Pauper's Child

by Meg Hutchinson

  So many beginnings… so many endings. The moon becoming obscured by cloud, its silver light swallowed by shadow which seemed to creep into her heart, Callista closed her eyes. Why was it misfortune followed so closely in her wake, ever ready to devour any happiness she found?

  The Fates are not always kind.

  She might have meant those words for herself.

  23

  ‘Moses Turley told me of what happened when I returned to the wharf this morning. You must allow me to help.’

  ‘Ain’t nothing you can do, Mr Farron, but I thanks you kindly for the offer.’

  ‘What exactly happened? Moses said Cal— Miss Sanford came running to the wharf and when he and the men reached here they found Daniel unconscious on the floor of the kiln.’

  Trusting to brewing of tea and setting of scones on a plate to find work for restless fingers and a diversion to an agitated mind, Abigail took the pot from the hob, filling it with boiling water.

  ‘Seems the leg he injured a while back don’t be healed as Daniel believed. He were halfway to the top of a bung… that be a column o’ saggars set one on another… when the leg buckled beneath ’im an’ down he come wi’ the pots he were carryin’ coming’ down on top of ’im.’

  ‘Is he badly injured?’ Taking the pretty poppy painted mug and plate with its fresh scone Michael caught the flicker of pain crossing the woman’s face before she answered.

  ‘Daniel be badly bruised but his spine be in one piece, praise be to God; but while bruises fade the pain o’ the ’eart remains to chafe.’

  ‘Pain of the heart?’ Michael Farron’s brow creased in a frown. ‘I don’t understand, Abigail.’

  ‘Nor would you, with not ’aving the years on you. But men like my Daniel, men who ’ave given a lifetime to one job… ’ave never known aught else but that one way of mekin’ their livin’… when it be snatched away so cruel like then it teks the heart wi’ it and leaves naught but pain in its place.’

  Was she saying Daniel would be a cripple as a result of his accident? That for all his spine had not been broken by the fall he might be unable to walk again? Politely drinking his tea Michael denied the urge to ask. The woman might find the question too harrowing to answer and he did not want to be the cause of more tears; Abigail Roberts had most certainly shed more than enough of those already.

  ‘Doctor said as Daniel shouldn’t go stackin’ bungs no more.’ Abigail supplied the answer to his unspoken question, her hands busy with setting mug and scone on a wooden tray set with a pristine white cloth. ‘Said as the leg ’ad a weakness, that it wouldn’t stand the strain o’ climbin’ ladders wi’ a saggar whether or not it were an empty one… so there you ’ave it… Daniel be finished in the potting.’

  Extracting a promise they would ask for any help they needed now or in the future, Michael rode slowly back to the wharf.

  He had hoped to see Callista Sanford but there had been no sign of her nor had Abigail spoken of her. Had she already left the Roberts’s house? She would have known of the doctor’s warning as to the stacking of the kiln. She would also have realised that if the man could no longer operate the pottery then her living also was snatched away! Had she not waited to find out?

  Fingers tightening on the reins Michael stared ahead but saw nothing of the wild flowers splashed like tiny jewels amid the rough grass of the heath.

  Had Callista Sanford cut her losses and run?

  *

  Dinner at The Limes had been a success. Sabine Derry paused in the entry she was making in the accounts ledger. Her dress, as she surmised, had brought envious glances from the female guests and several of approval from some of the males. How the gown would have affected poor plump Emma Ramsey…! Sabine smiled at the neatly written page. If she were not already dead she would have died of jealousy; she should have waited a little longer before seeing Emma into her grave, given herself an added satisfaction of seeing that jealousy which would so clearly have played over those puffy features! But she could not have everything, and the evening had been a complete fulfilment of all she had wanted, of all she had hoped to portray. Edwin Derry was a man of prospects.

  But there had been more… more than she could have hoped. It had come with the ending of the meal. Phineas had craved the men’s indulgence, asking that they delay cigars and brandy for a few minutes as he had something he would like them to see. He had led the way to the library and there, displayed on exquisite stands and tables, had been figurines, busts and delicate, intricately patterned bowls, each quite remarkable in its own right. But what had been most remarkable of all had been the statement: ‘They are all the works of Callista Sanford.’

