Mrs Patmore S3 E3
A/N: I'm still working on the next chapter of Thirty Years, but I felt the need to write something else, to clear my mind, and one of these insights seemed like a perfect plan. A little study of friendship and the possibilities of love.
The road to friendship for the fiery redhead and the equally forthright Scot has been long, arduous and frequently paved with seemingly insurmountable obstacles. But they have finally reached a point where mutual support is the preferred option to pitched battles.
Perhaps, Beryl Patmore thinks one evening after a series of events has showed how important their friendship is, it has something to do with their age. They are both approaching sixty (Elsie a little quicker) and in a world of demanding work and youthful indiscretion, they find themselves more in need of confidantes and shared quiet than they did before.
True enough Elsie Hughes was a support to the cook when ill health loomed in the form of cataracts and stress induced attacks, but the help had been offered in terms of practical considerations, a business transaction to ensure the continued smooth running of the household. Now, as Beryl has become the sole support for the housekeeper's fears regarding her own ill health, there is a softness which neither found necessary before.
Beryl has never been comfortable with illness, the possibilities that have to be faced alarm her, which is why, once she admitted things were wrong, she surrounded herself with as much support as possible. Elsie, on the other hand, seems determined to go through these initial stages alone, although she is quite as susceptible to worry, and has wept on Beryl's shoulder more than once when the thought that she might be nearing the end of her life at the age of 58 overwhelms her. But in general, she has been as calm and collected as she ever was, although to Beryl's knowing eye, she tires more easily.
Not that anyone else has noticed, least of all Mr Carson. His expectations remained high, especially with Lady Edith's wedding on the horizon, although even he has noticed something is amiss now, and is bumbling around, trying to relieve the pressure whilst simultaneously not letting on that he knows.
Elsie Hughes is not so easily fooled, and has labelled him a hopeless liar, but to Beryl Patmore's eyes, his halting care should be something of a comfort. If the worst is revealed when the results come back to Dr Clarkson, Beryl is sure Mr Carson will do everything in his power to ensure Elsie's last months are comfortable, if only the stubborn woman will let him.
Beryl cannot fathom why he has been left in the dark when the friendship between the three of them is so strong. In a world of rules and strict hierarchy, the only people the three heads of the household can truly trust with their private concerns are each other. To leave Mr Carson on the outside of this does him a disservice. If the situation were reversed, Beryl thinks, Elsie would have winkled the truth out of him long ago, and forced him to accept her help. She did so when the Spanish flu visited the house. Why this should be any different, why Elsie think that allowing him to view her as a sick woman will do anything to alter his other perception of her baffles Beryl entirely.
He may not say so in so many words, but it is clear Mr Carson cars deeply for the housekeeper. His polite concern that he expressed earlier in the years has, Beryl believes, shifted to something altogether deeper. He appears to have come to a realisation of what, exactly, could be lost to him. Not just an efficient colleague but also the warm and generous woman behind that persona. And, Beryl notes, as he has come to this new understanding, the woman herself has sought to set him further apart from her, to build an invisible barrier that will make separation easier if the worst should happen.
Beryl does not pretend to understand, although she has given up trying to force Elsie to be open. To her mind, if you care for someone, surely you will want their support. Unless … a new angle presents itself, which is both surprising and yet totally obvious. Elsie Hughes loves Mr Carson; loves him in the way a woman does a man, but also without the hope that the emotion will be returned. Her silence continues because she does not want a deathbed declaration, and if she is not ill, then she will continue as she has before. Beryl is suddenly absolutely sure that this is not a new regard that the housekeeper has kept hidden in her breast, along with possibly traitorous cells which seek to destroy.
Can Mr Carson ever turn his mind to romance? Beryl is not certain, although she has seen the way he looks at Elsie when her thoughts are elsewhere. There is certainly a softness that wasn't there before, but that could just be the natural reaction to her ill health.
Only time will tell. Tomorrow, Dr Clarkson will reveal if Elsie Hughes is to live or die, and Beryl Patmore will be there to provide friendship and support to deal with whatever the news might be. She prays for Elsie's health, not just because she does not want to lose the friend she has spent so many years working with, but also because she finds herself wondering if romance could actually blossom for these two strict creatures of habit, if the spectre of death is not looming over them.
She will leave it to fate though, a spinster such as herself has no business trying to help cupid along. The tangled romantic web in her kitchen is proof enough of how wrong things can go. Stranger things have happened though, and she won't begrudge her friends any happiness they might find.
A/N: A review or two would set me up forever.