Free Pit Bank Wench by Meg Hutchinson

from her, do not contaminate your hand by touching that which is evil.’
    ‘Mother isn’t evil!’ The awfulness of what had been said had held Emma speechless, but as her father lifted his hand the fear that he would strike her mother released her tongue. ‘She has done no wrong.’
    ‘Done no wrong?’ His glittering eyes were fixed on Emma. ‘You call lying with a man who is not her husband doing no wrong?’
    ‘Mother has lain with no man.’ Emma took her mother’s hand, weaving the fingers into her own.
    ‘It is not she who is the wrongdoer in this house.’ Her lips trembling, Carrie stepped forward. ‘Her only wrong is in answering you as she has. You do not care to be questioned, do you, Father?’
    ‘ “Honour thy father and thy mother” ,’ Caleb uttered one of the Biblical quotations that were balm to his soul. ‘Carrie, do not disregard the Lord’s word, do not speak so to me, keep a silent tongue lest you . . .’
    ‘She did not mean it,’ Emma answered quickly, fearing his anger would turn to Carrie. Things were going to get worse without her sister adding to them.
    ‘She did not mean it, neither did your mother?’ Caleb’s eyes took on a meaner glint. ‘Then why speak as she has, why speak of lying with a man if she has no knowledge of such? Your mother is a fallen woman, she will pay the price of that.’ His glance swung slowly to Emma. ‘I will have no fornicator under my roof . . . she will leave this house!’
    ‘We are all leaving,’ Mary said at last. ‘You are no longer a tenant of this house, Caleb. When I leave then so do you.’
    Full of righteous indignation he had temporarily forgotten that fact. Now with his wife’s reminder he cast around for words, but for once his store of Biblical quotations failed him.
    ‘Yes . . . yes.’ He stumbled over the words. ‘We all have to leave, but you will not travel with us. From this day on I have no wife and my daughters have no mother.’
    ‘Then you will have no family at all,’ Emma said at her mother’s strangled gasp. ‘If Mother does not go with you then neither do I. And neither will Carrie.’
    ‘What?’ Caleb moved a step forward, his heavy clogs making no sound on the rug his wife and daughters had pegged from clippings cut from worn out clothes. ‘You will do as I say, Emma, you and your sister, and I say you will turn your back upon that . . . that follower of Satan. Step away from her, do not soil your hand . . .’
    ‘As the Sadducee and the Pharisee stepped away?’ Emma smiled scornfully. ‘I see you take my meaning, Father. You are like them. You quote the Scriptures to suit your own ends, but when it comes to charity you are no Good Samaritan.’
    ‘I will not tolerate evil.’
    ‘Nor would you have to, not with Carrie, nor with Mother.’ Emma slid an arm about her mother’s shoulders as Mary cried out. ‘It has to be said so it is as well I say it now. You see, Father, it is as I told you. Mother has not lain with a man . . . I have.’
    Eyes hard as stone, lips working soundlessly, Caleb slumped forward, his hands palm down on the table, head hanging low between his shoulders.
    ‘It is the truth, Father,’ Emma went on quietly. ‘Mother is not guilty of that.’
    ‘You!’ he whispered. ‘I would not have thought that of you.’
    ‘There was no willingness on my part. I was attacked by . . . by someone while coming home.’
    ‘Attacked?’ Caleb glanced at her though he did not straighten up. ‘By whom?’
    ‘I . . . I don’t know.’ Emma felt the pang of guilt that accompanied the lie. ‘It was dark, I could not see his face.’
    ‘Then where?’ Caleb’s eyes glanced with passionate anger. ‘Where did this . . . attack . . . take place?’
    ‘In the coppice that borders the Hall.’ Emma saw despair flood her mother’s face but there was no going back. Her mother must not suffer for what had been done to her.
    ‘Did the man speak?’
    What did