Inherit the Skies (11 page)

Amos had gone to open the door and she returned to the kitchen untying the strings of her apron as she went.

‘Ah, Amos, we haven't interrupted your supper I hope?' she heard Gilbert say.

‘No. No, we had that some long time ago,' Amos said placidly and she experienced a fresh desire to strike him. Surely with the evidence of supper still on the table he could have had the sense to pretend they had only just finished! She bustled forward, bad temper conflicting with the lifelong habit of ingratiating herself with ‘ the gentry' she so despised.

‘Good evening, Mr Morse. You'll excuse the mess, I hope. We've been so busy talking I'm all behind hand.'

‘I wouldn't even notice, Mrs Pugh,' Gilbert said equably. ‘May we come in?'

‘Well yes – do!'

‘Now, this is Sarah. You know Sarah, Mrs Pugh?'

Bertha lowered her eyes from the tall figure of Gilbert to the child at his side. She looked very small and forlorn standing there clutching a reticule and somehow the contrived neatness of her added to her vulnerability. Her hair was tied up with a length of slightly crumpled ribbon, her pinafore was freshly washed and starched and there was a shine on her boots as if she had spent a very long time making them presentable. But as Bertha scrutinized her the small firm chin came up and the eyes that met hers held a look that might almost be defiance.

She's a little madam, I can see! Bertha thought. Aloud she said, ‘I understand you want us to take her in, Mr Morse.'

‘Yes. It's a great deal to ask, I know, but Sarah has no relations she knows of and nowhere to go. The Sticklands, her neighbours, have been taking care of her since her mother died but they don't have the room to make a permanent arrangement of it and unless some kind soul will give Sarah a home she will have to go into the Union until she is old enough to go into service. I'm sure none of us would want that for her. She has lost enough without having to leave her friends and familiar surroundings to go and live among strangers in … well, less than ideal conditions.'

Bertha gathered herself together, bristling slightly. Easy to see how Mr Morse had talked Amos into agreeing to his suggestion; he would not get around her so easily!

‘Don't think I'm not sympathetic, Mr Morse – I am,' she began. ‘But we're not used to children here. Amos is out all day and I …' she gave a little laugh, ‘I've got my hands full. Wouldn't she be better off in a family where there are others her age? There must be somebody who …'

Gilbert Morse's elegant head tilted slightly as if he was perturbed.

‘I was rather relying on you, Mrs Pugh. I gave the matter a great deal of thought before I approached your husband and I could think of no-one more suitable than yourselves. You have the room and Sarah won't be any trouble, I know. And there is something else,' he went on, lifting his hand to brook what had promised to be Bertha's interruption then letting it fall protectively around Sarah's thin shoulders, ‘I really would like Sarah to be close enough to the house for me to keep an eye on her. Sarah's mother, as you know, worked for us for a good many years and I feel a sense of responsibility towards her. If Sarah is nearby I shall be able to take a hand, perhaps, in her upbringing. A sort of honorary guardian, if you understand me. I'd like to make it clear I have no intention of simply depositing her at your door and taking no further interest. Sarah needs us – all of us. We are not going to fail her, are we?'

‘Well …' Most of the wind had gone out of Bertha's sails. Almost without her realising it Gilbert had done exactly what she had accused Amos of allowing him to do – cleverly taken the very line which was most likely to penetrate her defences. Bertha cherished a high opinion of her own innate goodness and she was anxious that others should know what a generous and kindly soul she was at heart, if not a fool – no, certainly not that. Taking in an orphaned child was an act of charity which would impress all her neighbours, Bertha felt certain. Besides this there was an element of snobbery in her make-up which had only grown more dogged as her ambition to ‘better herself' had been more irrevocably thwarted. If Mr Morse himself was to take an interest in Sarah's upbringing then there would be an element of social contact the prospect of which Bertha found quite irresistible.

‘I suppose we could manage it,' she said, cradling her heavy chins in the palm of her hand and eyeing Sarah critically. ‘Like I say there's no provision for children in the house and she'd have to be prepared to muck in and help with whatever wants doing. If you think she'd do that …'

‘Of course she would, wouldn't you, Sarah?' He patted her shoulder, smiling at her encouragingly, but Sarah stood mute, her lower lip rucked by her teeth. ‘It's uncommonly good of you, Mrs Pugh, I must say. You won't regret it, I'm certain.'

