One of Us Buried by Johanna Craven (year 2 reading books TXT) 📕

dig further. I felt an ache in my chest for the crying woman. Her plight reminded me why I had taught myself not to take on other people’s pain. “How dreadful.”

“Would you listen to you,” Maggie crowed, “talking like a princess.”

I said nothing. I could hear it, of course, the smoothed edges of my own speech up against the ragged phrases of the other women. I’d spent the six months of the voyage trying to roughen my words, but Maggie’s comments reminded me I hadn’t succeeded.

But I didn’t want to stand out. Nor did I want to face the questions I knew would follow.

The woman’s tears had dried by the time dark fell over the factory and we were sent back down the stairs. The air was thick and humid, and smelled of fragrant, passing rain.

I stiffened at the sight of Blackwell in the street outside the jail. Had he been waiting for me?

“You didn’t eat this morning,” he said, his voice low. “There was food for you on the table.”

“I’ve no way of paying for food,” I told him stiffly.

“You must be hungry.”

I began to walk. My stomach was groaning with hunger, yes, but that was no business of his. I didn’t want Lottie to see me talking to him. I couldn’t bear for her to find out I had slept on his floor. I was surprised she’d not asked questions after I’d appeared at the factory with my skin scrubbed clean.

I could hear his footsteps behind me, sighing through the mud. “There’s a bed for you, Eleanor.”

I bristled at the sound of my name on his lips. Back in London, no man beside my husband would have dared called me by my Christian name. It was a cold reminder that I had sunk to the bottom of the pile. Eleanor, like some ash-streaked scullery maid.

I stopped walking. “What do you want for it?” I kept my head down, bracing myself for his answer.

“Housekeeping,” he said after a moment.

A laugh escaped me. “Housekeeping?”

“Is that not to your liking?”

I swallowed, my gaze drifting over his shoulder to the crooked silhouette of his hut. Perhaps it was foolish to trust him. But how desperately I needed to believe I might earn myself a bed and fire just by sweeping a man’s floor.

I hesitated. Blackwell stood beside me, silent and patient. I managed a faint nod.

“Good,” he said shortly.

Inside the hut, the broom was resting beside the front door. I didn’t remember it being there the previous night. Had he put it there in anticipation of my arrival? Had he known he could convince me to crawl back through his door? The thought made me inexplicably angry. But he had been right. Here I was.

Blackwell nodded towards the broom. “The floor needs sweeping. And then please empty the grate.”

I swept with my eyes down, losing myself in the rhythm of it. Sweeping an earth floor felt like a losing battle, but I was glad for something to put my mind to. Rainwater had seeped beneath the door, turning the floor at the front of the cottage to mud.

Blackwell hovered awkwardly in the corner for a few moments, his eyes following the rhythmic strokes of the broom. Then he stepped out into the night, giving me the space I craved.

Housekeeping, Nell? I imagined Lottie saying as I swept. You believe he wants you for housekeeping?

I was aware of my naivety, so perhaps that erased it. It was not blind optimism that had brought me to Blackwell’s door, but desperation.

I swept that dirt floor, then scooped every last speck of ash from the grate. There was a part of me that believed if I worked hard enough, it might convince him that my shelter and fire had been duly paid for. Might prevent him from demanding more.

The dark was thick when the lieutenant returned. I wondered distantly where he had been. He looked at the swept floor, then at the empty grate.

“That’s enough,” he said. “You’ve been working all day.” He nodded to the loaf of bread on the shelf. A monstrous ant was traversing the crust. “Take a little. Rest.”

I broke off a small chunk of bread and hovered in front of the unlit fire, unsure what else to do. The hut felt too small for strangers. I chewed slowly, the bread coarse on my tongue. The crust was crisp and warm where I had sat it too close to the lamp.

I dared a glance at Blackwell. He was opening the jar of potted meat, his back to me. Would he come to my bed tonight, I wondered? There had to be more for him in this than a swept earthen floor that would become thick with dirt again before morning. The lid of the jar popped noisily.

I looked up at the sound of voices coming towards the hut. And then a sudden screech of fabric as a rock came flying through the cloth window. It thudded loudly against the bookshelf.

Blackwell snatched his rifle. “Get down.”

I scrambled beneath the table.

“Did they hit you?” he asked.

“No.” My voice came out breathless. “Who is it? The savages?”

“It’s not the savages.”

I heard yelling; mostly men, some women. Incoherent voices. English words? I couldn’t tell.

Blackwell charged from the hut with the rifle poised. “Get the hell away from here,” he hissed. His voice was taut and controlled, as though his anger, along with all his other emotions, was kept behind bars. I realised he’d not loaded the rifle.

“What’ll you do, you sasanaigh murderer?” spat a gravelly Irish voice. “Shoot us in the street?”

A cold laugh. Terse, unintelligible words from Blackwell. He marched back inside and bolted the door.

I stepped out from beneath the table. “Who was that?” I asked shakily.

He leant the rifle up against