Chapter Two- But It Was

Elsie found herself overwhelmed and completely breathless, her head still reeling but she didn't care: she was on cloud nine. She smiled deeply, realizing she was walking through the village in a daze, grinning like an idiot but she didn't care about that either. Dr. Clarkson had insisted he drive her home but she felt like walking: she needed the space and time to process this. Despite her joy she was also completely shocked.

'How could this be after so long?' She asked herself.

But Elsie didn't really care how it could be, only that it was. That's what you feel, of course when you've given up on your heart's desire years and years before and then suddenly it's just there and part of you, unexpected like a thief in the night.

By the time she was part of the way back to Downton, her feet had started to ache again and crossed paths with Branson who'd gone into town to get the car repaired. He pulled over when he saw her, insisting on giving her a ride back to the house and she accepted.

"Everything alright, Mrs. Hughes?" He laughed, noting that she was thrilled about something. He never seen the housekeeper so elated and it piqued his curiosity.

"Oh it's perfect." She grinned. "Just perfect."

In truth, the prospect of all of this frightened her on some level. She knew, practically, that this was uncommon, and dangerous at her age. Dr. Clarkson had warned her that she could be facing serious complications, but she couldn't bring herself to seriously contemplate those considerations. The thrill and the blessing of this was simply too great to not just revel in. She pushed off thoughts of the danger of it, and instead, focused solely on the joy.

She wondered what her Charlie would say, and how he would react when she told him. It'd been so long since she'd thought about how his eyes would light up, or how his jaw would drop, that such thoughts seemed new all over again. She wondered if he already had a feeling about it but hadn't told her yet, or if perhaps news of Lady Grantham's pregnancy had made him consider the possibility of it, as it had with her.

Her heart pounded when she got back to Downton. She was still undecided on whether or not she'd tell him right away, or wait for a private, romantic moment. It was something they'd both been waiting for, for so long, and she felt pressured to do it right.

"Someone's happy today." Thomas raised an eyebrow as he and O'Brian passed her in the hall.

They saw Mrs. Hughes as a rather stoic figure and were immediately suspicious about her seeming so happy. Within seconds of crossing her path, they started to think of her state as their personal business rather than a simple observation of someone else's joy. Soon it would be the basis for a vendetta, after all, in their minds, everything was about them.

"Enough with the cheek for today! Can't you ever just be…happy?" She chastised, hurrying past them.

"I wonder what she has up her sleeve?" O'Brian whispered once Elsie headed into the kitchen.

"Perhaps she's just happy about the new little brat like everybody else." He shrugged, finding it silly that everyone was so enthused about Lady Grantham's news.

Elsie felt even more in a daze when she finally reached the kitchen: being there with Charles made her news almost surreal and for a moment she stared back at him, not knowing if she could speak at all. Daisy watched Mrs. Hughes carefully as she stared doe-eyed at Carson who was arguing with Mrs. Patmore about the dinner, which she was insisting on cooking even though she couldn't see well enough to now and he'd told her to take the evening off.

Only Daisy noticed Elsie had walked into the room and she stared at her uneasily as she just watched Carson, complete adoration obvious in her eyes. Even the naïve Daisy recognized that something out of the ordinary was happening.

"Mrs. Hughes are you alright?" The girl asked, breaking the silence between the two of them.

Carson turned immediately when he heard she was standing right there. And in an instant she seemed too take his breath away. She looked different to him somehow than she had a few hours before. He didn't know what it was, but she seemed to be… for lack of a better term, glowing.

"Where have you been the past couple of hours?!" Beryl asked Elsie. "I could barely manage without ya, don't you know we're suddenly expecting a baby in this house and…"

Carson smiled brightly, noticing his wife blush at Mrs. Patmore's words, her smile not fading as she stared back at him.

"Mr. Carson. Charlie." She said, tears in her eyes. "May I speak with you in my sitting room, for a moment?"

"Certainly Mrs. Hughes."

Daisy raised an eyebrow, noticing that he was suddenly as enamored with her as she was with him.

"Charlie!" Beryl cried when they left the room. "Since when does she call him Charlie!?"

"Mrs. Patmore I think there's something going on with them, like between them..."

Mrs. Patmore turned back toward the hall quickly and then squinted back at Daisy, shocked at the prospect that she would pick up on something like that.

"Mrs. Hughes, there's not something going on between…wait, where did they go?!" She asked suddenly, not having realized they'd left.

