An Unusual Bequest by Mary Nichols

bag. It contained a few guineas—not enough to keep the four of them for more than a day or two, for she must include Miss Quinn, certainly not enough to pay coach fares and at least two nights’ accommodation for them to go to her great-uncle. She could write and ask him to send the fare, but her stubborn pride would not let her do it. He might refuse to have anything to do with her and that would be too humiliating to be borne.

    Besides, she had made her home here, at Parson’s End. She had grown to love the area, the cliffs, and the sea in all its moods, calm as a pond one day, raging and pounding over the shore almost to the base of the cliffs the next. She loved the pine woods carpeted with needles that crunched under your feet as you walked, and she liked the people, farming people and fishing folk, hardworking, dour and courageous. And as for their children, they were what made her life worthwhile, watching them grow, being able to help them to better themselves with a little education. It was an ongoing, self-imposed task and she did not want it to end, which it surely must if she did not have the means to continue it.

    She remembered the stranger on the cliff with a wry smile. He had taken her for a schoolteacher and she remembered thinking that was what it might come to. A school was the answer, one that took boarders, young ladies from wealthy homes whose parents were prepared to pay to have their daughters educated and given some polish before being brought out. If she did that, the village children could still have their school. The wealthy could subsidise the poor. But did she have the right qualifications to attract the wealthy? She would need teachers beside herself and premises and connections. She weighed the coins in her hand and laughed at her foolishness.

    She went up to say goodnight to the girls and quietly told Miss Quinn to make sure their doors were locked, though the poor lady did not need to be told; she was already in fear of her life. ‘Tomorrow we will make plans,’ Charlotte told her before returning to her own room and making sure that that door was locked.

    She could hear the three men downstairs, laughing drunkenly. They had called for wine and a new pack of cards which was evidence enough that Cecil had not changed his gambling ways. She did not sleep until long after she heard them stumbling up to bed in the early hours and the house had gone quiet.

     

    The next morning, she and the children slipped out of the side door to go to the village. She noticed a carriage arriving at the front as she passed the corner of the house, but, guessing it was John Hardacre, the family lawyer, she decided not to stay to receive him. Foster would alert the still-slumbering Cecil that he had arrived.

    They crossed the stable yard to a path that led into the kitchen garden and from there through a side gate of the estate wall on to the road into the village. The damp hedgerows dripped onto the newly thrusting primroses at their base and the burgeoning trees in the meadows on either side moved softly in the breeze and sheltered the new lambs. It should have been a joyful time, this time of new life, but for once it did not raise her spirits. She had too much on her mind.

    ‘My lady,’ the Reverend greeted her. ‘I did not expect you so early, you do not usually come until after noon.’

    ‘No, but I need to speak to you, Reverend.’

    ‘Then come into the church, I was on my way there.’

    She sent the children to the classroom and followed him into the church. ‘Reverend, I hardly know how to begin,’ she said, after they had genuflected to the altar and seated themselves in one of the pews. There was a chill in there that matched the chill in her heart. ‘My life has taken a dramatic turn…’

    ‘I had heard the new Lord Hobart had arrived.’

    ‘My goodness, news travels fast. Yes, he came yesterday morning and he is not prepared to go on as his father did and that