furnished in the height of fashion with heavy mahogany furniture upholstered in crimson velvet, matching velvet curtains and a carpet with such thick pile it felt like walking on a croquet lawn. The former Adam-style mantel had been ripped out on Mrs Carrington’s instructions and replaced by a huge, black marble fireplace that dominated the whole room, and a fire blazed up the chimney. An enormous Christmas tree took up one corner of the room, and was lavishly decorated with tinsel and glass baubles imported from Germany at enormous expense. At any other time Daisy would have been delighted, if only for Master Timothy’s sake. He was what her aunt Eleanora would have called ‘an afterthought’, being eleven years younger than Julian, and his parents were invariably too busy to spend much time with him. It was Daisy who read him a story each evening when he was tucked up in bed, and Daisy who took him for outings to the park or the Zoological Gardens.
‘I sent for you ten minutes ago. What kept you?’ Albert Carrington stood with his back to the fire, glaring at Daisy through the thick lenses of his gold-rimmed spectacles. ‘Well, what have you to say for yourself?’
Daisy had never felt comfortable in Mr Carrington’s company. He was said to have trebled the family fortune by investing heavily in the stock market, and it was rumoured below stairs that the master would receive a knighthood for his services to industry and his generous gifts to charity. Even so, his manner was cold and calculating, and all the servants were in awe of him.
‘I’m sorry, sir. I was mending a garment for Master Timothy.’
‘That’s no excuse.’
Mrs Carrington held up her hand. ‘Let me handle this, Albert.’ She fixed Daisy with a hard stare. ‘I won’t beat about the bush, Miss Marshall. As you know, Master Timothy will be starting school in January, and therefore we will no longer be in need of your services.’
‘Yes, that’s right,’ Albert said, frowning. ‘This is the end of the quarter and you will receive your wages from Mrs Thompson, together with a character, which should assure you of a position elsewhere.’
‘I’m to lose my job?’ Daisy looked from one to the other. ‘But who will look after Master Timothy during the school holidays?’
‘That is not your problem,’ Mrs Carrington said icily. She rose majestically from the sofa and ushered Daisy from the room. She lowered her voice. ‘Don’t imagine that we haven’t noticed what’s been going on between you and our elder son. I’ve seen the way you flirt with him, and it is just as well your time with us had ended naturally, otherwise I’m afraid I would have had to terminate your employment.’
Daisy stared at the floor, unable to meet her employer’s angry gaze. ‘I’m sorry. It wasn’t intentional.’
‘It never is.’ Agnes Carrington lowered her voice. ‘When you find another position, keep yourself to yourself. Nothing but ill can come of any relationship you enter into with members of the household. And beware of male servants, too. That’s the best advice that I can give you. Now pack your bags and leave. Don’t upset Master Timothy by saying goodbye. I’ll tell him you wish him well at school.’ She whisked back into the drawing room and closed the door in Daisy’s face.
The hansom cab trundled through the city streets, weaving its way through the carts, carriages and brewers’ drays. Snow was falling steadily from a leaden sky and it was bitterly cold. Workers hurried homeward, mufflers flying out behind them and their hats pulled down over their brows so that the only parts of their faces visible were the reddened tips of their noses. Less hurried were those out shopping for last-minute presents. The pavements were crowded with men and women laden with packages wrapped in brown paper, or baskets overflowing with festive food. Costermongers’ barrows illuminated by naphtha flares offered a tempting selection of oranges, lemons, rosy-cheeked apples and mountains of walnuts, together with bunches of red-berried holly and waxy white and green mistletoe. It was almost Christmas, a time for rejoicing, but all the way home Daisy could think of nothing other than the letter that Julian had written, ending their brief relationship. The rumbling of the cab’s wheels and the drumming of the horse’s hoofs sounded to her ears like a repetition of his name, over and over again, until she could think of nothing else. The ache in her heart intensified with every turn of the wheels and the further they drove from Queen Square, the deeper her despair. The last time she had seen Julian they had been deeply in love and filled with excitement for the future, but now he had severed the delicate thread that had bound them. She had left the house with a shadow over her name, and she had not even been allowed to say goodbye to Master Timothy, who would imagine that she had deserted him. He was too little to be sent away from home, too sensitive a child to face the rigours of public school life, and it was almost Christmas. She had planned to fill his stocking with oranges, nuts and small toys she had purchased from the bazaar in Soho Square. She had left the packages in the nursery, but she doubted if he would receive any of them; Mrs Carrington would make sure that nothing was left to remind her younger son of the governess who had loved him like a mother.
Daisy stared blindly at the crowded pavements, seeing nothing but a blur of shapes and colours, misted by the thickly falling snow. It had promised to be the best Christmas she had ever had, and now it was going to be the worst. She had told her aunt about her romance with Julian, and now she would have to face the consequences. Questions would be asked to which Daisy had no answer. Aunt Eleanora had drummed the importance of a good marriage into Daisy from an early age. Now she had to face her aunt’s disappointment as well as her own heartbreak.
The cab drew to a halt outside the leather merchant’s premises on