The Miller's Daughter (45 page)

‘You’re right, of course,’ she said, kissing his leathery cheek. ‘
Grandad
.’

He caught her by the waist and swung her round. ‘I’ll give you Grandad!’

Emma giggled, broke free of his grasp and ran to the foot of the stairs. Then laughing, she scampered up them with the sprightly agility of a woman half her age and several pounds lighter.
William pounded after her with the eagerness of a first-time lover.

They lay in each other’s arms, his head resting against her plump breast listening to the beat of her heart. In the aftermath of joyful lovemaking, they were quiet
together each thinking their own thoughts, even though no doubt those thoughts ran along similar lines.

‘A son,’ Emma murmured at last. ‘I can hardly believe it. At last, a boy to carry on the mill.’

William stirred and shifted his weight. She heard him sigh. ‘As long as there’s something for him
to
carry on.’

Again there was silence between them for Emma knew full well that their milling business was in decline.

‘Jamie was only saying yesterday he’s no work at all on the wheelwright side, hasn’t had for years, and very little on the smithing. It’s mostly his fancy wrought iron
work now. There’s a few folk still bring their horses to be shod. He gets quite a bit from that riding stable that’s opened up in Thirsby, but if it wasn’t for them . . .’
He left the words unspoken but Emma knew his meaning only too well. Her eyes strayed automatically to the bedroom window where she could still see the sails of the mill.

‘Grandpa Charlie said there’d always be a Forrest at Forrest’s Mill,’ she murmured.

William covered her hands. ‘Well, there will be, my dear. Sadly, the only thing in question now in this modern era is – how long will there be work for the mill to do?’

She sighed and then turning her eyes away from the window smiled and said, ‘Let’s not get morbid. Today, we have a grandson. And wouldn’t Grandpa Charlie have been tickled
pink?’

‘Aye, and your dad.’

She gave him a playful push on the shoulder. ‘And yours,’ she reminded him, almost accusingly. ‘He must be up there in Heaven rubbing his hands with glee.’

They laughed together and then Emma said pensively, ‘I wonder what Lottie will call him.’

‘Now then, Em, don’t go getting your hopes up. He’s
their
son, not ours.’

‘I know,’ Emma said wistfully, remembering her own boys, though she said nothing aloud for they were not William’s sons. ‘I know, but it would be nice.’ She shook
herself and threw back the covers. ‘I don’t know, William Metcalfe, lovemaking in the middle of the afternoon, whatever next?’ She slid off the bed and glanced at him archly.

His deep chuckle rumbled and he said, ‘Aye well, I’d best get back to me work and you,’ he wagged his finger at Emma, ‘had better go and tell Sarah the good
news.’

Despite William’s warning, the moment Emma held the child in her arms she knew in her heart that he was ‘her boy’ and when Lottie told her the names she and
Micky had agreed on for their son, Emma’s happiness was complete.

‘Oh, thank you, Lottie, thank you,’ Emma murmured, gently placing her lips against the black downy hair of the baby. She looked down at him and the child stared solemnly back at her
with dark blue eyes. ‘My own precious little Boydie,’ she whispered.

But Lottie’s sharp ears had heard her mother’s endearment and laughed. ‘I like that, Mum. His proper name’s a bit of a mouthful for such a mite, isn’t it? But
Boydie?’ She tried out the name again. ‘Yes, yes, I like that.’

Even after his christening three months later he was always known as Boydie, and, as the small party returned from the christening service in the Chapel, Emma carried him across the yard and
stood beneath the towering shape of the mill. ‘Look, Boydie, look. See the mill? Your great-great-grandad built this mill with his own hands. And one day, it will be yours.’

Was it her fond fancy or did the baby’s eyes focus on the sails, his hand wave in the air, his fingers outstretched towards it?

‘Now, Mum, he’s a bit young to be a miller yet.’ She heard Lottie’s voice behind her and Emma had the grace to laugh a little shamefacedly. ‘I was just telling him
. . . Ah well, time enough, but if you don’t mind, I’ll just pop into Sarah’s with him. She’s so disappointed she couldn’t make the christening, but her legs are that
bad today.’

‘Ok, but mind him going past those bees. There are hoards of ’em buzzing about the orchard today. I reckon they must be on double time.’

