careful not to offend Cook or Clara, though, and Clodagh gave her a furtive kick under the table in sympathy. However, Lucy listened avidly to the adventures planned for Master Clive so that she could tell her family the next time she visited.
It was early March before she was able to go home and then, as the Cassidys sat down after Mass to a bacon and egg breakfast courtesy of Mrs Murphy, they listened to Lucy’s tale.
‘So where is he going?’ Danny asked. ‘I mean, what countries?’
‘I’ll hardly remember them all,’ Lucy said, her brow furrowing as she tried to recall what Rory and Mr Carlisle had said. ‘It will be France first – I do know that – and Spain, and they are due to go to Italy, too, but course, the main country they will be heading for is Germany.’
‘Why’s that then?’ Danny asked
‘Because of the Olympic Games.’
‘And what’s that when it’s all about?’ Minnie asked.
Lucy gave a secret smile of satisfaction because she hadn’t known a thing about it until Clara explained it.
‘It’s a special games where one country can compete against others in all sorts of sports and all the people who compete have got to be amateurs. That means they can’t get paid for it,’ she went on, knowing that ‘amateur’ was a word that they wouldn’t be familiar with. ‘And they pick three winners for each event, the first one gets a gold medal and the one who comes second has a silver one and there is a bronze for the athlete in third place. Lots of countries join in and it’s held every four years. Each country sort of takes it in turns to put it on and this year it’s Germany’s turn.’
‘Well, you seem to know all about it, at least,’ Minnie said, ‘though I doubt it will make any difference to our lives.’
‘Nor mine,’ Lucy admitted. ‘But they all talk about it round the table and that, and you can’t help listening. It all began because Rory was saying that the Master – you know, the General – wanted to be well enough to spend some time with Master Clive before he sets off on this trip.’
‘Isn’t he an invalid?’
‘Well, he was when I got there first,’ Lucy said. ‘He spent a lot of time in his room and only came down for meals, and then Rory had to carry him down.’
‘So is he getting better now?’ Danny asked.
Lucy told her family that the General had confounded doctors by getting to his feet and started the long process of learning to walk again. ‘Course, I don’t know how much better he will get, but Rory said his ambition is to be able to ride horses again.’ She shrugged and went on, ‘He might never be able to ride again, for all his determination, but Rory said that he has made greater strides since the great freeze ended and he has been able to get outside in the fresh air.’
‘Well, that would make anyone feel better, especially after being cooped up in a room for a long time,’ Minnie said. ‘Anyway, we have some news of our own. Tell Lucy about it, Dan.’
‘I have got a job as well,’ Danny said. ‘Or at least I had a job through the winter.’
Lucy had sensed in the house a small ease of the extreme poverty that she had experienced before she left. It was such a slight shift that anyone else might not have noticed it, but it was there and she thought that it might have been her money or maybe Clara’s gift portioned out that had made the difference and now it seemed that ease in the house was due to Danny’s endeavours. She was irritated and couldn’t really understand why.
‘How can you have a job when you are still at school?’ she demanded.
‘It’s weekends,’ Danny said. ‘I work for Farmer Haycock. I went and asked him if he had any jobs I could do.’
‘So what do you do?’
‘Well, he keeps lots of horses, as you know, and they weren’t getting any exercise with the ground so hard and they had to be taken out into the yard, but first I had to use boiling water to melt the ice coating the yard and a really stiff brush ’cos there can’t be the slightest bit of ice that the horses might slip on. Then I have to lead them out one by one and walk them round and round and then clean out their stalls. Farmer Haycock showed me how to make a bran mash for them and I must always make sure their drinking water is not iced over. Then I have to groom them, put the blankets back over them and clean all the tack. He says I am a natural with the horses, like Dad was with cows, and he gives me five bob a week.’
‘Five shillings!’ Lucy cried, thinking life was unfair when she worked much longer hours for not much more. ‘Still,’ she said, ‘I get all my meals thrown in.’
‘I do too,’ Danny said. ‘Haycock’s wife gives me a big feed in the kitchen at dinnertime, with pudding and everything, and a few sandwiches to take home for my tea. And if we didn’t eat all the pudding she lets me take that home as well for the others. Point is, though, that job might have come to an end now the ice has thawed. I mean, I went up yesterday and there was no ice in the yard and when I said you were coming home today Haycock said to have the day off. So I only got half a crown, and he might not want me at all next weekend. I will go up and see, though. Maybe there will be something else. He says he will employ me to get the harvest in later in the year and pay me a proper wage so that’s something to look forward to.’
Lucy was thoroughly ashamed of her annoyance at Danny getting any sort of job. All he was trying to do was help their mother and his siblings. Her mother looked better than Lucy had seen her in years, and she knew that, though Minnie was still very poor, Lucy’s own contribution, and the added extra from Danny, had removed the worry from her mind that they might starve to death or be taken to the poorhouse. That alone had made her look better. The clothes from Clara had made a difference too. Lucy was quite surprised to see that with more food, less strenuous work and more money to dress nicely and look after herself better, her mother could look quite pretty.
After such a ferocious winter, the spring was a good one, and Easter, in the second week of April, was almost balmy. Lucy had hoped that Master Clive might be home for the holidays, but Clara told her that as the exams for his Higher School Certificate started not that long after Easter, he was staying with a schoolfriend in England where they were having extra revision lessons. ‘And, I believe, seeing quite a lot of the Ponsombys, or probably, I should say, it is Jessica Ponsomby he is interested in visiting.’
A totally unreasonable and unexpected stab of jealousy shot through Lucy as she said, ‘Cook told me about her. She says she’s a spoilt madam.’
Clara’s lips nipped together in annoyance. ‘Cook has a slack mouth at times,’ she said. ‘And I don’t know that she has seen that much of Miss Jessica to make such statements. Anyway, people change. The Ponsombys are old friends of the Heatheringtons. Norah told me that Lady Ponsomby had lost a son in the Great War, and when she learnt that Lady Amelia had lost sons as well, it was like a bond shared between them. Jessica is a year younger than Clive and their mothers have high hopes of them.’
‘High hopes?’
‘Yes,’ Clara said. ‘To marry. It really would be eminently sensible.’ And she added, ‘With her brother dead, Miss Jessica will inherit
