He sat back in his chair, watching the newly stoked fire’s flames cast shadows on the whitewashed walls. It would be good to have someone to talk to of an evening; some company to listen to his ambitions for the farm, and to give advice and encouragement when he needed it. But where to find such a woman, Adam didn’t know, and he didn’t care to think about it, either. His heart had been broken, and he cared not to socialize with the fairer sex. Even his lifelong friend Ivy Thwaite had not replied to his letter of yet; perhaps she too had turned her back upon him since his time in the Crimea. There were no deep feelings between them, but he did crave her company, for old times’ sake. What would be would be, he thought, as the darkness descended outside and night came to the farm. Tomorrow Lucy would be with him again, with her caring ways and hard work. She would suffice as company for now; indeed, she brought just the right amount of pleasant company into his life.
He felt content with his lot and now that the laudanum drops had eased the pain in his leg, he was starting to enjoy life slightly again. Tomorrow he would go and start walling the gaps between his fields and those of his neighbours, the Baxters, whom he had not yet seen or met, although Archie did not have a good word to say about them. However, until he had met them, Adam would not judge them, and he would take them to be decent people until he found differently. People were too quick to judge, he thought, remembering his own encounters with other people’s thoughts.
As for today, it was nearly done and bed awaited him, with the help of the laudanum. Morning would soon be upon him, and he would have to see what the following day brought with it. He’d leave the house shortly after daybreak, take his dinner with him and leave Lucy a list of errands that needed doing for that day. A full day alone on the moor would do him good, building up the limestone walls and listening to the skylark’s song. He was at peace on his well-trod piece of land.
9
Dorothy Bancroft sat on the edge of the bed and rocked her body and sobbed as she looked down at the bloodstained sheets and the body of the not-yet-formed baby that Bill was quickly wrapping in sacking, not even letting her look at the baby that had been growing within her body for the last few months. This was the fifth child she had lost, all badly deformed but through no fault of her own, and each time it hurt a little bit more. She sobbed and cried as Bill stood up and cast aside the small, imperfect body onto a chair and then moved to bring the jug and bowl filled with water next to her, to cleanse her of the bloodied clothes she sat in.
‘Aye, lass, it didn’t suffer. It wasn’t right, you couldn’t have called it a baby. Now hold your noise else you’ll wake the rest of the house, and it’s best they don’t know that we’ve lost another, under the circumstances.’ He bent down and kissed Dorothy on the head, before gently washing her private parts and making her stand to change her nightdress and the sheet beneath her. ‘It wasn’t wanted anyway. We’ve enough bairns without another under our feet. I’ll keep myself to myself from now on. You’ve had enough heartache, losing all these babies. Something must go wrong with your insides sometime, and I’d be best not asking you for any favours.’ Bill looked at his wife as she sobbed and shook on the newly cleaned bed edge, then he threw the soiled nightwear and bedding into a darkened corner of the room. ‘We’ve enough bairns. Bert’s only a year old. Look after the ones we have got and don’t mourn over the ones we’ve lost.’
‘Was it a boy or a girl this time?’ Dorothy whispered.
‘I can’t tell. Besides, it’s best you don’t know. I’ll take it out into the yard and put it in the quicklime pit, along with the others. It’s the best end to it. There’s no need for a burial, or that condescending parson to be involved. He’d only want to christen it, and then he’d be shocked at the sight of such a baby. It’ll soon disintegrate, like the rest that I buried there, and nobody will ever know our loss. The first two we lost were nearly perfect – it was right we buried them in the churchyard. But not this one; this one isn’t right again. Besides, the church would only charge and they don’t like burying chrisoms; they think every baby, no matter what, should be christened.’
‘Don’t call it a chrisom. It might not have been baptized, but I would have loved it and would have had it christened, if it had lived and had been normal. I can’t bear to walk past that part of the yard, knowing what is hidden in the pit. I have to live with my guilt every day, and I can’t help but cry for my babies’ souls.’ Dorothy lay back in
