DOWNTON ABBEY 1926
EPISODE 6.
Chapter 2. Tuesday to Thursday September 14-16, 1926
Thomas and Dr. Clarkson
"Barrow."
Thomas hadn't seen the doctor coming and slowed to let the man catch up to him, although he anticipated a conversation he didn't want to have. It had been several days since their uncomfortable encounter and Thomas would have preferred more time to have slipped by, however inevitable a meeting must be in the end. And how much more difficult was this for Dr. Clarkson?
When the doctor came abreast of him, Thomas resumed his pace and the two men continued along the village street together. Thomas was uncomfortable meeting the man's eye, but Dr. Clarkson did not waver in his gaze.
"I want to talk to you about the other night," he said, wasting no time on pleasantries. "I'll not be disingenuous. I was inebriated, to an extreme degree. It was an inexcusable indulgence for a physician. Thank you for saving me from myself and for seeing me safely home."
Thomas acknowledged the words with a nod, and wondered whether the doctor remembered what had been said once they'd gotten to the man's house, or was choosing not to draw attention to that.
"I don't know if you've told anyone," the doctor went on, "and I won't ask you not to do so. I would appreciate your discretion, but I won't impose on your conscience."
There was a quiet dignity and humility in the way Clarkson spoke, and Thomas felt an unaccustomed pang of compassion. People usually sought a witness's silence in the matter of a social transgression and the doctor's position as a professional in the community made such circumspection all the more imperative. And yet he seemed more prepared to face the consequences of his actions than determined to hide them.
"I've forgotten it already," Thomas mumbled, unsettled by the man's approach. "We all ... have ... lapses of judgment." He didn't know what to say and was stumbling through the first words that came to mind. It impressed him that Clarkson made no excuses for himself.
"Perhaps. But that was a rather significant lapse."
"I'll tell no tales on you, doctor," Thomas said abruptly. "I know what it's like to..." To what? Have a secret? Be lonely? Feel the crushing pain of rejection? He did not finish his sentence. He wondered if Dr. Clarkson would take offense at his presumption, although it was unlikely the man would know what he'd said when under the influence.
Dr. Clarkson did not take offense. "Well. Thank you." He paused and then added, "Good day, Barrow."
The doctor slipped away and, after a moment, Thomas glanced after him. Dr. Clarkson was a man of quiet authority, grace in bearing, and innate compassion. He did not hide the truth, for his own sake or anyone else's, but neither did he wield that knowledge for detrimental purposes. Thomas had first-hand experience of this.
No, he would not report Dr. Clarkson to His Lordship or Lady Merton or any other person in authority. Nor would he engage in gossip or innuendo about the man. But he was not quite sure that he should do nothing at all. This might have been a one-off occurrence - the doctor hadn't said either way. But the desolation of the man, laid bare before Downton's butler, did not bode well for future sobriety. Thomas knew well enough how such things could eat away at a man. And in the darkness of the other night, Thomas had glimpsed a soul in pain and had to acknowledge the limits of his own capacity to address it. This was beyond him. Only he didn't know where to turn for help.
Carson and Daniel Ryder
"Did you know the story of Lady Roberta and the siege of Lucknow?"*
The door of the Dower House had hardly closed behind them when Daniel Ryder demanded this of Carson, who was not at all surprised to be so accosted.
They had spent the afternoon listening to the Dowager Lady Grantham recount exploits of her husband's family in the tumultuous decades of mid-century. She was looking more fragile than ever, a fact which tugged at the edges of Carson's consciousness even as he plied her with questions. But she was in fine form. His Lordship's great uncle Patrick Crawley had witnessed the charge of the Light Brigade in the Crimea. His father Joseph had, as a very young man, fallen overboard in the Straits of Magellan while circumnavigating the globe with Prince Alfred. Lady Roberta had barely escaped with her life during the Indian mutiny.** All were thrilling tales, but this last had caught Daniel's imagination the most.
