The Emma Harte 7-Book Collection: A Woman of Substance, Hold the Dream, To Be the Best, Emma’s Secret, Unexpected Blessings, Just Rewards, Breaking the Rules. Barbara Taylor BradfordЧитать онлайн книгу.
thirty minutes of fast walking, without a pause for breath, she sighed with relief. There in front of her was the street where Mrs Daniel’s house was located. Rosie’s directions had been explicit. Now, for the first time, Emma stopped and put down the suitcase and pulled the paper from her pocket – Mrs Daniel’s house was number five. This street, too, was dark, with a poverty-stricken air, but Emma cheered considerably when she reached number five. It was a taller house than she had expected, and narrow, wedged in between others, its Victorian walls blackened by factory soot and years of industrial grime. But the lace curtains at the sparkling windows were crisp and white and the door knocker gleamed brightly in the faint afternoon sunlight. The three steps in front of the house had been scrubbed to silvery whiteness over the years and the edges were brilliantly yellow from the scouring stone obviously used daily to outline the worn rims.
Emma practically flew up the steps and banged the brass knocker several times. After a short delay the door was opened. A thin woman with grey hair and a sour expression on her lined and sallow face glared down at Emma.
‘Yes, what do yer want?’ she asked peremptorily.
‘I would like to speak to Mrs Daniel, please?’
‘That’s me,’ said the woman curtly.
The indomitable Emma was neither unnerved nor daunted by the woman’s nasty tone and inhospitable manner. She had to get a room here at all costs. Today. She did not have time to roam Leeds looking any further. And so she smiled her most radiant smile and instinctively adopted a charming manner, one which she herself had not known she possessed until that very instant. ‘I’m pleased to meet you, Mrs Daniel. My name is Emma Harte. Rosie from the Mucky Duck sent me to see you. She thought you would be willing to rent a room to me.’
‘I only takes gentlemen boarders,’ snapped Mrs Daniel, ‘less trouble. Besides, I’m full.’
‘Oh, dear me,’ said Emma softly, riveting her enormous eyes on the woman. ‘And Rosie was so sure you would have a room available. Even a small one would do.’ Emma glanced up. ‘It’s quite a large house, isn’t it?’
‘Aye, it is, but me two best bedrooms are let. There’s only the second attic and I never rents that.’
Emma’s heart sank but the smile did not waver. ‘Perhaps you might consider renting that other attic to me, Mrs Daniel. And I certainly wouldn’t be any trouble. Rosie will give me a reference if—’
‘It’s not that,’ the woman interrupted in a snappish tone. ‘I’m full up, as I said.’ She glared at Emma. ‘I can only cope with two lodgers and I’ve got them already.’ She made to close the door.
Emma smiled again, and winsomely. ‘Please, Mrs Daniel, don’t be hasty. It would be a great help to me if you would rent me the attic for a few weeks. Just as long as it is convenient for you. It would give me a chance to find somewhere else. Rosie was so sure you would be obliging. She spoke so well of you and recommended you highly. She told me you ran a clean and proper house, and that I would be safe here. Rosie said you were a good and honest woman.’
Mrs Daniel made no comment, but she was listening intently. ‘You see, I’m not from Leeds,’ Emma rushed on, determined to keep the woman engaged. She also wanted to convince her that she would be no trouble and dispel the apparent hostility the landlady had for women boarders. ‘I was living near Ripon, with my husband’s grandmother, and she died recently.’ Emma noted the look of amazement on Mrs Daniel’s face at the mention of a husband, but before she had a chance to say anything, Emma explained, ‘My husband is in the Royal Navy. On the high seas for six months. I would be grateful if I could stay with you, for only a few weeks. It would give me time to find a place of our own, for when my dear husband comes back on leave.’
The woman was silent, obviously ruminating on Emma’s story. Emma’s mind raced. Persuasion, flattery, and charm were having no effect at all. Perhaps she should appeal to her greed. ‘I can pay you a month in advance, Mrs Daniel. After all, a little extra money is always useful, isn’t it? For that attic you never rent,’ Emma said pointedly, and began to open her purse.
