How could Essie prevent her sisters from sharing his fate?
As she walked to the front of the room Essie counted the children with knock-knees, lame legs, missing teeth and hunched backs. It was at least half the class.
Still more had bare feet.
Essie counted her family’s blessings. Maggie would be fine once she got over her cold. The girls would be much stronger once their leg braces were fitted—when she could find the extra money. At least they all had shoes. That was something …
She pointed to the board where a spelling list ran down the side in Miss Barnes’s immaculate script.
‘When you are finished with your alphabet and your letters, I’d like you to copy this spelling list onto your slates.’
Over in the back corner a trio of fair-haired boys who spent alternate mornings and afternoons working in the mills were fast asleep. The sun streamed in the window, and a smattering of freckles rained across the face of the youngest. He looked serene, younger than his eleven years. He spluttered a little and lifted his hand to scratch his nose. Essie grimaced. His hands were red and cracked, wrinkled like an old man’s.
Like hers. She pulled the jar of beeswax and almond oil salve from her apron pocket, given to her by her neighbour, Mrs Yarwood, and tapped the boy on the shoulder. ‘Here, Jimmy, rub this on your hands. It’ll make them feel better.’
‘Thanks, miss,’ said the boy gratefully as he scooped a glob onto his palm and rubbed it into his work-roughened hands.
Essie smoothed her skirts and walked over to where Gertie was working her way through a list. Where all the other children worked on slates, Gertie worked in a book gifted to her by the Yarwoods. The page of her ledger book was divided into three columns. In one column was a list of English words; in the other two columns Gertie would write the translation of each word into both Latin and French. Essie felt a wave of pride, before noticing a glint of gold under Gertie’s sleeve.
It was the button from last night.
Freddie had arrived home filthy from a day’s digging and gone straight to where the three girls were huddled around the kitchen table. Usually he was weary and wanted a wash and supper before collapsing straight into bed, but today he seemed excited. His arms twitched as his hands remained in his pockets. Essie narrowed her eyes and thought about the handfuls of jewels the men had plucked from the soil over on Cheapside …
Gertie had finished the extra mathematics Miss Barnes had set her and had begun to sketch the twins with their heads together in mischief, plaits tumbling down their shoulders.
Essie stood at the table bruising a handful of ivy leaves with a wooden roller before dropping them into a pot of boiling port and cinnamon. The kitchen air smelled thick, sweet and woody—like Christmas. Mrs Yarwood, from next door, had shown Essie how to make the blend. ‘A draught of the liquor infused with a generous helping of ivy is the speediest cure for too much wine, love.’
Either way, Ma was in a bitter mood and a cup of this brew would see her off to sleep until morning. The house was calmer—quieter—when she slept.
Essie tried to quell her frustration that their mother had spent a day’s spinning wages on half a flagon. More’s the pity there was not a tea that could drain away her sadness.
The twins were reverently watching Gertie. There was only the mildest pushing and squabbling and bony elbow in the guts as they took turns to pass the ink to their older sister.
Freddie boomed, ‘Who wants to play the button game?’ Their pa had taught it to Gertie, Maggie and Flora when a brass button from his dress uniform had fallen off right before he shipped out—before Ma ushered the girls away and carefully stitched the button back on with a tender smile.
‘Me!’ they all squealed. Maggie jumped up and wrapped her arms around her brother’s legs, dark plaits dangling over her shoulders.
‘Now remember, just like Pa did it. Nice and fast. Hold your hands out, young ladies. Both hands. Now close your eyes. And I mean close them properly—I can see you squinting, Miss Flora Murphy.’ He tickled her tummy and she howled with laughter as she tried to wiggle away.
‘Honestly, Freddie,’ Essie sighed as she prepared the tea for her mother. ‘I was trying to keep them quiet before bed, not stir them up so they won’t sleep.’ But even as she tried to scold her brother, her shoulders softened at the sight of his wan cheeks and tired eyes. Freddie had tried to step into Pa’s shoes and find a job that paid enough to support them all, but he was still just a lad himself, with no skills or education, and with his dreamy demeanour and hapless optimism he had more in common with Gertie than their soldier father. Still, he was trying.
‘Freddie,’ Essie said softly. ‘You need to eat …’
‘Shh,’ said Freddie as he held a finger up to his mouth.
Essie held her breath as she noticed how like their father her older brother looked. The bridge of the nose, square jaw and strong hands. In different clothes he could be an aristocrat.
‘Hands,’ he barked, like their pa used to, and the girls straightened like soldiers and obediently held their hands out and closed their eyes. Maggie popped one open before squeezing it shut.
‘Button, button … who has the button?’
He dropped the button into Gertie’s hand and she clasped her fingers around it, squeezing it for a few beats before opening her eyes.
If Gertie were the God-fearing type, Essie would have sworn her sister was praying for something. More food, most likely.
‘Right, now you play with your sisters, Gertie-girl, while I have my wash,’ instructed Freddie as he tried to peel the twins from his legs. But the twins were having none of it. They ignored Gertie and dropped to their brother’s feet, kneeling on the cold dirt floor like a couple of puppies and bickering over who would be the one to untie the laces of his filthy boots.
As Essie pulled the bathtub from its hook on the wall and turned to boil up hot water for Freddie to bathe, she noticed Gertie’s usually composed face light up with a smile as she slipped a shining gold button into her apron pocket. For a moment Essie glimpsed the cheeky, carefree girl Gertie kept hidden away under her pinafore.
Gertie must have forgotten to return the button to Freddie, though, because here it was now, tucked under the corner of her book.
Carefully, so as not to distract her sister, Essie moved forwards for a closer look.
The button was a double-layered flower: a rose fashioned from gold, with just the faintest traces of blue and white paint. At the centre of the flower and dotted along the petals were blue, red and white stones. Were they precious stones, or coloured paste? Each of the inner circles also had gold indents, as if there were more to come.
Who did this button belong to? Also, if this was just a button, what on earth had the dress it was intended for looked like?
Freddie must have accidentally pocketed this on his worksite yesterday and then, in his excitement upon finding it, hadn’t been able to resist showing it off to the girls. It was so typical of Freddie to forget to take it back from Gertie when they’d finished their game. Instead, he’d wearily trudged straight upstairs to bed after his supper of bread and dripping. Essie would force Gertie to give the button back to Freddie the minute he arrived home this evening.
She took a minute to look at a sketch of the button Gertie had made below her spelling list. Their accountant neighbour, Mr Yarwood, had insisted on giving Gertie the ledger book to use for her drawings when she and her sisters had been over for a supper of pea and ham soup, followed by a sponge loaded with bilberries and cream last week. ‘Silly me, I bought the wrong one. Only good for your sketches, Miss Gertie.’