Story: Veronica and Aunt Miranda. Chapter 1.

by Jackie J

“Veronica? Veronica, what are you looking at?”

“Nothing. Nothing, sorry. Was I staring? Pass me the sauce please, Miranda.”

Miranda chuckled passing the sauce boat. 

“Nothing? You have been watching Jane all evening. It’s the same whenever you come to stay with me. I meant to ask you about it the last time you were here at Lowercroft. Does she fascinate you, Veronica? What could keep you engrossed about a maid going about her work? I fail to understand."

Following their meal and sat in the parlour having drinks Miranda watched Veronica’s eyes dart to the doorway when Jane entered with her tray and a soft smile grow across Veronica’s face watching Miranda’s maid curtsy.

“Clean glasses for you, Miss.”

Jane left the room and Miranda stared across at her niece watching the maid leave.


“So what is it with the maid, Veronica? What is it, a penny for your thoughts?”

Veronica laughed. 

“You wouldn’t believe me if I told you. It’s ridiculous really.”

Miranda leaned forward in her chair.

“Now I am even more intrigued. You must tell me, you simply must, Veronica.”

Veronica leaned forward and spoke in a hushed tone.

“It’s silly. Really, auntie, it really is. You mustn’t tell anyone, you really mustn’t. Mother would be distraught if she knew. Promise you won’t say anything.”

Miranda made her promise to keep what Veronica was going to tell her to herself then listened hiding a smirk whilst her young niece explained her fascination with the maid.

Veronica sat back and took a gulp of her sherry.

“There. So that’s it auntie, I have said it now.”

Miranda took a more reserved sip of her sherry looking at Veronica with incredulity at what she had heard. 

“You are the heiress to the Singleton fortune. Your father owns half the land in the county. You have not long returned from a finishing school in Switzerland, you will soon be found a suitor, you wear the finest clothes and have the whole world at your feet... And you tell me, I still cannot believe it by the way, that you envy my maid, the uniform she wears here at Lowercroft and would gladly trade places with her to become a maid? I would put those silly thoughts right out of your head, young lady, right out. Your mother would be mortified and rightly so! Madness, absolute madness!”

Veronica, fearing her auntie would tell her mother what she had told her pleaded with Miranda.

“Please, Miranda, you promised not to say anything!”

Miranda smiled.

“Don’t worry. I won’t. Your little secret is safe with me.”

The clock above the hearth struck ten and Miranda yawned.

“Come on, Veronica. Ten o’clock. Time for bed. You have a long journey ahead of you tomorrow and I suggest you put that nonsense you have just told me about out of your head completely.”

Miranda’s sister, Veronica’s mother Lady Elizabeth Singleton, held court at Latchwood, the family pile on their estate in Wiltshire. Elizabeth and Miranda were close well into their early twenties. David Singleton was about to leave the army when Miranda met the dashing young officer but like everything her elder sister wanted she got. Miranda could never prove her sister’s involvement but David went very cold towards Miranda and Elizabeth and David were soon engaged and subsequently married. Inheriting his father’s title and wealth, Lord and Lady Singleton lived a cosseted and privileged life. Elizabeth had worked hard and succeeded in becoming the most boorish conceited snob one could imagine and never missed an opportunity, with anyone unfortunate enough to listen, to wax lyrical about her little princess, her ever so pretty and clever little treasure Veronica. Even at 20, Veronica would be dressed in frills and bows by her mother when guests were at Latchwood. Apart from her perfect daughter Lady Singleton’s other topics of conversation was how rich her family was and deriding the working class.

Miranda had settled in the north, having married an ambitious and successful owner of several coal mines but a tragic and catastrophic disaster at one of the colliers robbed her of her husband and the opportunity to start a family of her own. Elizabeth was not happy with her precious daughter travelling up north, not wishing her to be corrupted and sullied by coarse northerners. But, at the pleading of Veronica, visits to her sisters at Lowercroft were allowed. Of course, it was not as palatial as Latchwood but never the less an impressive residence by any standards and deemed suitable by Lady Singleton for her little princess.

Veronica had visited her auntie numerous times for short stays, often no more than a week, happy to get away from the claustrophobic atmosphere and her fussing mother at Latchwood. With no children of her own, Miranda enjoyed having Veronica's visits but was becoming increasingly irritated by stories of her sister and what an awful snob she had become. 

Sat at her vanity gazing into the large mirror whilst she combed out her hair Miranda smiled recounting the revelations her niece had made. Her sister’s precious little princess stripping herself of her frills and bows to become a common maid. Elizabeth would surely die of shame if she knew, especially if a wilful Veronica actually realised such a degrading and demeaning ambition! 

Year 1896 yielded one of the best harvests for many years and Lord and Lady Singleton celebrated the increased rents from their tenant farmers coupled with renewed contracts from the military by throwing a ridiculously lavish ball at Latchwood. Miranda had politely refused any previous invites from her sister but Veronica had written to her and on this occasion she relented.

All Miranda’s previous reservations concerning visiting her sister and husband were borne out. Elizabeth was particularly obnoxious and what made Miranda incandescent with withheld and hidden rage was when she, Elizabeth’s sister, was told to address Elizabeth and David as Lord and Lady. Through gritted teeth Miranda complied. Yes, Lady Elizabeth, of course, Lady Elizabeth. Miranda’s sister took great pleasure from her younger sister’s deference and by association Elizabeth’s superiority of her in front of her many guests. Miranda noticed that Veronica was disappointingly quite different back in her gilded cage of Latchwood, pretty, prissy and precocious in her frills and bows, she was no doubt being touted by her mother for a suitable union with an eligible suitor.

