Hetty Feather Page 3

  I laughed and laughed and laughed. I even laughed while I was being paddled.

  Jem laughed too when I told him, but he said I must take care not to be so bad when I went to school.

  'Teacher has a big cane, Hetty, and she swishes it all day,' he said. 'She hurts much more than Mother.'

  'She swishes you, Jem?'

  'She swished my friend Janet for chalking her bs and ds the wrong way round, and when I said it wasn't fair, Janet had tried and tried to learn, she's just not very quick, Teacher swished me too and told me not to answer back.'

  'I don't like Teacher,' I said.

  I knew my bs from my ds already because Jem had taught me. But then I thought of Martha.

  'Martha can't write any of her letters,' I said. 'Will Teacher swish her?'

  'I won't let her,' said Jem stoutly.

  But Martha didn't go to the village school when she was five. Mother boiled up a tub of water one evening and gave Martha her own special scrub, even though she'd had a washday bath on Monday. Mother gave her a special creamy mug of milk for her supper and held her on her lap while she drank it.

  Father gave Martha a ride on his knees. 'This is the way the ladies ride,' he sang, jiggling her up and down while she giggled.

  Saul whined that it wasn't fair, he wanted a ride. Gideon said nothing, but he sucked his thumb and stared while Martha drank his milk. For once I didn't complain. I was too little to under- stand, but I saw the tears in Mother's eyes, heard the crack in Father's voice as he sang. I knew something was wrong – though Martha herself stayed blissfully unaware.

  She went to sleep that night as soon as her head hit the pillow. I stayed awake, cuddling up to her, winding a lock of her brown hair round and round my finger as if I was binding us together.

  Mother came and woke us very early.

  'Is it time to get up?' I asked sleepily.

  'Not for you, Hetty,' said Mother. 'Go back to sleep.'

  It was still so dark I couldn't see her, but I could tell that she'd been crying again. She gently coaxed Martha up and led her out of the room. I turned over into Martha's warm patch and breathed in her faint bread-and-butter smell, wondering why Mother had woken her so early. I decided I should creep out of bed and go and see, but it still seemed like the middle of the night and I was so tired . . .

  When I woke up again, the sun was shining through the window. I ran downstairs, calling out for Martha. She wasn't there. Mother wasn't there either. Rosie and Eliza were brewing the tea and stirring porridge.

  'Where's Mother? Where's Martha?'

  'They've had to go out,' said Rosie. 'Come and sit down like a good girl, Hetty.'

  I didn't want to be a good girl. I wanted Mother and Martha. My heart was beating hard inside my chest. I was very frightened, though I didn't quite know why. I started screaming and couldn't stop, not even when Eliza bribed me with a dab of butter and sugar, not even when Rosie slapped my kicking legs. Jem eventually quietened me, lugging me up onto his lap and rocking me like a newborn baby, but he seemed almost as anxious as I was.

  Rosie and Nat and Eliza knew something we didn't. They nudged each other and wouldn't look us in the eye over our breakfast. Jem questioned them persistently, I cried, Saul snivelled, and Gideon didn't get out to the privy in time and wet all down his legs. We couldn't manage without Mother. She was always there, as much a part of the cottage as the roof and the four walls. We were lost without her. And why had she taken Martha with her?

  'You know where Mother's taken her,' said Jem, standing on the bench so he was eye to eye with Rosie. 'Tell us!'

  'Stop pestering me, Jem. I've got more than enough to do without you and the babies fuss fuss fussing. Hetty, if you start that screaming again, I'll paddle you with Mother's ladle.'

  'Don't you dare paddle Hetty,' said Jem. 'She's not being bad, she's just fearful. She wants Mother.'

  'Well, Mother will be back presently,' said Rosie evasively.

  'Why did she go off without saying goodbye? Why did she take Martha with her?'

  'Poor little Martha,' said Rosie, suddenly softening. Her lip puckered as if she was about to cry.

  'Is Martha poorly?' Jem persisted, but Rosie wouldn't answer.

  When Gideon had been poorly with the croup last winter, Mother had called in the doctor. He had looked grave and said Gideon might have to be sent to hospital.

  'Is Martha so poorly she's had to go to hospital?' Jem asked.

  He lowered his voice when he said the word. We'd heard the villagers talking. Hospitals were terrifying places where doctors cut you open and took out all your insides.

