Without a Mother's Love Read Online Free PDF

ruck at the pit.’
    ‘An accident? Is anyone hurt?’
    ‘Nay, nowt like that, thank heaven. Keep the child upstairs. Yourself too. He’s got his pit manager with him and the pair of them are already on the rum.’
    Harriet ate the savoury duck in gravy with peas, and planned how she could occupy Olivia in the schoolroom for the rest of the day. The child hated to be cooped up in good weather and looked forward to her afternoon nature walk.
    ‘I want to go to the privy,’ Olivia whined.
    ‘Use your chamber pot,’ Harriet suggested.
    ‘I might wet my drawers.’
    ‘Take them off and roll down your stockings.’ She rummaged in the cupboard for a book. ‘Then I shall read to you and you must close your eyes, imagine a picture in your head and draw it for me on a slate.’
    As Olivia occupied herself with chalk, Harriet realized there might be an innocent explanation for why she had taken off her drawers outside. Had she simply been too far away to come back to the privy? But she was not a lazy child and preferred the outside privy to the chamber pot. In summer, at least. Later, when Harriet had to go downstairs, the library was quiet and Mrs Cookson was dozing by the kitchen fire.
    ‘Has the pit manager left?’ she asked.
    ‘They’re sleeping it off in the drawing room. But it’s a bad do.’
    ‘What’s happened?’
    ‘Matt said the coal seam is worked out and it’s mostly slack what’s left, so the master’s cut his colliers’ wages and they’ve been complaining.’
    ‘Well, I’m not surprised. I suppose they have to work just as hard to mine it.’
    Mrs Cookson gave one of her snorting laughs. ‘Aye, and the master can only sell it for half the price.’
    ‘When shall I bring Olivia down for tea?’
    ‘Best not to when the master’s been drinking. He’ll be wanting his own tea when he wakes. Come for a tray and I’ll cut you some cold meat.’
    It must have been late when the pit manager left because Harriet did not hear his horse on the cobbles before she fell asleep.
    In the morning Mrs Cookson was out of sorts, and Harriet guessed that the master would be the same when he woke, so she took her pupil straight outside after breakfast.
    ‘We’re going dragon-hunting,’ she explained.
    ‘I don’t want to,’ Olivia protested.
    Harriet had to take her by the hand and pull her along until they had left the house and its outbuildings behind them. She stopped by the old walled garden. ‘This is your garden, isn’t it?’ she asked.
    ‘What if it is?’
    ‘It must be special to you.’
    ‘It’s a secret.’
    ‘Will you show me if I promise not to tell anyone?’
    Olivia looked at her resentfully and Harriet wondered if she would run away again, but she was already learning how to punish her without beatings - or restricting her diet to bread and water as they did at Blackstone. Rather, she had noticed how much the child enjoyed being read to and used that to reward her improving behaviour.
    Harriet smiled. ‘Shall I go in first?’
    ‘No! You can’t! It’s my secret!’
    ‘Oh. Will you invite me in?’
    ‘You’ll tell Uncle Hesley.’
    ‘I have promised that I shall not.’
    ‘Not even if he beats you?’
    Harriet Trent was alarmed by that, but answered, ‘Not even if he beats me. It will be our secret, ours alone.’
    Harriet found some fallen branches to hold back the brambles, observing that a few shreds of fabric were caught on the thorns. She followed Olivia through the gap into what must once have been a productive garden. Brambles, ivy and bindweed grew everywhere, except in the far corner where a gnarled spreading apple tree seemed to be winning the battle for sunlight. The ground underneath was dry and scattered with kitchen implements, including a wooden bucket, a large long-handled spoon and a metal tankard big enough for ale. Beside it, the brambles had been cleared to reveal the low stone walls of a seed bed, its glass covers long gone. An old spade was stuck in a