I was not sure how much this would cost. Under cover of my skirts I fingered the money left in my purse. I still had to buy the ticket for this last train trip. I wasn’t sure there would be enough for a cab as well. Perhaps I shouldn’t have spent the money on the pie, though I had felt sick with hunger.
I decided I had better walk to Waterloo. I asked the direction outside Euston Station. First I was sent one way, and then the other. I was scared someone would try to snatch my suitcase away. I hung onto the handle so tightly that my fingers cramped. I tried to keep to the noisy main thoroughfare because I was frightened of what I might encounter in the dark alleyways.
My ankle was starting to swell alarmingly with all this unwonted exercise. I sat right on top of my suitcase for safety and rebound it as tightly as I could. I was so tired I was tempted to lie right down with the case as a pillow and sleep in a shop doorway. There were a few poor ragged souls doing just that, but they looked so vulnerable that it did not seem at all wise.
I gritted my teeth and limped onwards, dragging my case. I tried picturing in my head to divert myself from my pain and weariness. I imagined myself as a little girl again, playing with dear Jem in our squirrel tree. It had seemed a perfect fully furnished home when I was four or so. I remembered chairs and beds and tea sets, and a row of dear little squirrel babies tucked into their cots in their own snug nursery. I could see it all vividly, but perhaps we had just conjured them up from sticks and stones and mud and rags.
I was so tired now I seemed to be walking in a dream. I was not even surprised when I saw a familiar large bleak building coming into focus in front of me. I saw the entrance, the long path, the imposing door, the girls’ wing on the right, the boys’ wing on the left. I was looking at the Foundling Hospital.
I set my case down, stood still, and rubbed my eyes, thinking I had simply pictured it out of thin air. Surely it was simply an illusion. But no matter how hard I scrubbed at my eyes, the hospital stayed firmly in front of me, and as I watched, a dim light was suddenly extinguished upstairs, so that the whole hospital was in darkness. That must have been Matron Stinking Bottomly putting out her lamp after her final inspection of the dormitory. I pictured all those poor foundlings tossing and turning in their narrow beds.
It was hard to believe I’d been one of them scarcely six months ago. So much had happened to me in such a short time. I had lost my dearest mother and yet found a kindly father. I had toiled extremely hard in a conventional place of work and earned a pittance, and had idled through the days simply displaying myself in a bizarre costume and earned a relative fortune. I had lived in a variety of dwellings, large and small, but I had yet to find one that truly felt like my home. But I knew one thing. No matter how lost and lonely I felt right this minute, I would never wish myself back in the hospital. I was free now, and I was never, ever going back.
10
BY THE TIME I had limped all the way to Waterloo the last train had already gone. I bought another pie from a man just closing up his stall. He told me there were several cheap boarding houses in nearby streets, but I did not want to waste a penny more. I ate my meagre supper, then trailed round the vast station looking for a likely spot to settle. Eventually I wedged myself right in a corner, my back pressed against the hard wall so that no one could creep up on me.
The cold stone of the station made me shiver and I had no blanket, but I noticed that the sleepers in shop doorways had wrapped themselves in newspaper for warmth. There were any number of crumpled papers blowing around the platforms, so I gathered as many as possible and then set about making a newspaper nest in my corner.
I read David Copperfield for a while. David was away at school now, but I was free as a bird, so I tried to console myself that my lot was far better than his.
Other homeless souls shuffled around the station. I shrank away from them if they came near me, clasping my case to my chest, but no one actually accosted me.
I heard one ragged old lady say to another, ‘Poor little kiddie – she’s new to this life. See how well-scrubbed she is?’
I was feeling especially grimy after my long journey, and my hands were blackened with newsprint, but I supposed I did look clean compared to them, with their grey-brown wrinkled faces and sour smells.
I wondered if I should offer them some of my newspapers, but they shuffled off, sharing several swigs from a brown bottle. They had other ways of keeping warm.
I did not think I would ever sleep in that great cold station, but after several chapters of David’s adventures my head started nodding. I curled up small under my newspapers and dozed fitfully until at long last, at dawn, the first trains started hissing and puffing.