"I did," Carson said amiably, amused by the younger man's excitement and pleased that after days of rather more conventional memories of life on the estate in the 1870s, Her Ladyship had today related these very colourful tales. "I was not yet born when it happened, but the story was common currency for years. I grew up with it." Until His Lordship went to the South African War, Lady Roberta's credentials in imperial adventure were unmatched. There were those, Carson knew, who would still rank Lady Roberta's experience first, but Carson was loyal to His Lordship, firm in the belief that two and a half years of war with the Boers superceded a short-lived insurrection, no matter how terrifying those six months at Lucknow might have been. They would get to Robert Crawley's story eventually. Until then, Carson was prepared to let Lady Roberta have her moment.
"It's one of the most exciting stories I've ever heard!" Daniel went on, his eyes shining like a boy's.
"You've been to Palestine. During the Great War," Carson reminded him.
Daniel only shrugged. "Her Ladyship was fond of her sister-in-law, I gather," he said instead.
"Fond enough to remember her in the naming of her own son. She had her adventures, Lady Roberta, but she died at Downton. She's buried in the graveyard here." Carson waved in that direction and then glanced sidelong at his companion. "Let's have a look."
Daniel nodded eagerly. "Lady Grantham tells a story so well," he said, as they followed the road down to the church. "I was terrified for Lady Roberta's fate until she got us to the relief of the Residency."
"I noticed," Carson said, rather drily. Daniel had dropped his pen and, though Her Ladyship had feigned no awareness of his presence, she artfully let a crucial sentence hang in the air until he'd scrambled on the floor and found it again. Carson had been mildly vexed before he recalled that Daniel had not been trained to service and so it was unrealistic to expect him to have perfected the capacity for invisibility that every good servant possessed.
"Oh, Her Ladyship has a gift for a story," Carson went on. "We must be very careful to capture her voice in the recounting of the history of the Crawleys in her time."
They passed through the churchyard gate and Carson led the way to the area reserved for the family. The six men who had held the title of Earl of Grantham were memorialized in grey stone monuments of various sizes.
"An unbroken line of succession," Carson pointed out, "from father to son. Unbroken through His Lordship, at any rate. It will skip a generation to Master George. Lady Roberta lies over here."
They stood in silence before the red granite marker that also included Lady Roberta's husband and two infant children.
"She chose the stone," Carson said, at length. He knew endless details about the Grantham family. "It came from Ireland where she and her husband, Lord Sumner, spent some apparently happy years." There was a sceptical note in his voice. Carson had never been to Ireland, never wanted to go there, thought little of those who resided there, and was not much impressed with those who spoke favourably of the place. He had been years learning to think otherwise of Mr. Branson and was not entirely there yet.
Carson could not pass through Downton churchyard without pausing by the graves of his parents. He said nothing, but only walked that way with Daniel following, and then stopped before them.
"Your parents."
"Yes." And infant brother.***
Another moment of respectful silence descended.
"Did you get on?" Daniel asked this as they began to move toward the gate.
Carson nodded. "We did," he said lightly. "My mother had quite a personality. My father was a Yorkshireman." The latter description was a bit of verbal shorthand. Everyone from around Downton would know exactly what he meant by it. Daniel wasn't from Yorkshire but Carson didn't try to explain. It was something one knew or not. "There aren't many who would agree," he added, "but I think I took after her."
"He worked on the estate, your father."
"Yes. In the stables. He was head groom for a long time, as his father was before him. His Lordship would trust no one else with his best hunters." Carson spoke proudly of his father. They had traveled different roads, father and son, but Frank Carson was the best man with horses in Yorkshire and his son admired him for it. "That was never for me," he added, answering the unspoken question in Daniel's eyes.
"Did he mind, your father?"
"Not at all." Carson was emphatic on that point. "He never said so in so many words, of course, but he was pleased and proud of the way I took to service at the Abbey." He sighed. It was one of his few regrets that his father died before Carson had been appointed butler of Downton Abbey at thirty-two, a major coup.**** "You've not said much about your family," he observed, glancing at Daniel and mindful as he asked of Elsie's pointed comments about how little he knew of his assistant.
