Free Miss Mary Martha Crawford by Yelena Kopylova Page A

knew that if she hoped to return home today an early start was imperative. If the road had been icy or even snow-bound she wouldn't have been afraid of the drive into the town, but what she was afraid of, as much as Dilly
    appeared to be, was the journey from there into New castle. She had
    never been in a train before; the one and only time she had visited her great-uncle they had gone by trap.
    Owing to Gip's freshness she made the journey to Hexham in little over an hour and a quarter, and having left him and the trap in the care of John Gilbert, who man aged the chandler's, she walked briskly and with false confidence from the shop to the station. There, in the booking office, she bent down and said quietly to the man behind the glass
    window, "I would like a ticket to Newcastle, please."
    "Return?"
    "Pardon."
    "Return? Do you want a return, miss?"
    She was nonplussed for a moment until a voice from behind her said,
    "He's asking, are you coming back today?" She jerked her head towards her shoulder and looked into two round dark brown eyes.
    "He's asking you if you want a return ticket, do you intend to come back today?
    Look--' the man glanced at his watch, then towards the door that led on to the platform, saying softly but nevertheless firmly, 'the train is almost due, do please make up your mind. " Her indignation brought her shoulders back and her head up, at the same time she took in the number of people who were standing behind the man. Now she was bending
    towards the window again, saying, " Yes, a return please," " First, second. or third class? " s-mmmo-d 61 Again she hesitated, until the man behind her sighed, and then she said sharply, " Second, please.
    "
    "Well, now we know."
    She pushed a sovereign through the arched hole in the glass, and the man pushed a ticket and her change back at her, and so great was her agitation that a shilling rolled off the narrow counter on to the dirty floor.
    As she stepped to the side to retrieve the coin the man took her place and said, "Return first class Newcastle, please," and almost at the same time bent sideways and picked up the shilling from near his
    feet.
    When he handed it to her she kept her head bent, her bonnet shading her face, and she said stiffly, "Thank you," then turned away, knowing that her colour was as red as a cock's comb, and that the eyes of the other passengers were on her.
    As she entered the platform the train came puffing into the station, making a great noise, and she had to force herself towards it. As she took her seat in the empty carriage she saw the rude man having a hasty conversation with another man on the platform, then make a sudden dash for a compartment further along the train.
    She sat back and, opening her bead handbag, took out a folded
    handkerchief and wiped her mouth. That man had embarrassed her. He
    was a coarse individual. Yet he didn't appear a common working man.
    He was dressed almost as well as her father had dressed, but his
    square, blunt features seemed to suggest lack of breeding, as his
    voice, too, certainly did. It hadn't the Northumbrian burr, but it had a definite northern accent and it wasn't a refined one.
    She relaxed against the wooden partition. She was thankful she had the compartment to herself, it would give her time to get used to the
    train, and time to think. And she needed time to think, for if no help was forthcoming from Uncle James then their plight would be sorry
    indeed, for she had been both amazed and frightened by the number of bills that had poured in these past few days. Some were outstanding
    for two years or more. Their accumulated amount seemed so colossal
    that she couldn't see any way of clearing them except by selling both the chandler's and the house. She had never fully realized until these past two weeks just how much the house meant to her; even her thoughts of marriage had never carried her away from the house, for she pictured herself and her husband as living there whilst she