by Janis Mackay
“Ok,” I whispered. “I’ll stick with it another day. Two at the most. Then let’s go back, deeds or no deeds.”
“Great! And don’t worry about me, Saul. I’m happy in my hiding place. I’ve got my sleeping bag. And I’m used to adventure.” She squeezed my arm. “Goodnight, and keep searching for the deeds, Saul.”
I nodded to her through the iron bars though I could hardly see her. She was just a shadowy shape. But I could tell she was waving as she stepped away. “We can do it!” she whispered, and suddenly I felt she was right. We could do it! We were a team: me searching on the inside; her investigating on the outside. I wasn’t really a servant. That was just a cover. I was solving a mystery.
Trying not to make a sound, I padded quickly up to the dark house and slipped in the back door. I lay down under my tattered blanket, not bothering to get undressed. In seconds, I was fast asleep.
“Porridge!” Elsie screeched in my ear. It felt like only five minutes had passed since I lay down. I pulled the blanket over my face. “I says ‘porridge!’. Get up, deaf muttonhead. It’s quarter-past six and you’re lying snoring like a lord. Mrs Buchan says rise and shine, you hear?”
Elsie nudged me. She pulled at the blanket, which was so thin it ripped. “Now see what you done. Eejit. It’s poor me’ll have to put a stitch in that. Idle lie-a-bed. Get up!”
“Leave me alone,” I mumbled. I felt like I was stuck to the ground. There was no way my body could get up.
“Up and work or you’ll have us all in trouble with the master,” said Frank, and they both started tickling me.
“Jeez,” I groaned, fighting them off. They were up, dressed and ready for breakfast. Had they even been to sleep?
“You took the Lord’s name in vain,” Elsie snapped. “You’ll be struck down, won’t he, Frank?”
But Frank just laughed. “Come on and eat,” he called to me, waving a spoon in the air. Ok, I was hungry but couldn’t stomach more porridge. It was just bearable the night before. My dad can make good porridge with butter in it, then I pour cream over it and syrup, or if there’s no syrup, sugar. Elsie’s lumpy porridge is nothing like my dad’s.
“For whit we are about tae receive may the Lord mak us truly thankful,” Frank droned.
I dragged myself over to the miserable table where their spoons were clattering. They gobbled and made a lot of chewing, licking and slurping sounds. I couldn’t get excited about porridge but it was beginning to dawn on me that there was no toast, crispy bacon, croissants, hot chocolate or Cheerios on offer. It was porridge or nothing. So with a scowl on my face I managed a few spoonfuls.
Then Elsie scooped up the bowls and winked at me. “Off to work, laddie. Mrs Buchan’s gone to the market in town. She says not to let you near the silver. She says you’re to make the fires, and quick!”
I groaned and trudged up the stairs to face another day, and to sweep and lay again all the fires I’d laid yesterday.
Gaunt House had a bit more bustle about it today. Mrs Buchan was insisting that the curtains get a good wash and Elsie was beating the rugs, whacking them with a stick. Frank was sitting on a stone step polishing saddles and boots, whistling to himself. As well as laying the fires I had to polish the fireplaces until they gleamed. I worked hard, but kept reminding myself, I wasn’t really a servant.
I looked about me as I went from room to room. There were places everywhere that documents could be hidden, but nowhere that seemed likely. I looked behind old picture frames. I slipped my hands down the backs of chairs. I fumbled under beds, but all I found was dust. No deeds and no sign of my mum’s ring either.
After making the fires, Mrs Buchan had me peeling potatoes for lunch. I wondered whether chips had been invented yet!
19
Agnes
What a sweet and lovely thing to be woken by a lark singing above me. As well as a pencil sharpener, I had forgotten to pack a watch, but considering I had time travelled a hundred years, a watch would probably be useless. I lay for ages in my warm sleeping bag listening to the singing bird. It wasn’t completely light, only half light. The lark sounded like the happiest creature and I forgot today was August 3rd, 1914. I forgot Britain was going to declare war on Germany tomorrow, because they were obliged to, because Germany invaded neutral Belgium, and they’d promised they’d help Belgium, and then so many people would die.
