Bruar's Rest

bundle of sticks she’d gathered by the roadside on her journey home. Branches broken by the weight of snow were easy firewood, and saved her from wrestling with big ones deeper inside the forest. The ladies of the night had departed. Rachel was cooking a pot of watery soup, and the two men had left to snare anything mad enough to venture out from burrows or dens. She didn’t feel it necessary to bring up the previous night’s visitors who had risked their honour in O’Connor’s tent, but she did tell Rachel about the housekeeper from the castle needing extra hands.
    This sounded promising to Rachel. ‘Why don’t you and I go and see her? Anything would be better than freezing to death here in these tents. If they are so desperate for help, then I might be able to take wee Nicholas as well. Poor wee mite, if I don’t eat proper food my milk will not sustain him. You said yourself the men are going to get worse with the drink. Surely anything is better than this existence?’
    Megan knew all her sister said made good sense, but her place was here. Here in the campsite seeing to the fire and keeping a watchful eye on her good-father. She could not go away while he supped with the devil, though the pain in her jaw still stung from his handiwork the night before.
    That night the men failed to come home, and the girls reckoned a visit to the red-lipsticked females was taking place. This time they would be in their houses, and that meant one thing, that their menfolk, whether soldiers or ploughmen, were not at home.
    Next morning Megan and Rachel, with wee Nicholas snugly secured in two shawls for extra warmth, were standing outside the gigantic structure of Cortonach Castle. Mrs Simpson, the housekeeper Megan had met the previous day, opened the great creaking doors and beckoned them in. Perhaps it was the result of the talking to she’d received the day before, but the dear lady was kindness itself. For the first time in a long while meat and sweet jam found a welcome in their neglected stomachs. Rachel looked around the grand kitchen, with its rows of high shelves full of pots and pans of every size. Mrs Simpson politely asked if she might be allowed to hold the baby—such a long time since she’d had a youngster in her arms. Rachel handed Nicholas to her willingly, happy at the freedom to wander around the kitchen. Five large ovens gave out penetrating heat; she felt it reach her bones. Megan stood looking out of the window and thought how fine the gardens and grounds surrounding the place were; they brought to mind a painting she’d seen some place.
    Later, as they chatted around a large pine table smelling of fresh blood congealed on three hare ready to be butchered, the door opened. Mrs Simpson almost jumped to attention. Flicking biscuit crumbs from her apron, she tugged it into line with her skirt. ‘Good morning, Ma’am.’
    ‘Hello Simpy,’ said a thin, gentle-sounding lady coming down the stone steps. ‘Oh, and pray tell me who it is we have here.’ She was smiling at Nicholas with arms outstretched. The housekeeper handed over the boy without a word. Rachel, like Mrs Simpson, held herself straight and rigid in the presence of Lady Cortonach.
    It was Megan who snatched her nephew back and said, ‘This is my sister’s boy, and we’ve come for a job.’
    Angry at her abruptness, the housekeeper apologised, stuttering an explanation.
    ‘Oh Simpy, I’m pleased you asked the tinkers, we certainly need help with so many staff gone away because of this terrible war.’ She felt for a handkerchief folded neatly at the turn of a brown cardigan sleeve and dabbed her eyes, before saying, ‘It would be nice to have a child in the house, it’s so very dull and so empty without children.’ She was almost pleading, through tear-filled eyes. Even Megan, who trusted no non-tinker apart from the doctor, felt moved.
    Rachel, herself still in mourning, saw how hurt the lady was and spoke softly, assuming a genteel accent, ‘Madam, me and my bairn would like nothing better than to come here. I’ll work all the hours you want, and I know my sister here has a strong back; she can carry her weight in cut firewood, she can. Isn’t that the case, Megan?’
    Megan could hardly believe how much her sister grovelled: she felt ashamed of it and retorted, as she headed for the door, ‘Listen, you come here and work your fingers into whittles if you like, but I’m keeping one eye on my scourers, the other on