A Death, A Duke, And Miss Mifford - Claudia Stone Page 0,1
would I attempt to remedy a punishment quite obviously divinely sent; the good Lord gifted Mrs Canards with an earache so that she might understand how the rest of us suffer when she speaks with her malicious tongue."
Really! Mary had been in half a mind to upbraid her father for his blasphemous chatter, but his remark had caused her three sisters to descend into gales of laughter, and Mary was quite sure that if she opened her mouth, she too would be overtaken by mirth.
So instead, she had taken herself—with a pointed sniff—to the kitchen, where she had loudly begun to prepare her nostrum. Once the concoction of dried herbs and flowers had simmered sufficiently, Mary had allowed it to cool, before draining the liquid into a jar, using a muslin square as a sieve. She had then added a rather large drop of brandy for good measure; her mama's secret ingredient.
Once she had affixed a beeswax lid to the jar, Mary had set forth, though not before loudly shouting that she was leaving so that the whole house would know she was following through on her good intentions. What good was piety, she reasoned, if there was no one to appreciate it?
Mrs Canards lived just outside of Lower Plumpton, in a little cottage which lay about half-a-mile along the road to Bath. Mary hummed to herself as she left the village, much preferring to walk along a road lined with hedgerows rather than houses.
Birds chattered to each other from the trees, while slow, lazy bumble-bees haphazardly made their way from one wildflower to the next, drunk on nectar.
Country living was far preferable to town, Mary decided, as a donkey poked its head out over the bushes to say hello. London had, at first, seemed terribly exciting, but as the weeks had worn on, she had found that despite the hustle and bustle of people, she had never been more lonely in all her life. Plumpton was where she belonged, and it was where she would stay until the day that she died. Perhaps, if she put enough effort into being the best spinster possible, they might erect a statue to her in the village square, which might act as a point of solace to other young, unmarried ladies, showing them that the affliction of spinsterhood was not so bad.
The road before Mary curved sharply and her thoughts travelled from her distant death and canonisation to more imminent matters. To reach Mrs Canards' house, Mary would have to pass by Lower Plumpton's church—built in the thirteenth century and dedicated to St Mary the Virgin—as well as the rectory which abutted it—built in the seventeenth century and currently dedicated to its rector, the un-saintly Mr Parsims.
Mr Parsims had held the living in Lower Plumpton for some three years, but even time could not make his flock warm to him. A small man, with watery eyes and pale hair—which one could not quite bring themselves to describe as blonde, for it would do blondes the world over a disservice—Mr Parsims had the look of a distinctly unlikeable man, and the personality to match. Though the living in Lower Plumpton was said to be generous, and though Mr Parsims had no family to support, the rector was quick to demand that his congregation paid their tithes in full.
Sarah Hughes, Mary's particular friend, was convinced that Mr Parsims spent his nights creeping through the farms of the parish, counting the eggs in the hen houses and feeling the weight of the cows' udders, such was the accuracy of his demands.
As well as greed, Mr Parsims' other great sin was wrath; he enjoyed—especially publicly—dishing out insults to anyone who dared cross his path. His numerous barbs were delivered slyly as though in jest, leaving his victim confused and off-step. Plumpton was not a very sophisticated place and the villagers—especially the men—preferred an insult to be delivered straight, so as to be given a chance for a similarly straight rebuttal. A swift box, from man to man, was considered a perfectly acceptable retort amongst the less educated inhabitants of Plumpton.
No, Mr Parsims was not liked at all, and Mary quickened her step, hoping to whizz past without being sighted. However, as she was racing by, she saw a darkly clad man peering in through a window of the rectory and acting most suspiciously, and Mary decided that her need to avoid Mr Parsims was now outweighed by her need to be an upstanding citizen.
The scurrilous man