Chapter 5: Trims, Ferns and Turns

Jessica was roused by a banging on her door, a full forty-five minutes before her usual wake up time. It was late December now, and so this early there was no light at all to be had through the meagre window to her room. She looked with some annoyance toward the source of the noise, and tried to find the place to put her larynx to get Samson’s tones.

“Who is it?” She called, her voice cracking a little.

“It’s Frank.” Came the reply. “You decent? I’ve got something to show you.”

“You woke me up.” Jessica complained. “No, I’m not decent. Give me a few minutes.”

“Right you are.” Frank replied. “But don’t take too long, this basin’s heavy.”

Perplexed as to what exactly the boots might have brought her a basin for, Jessica got up and hurried put her clothes on as quickly as she could. The corset was a pain, and she considered forgoing it, but the notion of what conniptions her feminine chest beneath her masculine face might send Frank into made her think better of it.

She switched on the electric light, thankful that Lord Ashwater’s push to electrify the house had extended to the servant’s quarters and saved Frank a further wait while she lit the gas, and pulled open the door.

“What?” She asked, brusquely.

“Lemme come in and I’ll explain.” Frank fired back, struggling under the weight of a basin of water. He himself was half-dressed, wearing only the shirt and trousers from his own day outfit and sporting a rather pathetic tinge of stubble around his jawline. His hair wasn’t brushed, and there was some kind of box like a cigar case sticking out of his pocket.

“Very well.” Jessica stood aside and let the boy bustle in and put down the basin on her dresser. Her own was underneath but she presumed Frank hadn’t wanted to wait for her to fill it after being told what to do.

“Right then.” Frank said briskly. “I do apologise for knockin’ you up this early but there’s a matter of grave importance I wished to bring to your attention.” He pointed toward Jessica’s jaw. “And it is that right there.”

Jessica attempted to look down, but saw only Frank’s outstretched finger. The boy grabbed and tipped the dresser’s mirror so she could peer in at where he was pointing.

A thin lining of orange fuzz adorned Jessica’s face. She’d noticed it peeking through before, two days ago, but now that it had appeared it had evidently established itself very quickly. Frozen in shock, she rang her finger along the patchy beard again and again, feeling its alien softness and taking in how instantly masculinising it was on her face.

“Her ladyship don’t much like it when our facial hair’s too untidy.” Frank explained, softly. “I’m thinking you’ve been being let off a little, on account of your… circumstances, and what with you working out of doors. But sooner or later Rathbone’ll have you for that. Better to shave it now. I figured you probably don’t have kit of your own so I thought I’d let you borrow mine.”

“I, um….” Jessica mumbled, still looking into the mirror and down at the basin. “I appreciate it. Thank you, Frank.”

“Don’t mention it.” Frank took the cigar-case box out of his pocket and presented it to her. Jessica put her hand on the box and made eye contact with the boy over it. They stayed there, frozen for a moment, each looking at the other with an uncomfortable grimace, seemingly daring each other to ask the obvious question first. Frank opened his mouth a couple of times, seemingly trying to formulate his words, then stuttered out:

“D’you need someone to tea-”

“Yes!” Jessica breathed in relief. “Please. I’ve never really-”

“Right that’s what I thought, but you know, I didn’t wanter be presumptious.”

“No not at all! It’s fine! I mean, when would I have ever-”

“You’d be surprised! Some of the companies sell to ladies now, for body hair and the like.”

“Well.” Jessica said firmly. “I’ve never done anything like that, so if you could kindly instruct me in this particular art, Frank, I’d be ever so grateful.”

“Right.” Frank said, rolling up his sleeves decisively. “Why don’t I go first, seeing as I need it too, and you can watch, and then you can have a go, hm?”

“All right.” Jessica said, stepping aside so that the boy could stand in front of the dresser.

“Oh right, we’re gonner need soap as well. I forgot to bring that. Do you have some?” Frank said as he placed the cigar box on the dresser beside the basin.

