LITMIR.BIZ

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and death certificates. But there was nothing online this time. Instead the website suggested checking parish records for the time.

      Disappointed, I sat still at my desk for a minute. Then I gave up all pretence of working on my book and instead I picked up my notebook and a pen, and headed downstairs.

      Margaret was throwing a ball to the boys in the garden. I went outside and she looked round.

      ‘All done already?’ she said. ‘That was quick.’

      ‘Not exactly,’ I said. ‘I just need to pop out – I can take the boys with me but if you don’t mind staying, I would get it done quicker …’

      ‘Go,’ she said, without hesitating. ‘We’re having a great time.’

      Pleased to have something to think about other than Dad and the stress of our move, I bounded down the lane towards the village church.

      I’d not been inside before, but we’d admired it on our walks to the shops. It was a gorgeous Norman church with old graves in the churchyard and a square bell tower. The heavy wooden door was open, so I ducked inside.

      Luckily for me, the vicar was there, pinning a notice to the board in the porch. He smiled at me as I walked in.

      ‘Hello there,’ he said.

      I introduced myself and explained what I was after. And the vicar – who was much younger than I expected vicars to be and who told me to call him Rich – showed me into a side office where the parish records were kept.

      ‘They’re all fascinating,’ he said. ‘I sometimes look up people at random and trace their family back to see how far they go. Lots of folk have lived here for generations.’

      He pulled out the books for me and I settled myself down at the desk.

      It wasn’t as easy as searching online, but it didn’t take me long to find the christening record of little Violet in 1837, and then, in 1842, I found the record of Violet’s mother’s death. Harriet had died of childbirth fever, the record said.

      Not a murder then, I thought. I was disappointed that the mystery wasn’t a mystery after all.

      ‘Found what you were looking for?’ said Rich, peering over my shoulder.

      ‘I did,’ I said. ‘But she wasn’t murdered. She died in childbirth.’

      ‘The baby died, too,’ Rich pointed out. He showed me the line below Harriet’s entry. ‘A little boy – look.’

      ‘Frederick Hargreaves,’ I read out loud. ‘Aged two days.’ My voice caught in my throat on the last words.

      ‘Oh,’ I said. ‘Violet was five.’

      ‘Violet?’ Rich asked.

      ‘Harriet’s daughter,’ I said. ‘She was five when Harriet died. My mum died when I was five.’ I paused. ‘And I lost my baby brother too.’

      The vicar put his hand on my shoulder. ‘I’m sorry to hear that,’ he said. ‘You said you were a writer?’

      I nodded, still looking at the entry in the records.

      ‘Maybe writing this story can help you make sense of your own,’ he said.

      ‘Maybe it can,’ I said. ‘Maybe it can.’

      I thanked him and promised to come back another day to do more research. Then, with my head full of this unknown Violet who lost her mum as I’d done, and poor Harriet, I wandered home.

      I’d only been back about two minutes, and I was saying hello to the boys and Margaret, when I heard the front door open. Ben walked out into the garden, a bundle cradled in his arms. A little bubble of excitement popped in my tummy as he placed the bundle gently on the grass in front of the boys.

      ‘Careful,’ he said to Oscar who was bouncing up and down. ‘He’s just a baby.’

      ‘Mummy!’ shouted Oscar, almost roaring with excitement. ‘Mummy! It’s a puppy! Come and see!’

      I exchanged a look with Margaret.

      ‘Looks like you’re staying put then,’ she said with a smile.

      I nodded. ‘Looks like it,’ I said.

Chapter 12

      1855

      Violet

      After I’d run away from Mr Forrest on the beach, I went into the house through the kitchen – I didn’t want to see Father asleep or awake – and went straight up to the attic. I slumped in the chair and took my hat off. I could hardly bear to look down at the bottom of the cliff, where I’d been so rude to Mr Forrest. Cutting him off, rejecting his kindness.

      I flushed again, thinking of how he’d seen right into my soul. How had he known how trapped I felt? How I was looking at him to help me escape? I knew I’d been lucky so far, that Father hadn’t married me off to the first man to show an interest. But recently he’d started talking about a man called John Wallace, who worked with him on one of his projects. He mentioned how clever he was and how good with money, and how he ran a tight ship. And I knew – I just knew – that these were qualities Father admired. Qualities he thought would make a good husband.

      So far I’d resisted all his efforts for me to meet Mr Wallace, but it wouldn’t be long, I thought in misery, before Father invited him down to Sussex, and that would be it.

      I knew I ought to speak to my father. I should tell him how I felt, that I wanted to paint and that Mr Forrest seemed to be taking my painting seriously, because for all his talk of taking my work to London, I knew that in reality I could do nothing without Father’s approval. But what would he say if I told him? I shuddered at the thought.

      On the whole, Father had been supportive of my love of art to begin with. Lots of girls like me took drawing lessons and I had been taught by a mousey-haired woman from the village who’d been very keen on technique. She’d sent me down to the beach to collect things – shells, feathers, a stick – and then made me sketch them over and over using only charcoal. Never any colour.

      Despite the repetitive nature of the task, I had loved it. Loved it more than the lessons I got from my succession of elderly governesses who droned on about kings and queens and made me recite poetry. Urgh, just remembering old Mrs Pringle who had a passion for the Reformation and who liked to share it with me, made me want to curl up into a ball and go to sleep. But when I was drawing I felt like I had become who I was supposed to be.

      When my lessons were over, I would shut myself in my bedroom and draw some more. First I sketched parts of myself – a foot or a hand. Then I would gaze at myself in the mirror and draw my face again and again, struggling to get my hair right.

      I sketched Father then too and he exclaimed in delight that I’d got his expression ‘just so’ and patted me on the head proudly. He even took me to the Royal Academy most years, laughing as I gazed in speechless wonder at the paintings there.

      But as I got older, Father’s indulgence of my art waned.

      ‘No more talk of painting, Violet,’ he would say if I tried to talk to him. ‘It’s not becoming for a young woman to be so focused on one thing. You need to extend your skills. Your arithmetic could do with half the attention you give to drawing.’

      He would tut if he saw me with paper or pencil and refuse to answer if I asked for another visit to the Royal Academy. So I took to drawing upstairs in my bedroom, moving into the lounge – which had much better light – only when Father was on one of his frequent trips away.

      The only people who knew about my work – until Edwin found me on the beach that day – were Mabel, our housekeeper, and Philips, who did everything else around the house and garden. Mabel regarded my drawings with a sense of wonder – briefly.

      ‘Oh

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