…

Elsie didn't know how to begin. Her heart raced audibly as he closed her sitting room door; blood thundering in her ears almost drowning out her angst and her excitement at once. She tried, in those moments to remember all the perfectly thought out ways she'd considered telling him all those years ago but those faint imaginings seemed to fade into the foreground, leaving behind nothing but the choice of impulsivity.

"So, Elsie Carson." His smile practically made her weak in the knees. "Where has my love been all day long, hmm?"

"I haven't been gone all day." She defended.

"Yes, you have." He said, wrapping his arms around her waist, leaning his forehead against hers.

He began to rock her a little, almost as if they were dancing, their foreheads still touching. Elsie closed her eyes and took a breath. She was nervous and her mind a little frantic, but his embrace was comforting, acting as a bulwark against her fears and reminding her of how much she was loved.

"Charlie." She whispered. "I do have something I need ta talk to ya about."

"Oh?"

"Mr. Carson." She began, looking up at him. "My Charlie. I'm going to have your baby." She burst out laughing, unable to hide her joy any longer.

"What?!" He asked, his eyes lighting up. "What?! Mrs. Carson! It's been fifteen years since we stopped try…oh my Elsie. How did…"

"I don't know…" She smiled as she started crying again. "I don't know and I don't care."

"Oh it's wonderful." He replied, taking her face in his hands and kissing her deeply. She wrapped her arms around his neck and hugged him tight. "Are you sure?" He asked, breaking their kiss.

"I'm sure, I'm very sure."

"This is incredible. I don't believe it." He laughed. "It's been so long since we ever thought that…."

"Neither do I, but I promise its true."

He paused for a moment, overwhelmed as he studied her face. He had a million questions for her and wasn't sure where to begin. Then he remembered her dizziness from the night before.

"Here, sit down, my love. You should be off your feet."

"Charlie I…" Elsie was about to remind him that she wasn't going to get off her feet anytime soon with the Garden Party only a few weeks away and Mrs. Patmore mostly out of commission.

"No I mean it." He said.

She couldn't help but smile when he sat her down in the armchair and he sat across from her, removing her shoes and beginning to massage her feet. It was something he very often did for her after a long day at Downton.

"We need to tell his lordship right away, no wife of mine is going to be in this condition and on her feet eighteen hours a day!"

"But Charlie I…I don't want to tell people until we know."

"Until we know what?" He raised an eyebrow.

She sighed. "Whether it's going to stick or not. Sometimes when women get pregnant it doesn't always…"

"Oh." He replied sadly, devastated by the thought. "I see."

"I'm only eight or nine weeks, he thinks, not nearly as far a long as Lady Grantham. He said it's delicate and I don't want people knowing if…"

"You mean Thomas." He added. "I'll take care of Thomas."

He'd already heard Thomas say something rude about Lady Grantham's news and couldn't imagine he'd be any more polite about his wife's…or their bombshell that they'd been married nearly twenty years.

"Charlie it'll be too much for me to bear that way if we lost it and people knew..."

"Please, don't think of it that way. We're not going to loose it." He promised as she reached up to dry his tears.

"Don't make promises you can't keep." She said gently.

"But we don't know that will happen a-and for right now the child is safe."

"Our child." She corrected, smiling.

"Yes. Our child." He beamed, taking her hands and squeezing them tight before lifting them up to kiss them. "Oh Elsie, our child, what a thought."

"It's an incredible thought: our baby after so long. Speaking of which, you must help change my dress."

"Why, I like that one."

"Don't ya notice something different about me Charlie?" She giggled, getting up and going to her small closet to find another dress.

"Quite a lot, actually. I couldn't much make sense of it yesterday, but now it…"

"Well, start unbuttoning."

He did as she asked without really questioning why and suddenly he realized.

"This is on so tight…"

"I know, I've been squishing baby and that's never good… Charlie, I'm not ready to tell them. Perhaps after the garden party when…"

He sighed. "Elsie you mean more to me than anything in the world. And that's why I really must insist you take it easy. Not after the garden party, or when Mrs. Patmore's better: now. And the sooner that we tell them, the easier it will be for us to get rest for you."

"But Charlie."

"Just because they know doesn't mean everyone else has to and I really want you to have the best of everything."

"You're such a sweet man Charles Carson." She beamed.