“In the top drawer.” Jessica replied helpfully.

“Good. Okay, so. Reason I wanted to get to you before Rathbone, aside from saving you a hidin’, is if he taught you he’d no doubt make you use a straight razor, what you might call a regular razor, like you’ve seen yer dad use maybe.”

“My dad’s dead.” Jessica corrected. “So I never really saw him do normal dad things. But I’ve seen men on the market buying the kind of razor you mean. With the big blade and the hinge? I didn’t know there were other kinds.”

“Ah, that’s where folk like you an’ me are forever in the debt of one Mr King Camp Gillette of the United States!” Frank proclaimed dramatically. “The inventor of this little device here, what he calls the safety razor.” He opened the cigar box and produced an odd T-shaped device with a metal handle that Jessica had never seen before.

“If you look here, see.” Frank showed her the head of the razor. “It’s got removable, disposable blades, protected by a guard. You have to buy replacement blades, of course, but for my money that’s much simpler than havin’ to get them stropped or doin’ it myself. And with the guard, folks who’re still young, like me; and folks who’re new to shaving, like you- we’re a lot less likely to cut ourselves. First time with a straight razor I sliced myself up like a Christmas ham.”

“Hmm.” Jessica raised her eyebrows. “How expensive was it?”

“Mine was second hand. A new one’ll run you a pound and fifteen shillings.” Frank grimaced. “Though most razors are more than a little dear. And it comes with seven blades.”

“I can afford that, so long as it’s around for a good long time.” Jessica winced herself, but she knew that dipping into her princely salary for this expensive piece of equipment was ultimately something she could do, and more to the point, something she would need to do. “I probably can’t get into town until Friday, though. Can I borrow yours until then?”

“’course.” Frank assented. “Now, are you watching?”

Jessica showed that she was and Frank took the soap and began lathering it, before spreading the suds over his prickly jaw.

“It works better with the suds on.” He said. “Technically you can do it with just your jaw and the razor wet, but you’re more likely to cut yourself that way. Better to use soap. There are soaps specially for shaving if you’d like, and they’re better, but I tend to use just regular soap personally since I’m not made of money.”

“All right.” Jessica wondered if she should be writing this all down.

“Now then.” Frank said, clad in a comical beard of soap suds. “We take the razor, like so, we check it has a blade in, like so, and then you simply go like this.” He scraped the edge of the razor against his neck in a downward motion, washing it in the basin frequently. Jessica watched with interest as the soap suds were scraped away in bands, like a field being tilled, leaving almost nothing of the thin black hairs that had adorned the boy’s face before.

“You can get a closer shave if you go against the hair, see?” Frank said, his tone strained because of how tight he was holding his throat. “So on the neck that’d be upwards instead of downwards, but it’s not worth it in my opinion. You get close enough for neatness going down and if you cut it too close it’ll hurt like the blazes growin’ back.”

“Noted.” Jessica said in a non-committal tone. She briefly considered if she should shave the ‘wrong’ way to try and reclaim some of her lost femininity, but decided against it. It might invite criticism from Frank to do it in front of him, and what was the use really? The damn stuff was going to keep growing back, so she’d really be doing nothing but inconveniencing and hurting herself.

“Now.” Said Frank, upon finishing shaving his neck. “It’s a life of early starts in service, as I’m sure I don’t need to tell you. So what I like to do when I get to my face is to start with the cheeks and work inward on the jaw each side, leaving the chin, and then I do the chin and up to my mouth, see, and then my upper lip. That way, you see, if I’m interrupted before I finish, I still have what looks kinda like a respectable preened set o’ whiskers like what a gentleman might have.” He frowned in the mirror. “Well, not really I suppose, since it’s all short and patchy. But I can get away with that with just a dirty look from old Breadcrust, and you probably could too. Maybe even better.” As he spoke he began shaving his face from ears to chin on each side. Jessica watched intently, almost anticipating an exam of some sort.