As she walked towards the cottage, Emma held the child close to her, shielding him. She paused a moment and listened. The still summer air was filled with the sound of the bees, the buzzing came
closer and three bees rose from a yellow flowered bush nearby and circled her head. In her arms the child gurgled and waved his chubby arms. One bee flew closer, diving towards the baby. Emma gave
out a small gasp of surprise and fear and stepped back. But the bee merely circled the child’s head and flew away.

‘She’s right,’ Emma murmured, ‘Your Mummy’s right, Boydie, they are busy today.’

‘Of course they are,’ Sarah said a few moments later when Emma related the encounter in the orchard.

‘I thought they were going to sting him.’

‘Emma, oh Emma. What are you thinking of? Have you learnt nothing in all these years? Our own bees sting a Forrest? Tut-tut. Fancy you even thinking such a thing?’

Emma smiled tenderly, considering herself rebuked by the elderly woman whose faith in the bees was eternal. She was taking the child into her fat arms and bouncing him. ‘Now my little
fellow. You know better, don’t you? The bees will never sting you.’ The wrinkled old face bent closer and whispered to the child, who crowed with delight and reached out with tiny
fingers to clutch at the wisps of her white hair.

Old Sarah was right; it seemed as if the boy had a charmed life and from the moment he began to take notice, he was besotted by the mill. Lying in the sunshine in his pram, his
legs kicking with growing strength he would watch the mill’s sails turning and, if anyone mistakenly placed his pram so that he could not see the mill, his screams of protest could be heard
along the village street. His first tottering steps were made in the yard, straight towards the mill and his first word – after the obligatory ‘Dada’ – was
‘mill’ and later when he began to string words together, ‘Boydie’s mill’.

‘What
would
old Charlie have said?’ Emma would often remark, watching the boy with doting, grandmotherly love.

‘He’s a chip off the old block and no mistake. He even looks like him,’ William would say with surprise in his voice, ‘if those old pictures of Grandpa Charlie are
anything to go by. You wouldn’t think it’s possible four generations later, would you?’

‘Anything’s possible,’ Emma would say.

‘Now then, Em. I know you,’ William would say warningly, but his loving tone was filled with concern for her; concern that she should not be hurt yet again. Life had dealt his Emma
many blows, but this would surely be the cruellest yet. ‘Don’t go getting your hopes up about Boydie and the mill. By the time he’s grown, Emma, there’s going to be no
milling business left.’

‘I know, I know,’ she would sigh. ‘But I can dream, can’t I?’

He knew she heard what he said, knew she knew it to be the truth with her rational mind. But in her heart? Now that was a different matter. There was nothing more William could do, but he could
foresee more disappointment and heartbreak for his Emma.

Although the arrival of their child had been a joy and a living proof of their love, Lottie and Micky were so wrapped up in each other, so determined to succeed, that they
happily handed Boydie over to Emma during the daytime. As soon as she could, Lottie resumed her duties running Marsh Thorpe’s village post office which still formed part – the major
part now – of Emma’s shop. On leaving school, Micky had begun to work in the mill but a few months after their marriage, it had become obvious to all of them that there was not going to
be enough of a living to support them all.

‘The lad tried and tried hard,’ William had told Emma. ‘But he’s not cut out for it. His heart’s not in it. I don’t think he really likes the hard physical
work. He’s always seemed to like doing the paperwork though.’

Emma had snorted contemptuously. ‘Well, he’s welcome to it. I can’t abide all that side of business. It all seems such a waste of time when there’s real work to be
done.’ She had sighed. ‘What’s he going to do then?’

‘He’s applied to work in a bank in Calceworth. I reckon that would suit him fine.’

It had and it did. Micky had got the job and had embarked upon a career to which he seemed well suited, being promoted during his first year so that he and Lottie were able to put a deposit on a
small house a few doors up the street from Emma and William, even though Emma fought desperately with every excuse she could think of to keep them, and more importantly now, Boydie, under her
roof.

They saw Bridget Smith almost every week for she was getting very frail now. But her laugh was still as merry and her smile as warm. Much to Emma’s relief, they saw
nothing of Leonard.

‘Let him live in cloud cuckoo land,’ Micky would grin, unrepentant. ‘He wouldn’t know the truth if he saw it staring him in the face.’