"I can't do anything about…well." He paused. "The…physiology of things as it were but I can give you and the baby a fighting chance: you can rest, Mrs. Patmore will make you whatever you like…"

"If she doesn't burn the house down first." She rolled her eyes as she finished buttoning the new dress she'd chosen.

"I'll have Daisy wait on you…"

"But Charles…"

"Telling Lord and Lady Grantham about this is no different from our discussing Mrs. Patmore's sight with them, it's not personal." He defended, knowing that she didn't think of the family on a personal level as he did. He assumed she thought that he just wanted to share their news with them, an assumption that wasn't completely untrue. "It's about your health."

She sighed. "Alright, that's reasonable I suppose… We'll do it later today when we speak with them about Mrs. Patmore. Now can you tell?" She asked of her dress.

She thought you could tell she was pregnant in the old dress and hoped the one she'd changed into hid things better.

"Yes. But only because I know." He said, kissing her cheek.

Daisy watched carefully from her place in the kitchen as Carson and Mrs. Hughes finally came out of her sitting room. Mrs. Patmore was busy talking to herself and trying to contend with the stove she couldn't see so she hadn't realized that they had failed to emerge from Mrs. Hughes' quarters after a good half hour. The lapse of time wasn't lost on the normally naïve Daisy and she couldn't help but wonder why they'd been in there with the door locked for so long. She shuddered at the thought of it and refocused her attention on the batter she was stirring.

'No, no Daisy, it's just Mr. Carson and Mrs. Hughes. Your being silly nothing could be going on. ' She told herself.

It just couldn't be…. But it was. Daisy looked back up at them as they parted ways in the hall, her eyes widening in horror when she realized Mrs. Hughes was wearing a different dress than when she and Carson first went into the sitting room.

….

Elsie found herself incredibly nervous when she and Charlie sat down in the library with Lord and Lady Grantham. Not only were they about to share something deeply personal: they were about to reveal a nearly twenty-year-old secret. Part of her was worried it would get them fired, but Carson did not think it was a legitimate concern. She was very surprised when Cora had Thomas bring in tea for four.

"I hope you don't mind joining us." Cora said kindly. "But I'm just starving."

"No, no that'd be lovely." Elsie conceded, the offer of joining them for tea put her at ease.

"I do hope poor Mrs. Patmore's eyesight isn't too bad." Lord Grantham began.

"It's getting worse by the day it seems." Elsie lamented.

"We'd like to do all we can to help her." Cora added.

"I'm sure she'd be deeply touched by that M'lady." Elsie smiled. She was put further at ease when Thomas left the room.

"But the truth is." Carson interrupted. "Mrs. Hughes and I are here about more than just Mrs. Patmore."

"Oh?" Cora asked, batting her eyelashes.

"The truth is we've been untruthful to you all these years." Carson said.

Elsie was surprised by the way he said it at first, but then supposed that was just the truth of it. Cora gasped and Robert's eyes widened.

"We'll understand if you would like us to resign if…"

"Wait a minute, what's this about?" Robert asked.

"It's not Mrs. Hughes." Elsie explained, taking Carson's hand. "In fact, it's been Mrs. Carson an awfully long time now."

"What?" Cora gasped, a small smile coming to her face.

Something inside her was excited about this and not at all surprised. Thinking about it, she thought maybe she'd always known something was going on between the two. Elsie noticed this but couldn't help but note that Lord Grantham still seemed to be processing it. In fact, he seemed overwhelmed at the notion.

"We've been married eighteen years, m'lord." Carson continued. "Since around the time Mrs. Hughes first arrived at Downton, and lady Sybil was a newborn."

"Eighteen years." The lord repeated, seeming to be thinking aloud, rather than replying to them.

"It happened very fast." Elsie continued. "Way too fast for even us. We loved each other within days of meeting and we needed our jobs and didn't know what to do…you'll recall that such an arrangement eighteen years ago: the butler and the housemaid married it was…"

"Unheard of." Cora finished Elsie's sentence and she nodded in agreement.

Robert was silent for a moment and suddenly looked up.

"Carson…Mrs. Hugh… err Mrs. Carson. I'm so sorry." He said. Elsie's heart leapt, thinking he really was about to let them go. How would they provide for the baby if he did? "Old chap, you're my friend." He smiled faintly; and in an instant Carson knew he was hurt by the betrayal rather than angered. "I wish you would've told me. I'm so sorry you felt you had to hide such a happy thing all this time. Does anyone else know?"

