I LOVED HER FIRST

Chapter 9 Nightmares

A Problem in the Nursery

"I don't know why this is even a topic for conversation!"

The Dowager's declaration prompted a discreet exchange of glances between His Lordship and Her Ladyship that did not escape their butler's sharp eyes. He was making the rounds of the table with the claret as the discussion unfolded.

"Neither do I," His Lordship muttered darkly.

"This is why you have nannies!" the Dowager went on. "You ought not to be concerned with the matter at all."

Carson suspected that Her Ladyship would like to tell her mother-in-law to mind her own business. But, of course, that wasn't done, possibly not even in America. And besides, the young woman looked too tired to form the words of a rebuke, let alone challenge the formidable former grand lady of Downton.

Instead His Lordship took on his mother. "The nannies have run out of options, Mama. And they're just plain exhausted by it. As we are. The mere presence of nannies does not prevent the sound of a screaming child from travelling the passage and keeping everyone on the gallery awake."

"Your father always said the nursery was too close to the bedrooms," the Dowager chided relentlessly. "It's all this attention that's keeping her going. If you'd all stop fussing over her and let her cry herself out, she'd soon stop."

Lady Violet spoke in an authoritative voice and in most circumstances Carson would have yielded to her prescription. But in this matter he did not. The issue was Miss Mary's nightmares, which had begun to plague her almost a month ago and which seemed to be intensifying. The child woke up screaming in terror at a volume fit to wake the dead in the churchyard and quite enough to set off the two younger sisters with whom she shared the nursery. As His Lordship had noted, no one on the gallery could sleep through that. It had been a topic of conversation between the agitated parents on several occasions. The butler and footmen were well aware of the problem, although their rooms in the attics kept them well insulated from Miss Mary's outbursts.

"We're beyond that, Mama," His Lordship said, almost irritably.

"Have you spoken to...oh, what's his name, the young man down at the hospital...?"

"Dr. Clarkson has examined her and he says there's nothing wrong, not physically." They were the first words, beyond "good evening," that Lady Grantham had spoken. Even these few words betrayed her exhaustion. She had been soothing one child or another in the middle of the night for what seemed like weeks.

Her Ladyship the Dowager considered her son and daughter-in-law for a long, thoughtful moment, her disapproval of their ability to resolve this parenting problem apparent. "Why don't you ask Carson about it?"

Her Ladyship, His Lordship and, indeed, the footmen stared first at the Dowager and then at the butler. Carson himself froze in place, wondering what he had done to inspire this suggestion.

"What?" His Lordship looked from his mother to the butler and back again in bewilderment.

But the Dowager was unmoved by everyone's astonishment. "Remember how he was with her as a baby? What was it – the colic, I believe - that was driving His Lordship mad." She turned to Carson. "And there were other occasions, too, weren't there, Carson? You seemed an adept with a crying child, as I recall."

Carson did not know what to say. He had calmed Miss Mary a few times when she was a baby, on occasions when her exhausted or flustered parents were struggling. But he knew his success then was due to his quiet presence in a tense moment, rather than any innate talent. This was an entirely different matter.

"This is not really the time to discuss it, Mama," His Lordship said smoothly. "Nanny will get it all straightened out eventually, I'm sure."

They said nothing more on the subject, but Carson could not help but think about it. It troubled him that Miss Mary was so afflicted. He had not had the opportunity to discuss the nightmares with her directly. She hadn't been downstairs since they began, the result, he understood, of a stricter regimen that Nanny hoped would have some effect on the disturbances.

The two women rose to withdraw to the parlour and His Lordship got up as well. There was no point in dividing, not when there were only the three of them. Yet His Lordship lingered, waiting until the other two were out of the room before turning to his butler.

"I apologize for my mother, Carson. She ought not to have put you on the spot like that."

Carson waved away His Lordship's concern. "I was not discomfited, my lord."

"Good." His Lordship turned to go.

"My lord, I did wonder. About Miss Mary." He spoke hesitantly. When it came to household management, Carson spoke his mind. But this was different.

