Read Online Hope by Lesley Pearse - Free Book Online Page B

a husband who knows he loves me,’ she retorted indignantly, and began walking away from him.
    Nell was very aware that the vast majority of people married for exactly the reasons Albert had stated. This was something often discussed by the staff at Briargate as they sat around the table in the servants’ hall after supper. Gentry mostly married to strengthen links between two families, or to bring wealth to an illustrious family that was struggling financially. Baines, who had worked at or visited dozens of big estates, had said once that Sir William and Lady Harvey were the only titled people he’d ever met that he would call a ‘love match’. It was Baines’s belief that servants would do better by selecting a husband or wife for practical reasons rather than through what he called ‘love sickness’.
    But Nell had been born to parents who were a love match. Meg and Silas had been married now for twenty-five years and despite all the hardships, they still billed and cooed like lovebirds. Her father had once told her he felt no need to drink ale with other men; his favourite place was home beside the fire with his Meg. And that was what Nell wanted from her marriage too.
    ‘Don’t run off, Nell,’ Albert called after her. ‘I’m sorry if I put it badly. Will you marry me?’
    Nell stopped and turned to look at him. ‘Not until you can tell me you want me as your wife because you can’t live without me, and mean it.’
    Hope stood watching as her mother fiddled with Nell’s hair yet again. She wasn’t used to someone else in the family getting all the attention, and she didn’t like it much.
    The church bells began to ring. ‘That means it’s time we left,’ Silas said. ‘That is, if Nell’s sure Albert is the one for her.’
    It was September, and Nell had finally agreed to marry Albert when, a week after his proposal in the woods, he insisted he did love her, and explained that his slowness in admitting it was only down to shyness.
    ‘I’m sure,’ Nell said resolutely.
    ‘You look as pretty as a cherry tree in blossom,’ Meg said, placing a crown of white flowers on her daughter’s head. Albert had brought them down from Briargate early that morning while Nell was still asleep up in the loft. Meg had fashioned the crown with a little wire, moss and greenery, and fixed the smallest of the flowers on to it. The rest she’d made into a posy for Nell to carry.
    Nell had made her pink and white dress herself with some help from Rose, the parlourmaid. It had a low neckline and puffed sleeves, and the skirt had ruffles around the hem and a bustle like a real lady would wear. With a starched lace-trimmed petticoat beneath it and dainty shoes with silver buckles passed on to her by her ladyship, Hope thought her sister looked beautiful.
    ‘Why haven’t I got a crown?’ Hope asked.
    ‘Because Nell is the bride, and anyway, you’ve got a bonnet with new ribbons,’ Meg said, handing the posy to Nell. ‘Now, take that look off your face, Hope, and behave in church.’
    Hope knew that Albert was already at the church as she’d seen him come past a little while ago with Ruth and James, who would be his best man. Joe and Henry had left then too. Hope thought Albert looked funny in a wing-collar, but then so did everyone in their best clothes.
    Old Gertie Ford was waiting in the lane as they came out of the house. She lived in the cottage across the way and her legs were too bad to make it to the church.
    ‘Good luck,’ she called out, tottering on her stick. ‘You make a pretty bride, Nell; make sure that handsome man of yours treats you right.’
    Hope wondered why people kept saying that to Nell. Did it mean some husbands were bad to their wives?
    The whole thing about getting married was a bit mysterious to Hope. She had asked her mother and she said it was because women wanted babies and they needed a man to give them one. But Hope knew babies grew in women’s bellies, so that didn’t quite