Millcastle: The Complete Series (Ebook bundle) Books 1-6

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Chapter 1: Chapter One
Millcastle, England 1831
“If you will just wait a moment, Mr. Keswick, I’ll have the money for you directly.”
Billy Keswick blew his nose in his grimy handkerchief. “Can’t wait much longer, lass. I have rents to collect from fifty households before dinner, so you’d best be quick about it.”
Despite his warning, he took a seat at the table and planted his booted feet squarely on the scarred wooden surface. He was a rotund man with a reddish complexion, and a straggly mustache stained with tobacco. He was also the man who inspired terror in the motley inhabitants of the dilapidated properties in the Three Coins area of Millcastle, where Caroline and her family had been reduced to living.
Caroline desperately searched the dresser for the earthenware jar that last night had contained the exact amount for the week’s rent. Under the all too appreciative leer of Mr. Keswick, she gathered her skirts and clambered up on one of the rickety chairs to search the shelves more thoroughly. But there was no sign of the jar and, more tellingly, there was no sign of her mother who was supposed to be home watching the stew. The meager fire was almost out, and it belched puffs of smoke into the draughty air that sidled under the warped front door.
Caroline took a deep breath and slowly descended from the chair before turning to face her unwelcome visitor. She forced herself to smile.
“I wonder if my mother thought to take the rent, and bring it to you herself? She might have missed you on her way through the streets.”
Mr. Keswick spat on the bare well-scrubbed floorboards and loudly cleared his throat. “I did see your mam, but she was heading down Gower Street toward the church.”
Caroline nodded as if this made perfect sense. “She’s probably trying to find you right now.” She picked up her thick woolen shawl. “Perhaps we should both go and see if we can intercept her.” She walked purposefully toward the door, and gasped when Mr. Keswick grabbed hold of her arm and yanked her into his lap.
“I’m not that stupid, my little pigeon. If your mam has the money, we all know what she’s going to do with it. The last thing she’ll want to do is talk to me.”
“I’m not sure what you mean, Mr. Keswick.” Heat rose in Caroline’s cheeks, and she refused to look at her captor.
“She’ll be playing cards with all the other old ladies and with her bad luck, when she’s run through your rent money, she’ll be writing I.O.U.’s to everyone. Then you will be in a pickle.” He kissed her averted cheek and she forced herself not to shudder. “You know it’s true, lass, and you know the solution. You find some time to be nice to me, and I’ll forget about the rent this week.”
He kissed her again and the stale stench of ale, tobacco and lust rising from his heated skin made Caroline want to retch. Could she do it? Could she let him touch her if it meant her mother and sisters kept a roof over their heads for another week? She shoved at his chest and managed to scramble out of his lap.
“My sisters will be home at any moment.” She grabbed her shawl off the hook on the back of the door. “We’ll all go and find my mother and I’ll bring the rent to the George and Dragon. That’s where you have your rooms, is it not?”
“Is it not?” Mr. Keswick mimicked her upper-class accent. “Aye it is.” He licked his lips as he stared at her bosom. “And, if you still can’t find the money, you can step upstairs with me without any chance of your sisters catching us and pay off your debt in my bed.”
Caroline managed a nod before she turned, slammed the door and ran down the steep hill away from the narrow terraced house. Her boots slipped on the broken cobblestones, and she splashed through piles of filth and had to slow down before she fell. Her breath was coming in panicked gasps and her heart threatened to beat its way out of her chest. She paused at the corner and scanned the intersection. A lone horse and cart filled with barrels of beer rumbled by her, and she waited until it passed before darting across the road.
On the opposite corner of the street, facing out onto the square sat the old George and Dragon coaching inn, which she would have to visit whether she found the money or not. Caroline shivered and gathered her shawl more tightly around her shoulders. She would face that issue later. In the meantime, she had to find her two younger sisters and, more importantly, her mother. Was it possible that Marie had indeed taken the rent and gone to find Mr. Keswick? In her heart, Caroline knew it was a forlorn hope. Her mother had probably done exactly what Mr. Keswick had suggested, and used the money to stake her card game with the town busybodies.
Caroline glanced up at the towering walls of the cotton mill that belched out black smoke all day and night. In about half an hour the doors would be unlocked and the factory would disgorge its day shift, adding hundreds of bodies to the already crowded streets of Millcastle. She had to find her sisters and her mother before it became impossible to move.
“Caroline!”
She turned to see her youngest sister Ivy waving at her and waved back. She’d sent the girls out to the market earlier to find any end of the day bargains or damaged fruit and vegetables. Ivy had such a sweet face that she often persuaded the storeholders to give her something extra simply by smiling at them.
Some way behind Ivy, Caroline also spotted Ruby, chatting earnestly to a familiar looking man. She bit down on her already chapped lip. She did not want her friend and neighbor, Jon Ford to hear about her family’s current woes. He was far too keen to be of service to her as it was.
Caroline forced a smile as Jon tipped his hat to her.
“You’re out from the mill early, Mr. Ford.”
“Unfortunately not for long.” He bowed. “I would offer to escort you all home, but I have to be back at my post in the next five minutes, or I will be docked a day’s wages.”
Ruby made a huffing noise. “And yet you have been out on company business. It is so unfair.”
Jon met Caroline’s gaze over Ruby’s head. “It is indeed unfair.” His faint smile died. “Is everything all right, Mrs. Harding?”
“Everything is fine, Mr. Ford. Don’t let us keep you.” She winced at her dismissive tone but could do nothing to soften it in case he offered his help, and that would never do.
To her relief he took his dismissal in good part, and, with a last genial nod, walked up the hill toward the grand gated entrance of the Marsham Mill where he worked as a clerk.
“Why were you so rude to him, Caroline?” Ruby demanded. “Don’t tell me you have started to listen to mother saying he is too common to associate with us.”
“It’s not that.” Caroline said. “I needed to speak to you and Ivy alone.”
“What’s wrong?” Ivy whispered as she wrapped her arms around herself and edged closer to Caroline’s side, her pale triangular face lifted to Caroline’s, her blue eyes wide with fear.
“I can’t find the rent money.” Two pairs of horrified eyes met hers. “And mother has disappeared.”