"Go on."

"I had a thought. Only I don't want to presume."

His Lordship brightened a little. "A thought! Any thoughts are welcome, Carson. We're at our wit's end about it. What do you suggest?"

So Carson told him, feeling self-conscious as he did so. They might already have tried it. He did not know. He was not privy to all their conversations on the subject.

But they had not tried it. "It's as good as any of Nanny's remedies, Carson. And I daresay it makes more sense than whisky-laced milk or jogging her around the garden every afternoon. Nothing else has worked. I say, give it a go. What about tonight?"

His Lordship's enthusiasm brought Carson up short, as did the implications of his words. "Me, my lord?"

"Well, it is your idea. And you never know. She might be more receptive to a fresh face." His Lordship paused. "Miss Mary is fond of you, Carson."

They rarely spoke of his relationship with the child, though Carson knew that Miss Mary related her downstairs adventures to her parents, even as she spoke to the butler about things that transpired upstairs.

Carson nodded. "Very good, my lord. And Her Ladyship?" If he was reluctant about treading on His Lordship's toes in matters relating to Miss Mary, he was more so still when it came to Her Ladyship, especially after that incident with Miss Mary and Miss Edith in the cowsheds.

His Lordship appreciated this. "I'll speak to her right now, Carson, though I daresay she will welcome any solution to the problem. Any port in a storm," he added with a smile.

Nighttime at Downton Abbey

Nanny was caught between a rock and a hard place. She didn't appreciate Mr. Carson's interference. He could see that in the look she gave him when he appeared at the nursery door half an hour before midnight. But Her Ladyship had told her what was going on and she had no effective rebuttal. Her own remedies had failed. So she went to wake Miss Mary with an air of doubt mingled with resignation.

Carson didn't blame Nanny for her concerns. It was all very irregular. But they were all interested in resolving the child's problem and his idea was as good as any. And better, in his mind, than trying to drug or starve her into peace. That was an exaggeration, but he'd heard enough from conversations between His Lordship and Her Ladyship to know that a dose of brandy and manipulations of diet had been on the table.

It was a relief to the two of them that Miss Mary woke easily and, when Carson proposed that they take a walk together, she readily agreed. He could see in the flickering light of the candle he held that the prospect of an adventure appealed to her, that she relished the idea of doing something exciting that did not involve either of her sisters. In silence she put on her slippers and dressing gown and then, without a word, joined him in the passage where she eagerly took the hand he held out to her.

"You've been having bad dreams," he said, as they strolled along the gallery. There might have been some value in approaching the topic indirectly, but he thought it right to come straight to the point lest she get the idea this was some sort of lark. When a worried little look came over her at his words, he almost doubted himself. "Can you tell me what you dream about?" he asked gently.

Her eyes went round with fear. "Monsters, Mr. Carson!" she said, in a hushed voice, and then moved more closely to him, pressing against his thigh and looking about apprehensively.

"Monsters," he said gravely. He'd had no inkling of this. It intrigued him, even as it also puzzled him. "What kind of monsters?"

She shrugged. It was beyond her capacity to describe them.

"And why are you afraid of them?" No matter that this was a subject foreign to his understanding, Carson always believed in getting the facts before passing judgments or offering solutions.

"Because they're going to eat me up!" Miss Mary declared, and there was no ignoring the alarm in her voice. "And Edith and Sybil, too! They hide in dark places and come out at night."

"Do they." He pondered this. "No monster could harm you, surely. Not with Nanny standing guard all night."

"Nanny's afraid of spiders and mice," Miss Mary said scornfully. "How could she fend off a monster?"

If monsters were an irrational fear, Miss Mary had no difficulty making rational arguments about them. He took her point. "And...you believe monsters exist?" he asked cautiously, stifling his own immediate impulse to deny the validity of her fears.

The child looked up at him and he saw conviction in her eyes as she nodded emphatically. "Cousin Patrick says they're everywhere, Mr. Carson. He says there are nine different sorts of monsters at Croydon House."