  Callista Sanford! Sabine laid the pen aside, closing the ledger. The girl from Trowes Court… it seemed she had ability for more than scrubbing floors. Phineas Westley had been lavish in his praise of her pieces and of her talent, saying it was one such as is seen only rarely, that one day in the future they would become as collectable as any crafted by the old masters. ‘Antiques of the future’ had been the note he had ended on. Pushing the ledger across the desk she leaned back in the chair, her eyes glinting at the thought drifting quietly into her mind.

  The trouble with the future was it was always a day away!

  *

  How long since that accident? It seemed a lifetime ago, a lifetime when all the help she could give had been like no help at all. But in reality it had been only weeks. Her head beginning to throb with the headache which, returning so regularly, now seemed just another part of her life, Callista placed a hand over her eyes. They had worked the pottery together, herself and Abigail. The woman knew almost as much about the process of wedging the clay as did Daniel, kneading and re-kneading it until no air pockets remained to burst in the kiln and ruin a hard worked pot by leaving a hole in it or shattering the piece completely. Abigail could throw a vase or jug on the wheel, press a plate or dish in a mould with a skill to challenge Daniel’s own, but his strength she could not match. She did not have the strength it required to carry loaded saggars up and down a ladder; consequently the oven was fired each time with only a third of the crockery it might have held; even then Abigail and herself were exhausted.

  But tonight it had come to an end. There would be no more firings. She had seen the pain in Daniel’s eyes, the tight clutching of Abigail’s hand as he had said it.

  ‘The work were too ’ard for a couple o’ women alone, it were set to kill ’em should they try to carry on. You ’ave done your utmost, God knows I’ve watched you slave ’til you’ve fair dropped from weariness, and I’ll watch no more. The fires will be left to go out… there’ll be no more crockery comes from Leabrook Pottery.’

  It had been an effort for him to say it. Callista’s inner eyes played again over the whiskered face, the tight lipped mouth, the eyes blue and pained behind the façade of courage.

  They had both impressed upon her that her place with them would be unaffected by the decision, that she was welcome to remain at the cottage. But with no way of paying for her board and keep that was impossible. Daniel and Abigail would find it hard to feed themselves with no sales from the pottery; she would not add to their burden.

  Her hand covering her eyes closed out the silver moonlight but it did not shut off the remembered sight of a buttercup denuded of all but two of its petals or of one more fluttering to join its fellows in the short turf of the heath… one more mark of the misery of Callista Sanford’s life!

  *

  Standing in the yard of Leabrook Pottery Callista glanced at the bell shaped cone, its round bellied bulk rising dark against the sky. There was no more to be done. It was said so easily but the words held a finality she had not realised fully until this moment. The plates, bowls, mugs and dishes loaded now into large round wicker baskets and stored neatly against one wall were the last that would be fired in that oven. There had been a potter on this same site for hundreds of years. Daniel’s voice had thickened while telling her the history of hi
s workshop. In the seventeenth century the town was famed for its salt glazed vessels, pottery his forebears had made and marked Wedgbury Ware…

  ‘…more’n two ’undred years as we knows to…’

  Callista seemed to hear the words again, hear the pride and the crack in the voice which told of heartbreak.

  ‘…and ’ow many before that… the Robertses ’ave always worked the clay, but now it be finished… done. I’d thought once to see the place go on, to see it grow ’neath the ’and of… but I be the last.’

  The last! Callista felt tears rise to her throat. Daniel was a proud man with a proud heritage; he felt badly at being the Roberts to have broken that line, it had hurt him more than had that fall from a ladder and though the latter hurt would heal the former never would.

  I tried to help! The cry silent in her heart she walked slowly into the workshop, its wheel and benches sponged and tidied, the empty saggars stacked in columns higher than her head. She and Abigail had taken it in turns to stack the thick clay containers but even though they were empty they had proved too weighty for them to haul more than three steps up the ladder. Daniel was right in saying the work was hard; p’raps he was right also in saying it was too hard for women to do alone, but she would have gone on trying.

