Emerald Star (Hetty Feather) Read online

  Perhaps Mama would have left whether I existed or not. Perhaps she had taken against such a life. She had never spoken of it – perhaps because she hated to think about it. She must certainly have hated that father of hers.

  ‘I met my grandfather yesterday,’ I said.

  ‘Aye, I heard that – and I very much doubt he welcomed you with open arms. He’s gone soft in the head, has he not?’

  ‘He’s not soft, he’s very, very hard. He treated Mama dreadfully – and he called me a devil’s child and spat on me and tore my dress,’ I said. ‘I shall give up any claim on him to be my relative.’

  ‘Well, I’d certainly agree you’re better off without him,’ said Lizzie.

  ‘Lizzie, do you think I’m better off here, with Father?’ I asked earnestly.

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘I love him, and I know Mama loved him too, and I thought I should be truly happy if I could live with him as his daughter – but now I’m wondering.’

  ‘Has Katherine been really hard on you?’ said Lizzie sympathetically.

  ‘Well, I think it’s her nature to be hard on everyone,’ I said. ‘I know she doesn’t want me here. But it’s not just that. I don’t really feel I belong here. I don’t suppose you understand.’

  ‘Oh I do, I do. I don’t feel I belong here either. I don’t think like the other women and yet I don’t care to be in the company of men – leastways, not the men who prop up the bar of the Fisherman’s Inn every night and drink themselves into a stupor. I’ve often thought of leaving, but I had my boys and I couldn’t have lived with myself if I’d walked out on them. Or maybe I was using them as an excuse and I simply didn’t have the courage . . . No matter. It’s too late now to start a new life. I’ve nowhere to go, and I’m sure no one else would ever employ me.’

  ‘What about me, Lizzie? Do you think I should start a new life?’

  She set my knitting aside and put her arm round me. ‘You’re the only one who can make that decision,’ she said. ‘All I know is I shall miss you terribly if you move on from here.’

  ‘And I would miss you too, Lizzie. You are my only friend in Monksby, apart from Father,’ I said earnestly.

  I lay awake half that night, my mind whirling, trying to think what to do with the rest of my life. I felt so bewildered, almost ashamed. I had so longed to find a family, but now that I had succeeded, I still wasn’t happy.

  I still think I would have stayed, in spite of my doubts and anxieties – but in the morning I received the letter from Jem that changed everything.

  ‘Hetty has a letter from her sweetheart!’ Mina crowed. ‘Let me read it too, Hetty!’

  ‘Certainly not, it’s private,’ I said, elbowing her away. This letter was stark and to the point.

  My dear Hetty,

  Please brace yourself. I have very sad news. Father’s heart has failed and he passed away two days ago. Mother has taken it very bad and is not herself at all. We are burying Father on the nineteenth at twelve o’clock. Please say a prayer for him at noon. I am so sorry to have to be the one to tell you this.

  I am very glad for your sake that you have found your father – but I wish you were here.

  This scrap of letter is written with much love from your loving brother Jem.

  P.S. I wish you could come home.

  It was enough. I hobbled out of bed and limped to the window. I looked out at the gulls flying overhead, greedily waiting for the boats to come in. I squinted at the sunlight, and fancied I saw the first mast bobbing over the horizon.

  ‘Keep safe, Father,’ I whispered. ‘And please understand. I love you, but I have to go. My first family needs me.’

  9

  IT TOOK ME a matter of moments to pack my few possessions. I left my nightgown out, I took my sharp little scissors and carefully unpicked the swirly S and B embroidered on the yoke. Then I threaded my needle and quickly satin-stitched a fine big L for Lizzie. She was much larger than me, but my nightdress was suitably voluminous and should still cover her decently.

  I suppose by rights I should have gifted my nightdress to Katherine, seeing as she was my stepmother and had kept me under her roof – but I couldn’t find it in my heart to give her anything. I had a petticoat to give to Mina and a glass marble I’d found on the sands for Ezra. I wished with all my heart that I had something of value to give Father. In the end I snipped off a lock of my hair, tied it with green ribbon, and put it in a little envelope. I wrote carefully on the front:

  To my dear father. Here is a lock of my red hair. Please keep it twined about your heart. With the greatest love and affection from your firstborn daughter Hetty.

  Father broke down when he carefully spelled out the words. ‘I want to keep you, Hetty,’ he said. ‘I’m afraid that you will never come back. I cannot bear to lose you already, not when I have only just found you.’

  ‘I will come back to visit you, Father, I promise,’ I said. ‘But my other family need me now. Poor Jem – he sounds distraught in his letter.’

  ‘You are a good kind girl, Hetty. I’m proud of you. But you’re still only a little sprat. You can’t travel the length of the country all by yourself.’

  ‘Yes I can! I travelled here, didn’t I? I shall just get on a train – a series of trains,’ I said.

  ‘Aren’t you afraid to travel on one of those great roaring monsters?’ said Father.

  ‘Oh, Father, of course not,’ I lied, showing off a little. ‘I’m not a baby. And I’ve been on lots and lots of train journeys.’

  I had only been on four such journeys in my life, and my heart still pounded whenever that great puff of steam surged out of the chimney. Father looked at me doubtfully. I realized that my great brave father might be scared himself.

  ‘You are so like your mother, Hetty,’ he said softly. ‘So fearless and independent. She must have been so proud of you.’

  I felt the tears pricking my eyelids, but I was determined not to cry now. I wanted Father to think me brave as a lion.

  He went over to his shelf of blue-bound Dickens, reaching over the top of the volumes. He picked out a small purse that had been hidden behind them. He opened it and started counting coins.

  ‘No, Father! I don’t want your money!’

  ‘But the railway fare will cost a fortune!’

  ‘I have money saved, truly I do – more than enough.’

  I had earned a shamefully large amount showing myself as a mermaid at Mr Clarendon’s Seaside Curiosities. I had spent less than half on my travel up to Monksby. I had prudently kept enough so that I could always return if I failed to find Father. And now I had found him and I suddenly wavered, wondering if I should stay after all.

  ‘It means all the world to me that I have found you, Father,’ I said, feeling my tears spill at last.

  ‘It means the world to me too, Hetty,’ said Father, and his own eyes were suspiciously bright. ‘Please take at least one of these sovereigns, even if you won’t take the whole purse.’

  ‘What would Katherine say if she thought you were giving me your precious savings?’ I said. ‘Truly, Father, I can’t possibly take even a penny from you.’

  ‘Then . . . then take a book,’ said Father, seizing hold of David Copperfield.

  ‘No, I can’t! That’s the story you like to read yourself!’

  ‘I can read another. I have the whole set.’

  ‘But it will spoil your set if one volume is missing!’

  ‘Yes, it will. So you must come back to Monksby and return it one day,’ said Father, pressing David Copperfield into my hands.

  ‘You are the dearest father in all the world – of course I will return it!’ I said. ‘And meanwhile I will read it and treasure it and think of you.’

  We embraced, both of us clinging a little. Father stroked my hair, so that my pins scattered and my locks tumbled around my shoulders.

  ‘My girl,’ he whispered. Then his voice broke and he set me to one side abruptly and went out of the room so I