"Ah." Cousin Patrick. Without a direct heir, Robert Crawley's title and the estate of Downton Abbey would, in the event of his untimely death, fall first to his cousin James Crawley, the son of Robert's late uncle, his father's younger brother. Master Patrick was James's son and, as such, was the second in line in the succession to the Earldom of Grantham. Carson knew the family well. They spent a great deal of time at Downton. Master Patrick, who was two years older than Miss Mary, affected a worldly wisdom because he went off to a posh boarding school where, no doubt, he had encountered more than one kind of monster. But the only monster Carson knew to inhabit Croydon House was Patrick's grandmother. Carson shared with the Dowager Lady Grantham an antipathy for that woman.

That Master Patrick was the source of Miss Mary's fears gave Carson pause. It was difficult for an adult to shake a child's confidence in the solemn pronouncements of another child.

"And now you are concerned about the existence of monsters at Downton Abbey?" he ventured.

"Oh, yes, Mr. Carson! They come every night looking for us. Cousin Patrick says it's only a matter of time before they find the nursery!" There was a shrill note in her voice.

Well. Here was an angle he might pursue with some hope of success. "Oh, Master Patrick is quite mistaken there, Miss Mary," he said firmly.

She stopped walking and looked up at him.

He went on. "I am responsible for the safety of the house and everyone in it," he said seriously. "And I can assure you that no one and nothing can get into Downton Abbey when it is dark except that I let them in. And I never admit monsters."

His statement did not bring her the relief for which he had hoped. "Cousin Patrick says that sometimes they sneak in during the day when the doors are open and hide in dark corners."

Master Patrick, Carson mused grimly, ought to turn his agile mind to more important matters than frightening his cousin. He took a deep breath. "I am acquainted with all the dark corners of Downton Abbey and can state with authority that there are no monsters lurking in any of them." They had come to it, hadn't they? She had heard words of reassurance from Nanny and from her parents to no avail. She needed to see for herself. "Come," he said, nudging her into movement again. "We shall explore the house and all of its dark corners. And then," he added, "won't you have a tale to tell Master Patrick of your night-time adventure!"

Despite her trepidation, this appealed to her, as he thought it might. She was not, he knew, a timid child and so only wanted evidence to give substance to the reassurances she had already heard.

"Did you not tell His Lordship and Her Ladyship or Nanny about the monsters?" he asked, wondering. No one had mentioned this part in his hearing.

"No!" she said emphatically. "Cousin Patrick told me I mustn't! He said that if I told Mama or Papa or Nanny, the monsters would know about it and find me more quickly."

Carson had to acknowledge Master Patrick's facility with a tale, but it was not a talent for which he had much regard. "But he did not say anything about telling a butler," he noted drily. Miss Mary had taken her cousin's warning literally, fearing to tell the usual sources of comfort because she had been warned against them, but opening up immediately to him because he was not on the list. He could understand Master Patrick's oversight. The boy was a pleasant child and could be sweet, especially to Miss Edith. But he took delight in challenging Miss Mary, perhaps because she did not worship him, as almost everyone else did. It was one of the perquisites of being an only child. And though he was always polite, in Carson's observation, he also reflected the indifference to servants exhibited by his father and grandmother.

This loophole in Master Patrick's carefully drawn web meant, however, that Carson had some hope of dispelling Miss Mary's fears. He had thought to take her for a walk in the darkened Abbey, imagining some nebulous fear of the night. Now their stroll would have a more specific purpose. And it must be a grand excursion, for there were many dark corners in Downton Abbey.

They began in the Great Hall, where he showed her the bolts on the doors that he put in place every night. "Napoleon's legions could not force these doors, Miss Mary, never mind some pathetic, provincial monster." He spoke with requisite disdain for the enemies both real and imagined. Then they toured the main rooms and he pointed out the heavy shutters on the windows, laboriously closed every night by the staff and opened again in the morning. "All is secure, Miss Mary," he said, as he rattled a set of shutters to illustrate their sturdiness.