“Are you pressing down?” She asked, with some trepidation.

“Naw.” Frank replied. “That’s what you don’t wanner do. Easy to cut yourself if you apply any pressure, even with the safety razor. Just make sure it’s touchin’ your skin and slide it.”

Jessica nodded as she watched on. This wasn’t as complicated as she had feared, but it still seemed an incredible bother to have to concern oneself with every morning.

Frank gasped, swore and jerked. As the razor left his face, a tiny drop of crimson blossomed.

“I, er, meant to do that.” He joked. “To show you, see? That still happens occasionally. I check in the mirror if it’s deep enough to need urgent attention… doesn’t look like it. So I ignore it and carry on shaving. It’s the kind that’ll probably go away with a bit of washing, that’s all.” He carried on shaving, and Jessica noticed he began stretching the skin on his jaw with his hand.

“Is the stretching necessary?” She asked.

“Most places no.” He replied. “But it’s difficult to get all the hair along your jawbone specifically unless you stretch it a little. Wouldn’t recommend it on places like your neck though, you’ll just cut yourself.”

“Hm.” She nodded, watching him finish shaving his jaw and start on his chin. On Frank the moustache he was effecting looked a little ridiculous, she thought, but examining herself in the mirror she wondered if it might not look better on her. Ludicrous as it seemed to contemplate, her beard was a little thicker and longer than his already. There might be something to shaving in Frank’s sections.

“Almost done.” Frank said, as he took the razor to his upper lip. “Be careful with this bit- the skin’s very thin up here so you can easily cut yourself. And unfortunately it will hurt just a little. Oh, and right up near your nose, that’s where you do want to shave against the hairs, or you won’t get ‘em all.” He demonstrated what he meant, turning the razor upside down and pulling the handle towards the sky to get the hairs right under his nose. “Be really careful there, cause if you cut yourself it’ll be more than a wash job.” He finished up shaving, splashed his face with water to remove the rest of the soap and wash off the blood, and then rinsed the razor in the basin. He unscrewed the top and replaced the blade with one from a ridge in the case, and then handed it to Jessica.

“Your turn.” He said.

Jessica blinked in surprise and mild panic. She gingerly took the handle of the razor from Frank and stepped forward to the dresser, looking at her fuzzy chin in the mirror with some trepidation.

“Soap first.” Frank reminded helpfully.

“Right.” Jessica picked up the slippery bar and started lathering, dabbing the suds onto her neck and chin with little real conviction and shooting sidelong glances at Frank throughout until he finally gave a satisfied nod. She swapped the soap for the razor and gingerly scraped it down her upper neck.

“That’s it!” Frank said encouragingly. “Look at the difference!”

Jessica examined the trail of the razor in the mirror. True enough the slight orange fuzz that had been there under her chin was gone. Emboldened, she scraped again beside it, and then again further aside.

“Don’t forget to rinse.” Frank was obviously trying to suppress his instinct to lunge in and direct her by hand.

“Oh, right.” Jessica washed the head of the razor in the basin and returned to shaving her neck. As a newcomer to facial hair, the coverage on her neck was less complete than Frank’s, and in a minute or so she was satisfied with how bare she had managed to render it.

“So… you said cheeks now, and jaw, then chin, then upper lip?” She tried to remember what Frank had told her.

“That’s right.” Frank replied. “Though that’s just how I like to do it.”

“I don’t know, it sounds sensible.” Jessica put the razor just under her earlobe and began scraping down. With her neck under her belt, she felt she had a good handle on how this shaving thing worked now, and was proceeding much faster, though as she went she saw blooms of red forming on her throat that suggested she hadn’t been quite so proficient as she’d thought. Pressing on and rinsing the razor frequently, she quickly managed to reduce the soap suds to a thin line around her jaw and a comical faux-goatee about her mouth.

There was a sensation of dryness that Jessica found rather paradoxical setting in on her neck, but she pressed on, scraping the hair away from her chin and lower lip.