The other's face gave nothing away. "Oh, I was away at school for most of my childhood," Daniel responded breezily. "Then up at Cambridge. Then the war. I never really got to know them."
Away at school. Carson had gone to the grammar school in Ripon for a couple of years, which necessitated boarding in town for months at a time. But he had been exceptional among the village boys in doing so. Daniel's formal education denoted a different class altogether. But then, working class lads didn't go to Cambridge.
"And now?" It was a personal question, but Daniel had opened the door. And Carson did want to know him better.
"I don't see them." It was an unemotional statement. "We ... do not get on, not like you and your parents."
"I can hardly countenance it," Carson said, bewildered. "Who could have objections to you?"
This elicited a quick smile from Daniel. "Thank you, Mr. Carson. It may be, though, that it is I who object to them."
Carson was surprised at this possibility. "Do you?"
"No. No, I ... I'm fond of them. But... Your father, Mr. Carson, did not object to your taking your own road in life. My father has. He wanted ... still wants me to be just like him. It's been some years since I, at least, recognized that we are unlikely to be reconciled over this."
"Well." Carson had expected none of this from the congenial young man of whom he was increasingly fond. And he had no words to respond either, unsure whether condolences or rationalizations were in order. "Do you fancy a pint?" he asked, the sign of the Grantham Arms swaying in the distance having caught his eye as a likely distraction from this uncomfortable exchange.
"It's not open yet."
"Of course." Although he did not frequent the local pub, he well knew the hours of operation that governed - some might say tyrannized - the public houses of England.
Daniel Ryder, too, may have appreciated the strained atmosphere wrought by his admission and moved more effectively to shift the subject. "Did you know the Kearnses were giving up the Grantham Arms?"
"I... What?!" Carson stared at him. "How would you know that?" As a lifelong resident of Downton and over many years as butler at the Abbey, Carson had kept his ear to the ground and had always maintained an effective mastery of the local gossip. But he had not heard this. And he was astounded that a relative stranger would have this intimate piece of information before he did.
"Mr. Molesley," Daniel said, smiling at Mr. Carson's dismay.
"Oh. Right." Carson felt much better. Molesley. Yes, Molesley was at least as attuned as Carson had ever been to the village goings-on and had the added advantage of his father to collect information. "Well. That will be a change." He frowned. It didn't matter whether change affected him directly or not - he disliked it on its own account. He wondered if His Lordship knew about it.
Then he remembered where they had been before this digression and decided to go in a different direction with regard to Daniel Ryder's confession. "Come to the cottage for dinner," he said abruptly. "Mrs. Carson will be glad to see you."
Mrs. Patmore and Daisy
Mrs. Patmore was exasperated. Mr. Barrow distributed the mail at breakfast as the butler had always done at Downton and Daisy had gotten a letter. She'd put it directly into her apron pocket and then carried on with her day. If she looked at it that morning, then she'd done so surreptitiously for the cook kept a close eye on her.
Good Lord! Mrs. Patmore exclaimed to herself. Who was this alien creature who now inhabited Daisy's skin? For days the assistant cook had gone about her duties uncomplainingly, or, at least, with so few critical comments that it had the effect of seeming uncomplaining, leaving Mrs. Patmore with a dilemma. She liked an efficient Daisy because she liked her kitchen to run smoothly. But curiosity and impatience were slowly but surely killing her. There was nothing for it but simply to ask.
"Who've you heard from and what did they say?" she demanded bluntly over the lunch dishes.
Up to her elbows in soapy water, Daisy looked bewildered for a moment and then frowned. "I don't have to tell you everything," she said firmly.
"Yes, you do," Mrs. Patmore said doggedly, hoping that a good offence would obscure the vacuousness of her words.
Daisy raised a sceptical eyebrow. "I'll tell you, but not because I have to."
"Have it your own way." Mrs. Patmore had no troublesome scruples about means and ends. She dried her hands and waited for Daisy to continue.
