Mystic Mountains

into eight segments and passed them each a slice. "Help yourselves to cream." She pointed to the china jug in the centre of the table.
    Tiger sighed and reassessed his opinion. At least the pair of newcomers couldn 't hide their surprise and pleasure at being presented with edible food. The wench was positively drooling.
    One thing he 'd promised himself during his own years of suffering and want: once he could afford it no one beneath his wing would ever starve.

 
     
     
    Chapter Five
     
    "No, no, Bella, not like that." Thelma softened her rebuke with a smile as she moved Isabella away from the kitchen table, where she'd been doing her best to prepare a pudding mixture. "Here, let me do it."
    Isabella shrugged. "I 'm sorry, Thelma, I just don't seem to have the knack, do I?"
    "Don 't matter none, dear." Thelma flapped a hand her way. "Look, you go and pick them apples for me, then you can peel them. 'Tis clear as the nose on your face you'll never make a cook. From now on you just stick to the laundering and fetching and carrying. There are plenty of tasks to keep you busy. You get on with them all right and I shan't be disappointed."
    "Oh, Thelma. I 've never had to do much in the way of cooking before, 'cept making stews with the barest of food scraps. Most things we ate were pinched. I'd never eaten apple pie 'til I came here. There's no apple trees in Stepney, are there? The only fruit I ate was what I nicked off the barrows down the market."
    "I know, I know." Thelma took up the wooden spoon.
    Isabella and Dougal had been in Tiger Carstairs' house a week. Life had settled into a pleasant routine. Isabella often expected to find she'd been dreaming. She went to her bed in the tiny room each night feeling tired but happy. Not about to question the strange quirk of fate that prompted Tiger Carstairs to pick her out of the bunch that fateful day, she got on with her tasks without argument.
    It was her job to look after the chickens and the large birds she 'd found out were turkeys. She'd taken over the washing and ironing, changing of the bed linen, butter making, collecting the eggs, and the pulling of vegetables from the kitchen garden. She took food slops to the pigs and filled the water troughs for them and the goats. The days sped past. It was hard to believe no one stood over her or ordered her about. Thelma seemed happy with her.
    As for her English owner, he seemed to have forgotten her. This annoyed her, though she wasn 't sure why.
    Most days Dougal was off early with Gillie and the master working with the animals and helping with the farm chores. He told her they had movable fences for keeping the sheep safely penned at night, and these had to be shifted all the time. Whenever Isabella saw her friend he wore a contented grin.
    Dougal had to make sure the woodpile was kept high to stoke the stove where Thelma did all the cooking. They 'd found out Tiger planted two crops each year, one of wheat and one Indian corn. Dougal looked after the small hut where the meat was smoked and had learnt how to do the salting. He admitted he wasn't fond of helping with the slaughtering but had to learn to live with it. After all, they had to kill beasts to eat.
    Tiger Carstairs owned his house and tract of land and Isabella surmised he'd won the money gambling. The nights he went off until all hours she guessed he went to the area known as The Rocks. Here men won and lost large sums of money playing cards, and women sold their bodies to these men who flocked to what Thelma called a 'Den of Iniquity'.
    So far Isabella had attended church on Sunday and gone once to the store with Thelma. Tiger Carstairs remained a mystery. Thelma told her he was well liked among his own set, and was obviously a favorite of the Governor, whose residence he visited occasionally. Isabella also learnt Tiger was known to have a way with the ladies. This fact irritated her so much she was infuriated with herself.
    Sometimes Isabella would wake from a dreamless slumber to hear him going to his bed in the room beside hers. One night he 'd stayed away until dawn, and she suspected he'd been with his mistress. She hadn't been able to prize that lady's name from Thelma, who kept her counsel on that side of their master's business.
    Going out through the garden gate Isabella passed the hog 's enclosure. Following the path through the long grass she went to the small orchard at the end of the home paddock where there were apricot, plum and cherry