Free For Many a Long Day by Anne Doughty Page A

she went on quickly, seeing the look on his face. ‘but there is no one else to pay them.’
    ‘And how can I advise you?’
    ‘Well, I’ve thought and thought about what one could do, but I have only a very little money myself, not nearly enough to be useful, and I can’t think of anything else one could do.’
    She paused and smiled suddenly.
    ‘It’s all very well in stories. Someone always has some old piece of jewellery or some family heirloom they can sell when their friend is in difficulties, but apart from a Coronation teaspoon my great-aunt gave me as a christening present I don’t have
anything
like that.’
    ‘And do you think I might have the equivalent of some saleable object? Something that would provide for the financial needs of this young woman?’ he asked, wondering what she would reply.
    He had a good idea the girl in question must be Daisy Hutchinson. He’d noted how well the two of them got on and how often he’d seen Miss Scott helping her out when she was in difficulties in the shop.
    ‘No, I didn’t think that,’ Ellie replied honestly. ‘People must often ask for financial help, because they know you have a profitable business. I expect you have to say ‘No’ to many requests, but I wondered if you could use your influence with the landlord. Perhaps if Dais … my friend’s family had a little time, they could get back on their feet again. Something might come to help them.’
    ‘I take it we are talking about Miss Hutchinson?’
    Ellie nodded sadly.
    ‘What makes you think anything ever comes to help us except the effort we make for ourselves?’
    It was not said unkindly, but Ellie felt discouraged. Most people said that Freeburn was mean. That he gave nothing away. He was a self-made man and being what other people could only see as mean was what had made him so successful. But he had asked a question and she must try to reply. It wouldn’t help Daisy much if she just gave up now.
    ‘I don’t know,’ she said honestly. ‘I suppose I thinkthat while there’s life, there’s hope. It’s something my father often says when people are poorly. Losing a home and a farm is just like losing a person. If it goes it might as well be dead. You can’t get it back again even if later on you
do
have money.’
    ‘You could buy a better one.’
    ‘Yes, you could,’ she agreed.
    She wondered why he was watching her so patiently, waiting for her to say something more. She’d no idea what he might want her to say and even less of what she could say herself.
    ‘It’s
now
that matters,’ she said suddenly. ‘In a few months her brother might be able to find work when he leaves school, or her mother might improve and be able to do more to help on the farm. Or Daisy might marry someone with a lot of money. There is
some
hope, if only there were a little time.’
    ‘If Miss Hutchinson were to marry then I would have to train up a new assistant and I assume I shall be losing you in the not too distant future,’ he said matter-of-factly.
    ‘Oh no, Mr Freeburn,’ she said quickly, shaking her head. ‘It will be at least two years now before I can be married. My young man has gone to Canada with his uncle. He hopes to send for me when he has somewhere for us to live.’
    ‘Ah, I see,’ he said, nodding to himself, a small smile moving across his face. ‘And when does the landlord foreclose?’ he continued abruptly.
    ‘He said he was sending in the bailiffs at the end of the month.’
    ‘And how much are the arrears outstanding?’
    Ellie was quite taken aback by his change in tone, but she answered his stream of questions as clearly as she could. It wasn’t that she didn’t have the answers, for she and Daisy had been back and forth over the figures and the money needed a hundred times, but she couldn’t understand why he wanted to know all these details when he hadn’t said anything whatever about helping her.
    ‘I’ve been considering adding to my staff, Miss Scott,’ he