"It were from Gwen," Daisy said. "Her mother-in-law's finally on the mend and she's had time to write."
The cook tried to look receptive to this remark, though it was not the information she sought. "Good," she said.
"She also said there's a school for women like me that I could go to and learn how to do things like accounting and management so that I could open my own shop. It's called Hillcroft. Her husband, Mr. Harding, is on the board. She says if I make an application soon, I might be admitted by the new year." Daisy's eyes were sparkling. Though she struggled to relate this news in an indifferent manner, she could not contain her enthusiasm.
Well, that was progress! Mrs. Patmore had almost reconciled herself to Daisy's leaving, though the idea of it still pained her. Mr. Mason was more stoic about it, or perhaps just put up a better front. Or maybe it was because he was a man. But having accepted the inevitable, other considerations now popped into Mrs. Patmore's mind.
"It'll be expensive," she said. She didn't have to know how much to know that this kind of education would be beyond the means of an assistant cook in Yorkshire.
"There are scholarships and things," Daisy said vaguely. "The whole purpose is to help working class women better themselves."
"Is that what you want, then? A shop?" The idea made Mrs. Patmore look at Daisy with an eye to such an enterprise. The young woman was engaging enough, the cook thought, and genuinely liked people. And if she put her mind to it, Mrs. Patmore was confident she'd come out all right, though there were still some rough edges.
But on this Daisy hesitated. "I don't know," she said honestly. "But I know that I would like to go to school. I didn't appreciate it when I were a girl and then it stopped." She came out of her thoughts and stared at Mrs. Patmore. "Where'd you learn it all anyway?"
"All what?"
Daisy gestured around them. "All that you do. And then your bed-and-breakfast and everything. How did you learn to do the books?"
"Hard work!" Mrs. Patmore responded automatically. It used to be the answer to everything. "And I was apprenticed," she added. "As you were. Working in kitchens from the ground up, although I started right in as a kitchen maid, not a scullery maid." She was proud of that fact. "I've put in my years, I tell you. And there are a lot of numbers in running a kitchen."
"But your bed-and-breakfast is a real business."
"A simple one. I keep it simple. It helps that I own the house. A shop would be a much bigger undertaking."
"That's why I need to go to school." Daisy folded the dish towel she'd been using to dry the dishes and hung it up. "Pastry dough next," she said and Mrs. Patmore nodded agreeably. She assembled the ingredients, but Mrs. Patmore saw Daisy's eyes stray her way more than once.
"What is it?"
This time Daisy responded without hedging. "They're coming from Brancaster this weekend, I hear. Lady Hexham and her family."
Daisy had not spoken of Mrs. Drewe's letter in a while nor even made a disparaging class comment in more than a week. Mrs. Patmore had hoped her revolutionary spirit might have dimmed.
"You're not still on about that," she said, with an air of impatience.
"I'll not be forgetting it!" Daisy said defiantly. And then added, almost to herself, "I wonder if Lord Hexham knows about all that."
Mrs. Patmore gave her a warning look. "That's not your story to tell, Daisy."
Baxter and Molesley
Miss Baxter was both excited and nervous. It could hardly be otherwise. She was invited to tea at the home of old Mr. Molesley. Her Mr. Molesley, as she called him in her head to distinguish him from his father, had issued the invitation, but that hardly stilled her apprehensions. She had met the older man a few times, but exchanged only a handful of words with him. She thought he must be a kind man, given his son's nature, but this was not always the case.
Anxiety was offset to a degree by the prospect of taking tea with her Mr. Molesley. He'd seemed quite buoyant when he dropped by the Abbey on Monday evening to make the arrangements. She was glad to see the change in him from the summer months when he had laboured under the shadows from his past. Miss Baxter wondered how he had shaken them off and then thought perhaps it was the return to teaching that had done it. He did love being in a classroom.
