morning as she rooted through her closet. Martine sat perched on the bench in front of the dressing table with an anxious expression.
“You don’t ’ave to do this, Miss Em,” she said. “I’ve already got plenty of clothes thanks to you and your sisters.”
“But you don’t ever wear them.” Emma thrust her head out of the closet and regarded her quizzically. “Why is that?”
Martine picked up a tube of face cream and fiddled with it. “Because I wear regular clothes to work in, not dresses and twinsets, to be honest. And because most of the things you give me don’t fit properly,” she admitted. “I don’t mean to complain, truly; but you and Lizzy and Charli are skinny, tiny little things. I’m…fat.”
Emma regarded her in dismay. She hadn’t really thought about sizing; but Martine was at least a half a stone heavier than herself. Nevertheless, “You’re not fat,” she said firmly.
“I’m not skinny, neither.”
“You only need a bit of exercise…and so do I, come to that. I’ve an idea. Why don’t we start going for a run on the days you’re here?” she suggested.
“A run, miss?” Her expression was wary.
“Yes – a brisk twenty-minute jog down to the village and back. I’ll find you a pair of tracksuit bottoms to wear. You have trainers, don’t you?”
She nodded. “They’re a bit beat up, but they’ll do, I reckon.”
“Perfect.” Emma unearthed a pair of trackies with an elasticised waistband and handed them over. “We’ll start on Friday.”
“But…Lizzy’s party’s on Sunday,” Martine pointed out. “And there’s all them cakes and tarts and trifles to be made, and the house to be cleaned.”
Emma was forced to concede that the girl was right. “Well, then – we’ll start next week. And since my clothes won’t fit you, I’ll find some hats and scarves and show you how to accessorise your look.” She closed the closet doors and studied Martine with a thoughtful expression. “Right, let’s focus on your makeup in the meantime, shall we?”
“My makeup?” the girl echoed. She stared at her reflection, at her glossy lips and lashings of blusher, and admired the cat’s-eye flick she’d painstakingly copied from a recent issue of Bliss. “What’s wrong with my makeup?”
“Where to begin?” Emma murmured, and took a deep breath. “Let’s start,” she said as she came to stand behind Martine on the dressing table bench, “with your eye makeup. It’s fine for a party, but during the day you want to look more natural. As if you’re not wearing any makeup at all…”
With a sigh – and despite her misgivings – Martine leaned back and let Emma get on with it.
“Blimey, I wouldn’t let anyone else but you mess with my slap,” she grumbled, and closed her eyes as Emma began to wipe away all traces of her carefully applied cat’s-eye flick.
“You’ll love the results, I promise,” Emma assured her. “Just trust me.”
With another sigh, Martine muttered, “Right, I’ll try.”
“And please don’t frown,” Emma scolded. “I need to groom your brows a bit.”
“But I like my brows,” Martine protested, and her eyes flew open in alarm. “What’s wrong with ’em?”
“They look like caterpillars.” Emma reached for a pair of tweezers. “Now,” she ordered firmly, “I want you to sit back, relax, and close your eyes. This won’t hurt a bit.”
***
Twenty minutes later, Emma led Martine downstairs in search of Mr Bennet. They found him in the kitchen, a newspaper open on the table before him and a cup of tea at his elbow.
“Good morning, daddy,” Emma said.
“Good morning! Hello, Martine.” He glanced up at them with the briefest of smiles. “I didn’t realise you were here already.”
“Hello, Mr Bennet.”
“Distressing news in the paper this morning,” he said, and frowned down at the newspaper. “Our neighbour is selling his property to an investment group from London.”
Emma’s eyes widened. “Not Lord Darcy, surely –?”
“Oh, no. Sorry, I meant Sir Cavaliere. With no heir to be found and his health deteriorating, the old boy can’t keep the place up any longer and finds himself forced to sell and move into a care home.”
“What a shame! What will the investment group do with the property?”
“I don’t know. The article doesn’t say, as the transaction isn’t official yet.” His frown deepened. “I do hope they don’t pave it over and turn it into a water park. Or a shopping centre. To have something like that next to Litchfield Manor…” He shuddered.
“Well, there’s no use worrying about it if it hasn’t happened yet,” Emma reassured him. She drew Martine forward and eyed her father expectantly. “Do you notice anything different?”
“Different?” He set his cup down. “Erm…well,” he said after a moment, “I have to say, I don’t. Martine looks as…” he cleared his throat. “As lovely as ever.” With the smile of a man who’s just dodged a rather large bullet, he returned his attention to the paper.
“She’s had a makeover, daddy. Look at her face… Don’t you see a difference?”
“Oh. Oh – yes! Now you mention it, she does look, erm…fresh-scrubbed. Like a – a dairy maid from one of those eighteenth century pastoral paintings.”
Martine’s face fell. “Thank you, Mr Bennet,” she said. “Now, if you’ll both excuse me, it’s time I got on with it. This dairy maid has lots of work to do.”
She turned away to grab the vacuum cleaner from the hall closet, and began to attack the Hoovering.
“Well done, daddy,” Emma scolded. “Here I am trying to build up Martine’s shaky self-confidence, and you refer to her as a ‘dairy maid’. You might as well have called her fat.” She let out an exasperated breath and turned away.
“I meant it as a compliment,” Mr Bennet called out after her in consternation. “Truly!”
He looked down at the pug as Emma stalked off. “There’s no pleasing women sometimes, is there, Elton?”
***
On Thursday morning Emma arrived at the bakery bright and early. She shook out her umbrella and put it aside – thankfully, the forecast said the rain would end later today – and wrinkled her nose as she stared down at her wellies.
She’d stepped in a pile of Elton’s poo on her way out the door.
With no time to change, she’d grabbed a pair of espadrilles from inside the front door, thrown them in her handbag,
