Fairchild Read Online Free Page A

expense just to throw you out on your ear?”  
    Sophy swallowed. This circumstance had given her some confidence, but still . . .  
    “There you are,” Bertha said, bustling down the walk with ferocious brightness. Mrs. Wilkes walked beside her. “Mrs. Wilkes has brung a hamper for you, love.” Sophy stood and curtsied her thanks.  
    “What’s this?” Mrs. Wilkes asked, plucking the booklet from Fred’s hands. She turned it over and read the title, annoyance flashing across her face. “Take this instead,” she said, handing Sophy a green cloth-covered book from the basket on her arm. “You’ll like it better.”
    ‘Nursery Tales’ was printed across the front in black letters.  
    “Thank-you, Ma’am,” Sophy curtseyed again. She had seen this book at the shop in the village; it was a handsome present, and one which Fred watched her tuck into the basket with reluctance.
    Blinking and turning red around the eyes, Bertha launched into a list of instructions: Sophy was not to speak to strange persons at wayside inns or pester the maid and coachman who were escorting her with questions. She must always wear her flannel petticoat and keep a clean handkerchief about her. “I’ve tucked two spare ones in the top of your basket, dear.”
    Four heads swiveled at the sound of wheels jolting down the rough road. Waiting with stopped breath, they saw a handsome, if dusty, carriage appear beneath the trees.  
    “They’ve come,” Bertha breathed, her sigh of relief a strange contrast to her paling face. Fastening her eyes on Sophy and lifting her face in her hands, she instructed: “You write to me, Miss Sophy. Master Fred will read to me. I’ll expect to hear from you regular.” Voice a-tremble, she swept Sophy into a bone-cracking embrace.
    “How I’ll miss you, child,” she whispered, low enough for Sophy’s ears alone.
    “Good-bye Berfa,” returned Sophy, reverting to her baby’s lisp and blinking furiously.
    With unaccustomed brusqueness, Bertha set Sophy aside, questioning the coachman as he fastened Sophy’s trunk to the back of the coach. Fred gave Sophy another punch to boost her confidence, and Sophy returned the gesture with a hug that made him color and shuffle his feet. Then the coachman handed Sophy into the carriage.  
    Sophy froze, surprised. Surely the elegant woman seated inside wasn’t a maid.  
    The coach lurched forward and Sophy returned to immediate concerns, tugging down the window and leaning her head outside, blowing desperate kisses to Fred and Bertha, who were running behind the coach. Bertha’s trot was heavy, her arms and bosom jiggling as she ran. The sight of her waving and running, cap askew, was too much and Sophy burst into tears.  
    “Goodbye!” she called, and ducked into the coach.  

    *****
    Silently, the haughty woman handed Sophy a handkerchief, her face marred with a frown of distaste. Sophy lapsed into cowed silence.  
    “Finished, miss?”  
    She was the maid then, despite her fine wool dress and her bonnet with a single purple plume. Her raised eyebrow and belated ‘miss’ told Sophy that though she was a servant, she was a superior one and not pleased with her current assignment.  
    “My name is Liza Pritchard,” she said. “I’m to escort you to Cordell Hall. And you are Miss Prescott.”
    “My mother called me Sophy.”
    “I dare say she did,” Liza smiled. “But I’m certain Lady Fairchild won’t countenance that. You’ll be Miss Prescott to the servants, and if the family calls you by your given name, I expect they’ll prefer Sophia. It sounds better.”  
    Flushing, Sophy turned her face aside, finding oblivion in the changing leaves of the trees as they swept past the window. The coach seemed luxurious to her, with its soft brown velvet squabs and glass windows that could slide open and shut. She had even glimpsed a crest on the door before being helped inside. She was not to know that this was the oldest of Lord