Mr. Molesley came to Downton to fetch her and they walked down to the village together in a slight drizzle. He talked animatedly about the schoolchildren and their studies. Miss Baxter could not help but smile as she listened to him. He'd always had a pleasant manner when he worked at the Abbey, but these days he glowed. This was what it was like, she thought, to love your work. Miss Baxter was glad of her job, appreciated the kindness of her employers, and believed she served them well. But she did not wake every morning with the sense of exhilaration that seemed manifest in every word Mr. Molesley spoke.
"You're in very good humour," she remarked. It was an observation made from her own gladness for him.
"I am," he said brightly and his gaze rested on her for a moment, a half-eager, half-shy look that she found exciting, even though it also discomfited her just a little.
As they neared his father's cottage, Miss Baxter's apprehensions stirred more vigorously and she slowed. Mr. Molesley noticed.
"Is there something the matter?" he asked solicitously.
"I don't know your father," she said.
He gave her a reassuring smile. "My Dad's a fine man. He's easy to get along with. You'll see."
But this day not allay her anxiety. "Does he ... know about me?" she asked. "About my past?" How that transgression haunted her! It was the kind of thing that made a person a pariah, for no respectable person would readily associate themselves with a thief. Miss Baxter thanked God profusely every night for Her Ladyship's magnanimity and Mrs. Carson's forbearance. But she well knew how few others would have shown the same consideration.
"No," he said. "But it wouldn't matter if he did," he went on hurriedly. "He knows about me and the war and he's never said a word about it."
"You're his son," Miss Baxter pointed out.
But there was nothing to be done about it. They had arrived.
William Molesley had been waiting at the window and had the door open before they reached the step. Inside, Miss Baxter was enveloped by the warmth of a good fire and a kind host. She'd not been catered to in her life, not until she'd met Joseph Molesley. His father, a white-haired man with an arthritic bend in his back, proved more adept at it than ever his awkward son was. He settled her at the table and immediately poured her a cup of tea so as to "chase away the chill." And he quickly put her at ease with a stream of gentle gossip about the village that required no input from her. In the glow of the elder Molesley's hospitality, Miss Baxter had time to relax.
Her Mr. Molesley helped his father with the food, making sure that she had everything she needed. Every once in a while he added something to one of his father's stories, but for the most part he listened as attentively as she did, laughing at all the right moments. And occasionally he glanced shyly her way. Miss Baxter felt her cheeks grow warm when their eyes met. Being at his father's table, rather than looking at each other across the servants' hall at Downton made a difference. Despite these feelings, she was charmed by the Molesleys, father and son. They like each other, she thought. It was pleasant to see.
"How's that young man you've taken in?" William Molesley asked his son.
"Mr. Ryder. He's very pleasant." Molesley glanced at Miss Baxter. "Do you like him?"
She could hardly say she knew Daniel Ryder for she saw him only at meals and had never had a conversation with him. "He seems nice."
"Fancy you taking in boarders," the elder Molesley said.
"He needed a room and I had an extra one," the son said easily. "I wouldn't go in for it generally, letting rooms. But..it's nice to have someone about the house."
"But a cottage all your own." Miss Baxter had never had anything all to herself. She'd even had to share a prison cell.
Molesley's head bobbed at bit as he considered it. "I've never lived alone," he said. "And I do enjoy it. Or did, before Mr. Ryder came along. But ... I've not the habit of being alone, I guess."
"You get used to it," William Molesley said in a matter-of-fact way. As a widower for some decades, he could speak with authority. "I've seen your Mr. Ryder. What's he doing in Yorkshire, a man like that?"
Miss Baxter thought perhaps that this was a bit of a saw for Mr. Molesley and that the two men had had this conversation before, but the younger Molesley responded patiently.
"He's helping Mr. Carson to write his book on the family, Dad. He reads and takes notes and when they get 'round to actually putting it together, he'll write it up, too. Mr. Carson can't really write that much anymore, not with his palsy."
William Molesley made a sympathetic sound. "It were arthritis that did me in," he murmured. "But I've got my cottage and a pension," he added gamely.
"Dad was a gardener at the Abbey," Mr. Molesley said proudly. "Head gardener, in the greenhouses."
