The Favourite Child by Freda Lightfoot Page A

waif and stray you picked up. She’s gone, and Edward is upset. He seems to be blaming Mother for not keeping a better eye on her.’
    ‘Jinnie gone? Oh no, where?’
    ‘Nay, don’t ask me, I’m just the master in this house. I know nowt, and I recommend that line of action for you too. Least said, soonest mended eh? We did what we could for her, after all. Now she’s gone back to her own sort.’
    ‘Her own sort? And what sort would that be exactly, Father?’ Bella felt outraged by his nonchalant attitude. Perhaps she didn’t know her father after all.
    ‘Now then, don’t get on your high horse with me, lass. I fed and watered her, took her in off the street and what thanks did I get? None.’
    ‘It’s not long since you were accusing me of helping only for the sake of her gratitude.’
    ‘ I swear I am not responsible for what that girl does !’ Emily inaccurately cried, wringing her hands in a nice dramatic flourish. ‘I merely took her out for a walk in the fresh air, for the benefit of her health, that’s all.’
    Bella grasped her mother’s hands in an effort to calm her. ‘Where? Where did you walk, Mother? What exactly happened? Did Jinnie run off? When did she go?’ She could almost see the battle taking place in Emily’s head over whether to reveal all or fabricate a tale that might suit better. ‘It’s vital we learn the truth, or she may be in danger from those who put her in hospital in the first place.’
    She heard Edward’s gasp at the very moment she recognised her error in almost blurting out the truth. Bella hastened to rectify her mistake. ‘I mean, there are those who’d not be averse to putting the blame for the accident on Jinnie, instead of the other way about. They may well be prosecuted for allowing the horse to cause a riot in the streets.’ It sounded a feeble explanation but seemed to be accepted nonetheless.
    Edward stood before his mother, his distress evident in every line of his tense body, in the clenching of his bony, boyish fists. ‘Bella’s right, besides which, where would she go? Surely not back to the squalor she came from. Tell us the truth Mother. I expect no less of you.’
    Tears ran down puffy cheeks. ‘I did it for you, my darling boy. She’s no good for you. A trollop. No better than she should be, I’ll be bound.’
    ‘That’s pure prejudice, Mother, and you know it. Not everyone without money is a thief or a harlot. Besides, I’ll be the best judge of what’s good for me. You’ve picked and chosen my friends for me long enough, most of them failures. It’s time I had some say of my own. Where did you take her? I insist that you tell me.’
    It was the first time in his entire life that Edward had stood up to his mother, and Bella watched with sympathy as Emily’s face registered shock, and then her shoulders drooped and her whole body became deflated, like a punctured balloon.
    ‘Oh, very well then. I found this marvellous place.’ Just as if she had chanced upon it quite by accident. ‘I thought it the perfect solution.’
    ‘What place?’ He wasn’t letting her off the hook, not yet.
    She put a flaccid hand to her brow. ‘Oh, my head, my poor head. Why are you all so cross with me? I found her a place at the Mission, if you must know. It’s a God-fearing place where the girl will be properly cared for and led into the paths of righteousness.’ Emily fell back in her chair, both hands now clutched to her head in a desperate appeal for mercy, her voice falling to a pitiful whimper. ‘I did it for the best. It’s where she belongs.’
    Simeon turned on his son in a fury. ‘Now see what you’ve done, you great daft lump. You’ve upset your mother good and proper and she was only doing her best for the lass. You ought to be horsewhipped, great bully that you are.’
    ‘ You’re the bully, not me. It was no doubt all you’re idea to get rid of her. You’re glad that Jinnie’s gone. Both of you are. Well I liked her, even if