“Careful how you go there.” Frank cautioned. “The skin round there is very thin.”

“Uh-huh.” Jessica grunted, all she could manage while engaged in such a delicate operation. To her relief, she seemed to get away with shaving those areas without a painful accident, and the stretching to make sure her jaw was bare wasn’t that much more difficult. When it came time to shave the sides of her mouth, however, she yelped and pulled the razor away, a drop of blood straining the blade.

“Ah.” Said Frank apologetically. “Yeah, that’ll happen. It’s easy for the hair to get hidden in the creases round there, see, and stretching it by makin’ an O with your mouth leaves the skin very vulnerable. Very tempting to press too hard. Leave that be while you do the other side, and if it ends up not a wash job I can run and get a rag.”

Jessica reluctantly complied, carefully shaving the other side of her mouth, trying to get all the patches without cutting herself again. Eventually she was finished, and washed the razor- and then her bleeding face and neck- in the water. She looked at herself in the mirror to see the effect leaving the orange fuzz on her top lip had had.

“This might not be what you wanner hear.” Frank said quietly. “But it don’t look half bad.”

Jessica was forced to agree. The moustache seemed to look quite natural and fitting on her forcibly masculised boy-face. She imagined that if she brushed her hair she might even look a little distinguished. Certainly it made her look less like a child, she thought, though admittedly its powers were limited to simply making her look more like a young man her age rather than Frank’s.

“Do you think I should keep it?” She faltered.

“Up to you.” Frank deferred. “But I’ll say you can pull it off way better than I can. And I mean… well, I couldn’t say how it is for you, it’s such an odd thing ‘er ladyship’s making you do, but what’s one more costume piece? You were hardly dressing like you’d normally do before, and it does make you look a lot more respectable. And…” He adopted a conspiratorial tone. “Not to suggest anything about how long you’ll be doing this, but something I’ve observed about men with ginger hair and whiskers is, it often keeps you looking younger, longer. Looks like a young man’s game for whatever reason, like you’re only a few years older than me. And you are, obviously, but I mean you’ll keep looking that way for quite a while.”

“Oh. Well then.” Jessica said, her voice wobbling a bit as a little voice inside her balked at the decision. “Let’s give it a trial, shall we?”

“You don’t sound very sure.”

“I’m not, but it’s almost dawn and we’ve got work to be getting to. We both still need to get dressed and smarted up.”

“Right you are, Mister Hocking sir.” Frank sprang into action as the reminder sank in. “Shall I take the basin then?”

“Yes, and presumably you’ll want your razor and it’s box.”

“Yeah I’ll just pack those up before I go. If you’ve just started this whole hair business you probably won’t need one tomorrow, but maybe on Thursday I’ll knock you up again.” Frank babbled.

“Sounds good.” Jessica replied, gesturing to shoo the boy from her room before she started getting properly dressed.

Frank gathered up his things and, wobbling again under the weight of the basin, staggered out of her room and away down the corridor. Jessica shut the door. She waited for a moment, before daring to peek into the dresser mirror again. She hated to admit it, but this was the first time she’d understood what the other maids had meant when they called her a handsome young man…

---

Jessica winced as she knocked on the door to Lady Ashwater’s chambers. Her new facial adornment had not gone unnoticed when her Ladyship had ventured down to the greenhouse before lunch, and the invitation to bring some potted plants appropriate for indoor environs up to the master bedroom had been expanded to include an entreaty to “bring your downstairs equipment, Samson.” She wasn’t looking forward to having to navigate this latest salacious demand from her employer.

Since the initial encounter in the glass house Jessica had been made to fuck Lady Ashwater twice more; once in her potting shed and once in Lord Ashwater’s smoking room, which had had to be specially unlocked by Mr Rathbone. This last occurrence had frayed Jessica’s nerves to shreds, especially since she’d received a suspicious look from Rathbone as she was leaving, and quite a venomous one from Grace the scullery maid, who she’d initially hoped she’d been on good terms with despite their minimal interaction. She was not excited to have to further debase herself to keep her job.