"Worked there from when I were a boy," the older man said.
For the first time Miss Baxter wondered why her Mr. Molesley had not followed in his father's footsteps. His gentleness and sensitivity would have found an outlet in that environment, in the greenhouses anyway, among the delicate plants cultivated there. But she supposed it wasn't so strange that he had not. She remembered vaguely that Mr. Carson's father had also been employed on the estates, in the stables as she recalled it. Perhaps both fathers had seen service in the great house as a step up for their sons. Or perhaps it was the ambitions of the sons themselves or their natural inclinations. Her Mr. Molesley might tend to flowers, but she could not see him at the hard physical labour required in the vegetable gardens. And she could not imagine Mr. Carson in the stables at all.
"Would you like to see my garden?"
The question drew Miss Baxter back to the conversation. A slow smile spread across her face. "I would," she said eagerly. Her acquaintance with old Mr. Molesley might have been slight, but everyone in the village knew that his garden was his pride and joy.
"It's raining, Dad." Molesley said this very mildly but with evident concern for Miss Baxter's well-being.
His father turned abruptly and stared at him. "Aye, and we've an umbrella or two. It all looks so different in the rain," he added earnestly to Miss Baxter. "You can come again sometime when the sun is shining."
So they trooped out to the garden. It was the end of the season, so nothing was at its best. Miss Baxter could only imagine the splendour of this treasured enclave at the height of summer. But the time of year hardly mattered, for Mr. Molesley, who was engaging enough on topics of general interest, became positively mesmerizing when talking about the denizens of his garden. He caressed the leaves and handled the stems tenderly and spoke of each with an intimacy that reflected a lifetime's devotion. Miss Baxter had never heard anything like it.
Then they retired to the tiny sitting room and the fire to warm up again and Miss Baxter settled into a comfortable old over-stuffed chair and listened to the casual conversation between father and son that ranged over the price of tobacco to the amount of rain that summer to the fate of the Grantham Arms to the results of local sports matches.
"Fancy seeing Mr. Carson at a cricket match," William Molesley said. "And two weeks in a row. I've not seen him about like that since he were a lad."
"Well, he's retired now," Molesley said complacently. "And he's got someone to go with. Mr. Ryder," he added, for Miss Baxter's benefit. "I doubt Mrs. Carson's one for sports."
They all enjoyed a warm chuckle at that thought.
"They get on, Mr. Carson and Mr. Ryder," Molesley mused, sounding a little surprised by that fact. "I didn't know Mr. Carson liked anyone. Except Mrs. Carson, of course."
Miss Baxter did not say so, but she agreed. Mr. Carson had always been polite to her, but she wouldn't have said that he liked her. It was one of the aspects of Mrs. Carson - Mrs. Hughes as she had then been - that had impressed her in her early days at Downton Abbey - that the housekeeper was not at all daunted by the former butler. Mr. Barrow, try as he might, would never wield authority in quite the same way as Mr. Carson had.
After a while they said their thanks and goodbyes and began their stroll back to the Abbey. The rain had stopped. For the first few minutes they strolled in silence, reveling in the satisfaction of a pleasant afternoon spent in good company.
"I wanted to tell you," Mr. Molesley said abruptly.
"What is it?" She stopped, momentarily apprehensive until she saw the way he was almost bouncing on the balls of his feet. He was excited about something. He had behaved thus when he'd been offered the position at the school.
"I was going to tell you and Dad," he went on, a little hurriedly. "But then I thought you ought to know first, because you were so kind about it and it's really why, I think, the idea came to me in the first place..."
"What is it?" She was bewildered, but smiling at his animated manner.
"I've thought of something to do," he declared.
She didn't know what to make of that.
"You said I could ... I should try to think of something ... to make amends," he went on. "About the war." Making an explicit allusion to his great burden tempered his enthusiasm somewhat.
"Oh!" That was good news. "What is it? If you want to tell me, that is." Miss Baxter rarely made assumptions and felt a little chastened to have done so.