I cast off my newspaper nest and visited the ladies’ room. When I emerged, my dress still needed a good iron, but I was scrubbed clean and my hair pinned up to make me feel older and in control. I’d peered at my face closely in the looking glass, to see if all the emotional turmoil of the Monksby weeks had left any mark. I rather hoped for little lines and taut cheekbones and wan skin tones to give me a look of weary maturity – but my brow was smooth, my cheeks round, my skin clear, and I looked disappointingly childish. There seemed no danger of my foster family not recognizing me.
I went to the newly opened office and asked for a ticket to Gillford, the nearest town to our village. I had been right to be cautious with my money. I was left with only a few shillings. I was hungry and thirsty again, but I could not face yet another meat pie.
I stepped outside the station and found a baker’s down the road. I bought two white rolls still fresh from the oven, and then, back in the station, a scalding cup of tea, and felt much better after I had breakfasted. I could not help feeling proud of myself. I had journeyed all the way from Monksby and spent the whole night in the station, and I had not cried or begged anyone for help.
Well done, Hetty! Mama’s voice said within me. I am proud of you.
‘I’m not Hetty any more. I do not seem to be Sapphire either. I am Emerald now,’ I whispered. Mama didn’t answer. I had a feeling she was laughing at me.
The train out into the country went a great deal more slowly than the big express train from York, and it stopped every five minutes at station after station. I peered eagerly at each sign, not daring to read David Copperfield in case I missed my station altogether.
The carriage grew uncomfortably full and was continuously a-jostle with people coming in and others getting off. They all had pale faces and sleepy eyes, and many smelled of the stale bed they had recently vacated. I sat primly in their midst, waiting and waiting to see the right station. I dimly remembered making the same journey in reverse with my foster mother, who took my brother Gideon and me to the Foundling Hospital when we were just five. We’d been such babies then, with no idea of the rude awakening from our carefree childhood that awaited us.
I wondered if Jem had also contacted Gideon, telling him about Father’s funeral. And then there was my foster sister Martha, a year above me at the hospital, and Jem’s own blood brother Nat, and Rosie and Eliza. I tried hard to picture them all in my mind, but apart from Gideon they were all a little hazy now, as if I were peering at them through a thick mist. I remembered the tall skinny young Jem with his tousled brown hair and bright eyes and ready smile. I remembered every detail of that Jem – the knots of muscle in his thin arms when he lifted me up, his childish bitten nails, his jaunty walk. I could picture him laughing, his head thrown back, or yawning hard, mooing like a cow, at the end of a long day. I saw him running with a smooth steady pace – sometimes he would spot me watching and raise his legs and clop like a carthorse, neighing and shaking an imaginary mane, while I squealed with laughter. I saw him drawing with a stick in the dust, teaching me my ABC, I heard him reading aloud to me from our one tattered book, I felt him squeeze me tight when I crept into his arms.
I did not want to get his letters out of my case in front of everyone – but I could remember what they said. I repeated little phrases to m
yself. The very rhythm of the wheels beneath my feet seemed to judder I wish you could come home.
I had been mistaken to think my home could ever be with Father in Monksby, much as I loved him. Now that dear Mama was dead it was suddenly so sweetly clear to me. My home was with my first family.
At long, long last I saw the name of Gillford on the station platform. I rubbed my eyes twice, just to make sure, and then I grabbed my case, wrestled with the stiff door, and tumbled down the steps. My ankle seemed better for the rest during the train ride from Waterloo. It was still a little swollen, but if I unlaced my boot halfway down I found it reasonably comfortable. I was so eager to reach Havenford, so full of sudden surging energy, that I felt I could walk all the way.
I stopped an old couple outside the station and asked them if they knew the right road.
‘You’re intending to walk there, little missy?’ said the old man doubtfully. ‘It’s seven or eight miles, all the way to Havenford.’
It was a lot further than I’d thought, but I refused to be deterred. ‘I can walk that easily enough,’ I said. ‘If you would be so kind as to point me in the right direction I’ll be on my way.’