  Unable to stem the flood in her throat she stared through tears amid the silent workshop. She had tried reasoning with him, tried to argue they could manage somehow. She had already learned some of the processes; all she needed was time and she would learn the rest.

  ‘Ar, wench, you’ve learned.’ Daniel had smiled from his chair beside the hearth. ‘And though you’ve learned well it be as a drop in the ocean. I been in that workshop daily since I could put a dozen steps together an’ I still be learnin’, no… your ’eart be good but it teks more than goodwill—’

  ‘I am not afraid of hard work!’

  ‘Nor you ain’t, you’ve gied proof of that already.’ Abigail had smiled at the interruption. ‘But what Daniel be sayin’ be truth, to know all that be needed teks a lifetime in the learnin’.’

  Common sense had affirmed what she heard but love for the couple had driven it away. Yet even as she began to speak Daniel had shaken his head.

  ‘Listen to me, wench,’ he had said, ‘the good Lord touched your ’ands givin’ to them the skills of a potter, your eyes He blessed with a sharpness which sees the clay from the inside… you see not what it is but what it can be… an’ in His goodness He added to them blessings a quickness o’ the mind, but He give you only two ’ands. You learns, ar, an’ you learns well, but answer me this: given that you knows each an’ every process it teks to mek a pot ’ow many o’ them processes can you do at any one time? Ar, you can wedge clay, you can throw on the wheel an’ you can fashion by ’and but that don’t be the all. Who will act as saggar maker’s bottom knocker, makin’ the base you need by beating the clay inside the iron hoop which will give the shape you need… and who will be frame filler, beating out a flat sheet of clay which will be the sides o’ your box, and then who will be saggar maker, the one who joins sides to base, an’ who the carrier tekin’ them to the drying place? That be only one process; then who will mek the moulds you needs for cups an’ cup ’andles… who will be jiggerer, he be the plate an’ saucer meker, an’ who the jolleyer, the one who meks bowls an’ basins? Then there be the makin’ o’ slip, the mixin’ o’ clay an’ water ’til they be as cream, you needs that for casting o’ jugs an’ such from moulds. Then o’ course there be glazes; lead, soda an’ borax be the main fluxes for low-fired glazin’ but for high-fired glazin’ you needs add others an’ then you needs think about oxides to be used for colourin’. But that don’t be the all for when the oven be full an’ ready for firin’ the clammins — that be the doorway — must needs be bricked up an’ plastered over so as to keep heat loss at a minimum: then an’ only then can the fires be lit an’ these needs be fed wi’ coal every three to four hours ’til the right temperature be reached, that teks about forty-eight hours, an’ maintained for four more an’ most o’ that time sees a body shovellin’ coal into the firemouth. But that only be the work o’ the potter’s shed. On top o’ it you needs think o’ the buyin’ an’ transportin’ o’ clay o’ the sort don’t occur local, o’ buyin’ oxides an’ fluxes an’ then o’ sellin’ your wares… no, girl, it don’t be work for a couple of women, for even that which I’ve told don’t be near all there be to potting.’

  But he and Abigail had managed! Somehow they had kept the business going! She had wanted to cry out both of those reasons for continuing to try but she had said neither. She had known deep in her heart that try as she might for as long as she could she could not succeed.

  Heartbreaking as it was the facts had to be faced. Daniel was right in what he said: Leabrook Pottery was at an end.

  *

  Phineas Westley had said the tiny silk and velvet posy she had placed on her mother’s grave had not faded. Maybe then, a few months ago, they had still held their colour but now with the effects of sun and rain the tiny flowers and leaves were colourless bedraggled shapeless bits of cloth.

  As she knelt beside the grass covered patch, Callista removed the tiny offering, replacing it in the vase with the wild flowers she had picked while crossing the heath. There had been several glances from other visitors to the graveyard, frowns and whispered remarks from people bearing their own costly tokens. But beautiful as the sheafs and bouquets were with their lovely blooms, they were not laid with more love than these wild violets and kingcups or that posy the children of Trowes Court had made.

