Kneel for Mercy

Chapter One ~ 1814-1

Chapter One ~ 1814Marista carried the eggs that Hannah had cooked from the kitchen into the small dining room and put them down on the table.

As she did so, she glanced at the clock and hoped that Letty would not be late.

Her sister liked reading into the night and was therefore usually late for breakfast, which distressed Marista because eggs were precious and, if they were cold when Letty came down the stairs, she invariably left them untouched.

But that morning her fears were groundless for there was the sound of footsteps, the door opened and Letty came hurrying into the room.

“Good morning, dearest,” she called to her sister. “I am as hungry as a hunter!”

“The hens have been obliging for a change,” Marista answered, “so eat your eggs while they are still hot.”

“I have every intention of doing so,” Letty replied.

She sat down at the table with her back to the window and, as the sunshine made a halo of her hair, Marista thought that no one could look lovelier and it was a pity that there was nobody of any significance to see how stunning she was.

Every day it seemed to her that Letty, who had been christened ‘Lettice’ grew more attractive and more beautiful and she thought that if their mother was alive and they were living at The Castle, invitations would be pouring in for balls, Receptions and parties of every description.

As it was nobody bothered about two uninteresting girls living in a small house on the estate which was no longer theirs.

Days, sometimes weeks, went by without their seeing anybody but old Hannah and the people in the village.

But it was no use regretting the past, Marista thought, and they just had to make the best of the present.

Letty ate her eggs and then said with a note of excitement in her voice,

“What do you think, Marista? More vans arrived at The Castle yesterday and I could see furniture being carried in and what looked like pictures in cases.”

Marista’s lips tightened for a moment.

Then she replied,

“I have told you before, Letty, we must not peep and pry. The Castle has nothing to do with us now.”

“I know that,” Letty grumbled, “but nevertheless it is exciting. Do you think the Earl is coming here himself?”

There was a pause before Marista answered her,

“Hannah was told that he arrived last night.”

Letty gave a little cry.

“I don’t believe it! How thrilling! Perhaps he will give parties and, although we will not be asked to them, at least we might see his guests arriving.”

“I have no wish to have anything to do with the Earl of Stanbrook,” Marista asserted coldly.

The way she spoke made her sister look at her sharply.

Then Letty responded,

“Of course I understand what you are feeling, dearest, and indeed I feel the same. He is a horrible odious creature and, if we ever meet him, we will tell him so. At the same time anything unusual is definitely an event here.”

As that was undoubtedly true, Marista had no answer. She merely sparingly buttered a piece of toast and spread it with crab apple jam, which she and Hannah had made last autumn from the apples off the tree in their small garden.

As she did so, she knew that the trees at The Castle were laden with unpicked fruit and in the greenhouses, although they needed repairing, peaches and grapes were ripening until they rotted.

Then she thought of The Castle itself, shuttered and barred. It was, she thought, every time she looked at it, a bitter memorial to her father’s foolishness and it made her want to cry.

Letty interrupted her thoughts by saying pensively,

“I wonder what he is really like?”

“Who?”

“The Earl, of course. Because of what happened to Papa, we have always thought of him as an ogre, a monster who has gobbled up our happiness and therefore we have cringed from him in horror.”

She spoke so dramatically that Marista could not help laughing.

“I don’t think anybody could be as bad as that,” she said in her soft voice. “Equally it is impossible for us not to hate the Earl.”

“Of course he is loathsome,” Letty agreed, “and I suppose he did not cheat in the game he played with Papa, although we would like to think he did.”

“I am sure he would not do so,” Marista agreed. “After all, Letty, he is a gentleman and a sportsman. But then – ”

She paused.

“Go on,” Letty prompted her.

“It’s no use talking about it,” Marista said hastily. “What is done cannot be undone.”

Letty put her arms on the table and rested her lovely face on her hands.

“Looking back,” she said, “I suppose I was too young at the time to understand exactly what happened, but I cannot help thinking that it was extremely foolish of Papa to think that gaming when he could not afford it was the only way to pay his debts.”

“What else could he do?” Marista asked. “Actually Mama said the same thing, but it was too late to stop him.”

Letty smiled.

“Papa was impulsive and I am the same. You are more like Mama.”

“I hope so,” Marista answered. “I would be very flattered if I was only a tiny bit like her.”

“You are very like her,” Letty insisted. “The people in the village are always saying, ‘Miss Marista be just like her mother, God rest her, one of the kindest and loveliest ladies as ever walked this earth’.”

She mimicked the way some people talked and Marista laughed.

“It’s a good thing somebody appreciates us.”

There was a silence for a moment.

Then Letty asked her sister,

“Just suppose the Earl did ask us to a party, would you go?”

“Certainly not,” Marista replied. “I wish to have nothing to do with him. Don’t forget that he is the reason why poor Anthony is now having to work for Farmer Dawson and hating every moment of it.”

“At least he earns some money,” Letty proposed. “I lay awake last night trying to think if there was any way that you and I could make some. There must be something we could do, Marista.”

“I have thought and thought,” Marista replied. “But, despite the very good education Mama insisted we should have, it is very humiliating to think that unless we scrub doorsteps or become milkmaids there is no chance of our earning a single penny.”