  'She's had to go to the hospital, that's right,' said Rosie.

  Nat sniggered, though even he looked troubled, his eyes watering as if he was near tears.

  Perhaps Martha was very ill, about to die? But this was all such nonsense. I had cuddled up to Martha all night long and she hadn't been poorly at all.

  I clung to Jem and he rocked me again. He didn't go to school that day. He told Rosie he was staying home to look after us little ones. Rosie tried to make him go but she sounded half-hearted. She was glad enough to have him in charge while she scrubbed the cottage and set the cooking pot bubbling on the hearth.

  Jem played patiently with Saul and Gideon and me. When the two little boys had a nap after their soup, Jem took me to the forbidden squirrel house, trying his best to distract me. I was deeply touched but it didn't work. No matter how hard I tried to picture, it stayed a grubby hole in a tree. My mind was too full picturing Mother and Martha.

  Rosie had once won a Sunday school prize, a book called Little Elsa's Last Good Deed. It was a pretty book, bright blue with gold lettering, and I'd begged Jem to read it to me. He'd stumbled through the first few pages until we both got tired. It was a dull story and Little Elsa was tiresomely good. She didn't seem real at all. I leafed through the whole book, looking for pictures, but they weren't exciting like the Elephant and the Mandarin and the Pirate and the Zebra, my favourite pictures in The Good Child's ABC. I only liked the last picture, with Little Elsa lying in bed looking very pale and poorly, and an angel with curly hair and a shiny hat flying straight through the window to carry her up to Heaven.

  But now I kept picturing Martha as the ailing child in some grim hospital, a doctor sawing at her stomach, an angel at one end, intent on stealing her away up to Heaven, and Mother down the other end, hanging onto Martha's ankles.

  I sobbed this scenario to Jem and he did his best to reassure me.

  'Mother and Martha will come home safe and sound, you'll see,' he said. 'In fact I reckon they're home already, and when Mother finds I've stayed off school she'll be right angry with me. And if you pipe up we've been to the squirrel house, we'll both get a paddling.'

  We trailed back home. When we ran into the kitchen, there was Mother at the table, still stiff in her Sunday best, bolt upright because she was wearing her stays, though her head was bent. Martha was nowhere to be seen.

  'Where's Martha, Mother?' Jem asked.

  'Martha?' I echoed.

  'Martha's . . . gone,' Mother said.

  'The angels got her!' I said, starting to cry again.

  'What? No, no, she's not dead, Hetty,' said Mother. She took a deep breath. 'Where are the others, Saul and Gideon? Having a nap? Go and get them, Jem. I might as well tell all of you together. But Jem, wait – what are you doing at home, young man? Rosie, why didn't you make him go to school? Oh, never mind, make me a cup of tea, I'm parched.'

  We gathered around Mother, staring at her. I nudged up close to Jem. Gideon clasped my hand tight. Saul started snivelling.

  'There now, you needn't look so tragic,' said Mother, sipping her tea. 'Martha's very well. She's just not going to live with us any more.'

  We stared at her, baffled.

  'Where is she going to live, Mother?' Jem asked.

  'She's gone back to the Foundling Hospital, dearie,' said Mother. 'You were too little to remember when she came to the fam
ily.'

  'The hospital! They'll cut her into bits!' I wailed.

  'No, Hetty. It's not that sort of hospital, my lamb. It's a . . . lovely big home for lots of children who don't have mothers,' said Mother.

  'I remember you telling us about the hospital,' said Jem. 'That's how we got Martha, then Saul, and now Gideon and Hetty.' He put his arms round me, hugging me tightly. 'But why did Martha have to go back there? You're her mother now.'

  Mother's face crumpled. 'I know, my dear. But I was only her foster mother. I was simply looking after Martha until she was a big enough girl to go back to the Foundling Hospital.'

  'So when will she come home to us?' Jem asked.

  'The Foundling Hospital is her home now, my dear.'

  'But Martha won't be able to manage without us! She can't see properly, and she's a little slow. She needs us to help her!' Jem cried.

  'She will find some other good kind big child to help her,' said Mother. 'Now do stop your questioning, Jem. You're upsetting the little ones.'