And, because they were passing by and it was a good story, he pointed at the formal portrait of a striking man whose attire placed him in the late eighteenth century. Carson forbore to explain to Miss Mary how the cutaway coat and cravat were evidence of this, focusing on more exciting matters. "That is the Second Earl of Grantham. He crossed France during the Revolution and lived to tell the tale. And brought with him much of the art that hangs in your house." He made a mental note to tell her about the French Revolution, during the day and not in excessive detail. Who needed fantasy monsters when men like Robespierre walked the earth?

On the gallery, he took her into one of the unoccupied bedrooms and demonstrated the heavy clasps on the windows and the shutters there, too. Nanny, he knew, subscribed to the view that the night air was unhealthy for small children - utter rubbish in Carson's opinion, but it was not for him to say. He reminded Miss Mary that the windows in the nursery were never open when it was dark.

It occurred to him as they strode from room to room, passage to passage, that it was not enough to look behind curtains and under beds and behind doors to prove that no monsters lurked there. She ought, he thought, to be able to take with her back to bed a positive experience as well as evidence that the bad did not exist. And not more fantastic stories either. He would impart verifiable tales that would bolster her confidence in the truth of what he said.

"The Princess Amelia room is named for the youngest daughter of King George III. She was aunt to our Queen Victoria. Princess Amelia stayed here once, during the time of the Second Earl." That fact fit neatly with the portrait he had just shown her. "King George and his wife, the Queen Charlotte, had fifteen children!" he added. Miss Mary's eyes opened wide in astonishment. "I know," he said, nodding at her. It was a detail that never failed to amaze him. "Imagine having fourteen brothers and sisters!"

"I've quite enough sisters," Miss Mary said determinedly. "And I shouldn't like to have a brother at all. Where would we put one?"

Well, he agreed with her about a boy. Not that Miss Mary knew it, but a brother would have relegated her to insignificance. Once he had hoped, with the family, that Her Ladyship would give birth to a son. But his affection for Miss Mary had long since dispelled that wish.

They climbed the servants' stairs to the attics which were divided between the servants' quarters - which were themselves subdivided between male and female sections - and storage space.

"Why do the men live on one side of the door and the women on the other, Mr. Carson?"

He was momentarily stumped. How to combine honesty and accuracy and yet refrain from imparting too much information? "It is customary for men and women who are unrelated to sleep in separate quarters." It wasn't an explanation at all, but she accepted it.

"All these rooms are occupied," he told her, pointing down the long passage. "There are the footmen - Stuart, Geoffrey, Peter, and Arthur. And the hallboys, Samuel, Percy, and Mark. And His Lordship's valet, Mr. Sterling. And on the other side, Mrs. Dakin, Mrs. Yardley, all the kitchen maids and housemaids and lady's maids." They were crammed to the rafters, in fact. He relished the privacy of his own room. Only Mrs. Dakin was likewise blessed. Everyone else shared. But there was a larger point to this information. "There's just room for the staff up here, Miss Mary. There isn't a spare corner for a monster."

"Do you have a room here, Mr. Carson?"

"I do. And nothing happens up here that I don't know about. And I've not seen a monster yet."

At the top of the stairs to the men's quarters there was another door. Carson paused before it.

"Now we've come to the attic proper and we may find a few dark corners in here. Best we investigate them all, just to be sure." He turned the handle of the room and led the way in.

The door opened into a large, unfinished space where roof beams were not hidden by the ceilings that transformed the servants' quarters into habitable rooms. But otherwise the storage attic looked much like the drawing room when the family were in London - discarded or superfluous pieces of furniture all shrouded in white sheets. Scattered among them were trunks containing abandoned personal treasures of the past, household items no longer in use, and who knew what else. Along one wall were cupboards that Carson knew held some of His Lordship's clothing, rotated seasonally by his valet.