Watching Veronica being sashayed from group to group by her mother, the shy coy flower being exhibited by Elizabeth was not the young woman Miranda recognised from her visits to Lowercroft. Could a good marriage ever be worth the sacrifice? 

Miranda could not wait to leave and the morning following the ostentatious gathering she was packed and ready to return north after her three day stay at Latchwood, swearing never to return. Elizabeth had no doubt taken great pleasure in humiliating her in front of her friends although Miranda thought perhaps her Sister would be less high and mighty when trying to arrange a suitable marriage with a common maid for a daughter.  

During the journey back from Latchwood to Lowercroft Miranda brooded on Veronica’s secret desires to trade her privileged life for that of a common maid. Prior to her niece’s departure from Lowercroft, following her most recent stay, Miranda had quite forcibly sought to dissuade her young niece from such a folly.  During the final stages of her journey Miranda was now actively contemplating facilitating such strange ambitions instead.

Miranda chuckled reconciling that it would benefit Veronica by flushing such bizarre thoughts from her head once and for all by witnessing the true hardship and rigor of a maid's life first hand, experiencing the drudgery, physical demands and the constant unquestioning obedience and servility to one's betters being at the beck and call of a household's Mistress.

The true motivation for such a contrived and devilish scheme however was wishing to see her sister’s face when she realises her precious little princess had willingly reduced herself to the rank of a common housemaid. Perhaps if Veronica was stupid enough having the pretty thing indentured to her residence at Lowercroft, Elizabeth would have to beg Miranda to release her maid, her daughter from her service. 

Three months passed and Miranda had given her fantasy of embarrassing her sister's little treasure further thought. Her scheming had been an amusing distraction on the journey back to Lowercroft but nothing more. Indeed the whole matter would have been forgotten completely but for Miranda’s meeting with her new housekeeper Mrs Robinson, who herself had only joined Lowercroft the month before. Jane, Miranda’s maid, was to leave Lowercroft in the spring. Jane had been in the service at Lowercroft for seven years and had carried out her duties without cause for complaint in all that time. Replacing and training a new maid to fill Jane’s shoes would be no simple task.

Working through Jane’s file Miranda smiled at her maid’s agreement, an indenture that Miranda, given Jane’s exemplary service, would have no issues with releasing her from and indeed signed off the release clause during her musings.

At Latchwood Veronica was bored, which manifested itself in petulance with which Veronica’s self-centred mother was becoming increasingly irritated.  Veronica felt she was just waiting, but waiting for what, for her mother to select a suitable husband for her? She was tired of being trouped off to social gatherings by her mother making polite meaningless conversation with the families and sons of prosperous acquaintances of her family. Much to the frustration of Elizabeth Veronica categorically refused to accept any of the chinless wonders she had been introduced to. Having read the letter she had received that morning many times over Veronica giggled in the privacy of her bed chamber. Aunt Miranda had not forgotten her confession. Hiding the letter at the back of one of her drawers the smile did not leave her face all day.

At dinner that evening Elizabeth commented on the obvious change of mood in her daughter.

“What is it Veronica? You seem particularly pleased with yourself today for a change. I cannot remember the last time I saw you smile.”

Veronica knew her mother would never agree but raised the subject anyway.

“It’s Auntie Miranda. She says I can go to stay with her if I wish, for the whole summer.”

Elizabeth looked across the table at her husband and laughed.

“Summer, in the north, they don’t have summers up there do they? Such a bleak place. Why on earth would anyone in their right mind want to go to the north?”

It was only the answer Veronica expected from her mother. She never had a good word for the north or indeed, for that matter, her sister.

Veronica was not amused by her mother’s derogatory comment and was quite annoyed when her father also chuckled at the prospect of heading north for the summer months.

“Well, you may not like the north but I am minded to go. I need a change of scenery. I am so bored with nothing to do here.”

Elizabeth frowned at Veronica.

“Minded or not you will do no such thing, my girl”

Veronica huffed leaving the table and dining room with her meal half-eaten.

Elizabeth was about to follow her petulant daughter but David stopped her.

“Elizabeth, stop. It might not be a bad idea to let her go to stay with her aunt. Veronica has only stayed there for a week at a time before, if she gets a real taste of life in the north, over a full summer, I am sure she will be begging to come back home.”

Having retaken her seat Elizabeth and David finished their meal over which they agreed that Veronica could take up Miranda’s invitation.

What a change when Elizabeth gave her blessing for her daughter to go and stay with her aunt for the whole summer. Veronica hugged her mother.

“Really? I can go for the whole summer? Thank you mother, thank you!”    

Left alone Veronica retrieved the letter from her aunt and smiled, she was being offered the opportunity to replace Jane, the maid she had watched at her work during her stays at Lowercroft. It was to be their secret and Veronica must tell no one. As requested in the letter, Veronica set about writing out her application for the vacancy. Veronica’s aunt’s letter, to make things real for Veronica, had been quite instructive how to proceed if she wished to join her staff. She was a girl down on her luck and her letter should be addressed to Mrs Robinson, the house keeper at Lowercroft. She could use her own name but would be called Ronnie whilst in service.  Veronica’s excitement grew with every fictitious sentence she wrote. She was in service at Latchwood and was being let go due to hardship of the family she served. She lied about her skills, of which she had few, and she signed the letter with a flourish, Ronnie. 

Veronica had not been idle waiting for her aunt's reply, having discretely taken more notice of the maids working at Latchwood, not that she hadn’t before but over the previous two weeks more so.

The letter she had been expecting eventually arrived not from her aunt Miranda but from Mrs Robinson.  Veronica chuckled at the conditions stipulated in the enclosed agreement of service that she was to sign and bring with her, the start date given to be the twelfth of May, in three weeks time.

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