  She entreated him with her eyes, while Saul and Gideon and I sniffled by her side. We were too little and stupid and stunned to work out the obvious just yet.

  4

  We all mourned Martha – but within a few weeks we had almost forgotten her. I sometimes dreamed about her and reached out in my sleep for her hand or her hair, and then felt a pang. But Martha's place was soon taken by another little girl, a baby called Eliza.

  'That's my name!' said our Eliza. 'Oh, let me hold her. She's such a little darling.'

  Eliza and Mother fussed excessively over the baby. I thought her a plain, puny little thing, with a mewling wail that was most aggravating.

  'Oh, Hetty, you should have heard yourself when you were a baby! You shrieked like a banshee,' said Jem, chuckling.

  I was so relieved to see that Jem showed only a mild interest in my new little sister. He was fonder than ever of me, taking me everywhere with him. Father wanted Jem to help out on the farm when he wasn't at school, so Jem took me along too. I helped with the harvest, I dug for potatoes, I milked the cows.

  I thought at first that they were our crops, our cattle, and all the land was ours. It certainly felt that way, for all the other men treated our big father with respect. Some of the young lads even doffed their caps to him. But when Jem took me to the harvest supper in the barn beside the big farmhouse, I saw our father doff his cap to Farmer Woodrow.

  His wife, Mrs Woodrow, was pouring cider and serving great plates of meat to everyone. She laughingly gave Jem half a tankard and said, 'Only give your sister a sip, young Jem.'

  She was peering at me curiously. I stared back at her, and she laughed and pulled one of my red plaits. 'She looks a fiery one!' she said. 'So she's one of your mother's foundling children?'

  Jem pulled me onto his lap protectively. 'Yes, ma'am. This is our Hetty.'

  'Well, it looks as if your mother's doing a good job with her. How much does she get paid for looking after her?'

  I craned round. Jem was red in the face.

  'I don't rightly know, ma'am,' he said. 'But our Hetty's worth her weight in gold.'

  'What did that lady say?' I asked when Mrs Woodrow had passed along the bench to patronize another village child.

  'Oh, take no notice,' said Jem, which of course made me notice more.

  'Does Mother get paid for looking after us?' I asked.

  'I'm big, not little like you. I don't need looking after,' said Jem, not really answering my question.

  That Christmas Mother made me a doll – a rag baby with a sacking dress and a scrap of white muslin for a bonnet. She had little button eyes and a mouth that smiled. I thought her the most beautiful doll in the world and cradled her in my arms all the time, even while I ate my roast chicken. Gideon looked longingly at my soft, pretty rag baby, and begged to hold her just for a moment. Mine was the only doll. The new baby, Eliza, was too little for dolls, and big Eliza and Rosie great girls long past the doll stage.

  Gideon's own present was a little horse carved out of wood by Father. It was an excellent horse with its own brown leather saddle. Saul had a horse with a saddle too, and made it gallop across the floor. Jem and Nat got pocket knives, and Rosie and Eliza bead necklaces, one blue and one green.

  Marcus and Bess and Nora, the grown-up children, were not given leave to come home, but Mother had sent them parcels. She said she'd sent another parcel too, a twin rag baby to mine, specially for Martha.

  'Will Martha have a lovely Christmas day like us?' I asked.

  'Oh yes, Hetty, she'll have a wonderful time with all her new sisters. I dare say they'll all get lots of presents and fancy food and they'll play games and have such larks,' said Mother. 'Don't you worry your little head about Martha, Hetty.'

  I did still worry. Mother did too. When I trailed downstairs that night to trek out to the privy (I'd had two helpings of figgy pudding and had bad stomach ache), I found Mother weeping in a corner, holding Martha's old checked pinafore, clutching it to her chest as if it was her own rag baby.

  Mother took me out to the privy and held my hand while I groaned – and then, when I was better, she carried me back indoors. It was chilly downstairs without a fire, but Mother wrapped me up tight in Father's huge smock and cradled me in her arms.

  'There now, my lambkin,' she said. 'I have you safe. Don't fret.'

  Her voice was hoarse and I felt a tear drop on my face. I wrenched a hand free from my tight wrappings and reached up and stroked her damp cheek.

  'There now, Mother,' I said. 'Don't you fret.'

  She laughed at that, but she was still crying too. She murmured something. I didn't quite catch what she said, but now I am absolutely certain it was: 'I shall miss you so, Hetty Feather.'