Emma stared at her son-in-law, marvelling at his perspicacity where his own father was concerned. Then his face would sober as he would say with quiet solemnity, ‘Besides, there’s
not really much of a future in the mill. You know, you’ll have to sell it eventually, Mother, don’t you?’

Though it was never spoken of between them – it would have been a serious breach of the rules of banking if Micky had breathed a word outside the walls of the bank – he knew better
than anyone just how severely depleted their savings now were.

‘Over my dead body! Never, never. I’ll never sell Forrest’s Mill. It’s to be Boydie’s, you know that, young Micky.’

And Micky would put his arm about his mother-in-law’s shoulders and say softly, ‘I know, I know.’

What he did not say was that, in his view, she would be leaving the young boy a mountain of debts and a useless pile of bricks.

The growing Boydie had no idea of the gloomy predictions of his own father. From the time he could walk, he roamed the yard, the mill and the orchard with complete freedom.

‘Oh, watch him, do watch him, William,’ an anxious Emma would call from the bottom of the rough wooden ladder as she saw his chubby little legs climbing far above her, up and up and
round and round. She would hear William’s chuckle from the bin floor above and hear him say, ‘You come to help, young’un?’

Then would come the child’s piping voice asking questions, and William’s deep rumble as he answered, patiently explaining what he was doing and just why he was doing it. A smile upon
her mouth and shaking her head fondly, she would watch with fascinated wonderment as the boy stood on an upturned box, reaching out to gauge the flowing flour between his finger and thumb, a slight
frown of concentration on his forehead. Then he would reach up and, on tiptoe, grasp the tentering gear lever with his other hand, easing it gently until he was happy with the fineness of the
flow.

‘He’s a natural,’ William never tired of telling her. ‘He’s got a born instinct for it.’

Emma’s smile would broaden.

With the increase of traffic passing their gate, rushing towards the seaside, Emma’s anxieties for Boydie grew, but the child made no attempt to go out of the gate. The world beyond the
mill yard held no fascination for him.

She had not thought to ban him from the orchard, but the day she saw the seven-year-old trotting purposefully towards the hives beneath the trees, she gave a cry of alarm and began to run after
him, her heart pounding, her once strong legs suddenly feeling old and feeble. ‘Boydie, Boydie, no, don’t go near the bees!’

The boy took no notice and Emma watched in horror as he lifted the lid of one of the hives.

‘Hello, bees. Have you got any honey for me today?’ Emma pressed her hand over her mouth to prevent herself from crying out again. A sudden noise might startle the bees and make them
angry. They were swirling around the child’s head now, buzzing, diving and then swooping away. Away? Emma’s eyes widened in disbelief as she watched in fearful fascination.

A voice spoke behind her. ‘They won’t sting Boydie, Emma. You needn’t fear. He comes nearly every day to look at
his
bees.’ Leaning heavily on the two sticks she
now used to get about, Sarah was standing a few feet away from her watching the boy. She shook her head gravely. ‘It’s as if old Charlie had been born again, Emma. But don’t you
tell our Minister I said so, else he’ll think I’m forgetting me good Christian upbringing.’

‘No,’ Emma said softly, her gaze turning back to watch the child, still not quite able to believe what she was seeing. ‘And I know what you mean. I’ve thought it often
myself and the more he grows, the more I see it.’

Sarah chuckled. ‘Mind you, your grandad was an old rogue.’

Emma laughed, ‘Oh yes, but a
lovable
old rogue, Sarah.’

‘Aye, that’s true. That’s true.’

Emma held her breath as she watched the boy gently let the lid fall back into its place and come towards the two women. His dark blue eyes sparkled with mischief and when he smiled, two dimples
appeared in his cheeks. His black hair, ruffled into curliness by the summer breeze, shone in the sunlight.

‘They haven’t got enough for us to take any today, Grannie.’

Emma stared in amazement. Already, the boy knew that only excess honey, not needed by the colony, could be removed from the hives.

The dimples on his rounded cheeks deepened. ‘Hello, Grannie Sarah. How are you? Have you come to tell the bees some news today?’ The question was said in all seriousness, without a
hint of the derision with which some of the villagers viewed old Sarah’s beliefs.

‘You know, Boydie,’ Sarah was saying, ‘I’m finding it difficult to get out now, ’specially in the cold weather, so I was wondering if you could help me out by
taking over the job of telling the bees anything they ought to know.’