Between themselves, Ev and Jessa called the scullery “The Dungeon,” not only because it
was a windowless stone room, but because this was where they were sent every time they
were caught breaking the rules. The kitchen, just outside the door, bustled with activity,
warmed by its open hearth, brick bake-oven and the many lanterns hanging from hooks
high on the walls. The scullery was cool, quiet and damp. Its single lantern cast angular
shadows from cans of milk and cream standing in a shallow stone trough along one side
of the room. An array of pots and buckets sat upside-down on racks along the opposite
wall. Shelves held cheeses and eggs, meats and vegetables, anything that needed chilling.
The cool dampness came from a small spring bubbling through a pipe in the wall at one
end of the trough and draining out the other end.
Their assignment was usually peeling potatoes, and this is exactly what they were
doing, seated on low wooden stools on either side of a large wooden bucket. Their
elbows rested on its rim and their small knives sent long brown curls of peel into its
depths. At least, Ev made long brown curls of peel. Jessa watched her friend’s slender,
brown hands working quickly and carefully at the same time, the way Ev did everything.
Jessa’s potatoes tended to shed their skins in ragged chunks. This was the third and final
day of their latest exile. Jessa grinned.
“What?” Ev asked her.
“The look on Sister Mattia’s face when she caught me in that dress!” Both girls
giggled quietly. It wouldn’t be a good idea to be heard by the other servants in the
kitchen.
“Oh, but Jessa,” Ev said, “It’s a beautiful dress!”
A new Widow had arrived four days before. The Widows were high-born women
whose husbands were dead and children grown. No longer useful to their families, they
often chose, or were forced, to retire to the Women’s Retreat House. They had rooms on
the upper floor, poor compared to the mansions and castles they came from, but
comfortable by the standards of this place. They prayed with the Sisters and most of them
worked in the embroidery room making robes and hangings for castles and churches.
They wore the same grey dress as the Sisters, although their veils were black.
The new Widow had brought two silk dresses for her journey to the Retreat House.
Ev and Jessa were given the job of cleaning and pressing them for sale in the market.
Jessa just couldn’t help herself. She had to try one on.
“Oh! You’re so beautiful! It matches your eyes!” Ev had exclaimed, raising her
work-worn hands to her mouth while her friend danced around the room, swirling the
brilliant blue skirt around her ankles. Jessa had pulled off the grey scarf that covered her
hair and tossed away the pins that imprisoned it in a tight bun. It billowed in a thick
golden curtain around her happy face. Sister Mattia had chosen that moment to walk in.
Ev went back to peeling potatoes while Jessa sighed and looked down at her rough
grey dress, the standard uniform of a servant in the Women’s Retreat House. “I wonder
what jewels she wore with that dress. Do you think she had sapphires that same shade of
blue? Set in worked silver? Around her neck and hanging from her ears?” she asked.
“Oh Jessa …,” Ev began, but stopped and turned toward the door. There was music
somewhere, just faintly audible, not the singing they did in the Women’s