"Not a soul, it's our secret." Carson squeezed his wife's hand in reassurance.

"I must say I too wish I would've known." Cora smiled.

"Well, that's the thing m'lady." Elsie continued. "We were going to tell you, when we started a family."

"Unfortunately, we weren't blessed with children."

"Until now." Elsie smiled, looking over at her husband.

"Ha!" Cora gasped.

"I-is Clarkson sure?" Robert asked. "Because I barely believe him about Lady Grantham."

"Quite sure, yes m'lord." Elsie beamed.

"It will be wonderful!" Cora was suddenly delighted. "They'll have built in playmates!"

"Lady Grantham…" Elsie hesitated.

"Cora…" Robert also seemed anxious to voice his concerns.

"Oh but please! They'll be the only two children in the house, and they'll be the same age. It'll be perfect! They'll be fast friends I know it."

Everyone was reserved about this idea, except for Cora who wasn't afraid to let her plans for both children, or her enthusiasm about the whole thing, be known. Carson and Robert were concerned about the propriety of it all, and Elsie was worried about her child getting hurt. She'd never seen herself as being close to the family in the way her husband did.

"I've been worried about my child growing up lonely." Cora explained. "She won't have siblings close in age like the older girls did. So having another baby in the house the same age is just a tremendous blessing!"

Elsie sighed. "I suppose your right m'lady it does make sense that they should be friends." She had to concede that she didn't want her baby to grow up lonely either and that in some ways it might be a good match.

"I suppose it does." Robert added, understanding the argument now that his wife had discussed the matter of loneliness. Looking back on his early childhood, he thought he would've been devastatingly lonely without Rosamond. "Do you plan on staying on Mrs. Hugh…I'm sorry, Mrs. Carson."

"If you'll have me."

"Oh of course!" Cora smiled. "I'm going to interview nannies very soon." Cora added. "I'd like it if you helped me choose."

"O-of course." Elsie was surprised.

"Because she'll be your nanny too. I insist."

"It's the least we can do." Robert agreed. He felt awful they'd hid their relationship for so long, it just wasn't right.

"Oh, m'lady, thank you so much, but I'd like to keep my child myself when…"

"I understand but I want you to have a place to leave him when your working, or you ever just want a break…please consider it."

"Thank you m'lord, your ladyship." Carson preempted his wife and decided to agree for her. I think it sounds wonderful."

…..

In the end, Elsie was surprised by the wealth of the family's generosity but very upset at her husband for having agreed to something she didn't want. After a moment of hesitation the Lord and Lady had welcomed them and their news with open arms. In the end, the four had settled on the following: a revised work schedule for Elsie, discretion for now (as Robert and Cora had understood why they'd want to inform everyone else on their own time), childcare and a built in friend for the baby, and finally, it had been decided that Mrs. Patmore (accompanied by Anna) would be sent to see an eye specialist in London within the next few days.

The last thing had surprised even Carson, and made Elsie feel a little bit better about the whole situation.

"I have one condition." Robert had said. The term condition, made Elsie kind of nervous and it perplexed Cora and Carson until he explained. "You can't continue living downstairs now. It isn't right. Before the child comes, I will find you a cottage not far from here." It was exactly what they'd wanted all this time, and in some way, seemed too good to be true.

"I hope you're not angry with me." Carson said as they made their way back downstairs. "It's the right thing, the nanny, you know what we were both thinking…" They'd never discussed it, but he knew they'd both considered it. "We were thinking of making Daisy care for him when we were busy and we can't manage doing that it's not realistic."

"No it's not." She admitted quietly.

"Then, what's wrong?"

Elsie sighed as they approached the green baize door.

"It's just that…this child Lady Grantham's child, he's going to be a lord if he's a boy, and our child is not that…"

"He can be whatever he likes."

"Yes, we can give him far better opportunities than my parents gave me and I am proud of that. This little one will have a better childhood and brighter future than I did…I just don't want him to be crushed by having such a different life than his friend, that's all. You see Charlie, I'm going to teach him or her that there's so much more to life than these walls and that his life, his future is anything he wants it to be. He doesn't have to farm or to serve or anything just because his family before him did. He could be anything and his future is out there somewhere, far from here." She smiled brightly, her heart fluttering at the thought.

Carson froze, not knowing what to think about this. He wanted his child to have a good life but didn't know if he agreed with her on all of that. Elsie kissed his cheek sweetly before going down the stairs, leaving him standing there in a daze.