Gertrude Daniel, widow woman and childless, was not as surly as she appeared on the surface. In fact, her dour manner and grim face actually belied a rather kind heart and a pithy sense of humour. However, she had the strongest desire to close the door in the girl’s face. She wasn’t interested in the money. And she didn’t like women boarders. Troublemakers, they were. Yet there was something about this particular girl that held her attention, and she had said she was married. Involuntarily, and to her enormous astonishment, she found herself saying, ‘We’d best go inside. I don’t want ter be discussing this on the front steps, with all the neighbours watching from behind their blinking curtains. Not that I can rent yer the attic, mind yer. But perhaps I can suggest another place yer can try.’
With this statement she opened the door wider and admitted Emma into the tiny hall and led the way to the front parlour. Gertrude Daniel was now considerably confused. She did not know for the life of her why she had let the girl into the house. Broken her own rule, she had. Her husband, Bert, had run off with their woman boarder years before. Still, Bert was kicking up daisies now. Nevertheless, she had never rented a room to a woman since then, and she had no intention of doing so now.
The front parlour was a shrine to Victorian bad taste. It was bursting with black horsehair sofas and chairs and mahogany whatnots. Purple chenille cloths covered a table, a piano, and a large stand. There were potted aspidistras on various other surfaces not crowded with bric-à-brac and the most revolting copies of famous oil paintings virtually jumped off the walls, which in turn were covered with bright red flocked-velvet wallpaper that stung the eyes.
‘Sit down, then,’ said Mrs Daniel, her voice still harsh.
Emma placed the suitcase on the violent red-and-purple Turkey carpet, and perched on the edge of a horsehair chair, clutching her bag. She was desperately trying to think of something infinitely more persuasive and ingratiating to say, when Mrs Daniel cut into her thoughts.
‘This is the best parlour,’ said the landlady, preening. ‘Nice, isn’t it?’
‘Oh, yes, indeed. It’s beautiful,’ responded Emma swiftly, adopting her most sincere tone, whilst thinking how horrid it was.
‘Do yer really like it?’ asked Mrs Daniel, her voice suddenly an octave gentler.
‘I do! Very much.’ Emma glanced around. ‘Why, it’s one of the most elegant rooms I’ve ever seen. It’s superb. You have excellent taste, Mrs Daniel,’ gushed Emma, remembering words she had heard Olivia Wainright use so often in the past. She bestowed a glowing and admiring smile on Mrs Daniel.
‘Well, fancy that. Thank yer very much.’ Mrs Daniel was inordinately proud of her front parlour and for the first time her face softened.
Emma did not fail to notice this and grasped the opportunity. She opened her bag deliberately. ‘Mrs Daniel, won’t you rent me the attic, please? I said I would pay in advance. If you’re worried about the money I—’
‘No, that’s not it,’ interjected Mrs Daniel. ‘If Rosie recommended yer, I knows yer all right for the brass—’ Gertrude Daniel now hesitated, her eyes resting appraisingly on Emma. She had been scrutinizing her from the moment she had opened the door. Like Rosie earlier, she had noticed the girl’s clothes at once. The frock was a bit dated, but good. She had also become increasingly aware of the girl’s manners, her air of rectitude and refinement, her cultivated voice. This is Quality, she thought, and before she could stop herself, she said, ‘Well, I don’t know whether me second attic would be suitable for yer, seeing as how yer such a fine young lady. But, since yer’ve nowhere ter go at the minute, I’ll show it ter yer. Mind yer, it can only be for a few weeks.’
Emma wanted to fling her arms around the woman’s neck from sheer relief, but she kept herself perfectly still. ‘That is very kind of you, Mrs Daniel. I do appreciate it,’ she said in her most dignified voice, imitating Olivia Wainright yet again.
‘Let’s