Noel Streatfeild - Thursday’s Child

When Hannah had first come to work for the Camerons, Miss Sylvia had been twenty and Miss Selina eighteen. In those days they had been known as ‘Those pretty Cameron girls’. Now Hannah was over sixty, so Miss Sylvia was over seventy and Miss Selina rising seventy, and they were known as ‘The old Cameron ladies’.

Hannah had, almost since she was a baby, carefully taught Margaret how to be a good housewife. Her efforts had little effect for Margaret loathed dusting, polishing and sweeping, and as for laundry she just would not try. But Hannah’s efforts were not altogether a failure for she had taught Margaret to cook. Often Hannah found herself so tired at the end of the day she could scarcely drag herself up to bed, but it had never crossed her mind to give in her notice. Miss Sylvia, always the delicate one, was getting very frail, and poor Miss Selina ever so hazy in her mind. Anyway, Saltmarsh House, where they lived, was her home. She could not imagine living anywhere else.

Now Hannah’s bony, work-roughened fingers attempted to tidy Margaret’s hair. This was chestnut-coloured and very curly, so not at all easy to control.

Margaret tried to wriggle out of Hannah’s reach. She loved the rector but was surprised to be going to tea with him, for he was not the sort of man to give sudden invitations.

‘Why am I going to tea with the rector?’ she asked, still trying to pull away from Hannah. ‘Please leave my hair alone, you know the rector isn’t the sort of person who cares how people look.’

‘Tidiness shows respect,’ said Hannah. She stood away from Margaret to see the whole effect. Margaret was dressed as simply-brought-up children were dressed in the winter at the beginning of the century. A blue pleated skirt, a darker blue jersey and a red coat. On her head was a red tam-o’-shanter. On her legs black woollen stockings and the boots.

Hannah sighed, conscious that all Margaret’s clothes were darned and could do with a sponge.

‘I suppose you’ll have to do, but if only we’d had warning you could have worn your Sunday green.’

‘Thank goodness you didn’t know,’ said Margaret, ‘because I hate wearing my green for you’ve patched the elbows with stuff that doesn’t match.’

Hannah gave her a sad smile.

‘Beggars can’t be choosers. Come on or I’ll be late getting my ladies’ tea.’

Margaret liked going to the rectory for Mr Hanslow, the rector, was, excluding Hannah, her greatest friend. The rectory could have been a beautiful house, but the rector was very poor so both it and his garden were neglected. He was looked after by a Mr and Mrs Price who lived in a cottage down the road. Mr Price was really the verger, but he managed to combine his church work with a bit of gardening and cutting wood for the rector. Mrs Price cooked abominably and did what little housework was done.

Margaret never rang the rectory bell, she just opened the front door and shouted.

‘Can I come in? It’s me – Margaret.’

The study door opened and the rector came smiling into the passage. He gave Margaret a kiss.

‘There you are, my pet. Come in. Mrs Price has made toast for our tea.’

Over burnt toast and stewed tea, Margaret chattered away as usual, bringing the rector up to date with home and school news. Then, when Mrs Price had cleared away the tea things, she stuck out her legs.

‘Do you think you could speak to Miss Sylvia about these boots? Truly nobody wears boots any more. All the girls at school have laced-up shoes.’

Mr Hanslow did not look at the boots but straight into Margaret’s eyes.

‘I have always thought you were a sensible child, which is why I have asked you here today to discuss your future.’

Margaret was surprised. What future? Nothing ever changed in Saltmarsh House. It must, she decided, be something to do with the little school for the daughters of gentlemen which she attended.

‘Is it about school?’

‘That is one of the things we have to talk about,’ said the rector. ‘You remember, of course, the details of how you came to live here.’

Margaret was proud of her history.

‘Of course I do. One Thursday you found me on the steps of the church when I was a teeny-weeny baby. And with me in my basket there were three of everything, all of the very best quality.’

‘And a note,’ the rector reminded her.

‘Oh yes. Printed so no one would know who had written it. It said: THIS IS MARGARET WHOM I ENTRUST TO YOUR CARE. EACH YEAR FIFTY-TWO POUNDS WILL BE SENT FOR HER KEEP AND SCHOOLING. SHE HAS NOT YET BEEN CHRISTENED.’

The rector nodded, smiling at the memory.

‘You were a beautiful baby and if screams were anything to go by you certainly got the devil out of you at your christening. I would have dearly loved to take you in, but Mrs Price could not sleep in and an old bachelor did not seem a suitable guardian for you, so …’

‘So,’ Margaret prompted him, for she thought he was being rather slow telling the well-known story, ‘you asked the Miss Camerons to have me as they were the only people hereabouts with a big enough house and they said “yes”.’

‘God bless them,’ said the rector, ‘for there was no one else in the parish suitable and it did work out very nicely, but now things have gone wrong. This Christmas no money arrived for your keep.’

‘No money!’ Margaret gasped, for always the money had arrived with the utmost regularity. It came each year between Christmas Eve and New Year’s Day. It was put in a bag somewhere in the church – fifty-two golden sovereigns. The bag was never found in the same place twice and no one had ever seen the money arrive. ‘Do you think it came and someone stole it?’

The rector took a card out of his breast pocket and passed it to Margaret.

‘This was found in the font.’

Like the card which had come with her when she was a baby, this one was printed. It said ‘NO MORE MONEY FOR MARGARET’.

Margaret was shocked.

‘How very mean! You would think a mother would manage something. Have you told Miss Sylvia and Miss Selina?’

The rector hesitated.

‘Really this card has hastened something which had got to happen sooner or later. Miss Selina is getting very old.’

Margaret giggled.

‘She’s getting more and more like a baby every day. Now Hannah has to dress her and undress her.’

‘Very sad,’ said the rector, ‘but it is also very worrying. You see, with the old ladies needing so much attention, Hannah has too much to do. It has broken her heart to admit this but it is true. So even before Christmas I had agreed to find you a new home.’

Margaret felt like Alice must have felt as she fell down the rabbit hole. A new home! But Saltmarsh House was her home, her only home. How could she be going to a new one – children never did that.

‘I suppose you didn’t know,’ she said, ‘but I help Hannah. Often and often I cook the supper and I do lots of other things – not as well as I cook, but I do them.’

The rector took one of Margaret’s hands.

‘It is not a question of helping in the house, it’s everything. The two old ladies are all Hannah can manage. She admitted this before Christmas and we discussed plans, thinking you still had an income of fifty-two pounds a year. But now the situation has changed. The Miss Camerons are, as you know, very far from rich, and now you have no money …’ The rector broke off, looking at Margaret with great love but also with a childlike confusion.

The rector’s worried face pulled Margaret together.

‘If I still had fifty-two pounds a year where were you going to send me?’

‘Nothing was decided, but we had thought of a boarding school.’

‘Well, I’m glad I haven’t got the money for that for I’d hate it. Couldn’t I live with you? I could do all the things Mrs Price does and I’d work in the garden as well as I’d eat very little.’