I had slept really well, and felt ready to rise and shine. Plus I got this warm feeling that the lark was singing just for me. A few times he had looked at me, curious probably and pleased for a bit of company. On the other side of the wall I heard a door opening and closing. I scrambled out of my sleeping bag, smoothed down my very crumpled dress and rolled and stuffed the sleeping bag into my rucksack. I then hid the rucksack under the gorse bush. Apart from the pressed-down moss you would never know I had been there. I had this wild hope that Saul was up early and had some breakfast for me – maybe a warm roll and butter, or cake, or orange juice.
I strained my ears like mad and could just make out someone walking on the other side of the wall. It sounded like this person had shoes on – there was a soft tap-tap on the stones – maybe Saul had shoes now. He seemed to be walking round the house. I hurried round the outside of the wall, hid behind a bush and watched the gates. It wasn’t Saul, but a woman. My heart sank. She had on a hat and long coat, and carried a basket under her arm. She looked like a smart servant. I peered out from between bits of bush and saw her take out a bunch of keys. She slotted one into the gate lock, opened it with a creak then snapped it shut behind her. She locked it, pocketed the keys and briskly set off, over the open countryside towards town.
I guessed that this was maybe the woman that gossiped with the washerwomen about the house, so I followed her. She didn’t even look back.
I paused to have a quick look at the hills of the Borders that I knew so well. They hadn’t changed a bit and the day was breaking pale and lovely over the slopes. And there were the spires of the churches and the top of the bridge over the Tweed. For a moment I thought I was back in the twenty-first century.
I hadn’t been looking about long, but when I turned back the woman with the hat and the basket under her arm was gone. From the washerwoman’s talk the day before, I guessed she was going to the market.
I knew my way to the High Street. The soles of my bare feet were already hardening and it was getting easier to jump over stones and clumps of grass without it stinging. I clambered over the stone dyke and ran over the field that led to the edge of town. The church bells rang out for six in the morning. I don’t think I had ever been out so early, but it seems rising early was common in the past. There were lots of people around. Smoke was already puffing out from the chimneys of the mills. I could hear horses neighing and it sounded like every cockerel in the world had gathered in Peebles for choir practice. All I had to do was follow the noise.
In the High Street there were a good many animals. A man was herding sheep into a wooden makeshift fence and they were BAA-ING their woolly heads off. Another man with a long wooden stick was coaxing cows into a stall. They were MOO-ING and he was shouting. A group of women with long brown skirts on and scarves around their hair were busy lining up what smelt like barrels of fish. Already some of them were starting to cry out: “Herring, haddock, trout, eels! Come and buy! Come and buy!”
I stroked the silver chain around my neck. I was so hungry I decided to try and sell it to buy food. There was a butcher arranging pigs’ heads and pigs’ trotters and every bit of pig you could imagine – except bacon in a vacuum pack from a supermarket. Even the butcher with his pink face looked a bit like a pig. I ventured further along.
Carts pulled by horses were piled high with potatoes and cabbages and leeks and carrots and onions. Everybody was wishing each other a very good morning. There was no sign of the woman from the big house, but my eyes lit up when I saw, sitting among a pile of onions, a girl about my size smile at me. She was plaiting onion stalks and singing:
“Up in the mornings no fir me, up in the morning early…”
“Stop yer complaining,” a man shouted. He was arranging his vegetables in pretty shapes on the cart. I guessed he was her father. The girl went on silently stringing up the onions without even glancing up at him.
A woman called out, “Away to the butcher, lassie, and get us a ham shank. A good one mind, none of your scraggy end, tell him.” I guessed that was the girl’s mother and the girl seemed happy enough to lay down her onions and hop down from the cart. She skipped along the High Street, in no hurry to get that ham shank. I followed her, and skipped too. Soon we were skipping side by side.
“We’ll get a game of peevers soon,” she said, like she had known me for ages. “I got good stones for skiting.” She patted the pocket of her apron. I smiled and skipped some more. “Then,” she went on, waving to the men at the baker’s stall, “we can go down the river and play chuckie stanes.”