Then in a very different tone of voice she added,

“Talking of milkmaids, it is your turn to fetch the milk from the farm and you will find the money for what we have had this week on the dresser in the kitchen.”

Letty gave a sigh.

“That means I shall have to listen to Mother Johnson moaning on about ‘the old days’ and saying how the War has taken all the best and strongest men from the land and there is nobody to mend the farmhouse roof which lets in the rain.”

“I hear it too,” Marista said. “I am sorry for the Johnsons. They are growing too old to farm such a large acreage with both their sons away fighting Napoleon and the only help they have left is a man of sixty and the village idiot.”

“Loony Ben is certainly no good for anything,” Letty remarked.

“He feeds the chickens and finds the eggs and even his pair of hands is better than none.”

“He is always hanging about. He gives me the creeps.”

“Just hurry off to the farm and back again,” Marista suggested. “If you tell Mrs. Johnson that Hannah wants the milk for luncheon she will not be able to detain you.”

Letty made a little grimace, but she did not answer and at that moment Hannah came into the room.

“There be a letter for you, Miss Marista,” she muttered, “And it must have been pushed through the door last night or early this mornin’. I’ve only just found it.”

“A letter?”

Hannah lifted the envelope she held in her hand up to her eyes.

Then she exclaimed,

“I see now it’s addressed to your mother, ‘Lady Rockbourne’ is written on it, but no address.”

“I wonder who it can be from?” Marista said. “Obviously a stranger not to know that Mama has been – dead for over a – year.”

There was a little throb in her voice for even now it was hard to speak of her mother without realising how much she missed her.

“Well, all I hopes,” Hannah commented, “is it’s not a bill. There’s too many of ’em as it is.”

“Do we owe very much?” Marista asked in a frightened voice.

“Enough to start me worryin’,” Hannah replied, “and I’ve told Master Anthony to give me more out of his wages than he did last week. He seems to think I can feed him on air!”

As she finished speaking, Hannah picked up the empty dish that had contained the eggs and left the dining room.

Letty laughed.

“Anthony is always complaining that Hannah takes every penny he earns and he said last Friday that, if he had to keep a woman, he would much rather she was younger and more attractive!”

“Letty,” Marista cried out in a shocked voice. “How can you say such things?”

“It’s what Anthony said and, of course, at his age it’s natural he should want to take out a ‘bit of muslin’ or one of those fancy dancing girls from Covent Garden, who he says are so alluring that no gentleman can resist them.”

Marista looked even more shocked.

Then she said almost as if she was speaking to herself,

“Those are things that Anthony certainly cannot – afford to do.”

Letty parted her lips as if she had a retort to make and then changed her mind.

Instead she watched as her sister opened the note that Hannah had given her and sensed that Marista was apprehensive as to what it contained.

She pulled out a thin sheet of writing paper, stared at it for a moment and then gave an exclamation of horror.

“What is it? What have you read?” Letty asked anxiously.

“I cannot – believe – it,” Marista faltered.

She looked at the writing paper that she held in her hand and her sister saw that she was trembling.

“There – must be some – mistake!”

Without saying anything more Marista passed the sheet of paper to Letty, who then read aloud,

“My Lady,

On the orders of the Earl of Stanbrook, owner of the Rock Castle Estate, I have been empowered to collect the rents from his tenants.

It has come to my notice that during the two and a half years that you have occupied your present premises known as ‘Dovecot House’ his Lordship has received no rent.

Taking everything into account it is estimated that a fair rent for the house, garden and two paddocks would be one hundred pounds per year.

I would therefore be obliged if your Ladyship would arrange for the sum of two hundred and fifty pounds to be brought to the Estate Office as soon as possible.

I remain, my Lady,

Your most humble and respectful servant,

Emmanuel Robertson.”

As Letty finished speaking, she stared at the letter in the same way that Marista had, as if she could not believe what she had read.

Then she looked at her sister with an expression of fear in her eyes.

“Two hundred and fifty pounds!” she almost shouted. “How can we possibly find such a large sum of money?”

“It’s just impossible,” Marista sighed, “as you well know! Oh, Letty, Letty, how can this have happened to us? I thought that Papa had arranged when we moved out of The Castle for us to live here – free.”

“I believed it was our house,” Letty said. “It never struck me for one moment that we could be turned away like beggars.”

Marista did not reply.

She merely put her hands up to her eyes.

They had felt safe at Dovecot House after everything had fallen in ruin about them.

When their father had returned from London to tell them that he had lost The Castle and the estate that had been in the Rockbourne family for three hundred years, it had been at first impossible to understand what he was saying.

Yet they had to face the terrifying truth that, while they had been poor before, they were now practically penniless.

Sir Richard Rockbourne, Baronet, had always been excessively proud of his heritage, his ancient Castle and his ancestry, which went back to the reign of King Henry VIII.

King James II had dubbed the Rockbourne of the day, a respected Statesman, a Baronet and thereafter each Head of the Family had passed on his title and The Castle to his eldest son.

They had, however, grown poorer in the passing years, but still remained excessively proud.