Free A Carriage for the Midwife by Maggie Bennett

she stands up to drunken cottagers who mistreat their families – and when your mother threw out that fat dairymaid, Sophy took her in to save her from the workhouse.’
    ‘Ah, yes, the girl who was with child,’ nodded Henry, recalling his father’s stern questions at the time. ‘And didn’t I hear that both our mothers were offended some time ago when Miss Glover introduced a ragged, verminous child into the village school? Did you ever hear the outcome of that?’
    Edward gave him a coldly triumphant look. ‘Yes, I did, Henry. Sophy took no notice of your mother or mine, and the child you speak of has far outstripped her so-called betters – in truth, she is the best pupil in the school!’
    Too late Henry saw his blunter. ‘Edward! Are we speaking of the girl in the hayfield – your little friend Susan? Oh, I beg your pardon for my foolish words, I had no idea – I did not know ’twas she.’
    ‘Well, you know now, Henry. And our sisters have benefited, for they have to work that much harder to keep up with the charity child!’
     
    That night Edward woke suddenly and sat up in bed, roused by the whine of a door hinge and a light patter of feet on the floorboards, followed by a creaking of Osmond’s bed and a suppressed gasp. A painted Chinese screen separated the two beds, and some instinct warned Edward not to call out.
    Then the murmurings began.
    ‘Ah, I knew you were there – and you have come to me!’ Osmond sounded eager but also somewhat uncertain.
    ‘Hush, don’t wake y’r brother. Move over and make room f’r me.’
    The voice was low and definitely female; Edward could hardly believe his ears. Sighs and murmurs followed, and Osmond made a sound that was almost like a groan.
    ‘Here, let me show you. Put y’r hand here—’ she whispered.
    ‘Oh, this is what I have lain awake longing for, night after night! And now you are here, my—’
    ‘Call me Jael, Osmond.’
    ‘Jael! Oh, Jael, you are so beautiful. Mm-mm!’
    ‘Kiss me, Osmond – ah, kiss me!’
    Edward lay wide awake, tense in every muscle, holding his breath for fear of being heard; but the lovers were entirely absorbed in each other, and Edward had no choice but to listen as Mrs Ferris led his brother through the door from boyhood to man.
    ‘Oh, Jael, Jael, I’ve never known – this is my – oh! Ah! Jael –
Jael
!’
    She laughed softly, tenderly. ‘Hush, hush, my sweet love. We mustn’t wake the boy.’
    But in fact Edward lay staring into the darkness long after she had glided away and Osmond had sunk into the deep sleep of satisfied desire.
     
    At the same time Susan also lay awake beside the slumbering Polly. The day had ended dreadfully for her. Polly had been carted away by Doll, and although Susan had kept tight hold of Jack’s hand, the boy had been forced from her side when she was dragged down into the hollow where the ditch had dried out. What happened next had followed the usual sequence, and Susan dealt with it as she had taught herself to do: her whole body stiffened into rigidity, her eyes were tightly closed, her hands clenched into fists and her mind blanked out as if a curtain was drawn across her consciousness, separating it from what was being done to her unripe body. It was her way of coping, her means of survival until the day when she could escape and take Polly with her.
    Yet now, as she lay beside the sister who needed her, she thought of Edward, so kind, so
clean
, so far removed from her hateful knowledge; and she started to weep silently in her loneliness, for there was nobody in the world who knew how she had been betrayed. Except the two who above all others should have looked after her.
    So Susan shed tears as she mourned for her lost childhood, but noiselessly, so as not to wake her sister.

Chapter 7
     
    SUSAN WAS FOURTEEN when her monthly flow began, and she never forgot the day. The bloodstain on her petticoat meant that her body was changing; there was already a burgeoning of