The Nightmare by Nancy Means Wright

Author:Nancy Means Wright
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: mystery fiction, historical fiction, Mary Wollstonecraft, London
ISBN: 978-1-56474-752-5
Publisher: Perseverance Press
Published: 2011-09-09T00:00:00+00:00

XI. Curiosity Killed More than the Cat

The girl had been driving Dulcie to distraction, dancing about the house with a chair cushion, boxing with the cat, then flopping down on the sofa to read aloud some dribble about a foppish rogue who was ogling a young girl. She was doing it just to annoy Dulcie. So when she begged to go outside: “Just down the street a little,” Dulcie gave in.

“Go then,” Dulcie said. “But see you don’t go more’n two streets in either direction. Or I’ll tell Miss Mary and she’d be angry with both of us. Here’s tuppence. There’s a sweet shop in Russell Square. Buy yourself some almonds.”

“Almonds get in my throat,” the girl said. “They make me cough.”

“Whatever you like then. Be it almonds or walnuts, I don’t care. Just go. Go and be back by noon hour.”

“You know I don’t have a timepiece.”

“Then look at the sky. The sun’ll be overhead at noon.”

“There’s cloud. It’s looking to rain.”

“Go,” Dulcie cried, “just go. Go!” Tossing her head, the girl went. The door slammed.

Now it was Dulcie’s turn to dance about the house. She did a reel across the room, facing an imaginary partner. He wore a scarlet waistcoat with tiny pearl buttons that caressed her cheek as the pair whirled about. They danced up one side of the room and down the other, up and down, up and down. It didn’t take long, the room was small. Finally exhausted—she hadn’t slept well the night before because of a rat knocking about inside her wall—she fell back on the sofa and took a nap.

When she woke she looked at the mantel clock and saw it was almost noon. The girl should be home soon. The fire was dying, the floor dusty. A mouse skittered across the raggedy blue-flowered rug Miss Mary treasured; it had been woven by her grandfather. Dulcie gave the impudent mouse a swish with her broom and it disappeared into a hole beside the fireplace.

Half-past-twelve donged and no Annie. Let a creature off the rope and it was gone. A disobedient child, aye. So then. Let her take her lumps. Dulcie trotted down to the kitchen to butter a hunk of bread and heat water for a dish of tea. Then trudged up two flights to her garret chamber.

She sat in the small rocking chair that Mr Johnson had lent her and sipped the tea. She chewed the white bread and butter slowly—it was sweet butter she’d bought at the marketplace. Dulcie wasn’t up to making butter herself, all that churning! And Miss Mary just shrugged when Dulcie added butter to the list of victuals to buy—she liked a little butter on her bread. Dulcie was lucky to have such a distracted mistress, her friends said. Dulcie wasn’t sure about that.

She dropped to her knees to pull the hatbox of papers out from under the bed. She had been born with a generous measure of curiosity. Too much, the parish nurse would say, making her go lie on her bed when she asked too many questions.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.