But he smiled at her. "Of course I do. I want to put on a play, with the schoolchildren."
She didn't quite see it, so she only continued to stare at him.
"About the men who served," he said. "And died. Twenty-eight of them on the estate alone. Their names are on the memorial in the village."
"Oh."
He rushed on. "I've been wracking my brain ... and praying, as you suggested ... hoping something would come to me. And I can tell you, I was becoming a little impatient about it, though I know well enough that God works in His own time and I ought to be a better servant to His wishes, but ... I had hoped... And then...when Ambassador Houghton was here last weekend he said, at dinner that night, that their stories ought not to be forgotten. And then one of the children, at the school asked me the other day why history was all about great men and couldn't ordinary people make history, too, and I...it came to me." Words were spilling from his mouth in his eagerness to convey to her his idea. "The stories of the local men will never be in the history books. There are too many of them, all over England. Millions. And only a handful can become famous - George Wyatt, Albert Ball. But we can remember them and as more than just names on the cenotaph. We can tell their stories, so that everyone in the village knows them, old and young, not just their own families." He paused and gazed at her with that eager uncertainty that she had seen in his face before. "What do you think?"
"It's wonderful." And she spoke with feeling, too. He really was so smart and kind and sensitive. She knew nothing about the men of whom he spoke, or their families, or even that much about the war, so much had she been wrapped up in her own very constrained world of just making a living. But she had some idea of what this meant to Mr. Molesley. It sounded so daunting, this plan of his, but it had clearly seized his imagination. "It sounds wonderful, " she said again.
That was all he needed. He'd worked out a lot of the organizational details and these cascaded from him in rapid succession, sometimes getting tangled up in one another in his haste to express them. But by the time they'd reached the coal yard, she had a fair idea of what he wanted to do.
"Do you think the families will be pleased?" she asked, hoping he would not be thwarted by local feeling.
"Well, I'll ask permission, of course," he said promptly.
She might have known. Her Mr. Molesley was ever considerate. "I'm so pleased for you," she said.
"It'll mean a lot of work," he added, taking a cautionary tone. "And, obviously, I've never done anything like it before. But I think I can get around it," he went on, nodding. "I'd like to have it ready for the Armistice. That only gives me seven, eight weeks."
She put a hand on his arm and squeezed it a little, words having failed her. He stood taller at this gentle touch.
"Thank you for a lovely afternoon," she said. "Your father is very kind."
He grinned and she thought it was a compliment he was sure to have heard before.
"He likes you very much," he said.
With a last lingering look they parted.
*A/N1. You will recall how, in the Second Season, when Sybil was departing for her medical training, Violet waved her away to her duty, reminding Mary and Edith about their Great Aunt Roberta: "She loaded the guns at Lucknow." Lucknow was an incident during the great Indian Mutiny of 1857. The Crawleys would have heard and embraced the British imperial interpretation of this whole dark episode in colonial relations, and sided completely with white British subjects who found themselves astronomically outnumbered and under siege in quite terrifying conditions.
**A/N2. In the Timeline of Downton Wiki, Robert's father is Patrick Crawley and he served in the Crimea. There is no annotation for this, no evidence from canon to support it. In my version of Downton, Robert's father is Joseph Crawley. I have made up the bit about a great-uncle Patrick and the Charge of the Light Brigade, and also the bit about Joseph Crawley accompanying Prince Alfred on his world tour, as well as the detail of his falling overboard. The only incident listed here that is consistent with canon is Great Aunt Roberta's adventure.
***A/N3. That Carson grew up at Downton, that his father and grandfather worked on the estate there, and that his parents are buried in the churchyard along with an infant brother are all works of my own imagination with no foundation in canon. I developed these aspects in other stories, including Getting Married, Chapter 11, and in the first few chapters of I Loved Her First, and have possibly mentioned them elsewhere.
****A/N4. This is another self-referential tidbit, elaborated in I Loved Her First, Chapter 3 "The Heart Stirs Again."