The door opened, revealing Lady Ashwater in a bottle green sleeping gown that Jessica felt a pang of envy for. At least, she hoped it was envy. The older woman looked Jessica up and down, taking in her smartened hair and the trio of plant pots on the tray she held, alongside a wrapped brown paper package, and smiled.

“Ah, Samson! Just on time. And very smart, very handsome. Come in and tell me about these flowers.”

Jessica did as she was told, ferrying the pots in. She cast about the well-appointed room for a surface. The curtains were drawn on the great window, so the only illumination remaining was the electric sconces.

“Begging your pardon, Ma’am, but these pots are very heavy and I fear I might drop them if I have to show you them from the tray, might I have somewhere to put it down?”

“Oh yes of course Samson! You can put them down there on the dresser as long as you keep the tray under them.” Lady Ashwater cooed.

Jessica did so, and the older woman bent over like some great bird to peer at the pots.

“Not much to see in this season.” She observed. “What will they be?”

“Um…” Jessica considered the pots herself. “That one is a lemon button fern. Or if you’d prefer something a little larger, ma’am, the second is a pygmy date palm, which will get quite wide in time. Or lastly, we have sweet pea here, for some colour.”

“Oh how precious.” Lady Ashwater simpered. “Let’s see. Could we put the sweet pea by the little window, and the date palm where there’s room for it by the big one? Oh why not all three- the lemon button can go up there, on top of the writing desk back.”

“As you wish, Ma’am.” Jessica picked up the pots and ferried them to the various indicated locations, keenly aware of her employer’s predatory eye on her form. When she had finished, Lady Ashwater crossed the room to the tray and picked up the brown paper package.

“Now then, Samson. You look so very smart, and handsome, with your new facial affectation, that I absolutely had to give you another special job today.”

“I see, Ma’am.” Jessica reluctantly took the package from her employer’s outstretched hand and unwrapped it to reveal the ivory device once again.

“Hmm. Not a very enthusiastic response.” Lady Ashwater frowned.

“Doesn’t your husband come home in a week, Ma’am?” Jessica deflected.

“He does, yes.” Lady Ashwater put a hand on each of Jessica’s shoulders. “And for a month thereafter shall I be denied the touch of a competent lover!”

Jessica was taken aback. “Surely he isn’t that bad, Ma’am?”

“His technique is passable, Samson, but you can tell his heart isn’t in it, and I worry I have aged into too much of an old hag to satisfy his attentions any more. I’ve long suspected his eye has wandered and he has, tragically, become unfaithful.”

Jessica made a very odd noise that sounded like a cross between an explosive sneeze and a yelp of surprise. Lady Ashwater looked over to see her employee’s moustache quivering with the effort of suppressing a snort of laughter.

“The irony isn’t lost on me, don’t worry Samson.” She said with a small smile. She strode gracefully over to the bed and spread herself over the bottle-green duvet. Her eyes landed on Jessica again.

“Now come on, boy. Won’t you help an old woman out?” She murmured sweetly.

With a sigh, Jessica complied. By this point she knew how to put on the ivory apparatus on her own, and with that done she crawled onto the bed, straddling Lady Ashwater. At least, she thought, this was one of the few areas her ladyship had been capable of expressing what she wanted in simple, definite terms. By now she knew just how her employer liked to be fucked.

“As you wish, Ma’am.”

---

“You are coming to the boxing day ball, aren’t you, Sam?”

It took Jessica a moment to realise that Harriet was talking to her. “Oh, um, probably not, Hattie.”

“Aw, why not?” Lottie looked up from the table.

“I can’t, really, Lot.” Jessica grimaced apologetically. “Look at me, I can’t take this all off just for boxing day. It’s not practical, like. Going down to the village is more a multiple day ordeal.”

