Free The Loom by Sandra van Arend

delivered fortnightly by the carrier from Harwood.
    As he approached the stables a young lad of about fourteen appeared. Seeing Stephen he hurried to hold the reins.
    ‘ Give him a good rub down, Ned, there’s a good lad,’ Stephen said, getting off the horse.
    ‘I will that, Master Stephen,’ Ned said, rubbing Midnight’s head. ‘He likes a good rub down, don’t you, Midnight me beauty?’ Ned patted the horse affectionately.
    Stephen ruffled Ned’s hair. ‘I know he’s in good hands with you, Ned.’
    ‘Aye, he is, Master Stephen,’ Ned said. He flushed and looked embarrassed but he was pleased at the compliment.
    Ned loved horses almost as much as he hero-worshiped Stephen, who had rescued him from a life of poverty and misery in the back streets of Harwood, where beatings from his drunken father had been a daily occurrence.
    Stephen had found him one day, on the road leading out of Harwood, beaten almost within an inch of his life. He’d taken him back to Hyndburn and there he’d stayed. He’d never gone home again and he hadn’t missed it, except for his Mam, who had enough on her plate anyway with the ten other children she had to care for.
    ***********
     
    Leah continued slowly up the drive, watching as the big black horse (which had almost killed her) and its rider, disappeared from view. Now she could see the Hall, resplendent in the early morning sun and she drew in her breath. She stopped and stared in fascination.
    She had never seen it so close before, only glimpses of it between the trees when she and Janey and Darkie, in an unusual adventurous foray a few years ago, instigated by Darkie, had climbed the high wall surrounding the property.
    Leah remembered how nervous she’d been. She hadn’t Darkie’s adventurous spirit, and had been terrified that they would be caught.. Janey was more like Darkie, eyes bright with excitement at doing something she shouldn’t.
    So they’d stayed perched on the wall for some time, (where Darkie had hoisted them) until a short, squat man in corduroy trousers and jacket and a peaked cap had shouted at them. He carried a long, knobbly stick and had appeared through the trees before they could jump off the wall.
    ‘ Go on, get away with you,’ he yelled. ‘This is private property. Go on, bugger off!’ They stared at him in fright, jumped down and ran home as fast as they could.
    So this was her first real view of the Hall and she stood for a moment or two trying to take in the magnificence. She suddenly realized the encounter with the man on the horse would probably have made her late and she hurried on down the side of the house to the back door.
     
    **********
     
    Maud Walters was the cook at Hyndburn and at the moment she was kneading pastry with her firm, capable hands. She was up to her elbows in flour and loving it, for cooking was one of her greatest pleasures. She’d been up since five thirty and already had made a batch of pies and three trays of bread, which at the moment filled the kitchen with mouth-watering aromas.
    Maud was not your ordinary, run of the mill cook. Her culinary talents were exceptional and she had the ability to make any dish tasty, whether it was cordon bleu or simple hotpot.
    Maud shook the flour off her hands and bent down to place another tray of pies in the oven, her neat trim figure another misconception that cooks tended to be fat. In fact, even at forty Maud was, as Bob Watkins the gardener had admiringly commented one day, a fine looking female and a really grand woman into the bargain. Any man worth his salt would be a numbskull if he didn’t try to woo her. Bob had tried, but Maud would have none of it.
    Maud was a widow and intended to stay that way and even though she hated living on her own, it was preferable to living with a man. Her first marriage had not been made in heaven and she wasn’t going to take the chance that a second one would. But her loneliness had got the better of her and this was one of