The taper was a poor instrument for exploring the room but it was all they had. It cast fragile streams of light into dim corners, creating a more ominous effect than solid blackness would have done. Miss Mary crowded more closely to him and clutched his free hand with both of hers.

"There are so many places a monster could hide in here," she said in a whisper. He heard a tremor in her voice.

Well, the only way to combat that was to confront it directly. "Let's look everywhere," he said, and moved ahead boldly. He set the candle holder down on a sturdy surface and whipped the nearest sheet from the object shrouded beneath it - a round table of a size that might have served one of the tenant families, if any of the estate farmers used round tables. "A relic of King Arthur," Carson muttered disdainfully. Round tables undermined authority. Rectangular tables assured that rank was preserved. Perhaps the Second Earl had brought that back from revolutionary France, too. "Nothing there," he said cheerfully, glancing at Miss Mary. And then they both sneezed from the dust. And laughed. Her grip on his hand loosened.

"Come on," he urged, leading her to the next item. Together they picked their way around the attic, uncovering everything. After the fourth piece of furniture had been revealed without a monster in sight, she joined him in tugging the sheets off. In short order, there were untidy heaps of sheets on the floor amidst an assortment of tables, chairs, bedframes, and other oddities whose banishment to the attic Carson had no trouble understanding. There was also a great deal of dust in the air. It had all taken them about fifteen minutes. It would take far longer to make it right again. He would send one of the hallboys up in the morning.

"Nothing!" he declared, as they'd pulled the last sheet away.

"Nothing!" she echoed him. Her timidity was gone. She enjoyed creating the chaos of discarded sheets and dust everywhere, even in the dark room.

"No monsters," she said firmly, and he saw, in the way she look calmly about them, that she was persuaded.

He thought he might press the point. "Do you think, perhaps, Master Patrick might be having you on, Miss Mary."

She said nothing, but only got a determined look on her face. He liked that she didn't burst out in recriminations, although he thought she might be considering retaliation. He sought a distraction.

"Come here." He beckoned to one of the shuttered windows. It took him a moment to get it open - more evidence, he told her, that nothing could get into the Abbey - but when he got the latch undone, he flung the shutters wide. She came to his side eagerly now, prepared for new wonders, but she could not see over the ledge. He picked her up and held her in his arms.

"Look," he said, pointing. "A brilliant moon. And the stars. Have you ever looked at the stars, Miss Mary?"

She shook her head and as she did so he realized what a foolish question it was. Children her age were in bed and fast asleep when the stars were out. And who would tell her about them anyway?

"There are patterns in the stars," he said. "And pictures, of a sort."

"Pictures? Where?"

Now he was in for it. He only knew a few of them himself and one of them was Orion's Belt, which wasn't very interesting, even when it was visible. The most useful thing about it was that it helped you find Canus Major.

"There's a dog," he said, and told her how to see it in the alignment of stars.

"It's not a very good dog," she said, wrinkling her nose. "Edith could draw a better one."

"You have to use your imagination. And, you see, it contains the brightest star in the sky, Sirius."

"The star's name is 'serious'?"

"Sirius. S-I-R-I-U-S. And there's the Plough." He pointed in another direction. This was a more obvious pattern. "And if you draw a line from the two outer stars and extend it upwards, you find the North Star. If you can find the North Star, you'll never lose your way. Sailors have used it for centuries to help them navigate the seas because while all the other stars move across the sky, it stays in the same place."

This was a more satisfying tale. She stared at it in awe.

Despite his inability to identify any other constellations, she stared raptly at the sky for a few minutes, and then her gaze turned earthwards, looking for other novelties. By the light of the moon, he pointed out estate sights that were more familiar - the folly, the stables, the tip of the church steeple in Downton Village. She looked at everything entranced. His eyes rested on her, equally absorbed.

But they could not do this all night. He had to get up early and she would probably be a bear for Nanny all day for having had her sleep disrupted. Still he lingered.

"Are you hungry?" he asked suddenly.