I worked that one out. Chucking stones. I smiled. “Guid,” I said, trying to sound like her, “that would be just grand.” The smell of fresh bread was making me feel light-headed. I unclipped the tiny silver chain from around my neck. It had belonged to my mother, but I knew she wouldn’t want me to go hungry. I swung it in front of the girl. “Where’s the best place to sell this?”
The girl froze and stared at the silver chain. “You pinched that, did yea?”
I shook my head and clasped it to me, and just to prove the point tears welled up in my eyes. “It was my own dead mother’s,” I said with a little sob. I wasn’t acting. I really did feel sad.
Next thing the girl wrapped her arm around my shoulder. “You poor lassie,” she said. “My own mother clips me about the ear for next to nothing, but if she died I would die too, of a broken heart.” I thought she was going to burst into tears.
“But I have an auntie,” I said quickly, “Jean Burns.”
“Yea mean that herb-wifie down at Walkershaugh?”
I nodded and the girl hugged me even tighter. “My mither says she could raise the dead with all her salves and ointments.” Then she whispered in my ear, “Donald Christie. Along next to the fishmonger. He’s always after a bit o’ silver. He’ll give you a pretty penny for it. Tell him Peggy Bell sent you, then he won’t cheat you.”
“Thank yea,” I said, and slipped away. I turned to wave then hurried along the High Street, darting in and out between stalls and smells and feeling so hungry I thought I might faint. I planned on buying buns with strawberry jam smeared on top. Loads and loads of buns.
It was easy to follow my nose and find the fishmongers. Phew! What a stink. Fish shops in the future never smelt so strong. I pulled myself away from the fish and worked out that the man at the next stall was Donald Christie. He had white hair and a beard, and was sitting on a wooden box and smoking a pipe. At first glance it was hard to tell what kind of stall his was. He’d laid out brooches and hatpins and china dogs and candlesticks. The smoke from his pipe was pretty strong and wafted right into my face. I couldn’t believe how smelly the past was, or was it me being so hungry that made everything so overwhelming? “Morning,” he said and sucked loudly on his pipe.
“Morning,” I replied.
“It’ll stay fine till noon, then I daresay it’ll break. Then we’ll have a shower. Or two.”
I looked up at the sky, wondering whether he could forecast the war as well as showers. “Aye,” I said, “I think you’re right.”
“Not seen you afore,” he said, eyeing me inquisitively. “Not from these parts, eh?”
“Staying with my aunt for the summer,” I blurted out, feeling my palms sweat. “I have a silver necklace.” I held it out over the stall. “How much would you give me for it?”
His eyes lit up. “Have to have a good old peek at it first, won’t I?” I dropped it into his outstretched palm. He brought a huge magnifying glass up to his eye and peered closely at my necklace. “Not bad,” he said, still sucking on his pipe. “Not bad craftsmanship.” He peered from me to the necklace.
“It was my mother’s,” I explained, “and hardship has forced me to sell it.”
He hummed and hawed. “Sixpence ha’penny,” he said, “not a farthing less and that’s good clean money too.”
I had studied currency, and sixpence ha’penny was hardly a fortune, even in 1914. I knew my necklace was worth more than that. Suddenly the man gasped and brought the bracelet even closer to his huge magnifying glass. “There’s been some hallmarking error,” he said, “it is marked 1979.”
“1879,” I said, too hastily. “I mean, that’s what it should say. Easy to mix up an eight and a nine, eh?” I smiled at him and swiftly went on. “Peggy Bell said you would give me a lot more than sixpence ha’penny.”
He looked flustered for a moment then nodded. “Mistakes all round this merry morning. Here’s the date wrong, and here’s me meaning to say one shilling and sixpence. What was I thinking? It’s August madness, that’s what it is.”
“August madness right enough,” I said and skipped away from Donald Christie’s bric-a-brac stall with one shilling and sixpence in my hand. In modern money that is only about thirteen pence, but in 1914 it could buy a lot.
