One of Us Buried by Johanna Craven

Author:Johanna Craven [Craven, Johanna]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2021-01-05T16:00:00+00:00

PART TWO

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

“Nell Marling,” the superintendent barked. I looked up from the spinning wheel. “You’re to go with Corporal Anderson.” He nodded towards the sunburned young soldier dithering at the top of the stairs. “You’re being assigned. Housekeeper to Mr Robert Leaver. You’ll be escorted to his property shortly. He has a room ready for you.”

I swallowed. “A room?”

The superintendent chuckled. “I trust that’s to your liking.”

I traipsed down the stairs behind the soldier, feeling stupidly unsteady.

Had Blackwell had a hand in this? I couldn’t tell.

I looked back over my shoulder as I climbed down the staircase from the factory. A place that, for all its horrors, had become strangely comfortable in its familiarity. The life I had scratched together here – days at the spinning wheels, nights on Blackwell’s floor – was something I knew I could cope with. But here I was facing the unknown again.

It was almost a relief to be leaving the stool beside Lottie. In the three days since Owen had manhandled me to the river, we had barely exchanged a word. Each night as I’d left the factory and walked back towards Blackwell’s hut, I could feel her eyes on me. Once, I’d thought to call out to her, make some attempt at resurrecting our friendship. But it felt like the time for that had passed. It had disappeared the night Owen had dragged me from the hut and told me lies about Castle Hill.

Or perhaps it had disappeared on Christmas night when I had shown the colony the way my heart sped for Adam Blackwell.

My new overseer, Robert Leaver, was waiting outside the factory. The soldier escorting me squinted as he read from the crumpled paper in his hand.

“Eleanor Marling, sir. Twenty-eight, childless, healthy.”

Leaver was a short man with a wide, sun-streaked forehead and pale tufts of hair that reminded me of tussock grass. Forty perhaps. Maybe younger. I knew this place had a way of ageing you. He looked me up and down.

“She’ll do.”

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