Miss Mary turned wide eyes on him. "I'm starving, Mr. Carson! Nanny makes me eat so early now. She thinks my dinner made me have bad dreams." She paused. "I almost told her it was monsters, so that I could eat properly again." This information tripped off her tongue casually.

"What about those monsters, then?" he asked.

She thought for a moment. "There may be monsters at Croydon House, but there aren't any at Downton." She looked at him with her dark, compelling eyes. "You won't ever let any monsters into Downton, will you, Mr. Carson?"

"You may rely on me for that," he said solemnly. Then he put her down and took her hand again. "It's a very long walk down to the kitchen now, and then back up again to bed. Can you manage it?"

She was eager to try.

There wasn't much to be had in the kitchen to eat, not much that wouldn't be missed, anyway. Mrs. Yardley kept a close watch on the food that came in and went out and he didn't want to fall afoul of her. Fortunately, Miss Mary wasn't fussy. He made them each a jam sandwich - Mrs. Yardley put up the jam herself and Carson had often remarked that she did wonders with already delicious strawberries - and gave her a cup of milk besides. He had none of the milk. He was already trespassing on Mrs. Yardley's good will.

They sat together at the table in the servants' hall, he on one side - forgoing his usual place at the head of the table - and she on the other. She was tired, he could see that. But she was exhilarated, too.

"What are you so happy about?" he asked, smiling.

"I've never had such an adventure, Mr. Carson! No one I know ever has. I'm sure Cousin Patrick has never been all over his house in the dark!"

"Nor should you have done, on your own," Carson said seriously, not wanting to encourage her to further exploits. "But it's good to do it once, so you know it all looks the same as it does in the day."

"But it doesn't!" she cried passionately. "It's...magical...at night!"

Well. He couldn't argue with that. The glimmering of the taper, the echoing creaks and groans of a house settling in the silence of the night, the twinkling stars and the shining moon illuminating Downton from the heights of attic windows ... yes, he supposed that all struck her as bewitching. But for him it was all about the company. He was charmed by her innocent awe.

"This is delicious, Mr. Carson. I've not had jam in ages!"

He wondered what Nanny did approve for the children's consumption. But he could think about that another time. When she had swallowed the last bite and drained her cup, he stoop up and held out his hand again. "Time for bed, I think."

She stood up, too, but less energetically than she had moved earlier. The fears, the thrills, and the snack, not to mention the long walk, had caught up with her. He relented, though he had not much resistance to begin with, and took her in his arms. She nestled against his chest as he climbed the stairs to the gallery. He thought she might have fallen asleep between the kitchen and the nursery, but she hadn't, though she did yawn as he set her on her feet at the door.

"Goodness, Mr. Carson!" Nanny said reprovingly in a hushed voice, mindful of the sleeping children within. "I was about to send for the constable, wondering where you'd got to!"

"We've been everywhere, Nanny," Miss Mary said, never too tired to be impertinent.

Nanny ignored her and only held out her hand to receive the child back into her care.

But Carson wasn't quite finished yet. He crouched beside Miss Mary that he might look her in the eye, and though she stifled another yawn, she readily met his solemn gaze.

"There are no monsters in Downton Abbey," he said firmly, " and now you know it. Nor will any ever darken our doors, not while I'm here. And you know that, too."

She nodded.

"So you can stop waking everyone up in the middle of the night, now, can't you?" It wasn't so much a question as an expectation. And Miss Mary nodded again.

"I'm not afraid any more, Mr. Carson."

"Well, I'm glad of it." He wanted very much to finish their adventure together by kissing her goodnight, as his mother had kissed him many years ago, but it wouldn't be proper. So he stood up again. "Right. Good night, then."

"Good night, Mr. Carson." And she took Nanny's hand and disappeared into the nursery.

He turned and headed for his own room in the servants' quarters above. He had undressed and was getting ready to get into bed, when the light from the night sky glimmering through the gap in the curtain caught his eye. Moving to the window, he pushed the curtain aside and gazed for a long moment at the bright moon and sparkling stars. How different it all looked now that he had seen it through the eyes of a child.