Bertha was unable to resist one last stab. ‘I hope not, Mr Morse.'

He straightened. ‘That's settled then. Run out and get your other bag from the motor, Sarah.'

She did as he bid and when she had gone Gilbert Morse said swiftly: ‘There's one more thing. I'll make you an allowance to meet the child's keep, Mrs Pugh, but I'd rather she did not know about that.' He pulled out a wad of bank notes and pressed them into the astonished Bertha's hand. ‘That should cover her food and perhaps buy any clothes she may need. It seems to me she has very few possessions. Now …' As Sarah's returning footsteps clattered on the yard, ‘put it away and not a word to Sarah.'

The child reappeared in the doorway clutching a small suitcase of scuffed brown leather. Gilbert smiled at her encouragingly.

‘Come along in now, Sarah, and don't be afraid. Mr and Mrs Pugh will be kind to you I am sure.'

Bertha sniffed. Forlorn she might look, alone in the world she might be but fear was not an emotion she would have thought of attributing to the child whom Mr Morse seemed determined to foist upon them.

‘I'll have to make up a bed for her,' she said. ‘You had better come with me, Sarah, and I'll show you where it is.'

The room was small but painstakingly furnished; for it not to have been would have offended Bertha's sensibilities though she could not remember the last time anyone had used it. There was a tall narrow wardrobe, a matching chest of drawers and a marble-topped wash stand holding a jug and basin, a soap dish and a small china pot for hair pins. The wallpaper blazed with overblown cabbage roses, a large maidenhair fern in a pot sat on top of the chest of drawers and a framed worked sampler and a picture of Jesus, arms outstretched, with the text ‘Suffer the Little Children to Come Unto Me' hung from the picture rail.

The picture brought a lump to Sarah's throat for it reminded her all too clearly that her mother, though not a little child, had gone to Jesus.

That was how Dolly Stickland had put it to her on the night that Rachel had died.

‘Don't cry – don't cry!' she had said, clutching Sarah so close to her ample bosom that Sarah could scarcely breathe. ‘She's gone to Jesus, my love. She's gone to a better place.'

But she had been crying herself, great noisy gulps and snuffles, and Sarah had been bewildered by the sentiments. How could her mother have gone to a better place? What could be better than Chewton Leigh in summertime? And if Jesus was all loving and all knowing as she had been taught in Sunday School, why had he taken Rachel when she did not want to go and when Sarah needed her so? Sarah's head ached from thinking about it, her heart ached with a leaden grief that was almost too great to be borne and her throat ached with the tears she was desperately trying not to cry.

‘If you are going to stay here you'll have to do your bit,' Mrs Pugh said harshly. ‘I haven't got time to wait on you hand, foot and finger. You'll make your own bed in the mornings and you can help me get breakfast. Mr Pugh gets up early and he likes to come in to a good feed when milking is done. And I shall find some other jobs for you, so be warned. You could black the grate for me for a start. And dust round the place. Then there's the flag floor in the kitchen – that gets in a terrible state with all the tracking in and out. That could be your job – washing it down every morning with a bucket of soapy water and a scrubbing brush. Do you know how to scrub a floor?'

Sarah nodded, daunted but not intimidated, and Mrs Pugh's mouth tightened so that it almost disappeared in the mound of flesh that seemed to join her cheeks to her shoulders.

‘Well, I dare say what you don't know you'll soon learn. Now, you'd best have a good bath before you go to bed dirtying up the clean sheets.'

Sarah stared at her. Saturday night was bath night and in any case she was not dirty. She had a good strip down wash at the sink every morning and all that was necessary at night was to wash her hands, face and knees.

‘I don't need a bath!' she protested.

‘I'll be the judge of that, Miss. And you might as well know here and now I won't stand for any talking back. Children should be seen and not heard. That's how it was in my day and I don't reckon there's any call to change that now.'

A tin bath was brought into the kitchen and kettles set to boil on the open range. Mr Pugh went out for a last look around the farmyard but to Sarah's discomfort Mrs Pugh remained, watching as Sarah took off her neatly patched underwear, folded it and placed it on a chair, and tutting at the child's thinness.