  The enormity of what was to happen to me didn't dawn until late spring, when Saul went. For days Mother had been favouring him, pretending not to see when he poked me with his crutch, when he tripped Gideon, when he pinched Eliza in her cradle. Mother rubbed his poorly leg and encouraged him to stand up straight when he walked.

  'That's it, my little man. Step out like a soldier – left, right, left, right.'

  'Yes, I'm a soldier, like my brother Nat. I'm a soldier and I shoot people with my gun,' said Saul, aiming his crutch at me. 'Bang bang, you're dead, Hetty!'

  He banged so enthusiastically he struck me sorely in the chest.

  'No, you're dead, Saul,' I said, seizing the broomstick. 'I'm a soldier and I'm on my horse, gallopy gallopy, and I'm going to whack whack whack you!'

  'Hetty, Hetty, stop that now! Stop plaguing us! I need a little time with your brother,' said Mother, pushing me away.

  I flounced off in a temper. Jem was at school so I played with Gideon instead.

  'We'll play whacking, Gideon,' I said.

  'No! Don't want to!' Gideon whimpered.

  'I'm not going to whack you, Gid. We'll whack Saul. Whack whack whack.'

  'Not really?' said Gideon, looking horrified.

  'Yes, really. We'll whack him and bash him and stamp on him,' I said.

  'We'll hurt him!' said Gideon.

  'He hurts us,' I said, pulling up my dress and examining the angry red mark where Saul had prodded me with his crutch.

  'We must turn the other cheek.' Gideon was parroting the Bible in a sickening fashion. He always listened hard at Sunday school and absorbed the moral lesson. I listened when there were tales of lions and whales and animals walking two by two into a great ark, but I didn't pay attention otherwise.

  I didn't feel like turning my other cheek to Saul, especially when Jem came home from school and he started making a fuss of Saul too. He gave him a piggyback ride all around the house and then let him play soldiers, taking pains to fall down dead every time Saul potted a shot at him.

  When I tried to join in too, Saul screamed, 'No no no, this is boys' play, Hetty,' and Jem didn't dispute this.

  I stomped off and murmured darkly to my rag baby, hating them all, even my Jem. I especially
hated Saul. When Mother bade us kiss goodnight, I sucked my lips in tight and wouldn't kiss Saul. I did not relent, even when Mother shook me.

  'You will be sorry, Hetty,' she said ominously.

  'No I won't,' I said, but it came out 'Mm mi mn't' because my mouth was still shut into a slit.

  'Please, Hetty, there's a dear,' Jem whispered into my ear, but I took no notice.

  Saul didn't care in the slightest. He laughed at me triumphantly, eyes bright, cheeks scarlet with excitement, the centre of everyone's attention. He didn't have any idea what was going to happen either, not till Mother woke him at dawn.

  I heard him getting cross, then crying . . . then screaming. I sat up, my heart thudding. I ran to him. Mother had him half dressed in his best Sunday clothes, but he was kicking hard with his good leg and pummelling with his arms. All the while he screamed, 'No, Mother, no, I won't, I won't, I won't go.'

  Rosie and big Eliza were trying to help Mother get him dressed, while baby Eliza wailed miserably in her cradle.

  'What are you doing? Why are you dressing Saul in his Sundays?' I asked.

  'For pity's sake, Hetty, I can't be doing with your questions, not now,' Mother gasped. 'Oh, Saul, my sweetheart, try to be a big brave boy.'

  But Saul scrunched himself up small and sobbed. I stared at him. Suddenly I didn't care about all his proddings and pinchings. He was Saul, my brother, and I couldn't stand to see him so scared.

  I plunged forward and threw myself at him, planting eager wet kisses on his cheek and neck and curly hair. Saul clung to me.

  'Oh, Hetty, Mother's taking me away to the hospital and I can't never never come back!' he sobbed.

  'No, you can't, Mother! You won't!' I shouted, and I started hitting and kicking her too.

  Jem and Nat had to carry me away while Mother persisted with dressing Saul. I don't know whether he continued to cry. My own shrieks were too loud for me to hear anything else. Nat thumped me hard and shouted at me, Jem held me close and whispered soft words into my ear, but I didn't respond to either brother.