Free The Colour of Milk by Nell Leyshon

her feet. and i was rubbing them with lanolin what comes from sheep and i was doing that for her skin got dry.
    look at your hands, she said. look at the colour.
    i held them up. the skin was light brown on the palms and the fingers.
    it’s the walnuts, i said, for i had been peeling them and putting them to dry all afternoon. it’ll wear off, i said.
    i suppose so.
    i carried on rubbing and she sighed loudly.
    what?
    the nights are getting longer, she said.
    i looked up at the window what was black like a mirror and i could see the room in it.
    i stopped rubbing her foot.
    don’t stop, she said.
    i got to see to the fire, i said.
    she watched me as i closed the curtains and then i poked the logs and they fell down and i brushed up the ash what fell out and i took a log from the basket.
    i don’t know, she said, what we did before you came to us.
    i spec you managed.
    i don’t think we were as happy.
    the flames got hold and i put on the log and then another. and i stayed kneeling and watching the fire.
    mary, mrs said.
    what?
    my father was not a nice man, she said.
    i turned round to look at her.
    he had no kindness, you see. i think i was permanently scared of him. i think that’s why i was happy to get married.
    maybe fathers think they have to be like that, i said.
    maybe. yes. maybe.
    i watched the flames touch the log and blacken the pale wood where it was split.
    my father had a job in africa, she said, and i was born there. my mother and i came back when i was school age. my father said i didn’t need an education but my mother wanted me to. she said i was clever.
    and did you go to school?
    she laughed. not school, no, she said. i had a governess. and then my father came back soon after and joined us in the village. that is how i met my husband. his father was the vicar. my husband was kind to me when we were growing up. sometimes that is all we need, a small piece of human kindness.
    i turned back to the fire and put two more logs on and i went back to sit by her and i took her foot and rubbed it.
    that feels good, she said.
    she watched me rubbing and didn’t say nothing for a bit then she spoke.
    my father’s skin was cold when i touched him, she said, though i didn’t touch him many times. he wanted sons, you see.
    like my father.
    yes. she smiled. like yours. i was his only child, she said, and i was a girl. i don’t think he could have been more disappointed.
    mine just wants people to work, i said. he needs extra hands to do the milking and bring the crops in and plough the fields.
    and does he make you all work?
    i laughed. you ain’t got no choice, mrs. that’s just the way it is.
    is it harder work than here?
    a lot harder. when i first come here i was looking for jobs for i ain’t been used to it like this.
    have you got used to it now?
    i spose. though i ain’t here through choice.
    she smiled. i know that. you never let us forget.
    i looked round the room. the rug on the floor was soft under me and the books were all colours in the candle light. the flames of the fire reached right up in to the chimney and i thought of the fire at the farm where father only lit it when the frost came and we shook with cold. and the flames never went so high for he never put too much wood on. he said that way the pig’s heart what was stuck with pins and put in the chimney to keep the devil out was safe from burning.
    mary?
    sorry, mrs.
    i was saying we married quickly. my husband proposed and we were married soon after. i had a daughter after a year but she died not long after she was born.
    she moved her foot out of my hand and rested it on the bed.
    that is when, she said, my husband decided to follow his own father in to the church. and then one year after he was ordained i had ralph. he is a perfect son.
    there was a knock at the door and it opened. edna stood there.
    excuse me, mrs graham, she said, only mary’s sister is here and she would like a word with mary.
    it’s late, said mrs. but you had