The Straw Halter Read Free Page B

her job. Instead her lady said softly, ‘Cook also tells me this is not the first time. That you often skid across the kitchen floor. Perhaps you should try to make two journeys instead of one and maybe even be a little slower, Betsy.’
    Now, all these years later, Betsy thought it was the use of her name that had triggered the tears then, for even her mother scarcely used it, and cook referred to her as girl or you girl. Whatever the reason she could not stop her eyes from filling and the tears overflowing and running down her cheeks. Mrs Wallasey came closer and touched her hand. ‘It’s all right, Betsy, nothing is going to happen to you. Just be more careful in future, there’s a good girl.’
    A week after that encounter Mrs Wallasey sent for her again. ‘How are you getting on here, Betsy?’ she said.
    It wasn’t in Betsy’s nature to pretend, and after a moment’s hesitation she answered truthfully, ‘I do my best, ma’am. I don’t seem to please.’
    Gently Mrs Wallasey had lifted Betsy’s hands from her side and examined them. They were red and tender, raw with continually washing the kitchen floor, peeling great bowls of potatoes, and generally doing all the tasks the other two no longer did. She remembered how ashamed of them she had been, and as she tried to wriggle them out of Mrs Wallasey’s firm grip her employer said quietly, ‘Do Jane and Annie share the heavier and dirtier tasks with you, Betsy?’
    She remembered, even now, how she could not look her special lady in the eyes and not tell the truth. Instead she had concentrated her gaze towards the floor and said, ‘We all do as cook tells us, ma’am.’
    She had felt a very soft finger beneath her chin, gently easing her face upwards. ‘I’m glad to hear that. You may go now, Betsy,You’re a good girl.’ She was out of the room before the tears fell and had wiped them away well before she was down the back stairs and in the kitchen.
    ‘Well,’ cook said, ‘what did Mrs Wallasey want with you?’
    ‘To – ask how I was getting on with the work, Mrs Bates.’
    ‘And what did you tell her?’ Cook’s huge body loomed over her.
    ‘All right,’ she lied.
    ‘Good. Come on now, you’ve wasted enough time when you should have been working, so get and help Annie with those vegetables. I hope milady isn’t going to make a habit of asking the scullery-maids how they’re getting on. Hmmph.’ She bustled over to the kitchen range.
    A week later cook told her that Mrs Wallasey was short of a maid upstairs and that Betsy was being sent up for the time being. She was ten and a half and had worked at Wren Court for three months.
     
    The same noise that she had heard earlier quickly brought her back to the present and this time she stood up, the book still in her hand, to check what it was. For a couple of seconds all was quiet, and then it came again, a scratching noise by the window. Nervously Betsy walked across the room. The brown curtains were drawn and yet someone was out there – there it was again, a rattle against the window as though someone was trying to open it. She put her hand on the curtain. Should she pull it and see? Whoever it was couldn’t get in that way and Daniel had warned her that the doors were all locked. She wished he was there with her now.
    Deciding to ignore the noise she returned to the fire and picked up the heavy poker from the hearth. If whoever it wasdid manage to get in she would at least have something to defend herself with. The silence as she sat in the chair again was eerie. She knew she could not concentrate on the book, and she didn’t want to wander around the place. The candles gave out a soft glow, but enough for whoever was out there to know the room was occupied. Maybe they had seen Daniel go off and knew she was here alone. The noise began again; it wasn’t a tap, nor yet a knock, more of a scraping sound. Suddenly she knew she had to see who was there. They were, after all, on the other