“So come as you are!” said Catherine. “No reason Sam the gardener can’t come to the boxing day ball!”

“What? But what if I’m recognised, Cath?” Jessica yelped. “People in the village know my mum! If it got out that I’m a… well, a cross-dressing pervert… she’d disown me for sure!”

“Don’t take this the wrong way, Sam…” Harriet murmured. “But nobody’s going to recognise you in a month of Sundays.”

A stab of panic ran through Jessica’s frame. She felt like she didn’t believe Harriet, and it terrified her to think she’d be identified… but what if the older girl was right? That almost seemed more frightening, that she’d been completely taken over by Samson such that there was no recognisable part of Jessica left.

“Well…um…” She stammered “We went to maid school together, all of us. People are bound to ask where I am!”

“A problem of course neatly solved and definitely not exacerbated by you not being there at all.” Grace the scullery maid droned sarcastically from over by the sink.

Catherine nodded. “We’ll just tell whatever lie were were gonner make up anyway, and say if anyone makes the connection that you’re a cousin of some sort, only an estranged one; you and Jess didn’t even know ‘till you started workin’ together!”

Jessica flushed beet red and avoided the gazes of the various maids. “I can’t go as Sam, I… I don’t know the men’s parts to any dances!”

“Most of the dances are gonner be ragtime.” Catherine observed. “They don’t have different parts. And nobody but the olds are gonner do the quadrille. So that just leaves the waltz.”

“Waltz is almost the same too.” Harriet said briskly. “It’s all the same steps, you just have to hold her a little different and lead more often. But it’s just spinning. I can teach you that, Sam.”

Jessica looked up and blinked. “You can?”

“Yeah. Norm and I took a class together. It’s not hard, and honestly almost the same if you already know the woman’s part. But I’m too big for you. You’ll need a smaller partner. Lot or Marcie. Or Grace, if she’s up for it?”

“Another time maybe.” Grace said brusquely. “There’s dishes need doing.”

“Right.” Harriet turned to the younger women. “Girls? Volunteer?”

Marcia turned a colour that challenged Jessica’s crimson face. Lottie nervously got to her feet. “I can do it, I think.”

“Great.” Harriet said. She and Catherine worked to push the table aside and clear a space in the kitchen as Lottie stepped over to Jessica and the two clumsily got into hold. Harriet looked them over with an analytical eye and stepped in to manually adjust Jessica’s hands, before retreating to a safe distance.

“We can’t be having music, or Breadcrust’ll have our hides.” Harriet turned to Catherine. “Cath? Will you give us the time?”

“Awright.” Catherine turned to the awkward dancers. “Ready you two? One two three one two three one two three one two three…”

In a slight panic, Jessica tried to call on her limited Viennese waltz experience and invert it in her mind. Surely this couldn’t be that hard, right? After all, the woman went both ways in the waltz normally, so all the steps were the same, she just had to remember that it was her job to lead- and with squeaky little Lottie in her arms she wasn’t likely to forget that. She snatched a peek at the tiny girl’s youthful face. Compared to her own moustachioed mug, Lottie’s visage seemed impossibly young, when in truth she had less than a year on the smallest of the maids.

“Very good, you two!” Harriet called over Catherine’s counting. “How about a few fleckerls? Probably better in this space than trying to turn on the move.”

As she spun Lottie into the middle of the kitchen, Jessica took in the faces around her. Catherine’s frown of concentration. Harriet’s evaluatory furrow, preparing to step in the moment she screwed up one of the simple steps (she knew it would be the reverse turn, it was always the one that had given her trouble). Marcia’s blushing, moonlike face looking on with an odd, inscrutable expression. Grace’s almost contemptuous scowl. Jessica sighed, breathed in, and tried to concentrate on not tripping over Lottie’s feet. The waltz was a simple dance, but Harriet was a perfectionist; it would be a fair while before they were done here and she could retreat to the solace of her potting shed again.