Chapters (53)
- Cover
- Title page
- Dedication page
- One
- Two
- Three
- Four
- Five
- Six
- Seven
- Eight
- Nine
- Ten
- Eleven
- Twelve
- Thirteen
- Fourteen
- Fifteen
- Sixteen
- Seventeen
- Eighteen
- Nineteen
- Twenty
- Twenty-one
- Twenty-two
- Twenty-three
- Twenty-four
- Twenty-five
- Twenty-six
- Twenty-seven
- Twenty-eight
- Twenty-nine
- Thirty
- Thirty-one
- Thirty-two
- Thirty-three
- Thirty-four
- Thirty-five
- Thirty-six
- Thirty-seven
- Thirty-eight
- Thirty-nine
- Forty
- Forty-one
- Forty-two
- Forty-three
- Forty-four
- Sow the Seed
- Reap the Harvest
- About the Author
- ALSO BY MARGARET DICKINSON
- Acknowledgements
- Copyright page
Sam Brumby concentrated on his bowl; he neither spoke nor looked at either of the other two. Esther rose and poured each of them a mug of tea.
As they finished the meal, Matthew stood up. ‘I’ve to go to Mester Willoughby’s after dinner today. Shall you be wanting me tomorrow, Mester Brumby?’
Esther saw Sam glance quickly at her and then look away again. He sniffed. ‘Aye,’ was all he said.
Matthew grinned at Esther, picked up his cap and, whistling jauntily, left the house. Esther cleared away the dishes and carried them into the back scullery. She drew hot water from the tap in the range. As she poured it into the sink in the scullery, she felt Sam Brumby’s presence in the doorway behind her and smelt the sweet-sour smell of tobacco smoke as he methodically packed his clay pipe and lit it.
‘There’s a room – ’ he spoke in short bursts between each puff as he drew deeply on his pipe to get it fully alight – ‘above ’ere.’ He prodded his pipe stem towards the ceiling of the kitchen. ‘You can get to it by a ladder in yon corner. It’ll – be warmer – than the hayloft.’
He turned away without waiting for her to speak and went out of the back door.
Esther leant on her knuckles in the bowl of hot water and closed her eyes. Two tears of thankfulness plopped into the washing-up water.
The room above the kitchen was no more than an attic boxroom. When Esther climbed the narrow ladder from the corner of the kitchen and poked her head through the trap door, she was met by the musty smell of rotting apples. To one side, spread on newspaper, were apples from the previous autumn; maybe even the one before that, she thought, by the look of some of them. Several were aged to a brown pulp and covered with a thick blanket of dust.
The small, oblong room with a sloping ceiling was littered with bits of broken furniture, a trunk of old clothes and the general clutter of a family who had lived in the same house for generations. In one of the corners, tied up with binding, was a rolled mattress.
Esther surveyed the chaos grimly but by nightfall when she lay down on the mattress, the room was clean and sweet-smelling.