A Place to Call Home: Rose’s Story by Evie Grace

Author:Evie Grace [Grace, Evie]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Amazon: B076DP69D2
Goodreads: 36602977
Publisher: Cornerstone Digital
Published: 2018-07-12T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter Fourteen

One to rot

One to grow

One for the pigeons

One for the crow

Rose was woken by the sound of metal hammering against metal. Remembering where she was, she peeked past the curtain, catching sight of a boy outside in the farmyard. He was holding on to a big grey horse while a middle-aged man stood bowed over with its hoof between his knees as he nailed a shoe on to its foot.

Having wished Minnie a good morning, she shook Donald awake and told him to get up, then quickly brushed her hair before walking out on to the landing, afraid they had overslept. She headed downstairs to the kitchen where she found Mrs Carter bringing a basket of eggs indoors, and a maid preparing breakfast: eggs, bread and jam, the sight of which made her mouth water.

‘It wouldn’t be right to throw them on to the parish, Alice,’ Mrs Carter said.

‘No, ma’am,’ the maid said.

‘Or send them on to Faversham to find work in the brickfields. There is plenty of work there, so I’ve heard, except that it’s long and hard, and only for the summer. Ah, there you are, Rose. There’s a bucket and water to wash with out there.’ She pointed towards the door leading into the corridor. ‘Mind you don’t splash your feet when you work the pump – my brother used to tease me to death about it.’ Her husband appeared in the corridor, taking off his boots. ‘Oh, there you are, Stephen. What did she have?’

He beamed broadly. ‘A beautiful colt. He’s perfect. And Stanley has already put a new shoe on the young man’s horse.’

‘Who is he?’ Mrs Carter said as two more men in their late thirties or early forties followed Mr Carter into the kitchen. She quickly introduced them to Rose as her stepsons, Stanley and Matthew, before returning to the subject of the visiting stranger. ‘Didn’t you ask him who he was and what business he had in Overshill?’

‘I didn’t interrogate him as you would have done – he gave me the impression that he wanted to keep himself to himself, but he did mention that he’d hired his mount and ridden this way early from Canterbury to meet with the agent who’s selling Churt House.’

‘Really? That’s interesting. What did you tell him?’

‘Not a lot – he didn’t ask much.’

‘What does he do to afford a place like that?’ Mrs Carter said, rather coldly, Rose thought. ‘It hasn’t been touched in years.’

‘Not since the owner died. What was his name?’ Stanley – the younger of the brothers – piped up. ‘Handley? No, Hadington.’

‘The weasley old lawyer who used to fall out with the squire over the boundaries of their estates. That’s right,’ Matthew said, reaching across the table for a slice of bread. ‘You should have remembered him – we used to shoe all his hunters and carriage horses, didn’t we, Pa?’

‘I sold him a good few animals,’ Mr Carter said, his eyes on his wife who turned away and busied herself with slicing more bread.

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