like a wedding to lift everyone’s spirits, and it had come just at the right time.
‘How are things up at The Folly?’ asked Molly curiously.
Mary frowned. ‘To be honest, apart from me, the rest o’ the staff rarely see the mistress at all now; she keeps to her own rooms much o’ the time. I overheard Cook sayin’ the other day that the master’s sorely worried about her. As I once told you, it’s been years now since the master ordered Jessica, the daughter, out o’ the house, and the mistress has been going steadily downhill ever since, which is why he promoted me to fetch an’ carry for her. She’s a kindly lady though, an’ I like workin’ for her.’
‘Poor soul,’ said Molly. ‘Have yer never found out why he threw the young mistress out?’
Mary shook her head. ‘It’s more than yer job’s worth to even mention her name in front o’ the master,’ she confided. ‘Mind you, there’s the other madam, Miss Eugenie, Master Adam’s wife – now there’s one I’d like to see go. I reckon as even he’s getting sick of her tantrums now. He stays away from the house more and more. He’s either out riding on his horse, Pepperpot, or it’s rumoured that he’s taken to drinking – when he isn’t working in his hat shop, that is. Not that you can blame him. That one could make a saint turn to drink from what I’ve seen of her.’
‘Sounds to me like Mr Forrester’s got his hands full and no mistake,’ Molly said sadly. ‘But then happen things wouldn’t have turned out as they have if he hadn’t thrown his daughter out.’ And with that the women turned their talk back to the good news and the rest of the visit was spent discussing the wedding. Molly insisted that they should celebrate properly and ordered Amy to fetch a bottle of her homemade elderberry wine from the pantry.
‘Ain’t it a bit early in the day?’ Amy questioned.
‘It’s never too early in the day to celebrate good news,’ Molly told her. ‘Besides – I’ve been keeping a few bottles o’ me elderberry wine fer a special occasion an’ it don’t get much more special than this from where I’m standin’, so just go and fetch it and do as you’re told fer once.’
Thrilled to hear her gran sounding so much more like her old bossy self, Amy scurried away to the pantry. One bottle turned into two and two into three, and by teatime, when Mary and Beatrice finally made their unsteady way back to Forrester’s Folly they were more than a little tiddly and in a merry mood, as indeed were they all.
With February came the snow. Molly had been expecting it for weeks, insisting that the skies were full of it, and when it did come it came with a vengeance.
They woke up one morning to a silent white world. When Amy pulled aside the pretty flowered curtains at her bedroom window, all she could see was a blanket of white. The windows were frozen over inside into intricate little patterns and she had to breathe on them and rub a little space to peep out. The sight that met her eyes made her shudder, and after washing as quickly as she could at the little pot bowl in her room, she got dressed and tied a warm woollen shawl about her. Then, hurrying downstairs, she skilfully banked up the fire and pushed the kettle into it. Molly was still in bed. Since her illness, Amy had insisted that she lie in until she had got the kitchen warm each morning, and today she almost envied her. It was so cold that her teeth were chattering, and after hastily brushing her unruly curls and tying them into a ponytail with a ribbon, she caught up the copper coal-scuttle and bracing herself, went out to the little coal shed in the yard. The snow had drifted halfway up the door by then and she began to shovel it aside with her hands. By the time she was done, her fingers were blue and she looked as if she were dressed all in white.
After finally managing to drag the door open she stared in dismay at the contents. There were still a few logs and odd bits of wood inside, but the remaining coal was little more than slack, and not much of it at that.
Filling the scuttle as fast as she could, she scurried