Read the first page of The Light Years by Elizabeth Jane Howard

The day began at five to seven when the alarm clock (given to Phyllis by her mother when she started service) went off and on and on and on until she quenched it. Edna, in the other creaking iron bed, groaned and heaved over, hunching herself against the wall; even in summer she hated getting up, and in the winter Phyllis sometimes had to haul the bedclothes off her. She sat up, unclipped her hairnet and began undoing her curlers: it was her half-day, and she’d washed her hair. She got out of bed, picked the eiderdown off the floor where it had fallen in the night and drew the curtains. Sunlight refurbished the room—making toffee of the linoleum, turning the chips on the white enamel washstand jug slate blue. She unbuttoned her winceyette nightdress and washed as her mother had taught her to do: face, hands and—circumspectly—under her arms with a flannel dipped in the cold water. “Get a move on,” she said to Edna. She poured her slops into the pail and began to dress. In her underclothes, she removed her nightdress and slipped on her dark green cotton morning dress. She put her cap over her unbrushed-out sausage curls, and tied the apron around her waist. Edna, who washed much less in the mornings, managed to dress while still half in bed—a relic of the winter (there was no heat in the room and they never in their lives opened the window). By ten past seven they were both ready to descend quietly through the sleeping household. Phyllis stopped on the first floor and opened a bedroom door. She drew the curtains and heard the budgerigar shifting impatiently in his cage. “Miss Louise! It’s a quarter past seven.” “Oh, Phyllis!” “You asked me to call you.” “Is it a nice day?” “It’s ever so sunny.” “Take Ferdie’s cloth off.” “If I don’t, you’ll get up all the quicker.” In the kitchen (the basement), Edna had already put on the kettle and was setting their cups on the scrubbed table. Two pots of tea were to be made: the dark brown one with stripes for the maids, and a cup taken up by Edna for Emily, the cook, and the white Minton now set out on a tray with its matching cups and saucers, milk jug and sugar bowl for upstairs. The early-morning tea for Mr. and Mrs. Cazalet was Phyllis’s job. She would then collect all the coffee cups and glasses from the drawing room, which Edna would have started to air and clean. First, however, there was their own scalding cup of strong Indian. It was China for upstairs which Emily said she couldn’t even abide the smell of, let alone drink. They drank it standing, before the sugar was even stirred to melting point. “How’s your spot?” Phyllis felt the side of her nose cautiously. “Seems to be going down a bit. Good thing I didn’t squeeze it.” “I told you.” Edna, who did not have them, was the authority on spots; her advice, copious, free and contrary, was, all the same comforting; it showed an interest, Phyllis felt. “Well, this won’t make us millionaires.” Nothing would, Edna thought gloomily, and even though she had troubles with her complexion, Phyllis had all the luck. Edna thought Mr. Cazalet was lovely really, and she never saw him in his pajamas like Phyllis did every morning.