I bought fresh buns. Sitting down by the mercat cross I stuffed a warm one into my mouth. I didn’t care that I looked famished. I was famished. I chewed and swallowed and with every bite felt better and better. With my cheeks stuffed like a squirrel’s I saw the woman I had been following from the big house. She was bustling past with parcels under her arm and bread in the basket. That bit of food I’d had gave me courage so, swallowing fast, I ran over to her. “Hello,” I blurted out. “Thought I saw you come from the big house over the field.” The woman frowned at me and puckered her lips. She looked ready to stride off, so quickly I said, “And I wondered if you need a scullery maid? I’m a good worker, and honest.” She looked me up and down. “I can wash dishes and pots, and dry them too. I’m very careful,” I went on, smiling, and making myself as tall as I could.
“Might do,” she said, or snapped more like, but that didn’t put me off. I kept smiling, kept thinking of being with Saul and finding the deeds.
“I can also scrub and sweep, cook and launder,” I said, “I’m not afraid of hard work. Not one bit.”
She frowned, stared at me again, then nodded. “Call round at the house tomorrow. Say Mrs Buchan sent for you.” With that she marched off and vanished into the crowd. An even bigger smile spread over my face. If I wasn’t mistaken, I, thirteen-year-old Agnes Brown, had a job!
20
Agnes
I sunk my teeth into another bun. I still had six left, and planned on saving some till tomorrow and sharing them with Saul and the other poor servants.
Feeling pretty chuffed, I ambled towards the river. I looked to see if the girl called Peggy Bell was chucking stones into the river. She was and waved, but when she beckoned for me to come over I shook my head. I had things to do. Like finding a great-great-great-great aunt, for instance.
Peggy Bell had said Jean lived in Walkershaugh. That’s a road, and it was easy enough to find, but I had no idea what number house to knock at. I wandered along past the stone cottages, gazing at the pretty little violets and pansies in the gardens. A woman in a flowery-patterned pinny was outside one house, polishing her brass doorbell.
“Lovely morning,” I piped up.
The woman swung round and peered at me. “For now,” she said, curtly, and breathed on the brass.
“Can you tell me where, um, Jean lives?” I blurted out. “Please?”
The woman eyed me again. “What do you want with Jean? If that’s a parcel for her you can leave it here.”
I didn’t know what to say. I shook my head and held on tightly to the brown paper bag of rolls. “No. It’s not, um, a parcel. I just wanted… to bring her greetings from a distant relative.”
The woman stopped polishing. “Oh, aye, and where would that be from, then?”
I flu
ng an arm vaguely to the north. “Edinburgh,” I said.
“Oh, Edinburgh? I didn’t know the auld wifie had kin in Edinburgh. Anyway, Jean’s no in.” I saw the woman nod to the small stone cottage opposite. “I’ll tell her yea came looking fir her. What’s yer name?”
“Mind your own business. Jeannie’s here.” I swung round and stared at a woman who was standing behind me on the street. I hadn’t heard her approach. She had thick grey hair that tumbled, kind of wild looking, all the way past her shoulders, and she wore a long green dress. She looked like she had stepped out of the forest. I could see bits of moss sticking to her dress and her hair. She had a twinkle in her eye and she smiled at me. It was the same woman I had seen when I had been singing on the street. “It’s alright Mrs Gilchrist,” she called out, “I’m home,” then she linked her arm in mine and, like a long-lost chum, led me over the road and into her little garden. “Nosy old bat,” she said, taking me into the house. “Everybody else’s business is always more interesting than her own. Here, have a seat on that old chair, lassie, and tell me what I can do for you.”
It felt cosy inside. The place smelt of geraniums, and all kinds of other flowers. Jean made herself comfy in an old chair and now she was gazing at me, smiling, and waiting for my story. Somehow, looking at my great-great-great-great aunt and her being so soft and her eyes so kind, I couldn’t spin any lie like I’d planned to. If anybody on this planet was not going to bat an eyelid about time travel, I had the feeling it was her. “Did you ever hear of Agatha Black?” I began.