As she washed and dried herself on a scratchy towel Sarah was aware of Mrs Pugh's continued scrutiny. Her eyes were like a pair of boot buttons, Sarah decided, small and hard and black. ‘The eyes are the mirror of the soul,' Rachel had used to say and Sarah thought if this were true then Mrs Pugh could not have a soul – or if she had one it must be very small and mean.

‘We go to bed at a decent time in this house,' she said briskly when Sarah had completed her toilet to Mrs Pugh's satisfaction. ‘You won't be allowed out playing all hours here, so you might as well get used to it.'

She escorted Sarah upstairs and hovered in the doorway whilst Sarah knelt beside the bed to say her prayers. Then with a short ‘Goodnight, then,' she was gone and Sarah was left alone.

Sarah climbed into bed and felt the tears squeezing out of the corners of her eyes. She had been unable to pray under Mrs Pugh's watchful eye and she was unable to pray now. She must have done something very wicked to be punished in this way, she decided. Bad enough to lose her beloved mother but now to be imprisoned in this awful place … But what had she done that merited such retribution? One day a week or so earlier she had slapped Billy Stickland's legs when he had tried her to the limits of her patience but surely it could not be that. Then there were the lilies of the valley she had stolen from old Miss Read's garden to take home to her mother. She had crept in at the gate and picked the flowers that the old lady had let go wild while Phyll watched the windows to make sure Miss Read was not watching. She shouldn't have done it she knew but even so …

Sarah swallowed her tears and her small mouth hardened. At least she had already suffered the worst punishment imaginable. She could do something much worse than stealing Miss Read's lilies and not have anything happen to her in retribution.

I think I'll do something really bad, Sarah thought. Only just for now I don't know what it is. But when the time comes I'll know. And I'll do it. I will!

The thought provided some small comfort and Sarah held onto it lying in the hard and unfamiliar bed waiting for the temporary release of sleep.

Sarah struggled into the farmhouse kitchen with a gallon jug of water which she had drawn from the well in the farmyard, heaved it up and tipped it into the big stone sink. The can was too heavy for her to manage properly and some of the water slopped onto the floor. As she felt it splash her legs she pulled a face and continued pouring more carefully. Mrs Pugh would be annoyed if she found the floor wet but she would be even more annoyed if she came in from her expedition to the village to buy brown paper and sealing wax to find Sarah had not yet finished the jobs she had given her to do. Get those out of the way first and wipe the floor afterwards, Sarah decided, turning her attention to the basket of eggs which stood on the scrubbed wooden cupboard beside the sink waiting to be washed. Last week Mrs Pugh had accused her of not getting them clean enough and Sarah was anxious not to incur her wrath on that score again.

The trouble was Mrs Pugh really was a difficult woman to please. Nothing Sarah did seemed to find favour no matter how hard she tried. This past month since she had been at Home Farm she had worked harder than she had ever worked in her life and still met with nothing but disapproval. When she blacked the grate Mrs Pugh never seemed to notice how it gleamed – she only sniffed and said things like: ‘Look at the state of you! There's more blacklead on your face and hands than there is on that grate!'; when she dusted Mrs Pugh would follow her round, running a finger across surfaces Sarah was unable to reach, clacking her tongue and shaking her head; when she scrubbed the flagged floor there was certain to be some corner or crevice which failed to meet with Mrs Pugh's satisfaction. Several times in the last weeks Sarah had been late for school because Mrs Pugh had insisted she re-did it though for the life of her Sarah could not see anything wrong with her first effort. Then by being late she would incur the wrath of Miss Keevil who would punish her by making her learn extra spellings or keeping her in when school ended to make up the time she had lost.

Sarah did not mind the extra work – she found learning easy and satisfying – but she did mind being kept in after the others had gone. She looked forward to walking up the lane with her friends and perhaps stopping for a game or two on the way. It was the only social contact she had now for though she could have gone back to the village to play in the evenings Mrs Pugh generally kept her busy until it was too late and the curfew she imposed meant that Sarah had to be in, and ready for bed, by nine o'clock. That in itself was horrid while the evenings were long and light for tired though she was Sarah found it impossible to sleep. Only during haymaking when they worked in the fields until dusk was the curfew extended and then, washing up a seemingly endless stream of crockery and glasses after they had served supper to all the labourers, Sarah had been so exhausted that her eyes had been dropping even as she stood elbow deep in suds. Yet still Mrs Pugh had not been satisfied.