Justice Is a Woman by Yelena Kopylova Page B

when she made
    her way downstairs. The sun was shining, throwing broad shafts of light through the
    stained-glass
    windows on the landing. She had decided to take a walk round the garden before
    breakfast and was
    crossing the hall towards the front door when Ella came from the morning-room carrying a brass, helmet
    shaped coal scuttle. Seeing her, she stopped for a moment, exclaiming, “Eeh! miss;
    you’re up early.”
    “It’s a habit, Jane, and I can’t get out of it.”
    “Well, the fire’s blazing away in the breakfast—room, miss, and I’ll get your breakfast early if you want
    it.”
    “No. No, thank you. I’ll have it at the usual time;
    I’m going to take a walk around the garden. “
    “Do that, miss; it’s a lovely morning, sharp though.”
    “Yes, it is lovely. It’s been a beautiful autumn; but we can’t expect this kind of weather to last much
    longer.”
    “No, you’re right there, miss. Oh, and when the winds start an’ the snow, my! it would freeze a brass
    monkey.”
    “I bet it would. Well, I’ve got that to come.” She smiled at Ella now, then opened the door and went
    out, the while Ella, moving to one of the hall windows, watched her stride across the drive towards the
    terrace, before she herself turned and hurried to the kitchen.
    “She’s gone out, the miss, for a walk in the garden. By! but she’s pleasant, isn’t she?”
    “Aye, she is that.” Mary nodded her head slowly.
    “She’s plain but she’s very pleasant.”
    “Well, I’d rather have her than some I could mention.”
    “Now, enough of that. There, drink your tea and then get about your work... But what did you say?
    She’s gone walking in the garden?” They both turned now and stared at each other as the same thought
    struck them.
    Betty had stopped by the lakeside. But rather than looking down into the water, she raised her head to
    the sky and drew in deep draughts of air, and as it filled her lungs she likened it to wine, for it made her
    feel heady, and good. It was odd, she thought, as she now walked round the lake, that she had disliked
    Cousin Kathryn’s garden, and yet she already loved this one. But, she told herself
    ruefully, the reason
    wasn’t really hard to find: Kathryn had had her digging or weeding, working like a horse every day.
    Here, everything was neat and tidy and you could walk round and enjoy it.
    She made her way through an arch in the privet hedge and took a path to the left. It was new to her and
    led away from the kitchen garden and the greenhouses and into a narrow belt of
    woodland.
    When she came to the end of the strip of woodland she found she had also reached the
    extent of the
    grounds, for here she came up against a fence. It was low, only three and a half feet high, and made of
    staves wired together. The path itself ended at the fence but to the right of her was a patch of rough
    scrubland, with hawthorn and bramble, that had overgrown the fence in places.
    She was about to turn and retrace her steps when a piece of sacking protruding from the bushes near the
    fence caught her eye. The fact that it didn’t look like old sacking made her curious.
    Stepping from the
    path she approached the bushes and parted the branches to reveal a partly filled sack, its top folded over
    to cover its contents.
    Slowly she bent down and flipped back the top and her surprised gaze saw a loaf partly wrapped in
    paper, a brown—paper bag and below these carrots and onions and potatoes. She
    straightened her
    back and looked about her, then looked down into the sack again and, stooping, she
    opened the paper
    bag. It held a number of sausage rolls, some queen cakes and, wrapped in a piece of
    grease proof
    paper, a solitary chop.
    She fastened up the paper bag again, folded the top of the sack into the shape she had found it, then
    stepped back on to the path.
    “Well, well.”
    She walked now into the woodland and stood against a tree. The land in front of her and beyond the
    fence