‘You’re a spirited little lass,’ said the old lady, fumbling in her bag of shopping. ‘Here, take these to help you on your journey.’
She gave me two big rosy apples and I thanked her very gratefully. I put one in my pocket and bit into the other straight away. The crisp white flesh tasted wonderful and I set off freshly invigorated.
It was interesting walking through the town, seeing streets I dimly remembered from trips to market with my foster mother. I wandered up and down the stalls, and spent sixpence on a big bunch of Michaelmas daisies for Mother to show my sympathy. They were softly purple, an appropriate colour of mourning. I tied them in a tidy posy with a black velvet hair ribbon.
My spirits remained high until I reached the edge of town and saw the long, long lane in front of me, stretching as far as I could see. I stepped out determinedly, but my ankle was throbbing ominously now, my suitcase seemed to have doubled in weight, and even the bunch of flowers seemed an intolerable burden.
I tried to talk to Mama but she would not speak to me. I grew worried that she might not approve after all. She had urged me to find my father, so perhaps she felt that my place was still with him.
I sat down by the side of the lane, perching on my suitcase. I took my boot off and rubbed my poorly ankle, and ate my second apple to try to spur me onwards, but this time it didn’t seem to work. When I stood up again, the pain shot right up my leg. I had a blister forming on the top of my foot where the loosened boot had rubbed it, and the sprain now felt doubly sharp, as if a wild animal were repeatedly gnawing at my ankle. I tried singing hymns to lift my spirits, but it was no use – I was practically sobbing with pain.
I felt myself grow hot and damp with effort in spite of the cold day. My dress was sticking to me and I was terrified I would sweat enough to stain the armpits. I felt the pins dropping one by one from my hair. I had tried so hard to look clean and neat and respectable, and now all my efforts were wasted. My bladder was clamouring too, so I dragged myself wearily off the road towards a distant clump of bushes. I was crouching there, whimpering, when I heard a rumbling, a clatter, getting nearer and nearer. I peeped round the bush and saw a man driving a horse and cart.
‘Oh my Lord! Wait! Please sir, wait!’ I screamed, very hastily pulling up my underwear. I grabbed my case and my flowers and stumbled back into view. ‘Please, please, please wait!’ I gabbled, lumbering desperately towards him.
The man stared at me, startled, and seemed about to urge his horse to trot on faster to escape the mad screaming girl hobbling from the bushes. Perhaps he saw the tears running down my face, because he pulled his horse up after all and sat placidly chewing his tobacco until I reached him.
‘Oh thank you, thank you!’ I said. ‘Please, for pity’s sake, could you give me a lift to Havenford?’
‘I’m not a licensed carter, missy. I’m simply on my way home from market,’ he said. ‘I’m not going to Havenford anyway. I live on Carter’s Bray.’
‘Is that the big hill that overshadows the village? Well, could you at least take me there? I have hurt my foot and can’t walk properly and it’s vital that I get there. I am in mourning! I have to attend a funeral,’ I said.
He peered at my tear-stained face and sniffed. ‘Whose death are you mourning, then? You don’t come from round these parts,’ he said.
‘I do, I do! I have come all the way from Yorkshire to attend the funeral of my father, John Cotton,’ I declared.
The man sniffed again. ‘What, big John the ploughman? You’re one of his children?’ he said doubtfully.
‘He was my foster father when I was little,’ I said.
‘You’re still a little squirt now,’ he said, being one of the many who felt free to cast aspersions on my size.
In any other circumstances I would have marched past haughtily at such an insult. He did not seem a kind man at all, and his nose was running unpleasantly in spite of his sniffs. But I knew that he was my only chance of getting to Havenford today – otherwise I’d still be crawling along the lane when it got dark.
‘Do you think you could possibly be kind enough to give me a lift to Carter’s Bray?’ I asked, opening my eyes wide and gazing at him imploringly. ‘Please, please, please,’ I added.
He chewed his tobacco thoughtfully and then spat a disgusting yellow wad over the edge of the cart. It sizzled in the sandy lane an inch from my foot. I drew my skirts up and struggled not to look disgusted.
