‘Aye, we will.’ He grinned as he again ruffled Ruby’s red curls and then they were off, leaving Ruby to make her way back to the house feeling suddenly very lonely. So very much had happened in such a short space of time. She had lost the woman she had always thought of as her mother, her father had raped her, she had run away from home to be befriended by Maddie, who Ruby still secretly hoped was her real mother, but seeing as the woman didn’t even seem to miss her, she was beginning to have her doubts, and now here she was working as a maid in a big house. It was all so much to take in.

*

‘Ooh, you look perished,’ Cook said when she stepped into the kitchen a short time later, letting in a blast of icy, damp air. ‘Get over here by the fire an’ get warm else you’ll catch your death o’ cold.’

Ruby willingly did as she was told as she unwound the damp shawl from her shoulders and placed her sodden boots in front of the fire to dry, then she sat watching the staff rushing about as they prepared the family’s evening meal. Sunday was the only night of the week when they had a light meal having had a cooked meal at lunchtime, and tonight Cook had prepared them a large bowl of salad, cold cuts of meat left over from lunch and a selection of pickles along with a pork pie, hard-boiled eggs, a large crusty loaf and a fancy plate full of dainty cakes she had baked that afternoon.

‘That should keep ’em happy for a while,’ she said with satisfaction as Betty rushed the last of the meal through to the dining room. ‘I’ll just have a nice cup o’ tea an’ then I’ll see about gettin’ us lot fed.’

Cook made them all tasty sandwiches for tea but Ruby found that she couldn’t eat a thing and wondered if perhaps she had caught a chill. With this in mind she excused herself as soon as the meal was over and decided on an early night, and within minutes of snuggling down beneath the cold sheets, she was fast asleep.

She woke early the next morning feeling ill and for the first time since she had been there, she hooked the chamber pot from beneath the bed and was violently sick into it, waking Betty.

‘Crikey, looks like you’ve eaten somethin’ that disagreed with you,’ Betty commented as she swiped the sleep from her eyes. Then glancing at the dark window and realising that it was still very early, she turned over and went back to sleep again.

*

‘You look a bit peaky, are you feelin’ unwell?’ Cook asked kindly when Ruby went downstairs sometime later to prepare a breakfast tray for Miranda who had come down with a cold and had decided to have breakfast in bed.