Hope by Lesley Pearse

him lessons in the schoolroom every day.
    ‘I’d rather go to Reverend Gosling like Hope does,’ Rufus replied.
    ‘Reverend Gosling only teaches the village children,’ Lady Harvey said sharply, looking cross that her son was being so uncooperative. ‘And Miss Bird will be teaching you some history, geography and music too. She plays the piano.’
    Hope wanted to laugh at Rufus because he looked funny with his lower lip stuck out petulantly. She thought he was a bit of a sissy mostly, though that was partly because he was always dressed in a sailor suit and his white stockings never had a speck of dirt on them. She could see why he didn’t like the look of his new teacher. She looked mean with her straight back and her thin, unsmiling lips. She had no chin either; the bottom of her face disappeared into her neck.
    ‘Will she teach Hope too?’ Rufus asked.
    ‘No, she won’t,’ Lady Harvey said, and moved closer to him to ruffle his blond curls. ‘Your father thinks it’s time you mixed with some boys, so two afternoons a week Benjamin and Michael Chapel will be coming over here.’
    Hope knew from Nell that the Chapels lived in a big house at Chelwood because they came to dine here sometimes. She’d never seen the boys herself but Nell had described them as little prigs.
    ‘I think you’d better run along home now, Hope,’ Lady Harvey said. ‘I’d like Miss Bird to talk to Rufus alone.’
    While Rufus began to complain that they were in the middle of a game, Ruth fetched Hope’s shawl and bonnet and nudged her towards the door. It was quite clear to Hope that she was supposed to disappear permanently without a word, but that seemed unfair to her.
    ‘Won’t I be able to come to see Rufus any more?’ she asked at the door.
    Lady Harvey frowned. ‘You’ll still see him at church,’ she said.
    As Rufus let out a wail of protest, Hope slipped out of the room because she was afraid she might cry too. While it was true she was often bored with Rufus, she was fond of him and they’d been playing together for a long time. Yet what hurt most was that James had warned her just a couple of weeks ago that she would be dropped like a hot brick when Sir William decided it was no longer seemly for his son to be playing with a village child.
    Hope hadn’t believed James; in fact she’d kicked him for being so nasty. But he was right after all.
    She ran straight down to the kitchen. Cook looked up from rolling out some pastry. She was an odd-looking woman with crossed eyes and a small hump on her back, but Hope liked her. ‘Hello, my little dumpling,’ Cook said in her usual affectionate manner. ‘You’re early today. Or have you been sent down with a message for me?’
    Hope blurted out the gist of what had happened. ‘So I’m to go,’ she finished up. ‘I’m not wanted any more.’
    Saying it outright like that made her cry and Cook drew her to her bosom for a cuddle. ‘There, there,’ she said comfortingly. ‘They’ve got to make Master Rufus into a little man for when he goes away to school. But don’t take on, he’s going to miss you, and I don’t doubt he’ll play this new governess up because of it. Maybe Lady Harvey will call you back again then.’
    ‘I shan’t come back even if she does,’ Hope said proudly, sniffing back her tears. ‘Where’s Nell?’
    ‘Off home,’ Cook said, taking a newly baked biscuit off the cooling tray and handing it to Hope. ‘She’s had her afternoon off changed to Mondays now.’
    Hope wanted to cry again at that news, but she bit back her tears, said goodbye to Cook and left.
    The way home was over the stile behind the stables and across the paddock to the woods, but she changed her mind as she reached the stile and turned back to march round the side of the house and down the drive. Part of it was because she wanted to see Nell and her cottage was down that way, but the major part was an act of defiance as she knew she could be seen clearly from the