‘Well now, I could – but my horse is going lame. I don’t want to put too much strain on the old nag, pulling two instead of one,’ he said.
‘Yes, but as you yourself remarked, I am very little,’ I responded.
‘And there’s all your luggage.’
‘My case is very light – and good gracious, my flowers don’t weigh anything. Please let me up in your cart, sir.’
‘Well, I don’t want you travelling in the cart. I don’t trust you at all. You’ll be nibbling at all my provisions. You’ve got that hungry look in your eye. You could sit up here beside me . . .’
‘Oh, thank you, sir!’
‘But I think I deserve payment, don’t you? A little compensation for my kindness.’
I took out my purse and tipped out the few coins I had left. ‘This is all I have, sir, but you are welcome to it,’ I said, making the theatrical gesture of turning my purse inside out.
‘That’s a very poor offering. I don’t think that will do at all,’ he said. His rheumy old eyes were brightening. He was clearly enjoying playing cat and mouse with me.
‘It’s all I have, sir,’ I said. ‘You can see that.’
‘I’m not of that opinion. I think you could make more of an effort to please me. How about a kiss from those pretty little lips? Then I might consider taking you all the way to Havenford.’
I wanted to punch him. Kiss this creature with his tobacco-stained mouth and dripping nose? I’d have sooner kissed the backside of his poor old horse. But I forced myself to smile coyly, though it made my whole face ache.
‘I think you are trying to take advantage of me, sir. If I kiss you now you can still drive off without me. How about you taking me to Havenford, and then I will kiss you gladly, several times.’
‘Up you hop, then,’ he said, leering at me. ‘You drive a hard bargain, you saucy little baggage.’
I hauled myself up beside his horrible hulk, and he shook the reins and clicked to the horse to continue the journey.
Oh, what a torturous journey it was too! I tried to keep as far away from him as I could, clutching the seat to stop myself tumbling right down, but he kept trying to pull me closer. Every time he looked at me he made revolting smacking noises with his wet lips. I did my best to distract him by engaging in rapid conversation. I asked his name and age and livelihood, and pretended an interest in his unpleasant ho
bbies of ferreting and drinking. I knew his ferrets’ names and habits and how many scores of rabbits each had killed by the time Carter’s Bray loomed ahead.
He did not pause, carrying on driving round the hill towards Havenford. I talked feverishly of types of ale and the charms of cider and the strength of spirits, until at long last I saw the village there before me, small as a child’s toy model at the far end of the lane.
My heart started beating fast inside my bodice. The horrible man flicked the reins to make his tired old horse go faster – and smacked his lips. We drew nearer and nearer. We passed the first few cottages straggling on the outskirts of the hamlet – and then I saw our cottage! It wasn’t quite as I’d remembered. It was smaller and more tumbledown, the thatch threadbare and mossy, the garden a tangle – but I knew that cottage come rain or shine, even though it was nearly ten years since I’d seen it.
The old man felt me start and gave me a very terrible grin. I could see shreds of tobacco stuck between the stumps of his teeth.
‘That your cottage, missy?’ he said.
‘Oh no,’ I said quickly. I didn’t want him to know where I lived! ‘No, my cottage is right at the other end of the village.’
So he drove us onwards and I sat staring at all the houses until my eyes watered. I remembered the big square one set back from the road, the village shop with the jars in the window and the rusting enamel sign by the door, the wreck of a cottage where Slovenly Nan lived with her ten children, the neat schoolhouse with the picket fence . . . I had tried to jump over it once to run to Jem, and still had the scar where I’d tripped and cut my lip. I was in such a daze of reminiscence that I almost forgot my grim companion.
‘Aren’t we there yet?’ he said. ‘Are you sure we haven’t passed it?’
‘No, no . . .’ I spotted a woman hanging out her washing in the garden. I took a deep breath. ‘Mother!’ I shouted, and I grabbed my flowers and case and scrabbled down from the cart before he’d stopped.
Emerald Star (Hetty Feather) Page 11