  Trowes Court! Callista stared at the wisps of faded cloth. It seemed so far away, as if she had lived there in some distant past. But Trowes Court and its poverty was not far away nor was it a memory of a distant past; the place and all it stood for was close at hand. Her leaving there, finding happiness and what she thought to be security, had been another illusion, a whim of the Fates she had spoken of to Michael Farron; with the same cruel twist her life was once more in turmoil. Yet it was not empty of love as it had felt on her mother’s death; Abigail and Daniel had removed the loneliness, had treated her as a daughter. But once she was gone from the cottage, once she was no longer with them, then the loneliness would return. The worst cruelty of all would be not being able to come here on Sundays, not being able to kneel here beside the resting place of her mother or there beyond the wall where her father lay.

  ‘… so long as you remembers… the two of them will always be with you…’

  The words told her by Ada Povey whispering again in her mind, Callista placed the weather worn posy next to the vase of wild flowers. She would leave it there, the token of respect made by the hands of the children of Trowes Court; her mother would have wanted to keep it always. Touching her fingertips first to her lips she rested them on the soft turf. It was a last goodbye kiss. Tears gathering behind her lids she rose and turned quickly along the path which would take her to the street.

  ‘Miss Sanford… it is Miss Sanford?’

  Her head bowed, Callista had passed the figure dressed elegantly in pale grey but now as her name was called she turned.

  ‘Mrs Derry, good afternoon.’

  ‘My dear, I hoped so very much to find you. I did attempt to contact you, poor Mr Slade was making enquiries and then…’ Letting the sentence trail away Sabine held a gloved hand expressively to her lips while her eyes lowered in pretended grief.

  ‘We heard at Lea Brook of Oswin’s death. It was a terrible thing to have happened.’

  ‘Terrible,’ Sabine echoed, her glance still lowered, ‘how… how could anyone do such a thing, and to such a nice well mannered young man. The dreadful business fair has folk afraid to leave their homes.’

  Well mannered… yes, Oswin Slade could be the gentleman when it suited him, but nice! Could she in any honesty say she had ever found him nice?

  ‘Of course what alarms most is the fact the culprit has not yet been arrested. The constables made enquirie
s, of course, but so far they have come to nothing. Tell me, my dear, did they come to… where did you say you are moved to?’

  ‘Leabrook… Leabrook Pottery. Yes, the constable did call.’ The sickness which had risen in her throat as the man had told them of Oswin’s murder blocked Callista’s throat again.

  Obviously the girl had what the newspapers termed a watertight alibi. Sabine lifted her glance.

  ‘That was something they had to do, my dear. It was possibly because you had known him. I believe they spoke to everyone from whom Mr Slade collected rents; you must not allow it to worry you, they can in no way believe such a monstrous deed could have been done by a woman… the whole idea is too horrible to contemplate.’

  ‘The Robertses said it would be no more than a matter of procedure and it seems it was for no constable has called since.’

  ‘The Robertses?’

  ‘They own the pottery,’ Callista supplied in answer. ‘Daniel… they gave me work and a home.’

  ‘That was kind of them and fortunate for you, my dear… will you remain there with them?’

  Her glance straying to the small patch of colour among the grass at the furthest corner of the graveyard Callista’s fingers curled tight against the rush of emotion.

  ‘I… I had hoped to but the pottery is to close and I cannot stay without employment with which to pay for my keep.’

  ‘Then my dear you must allow—’

  ‘No!’ Callista replied sharply. ‘You were kind enough to offer me financial help after the death of my mother…’

  ‘Which you did not take.’

  Bringing her glance back to eyes grey as the hat perched on fiery red hair Callista was surprised by the hardness of them and of the features the Poveys would have called wire strung, referring to the sharp nose and taut thin lips. It gave entirely the wrong impression of the woman who had offered only kindness.

  ‘Which I could not take seeing I did not earn it, though I was grateful for the thought, and once more I thank you for it.’