The Straw Halter Read Free

tell me more about yourself. All I know is that you are eighteen years old and breathtakingly beautiful. I want to know much more.’
    ‘I’m the youngest of eight children. My father died when I was a baby and I don’t remember him at all.’
    She paused and Daniel said gently, ‘Your mother – is she still alive?’
    ‘Yes.’
    ‘Then you must introduce us later. She will want to know you are well cared for.’
    ‘I can take care of myself. I’ve been doing so for years.’
    He looked at her sharply, ‘Have you quarrelled with her?’
    ‘That is my affair. You may have bought a wife, but you haven’t bought her soul as well as her body.’
    She glanced across to where the straw halter now hung on a nail behind the door, then looked quickly away. His expression changed and in an instant the atmosphere became charged with tension. He clenched his hands until the knuckles looked brutal, then suddenly he said, ‘That’s fair comment, I suppose. However, if we are to live together in some sort of harmony, and I hope we are, then you must learn as I must learn. You are far too quick to jump. I have no wish for you to be too subservient but I expect a certain–’
    At that moment there was a terrific hammering on the door. Daniel looked startled, but was up and out of the room faster than she would have thought possible. She heard anxious voices, both men’s, one of them her new husband’s. After what seemed a long time to her, sitting apprehensively in the armchair, Daniel returned.
    ‘I have to go out, trouble at Denmeads, Martin there, is our nearest neighbour,’ he told her. ‘I don’t know when I’ll be back, so if you are tired get yourself to bed and I’ll be along later.’ He hesitated for a second and she thought he was going to kiss her, then he grimaced and said, ‘Tonight of all nights, but maybe I won’t be long. You’ll be all right, the back door is locked and I’ll take my key. Don’t push the bolts though.’ Then he was gone and she heard him talking to whoever it was in the hallway, imagined him pulling on his boots to go and help with whatever catastrophe had befallen his neighbour.
    Alone in the farmhouse Betsy wasn’t sure what she wanted to do. It was only half past eight, far too early for bed. Nevertheless she went upstairs to their bedroom and unpacked her clothes, placing them neatly in the drawers and wardrobe space that Daniel had indicated would be hers. She drew the curtains, leaving a two-inch gap so the room would catch thefirst light of dawn, then she went downstairs and looked at the books on the shelf from which Daniel had taken the Bible earlier. Several were farming manuals but there was some fiction. She took one of these, returned to the armchair and began to read. It was a story about a servant-girl and when the lady of the house was mentioned Betsy closed her eyes, remembering her own days with the lady of the house where she had been sent to work when she was ten years old.
    Mrs Wallasey had been kind to her from the beginning, asking about her brothers and sisters, sending little treats home with her on the few occasions when she was able to go. These were usually on Mothering Sunday and Christmas Day if she was lucky, although she actually found it better to be at the big house on Christmas Day rather than with her own family. This did sometimes make her feel guilty.
    She had started work in the kitchen at Wren Court and for three months had not seen anything of the rest of the house, except the back stairs leading to the bedroom that she shared with two other girls. They were both older than she was; one was twelve and one fourteen, and they resented having such a young girl with them. At night Betsy was so tired she simply wanted to sleep, but they talked and giggled, mostly about the butcher’s boy who delivered the meat for the house every day.
    Jane, the older one, tripped her deliberately on more than one occasion, both in the kitchen and upstairs in