The Scullery Maid

by Karen Schauber

Marthe occupies a squat three-legged stool, her knees splayed wide accommodating a crude weathered pot, peeling, scrubbing, and slicing the morning potatoes; the white-coated Alsatian curled on the flagstone beside her. Her back is slender and taut, eclipsing the straight lines of the scullery’s low back door, sunk a foot lower than the main kitchen. This is her preferred spot each morning, early, before the light is adequate, before others have arisen, before the busyness of the household is set in motion, before she loses herself to the whims of all others.

Still before cockcrow, blue light seeps through thickets of pokeweed and inkberry along the fence in the summer garden. Marthe’s gaze is lifted toward the eastern sky at the sound of a high-pitched ke-ke-ke and the approach of a broad-winged marsh harrier circling high above, arriving from far beyond the estate lands. She is distracted, but not from her ruminations—the events of the previous day—the Painter, the way he looked at her, the way he made her feel; her breasts still quivering. She has not slept. How could she.     

 The young Marthe, sent to work as a scullery maid at age fourteen; a plum position. She travails from pre-dawn, preparing roughage for the massive skillet. Then scours pots and pans at the back end of the scullery on into evening, floating on a raised bench, keeping her feet dry. Mostly, she has a room over her head, never goes hungry, and has a promising future to one day become a kitchen maid working upstairs in the manor. At present she is under the wing of Mlle Clara the kitchen maid, and above her, Mme Beaulieu, the Housemaid.

***

It is yesterday morning, and Mlle Clara has taken ill, her monthly bleeding. The alienist has prescribed limiting exertion.  Marthe is consigned to bring Monsieur Guillaume Fragonard his breakfast, in Clara’s stead. The Monsieur is lodging at the cottage beyond the summer garden, past the glade and the fallow field, in situ at the nape of the brook. He is here for the year to paint the portraits of the Montague family. Marthe is not all that familiar with the lay of the Montague estate beyond the summer garden. She has been down in that region only once, to accompany Miss Clara in bringing fresh linen and orange and clove pomanders prior to Monsieur Fragonard’s arrival.

The kitchen help is greatly harried especially with Clara gone, and no one is attentive to giving the young Marthe proper instruction. She steadies the double-handled hickory basket braced on her slender hip. It is filled with pandemain, fraise compote, and a large dairy bowl of clotted cream. The buttery nutty crust on top jiggling with each step she takes. She makes her way down the flagstone path, passing two gardeners at their morning tasks in the field, and a boy she has never met, corralling the guinea fowl. The white Alsatian trots alongside her until the verge of the brook. She is grateful for the company. The morning sun inches above the treeline. Blackbirds cluster as daylilies open. What lies beyond, begins with the next step. She is terrified of encountering the Painter on her own. She will leave the basket on the front stoop and come back for it later. 

Marthe arrives at the cottage and is ushered in. The Painter insists. He is a full foot taller, and she must look up to meet his eyes. She cannot say no, back away, make excuses. She is not used to speaking up. She does what she is told, by the women around her, but this is the first time a man is doing the telling. She is almost trembling, wishes Clara were back at her post. Noone told her what to expect. Why is he speaking to her? Why doesn’t he just take the basket? The Monsieur has no idea how hard she worked to keep the pain warm, the creme cold. Left much longer neither will be appetizing.

Her heart pounds inside its petite ribcage. Mme Beaulieu would be cross —a scullery maid is to remain in the shadows, never seen, never interact with the Monsieur or Madame of the house, neither their children, nor their guests. She is relegated to the back kitchen, the back stairs, the attic rooms. This prolonged encounter is out of the question, unheard of.  She is certain she will lose her position. The chaos this morning without Clara has sent her off in this untenable direction. Is this where her good fortune is to end?

The Painter lifts the basket from her arms with an imperceptible sleight of hand. A motion that is hypnotising. Marthe is hardly aware of its release as she is ushered further into the cottage with a flourish and demi-bow. The atelier is bathed in bright mid-morning sun spilling in on the west wall. The heavy drapery pulled open, gathers at the floor, 12-foot-tall double windows wide open. The smell of lavender and quince blowing in from the glade.

Marthe hesitates, standing motionless like a garden statue. He, a gentleman is gesturing to accommodate her. The way she sees the master and lady of the house conduct themselves with one another, and with their guests. It is dreamy and frightening to be on the receiving end. She does not know how to comport herself. She glimpses a Madras-blue butterfly as it flits ahead of her. Its iridescent wings dance in a stream of morning sun before it settles on the long harvest table in-between glass bottles of multi-hued pigments. The melange of colours, brilliant and dazzling like shards of stained glass in the basilica. Stifling air begins to close in with a rancid odour of sap, resin, turpentine, varnish, and shellac.  A brew of fresh boiled oil—walnut, poppy, hempseed, pine nut, castor, and linseed—bubbles over an open flame, adding to the pungent, nutty fumes and heat.

A larger than life-sized portrait of Madame Montague in her boudoir finery, stands in the middle of the atelier. Her customary postiche is let loose in flowy raven curls, unadorned. The Madame’s face is soft and radiant, silhouette diaphanous. The large garnet signet ring on her right pinky, missing. Her mouth hints at mischief. Oil pigments—cerise, ochre, viridian, ultramarine, and gamboge—sticky and wet; glisten. Marthe is full of shame. She should not be privy to this intimate portrait. She will tell no one she has seen it; and averts her gaze.

The room falls silent like a deserted chapel. The kind of stillness that presages a mounting storm. The Painter is staring— ogling—stroking his patchy whiskers. His chestnut hair brushed back from his forehead, is loosely tied with a thin black ribbon. A sudden frisson— a whiff of excitement and fear, jolts—taking hold of Marthe. His gaze, held much too long, makes the corners of her mouth quiver. She tidies the front of her smock dusted with cinders and charcoal from the black oven cavity where she removed the double paindemain; her small hands ruddy and chapped. Marthe senses something is about to happen——but does not know what or why. She wobbles, heady, faint.

She imagines the painter leaning into her. Her legs fanning, open and closed like the butterfly. Feels his warm breath on her cheek; hints of bergamot and sage, shroud the fetor of varnish and resin. Unhurried, he removes her bonnet, fingers her soft brunette curl, twirling then draping it softly down her neck and shoulder, loosely arranging her chemise and undergarment, exposing her supple roundness—breast and areola. She tries her utmost to hide her body’s response, lowering her eyes, biting her lip. “Non, non, Monsieur. I must leave…” never escapes her mouth. The Painter steps backwards and looks down the axis of his long-handled weasel-hair brush with left eye squinted, draws in a shallow breath—holding, holding…. and gestures to her to lift her chin slightly. She understands immediately— a stollen kiss. They are sympatico, as he says, “Perfecto, amora - don’t move”. 

Outside, the Alsatian is causing a ruckus, barking wildly. Likely a scrappy roe deer by the brook. The Painter announces, “Merci, Mlle”, fishing out his breakfast from the panier. He walks Marthe to the front door of the cottage. The hickory basket back in her arms; lighter, floating…

***

Marthe nicks the tip of her thumb with the paring knife. A tiny drop of blood beads onto her morning smock. Her knees mash together against the crude pot. Above, the marsh harrier glides on an extended warm thermal. The kitchen is coming alive with sound. The clip-clop of Mlle Clara’s shoes fast approaching.