The Black Dress by Pamela Freeman Read Free Book Online Page B

Kingdom—’
    ‘Wait, wait, Mary, you have gone past yourself.’
    ‘I don’t understand, Papa.’
    ‘Come, we will look at it word by word, phrase by phrase. Let us start with “qui es in caelis”, Mary . ’
    So we went through the Our Father, and the Hail Mary, fitting the Latin words to the English, and winnowing the meaning out of both.
    ‘Pater means father. Look at it, Mary. Does it remind you of any other English word?’
    I shook my head. The only thing I could think of was ‘plate’ and I was sure that plates weren’t part of the Our Father.
    ‘It is the source of other English words: paternal, patriarch, paternity...’
    I could see the pattern. Papa pulled words apart for me and put them back together. It was a game, but a game with a point. It was fun.
    ‘Mater means mother, Mary.’
    ‘I know! Maternal and maternity.’
    ‘Good girl!’
    We had lessons for an hour every morning after he had given the men their orders for the day. Then he set me some reading and arithmetic to do while he was busy about the farm. In the evenings, before dinner, he would inspect my work.
    Papa also taught Maggie and John, but they were younger and still just learning simple reading and arithmetic. Papa took pains over their lessons but he didn’t enjoy it as much as our lessons together. I could see that. I could see why, too. Papa had a complicated mind. He liked a challenge. He liked to see me trying hard and then conquering a problem.
    I did try hard. I enjoyed it when Papa praised me, when his eyes lit with warmth.
    The study game was fun. It was like playing with puzzles and seeing all the pieces slot into place. Papa and I were alike, I realised. We both loved words and learning. Even arithmetic was interesting, once I realised that adding up and subtracting was what Papa did with his accounts each week.
    But before lessons, and after them, I worked side by side with Mamma and Bridget. With Mamma there was no little need for talk, because we worked together in perfect understanding of what needed to be done and how to do it. After all, Mamma had taught me most of these chores before I lived with the L’Estranges. There were only a few things Mamma or Bridget would not let me do yet, like touch the hot flatirons.
    ‘Soon enough, little mother,’ Bridget would laugh. ‘You won’t be so keen to iron when you have a family of your own. Here, hold the baby while I do your papa’s Sunday shirt.’
    So I held Lexie and tickled and cuddled her and wished for a baby of my own some day, while Maggie fed Annie her bread and milk and John fed a poddy lamb with a rag stuck into a bottle of milk. It was good to be back in the family. The L’Estranges’ seemed a long way away.
    ***
    After Papa had gone to Scotland, there was still Lexie and Maggie and Annie and John to look after. Still the cooking and the mending and the washing to help with. But the lessons were no longer fun.
    I worked from my books. I read. I tried to continue as though Papa were still there. I repeated what Mamma had told me. Four months’ sailing to Scotland. Perhaps two weeks there to see family and friends. Perhaps another month if there were no boat leaving. Then four months back. Nine months. Nine months before we could even begin to expect him.
    ‘Nine months is not so long, child,’ Mamma had said. But it seemed a very long time indeed. I counted off the days on the perpetual calendar at Uncle Peter’s house, when we visited.
    Aunt Julia made sharp comments to Mamma about Papa’s absence. ‘No word, yet, Flora? He could at least have sent a letter from the first port.’
    ‘There’s hardly been time for a letter to have reached us, Julia,’ Mamma said quietly. ‘No doubt one will come soon.’
    ‘No doubt, no doubt,’ said Uncle Peter heartily, with a sidelong glance at Aunt Julia. That glance held something I did not understand, some warning. Aunt Julia sniffed and shrugged.
    ‘Well, you’d better pray that he comes home