The Maidens of Walsingham
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– 'Well, what have you come up with, sweetheart? Chris loves you, she just has a very bad temper," she said, stroking Cassie's hair.
She knew Cassie was right, but she was a child and extremely vulnerable, so she was better off not knowing that Christine couldn't forgive her for her mother's death.
– Why? – Cassie asked, looking at her sister with her blue eyes: even during her illness she looked like an angel.
– Because she doesn't pray much and doesn't like to read the Scriptures," Catherine explained to her. – But you and I are good Christians and love the Scriptures, aren't we?
– We do.
– All right, do you want to sing a little song about chickens?
– I don't want to… Nobody loves me but you and Daddy! – Cassie wept bitterly, and Kate tried to comfort her, but her soul was torn by her favourite sister's cries, for she loved her as a mother loves her child.
Chapter 8
Mr. Pilough, the architect invited from London, inspected the church, made measurements and calculations, drew the blueprints, walked round the building a hundred times, spoke to Pastor Glowford about the commencement of the work, and left for the Earl's estate, where he was staying while the parish church was being restored.
When Christine brought her father a bundle of food, the parson had already finished his grammar lesson and was preparing for vespers. Today he was busy: he personally pointed out to Mr. Pilough every crack in the walls, the nearly collapsed rim and the leaking spots in the church roof. He asked the architect whether the renovation would not be too ruinous for the noble landlord, but he told him that the Count had ordered that no expense should be spared. At vespers the parson announced to the congregation the joyous news of the Count of Draymore's generosity, to which the peasants immediately clapped their hands and enthusiastically raised a hymn to the Saviour.
In the evening the Glowfords were visited by Mr. Morris: he examined Cassie, and announced with satisfaction that her health was recovering, in spite of her strange walk to the old mill. When the doctor returned to Rivershold, he and Mr. Pilough wrote up the reports of their work and sent them to their employers. Mr. Morris, in a rather lengthy letter, reported to Viscount Wilworth on the state of Miss Cassandra Glowford's health, explaining in detail his thoughts on her recovery and the improvement of the family's living conditions. He also mentioned a couple of times that the family's beds were ordinary straw bunks, placed directly on the floor. He could not keep silent about Cassie's "escape" to the mill and the fact that during those hours the girl was dressed in only a nightgown and barefoot, and that he had advised Catherine to bathe his young patient. Mr. Pilough, on the other hand, wrote to Lord Draymore with his reasonings as to the possibility of rebuilding the church, and informed him of the amount the work would cost the Earl, and soon afterwards received a letter in which the Count informed him that the necessary building materials for the church had been bought and brought to Walsingham as soon as possible.
***
Following Mr. Morris's advice, Catherine heated two buckets of water, poured it into a small wooden tub, which she had to carry into the house, mixed boiling water with cold water from a nearby stream, and washed Cassie in it. Then more clean water was added to the tub, and Christine and Catherine bathed in it. Pastor Glowford seldom bathed at home: when spring came, he always bathed in the local stream, and used the tub only in winter. His health had always been characterised by an enviable resistance to disease.
A week later, May came: the warmth, which was unusual for this month, and everything began to green up even thicker and brighter than before. The Walsinghams gladly threw off their heavy woollen shawls and coarse jackets, and put on their summer cotton clothes, which, like the rest of the peasants' wardrobe, were old, worn and shabby, but clean: in spite of their poverty, the peasants were zealous for cleanliness. They were not ashamed of their life of poverty: they had nothing to compare it with, and only Christine Glowford secretly hated it, dreaming of more than this provincial, peacefully flowing, meaningless life in this dying village.
Cassie was quite recovered: the warmth and care of her family and Mr. Morris, as well as his healing mixture, did their good work, and already in the first days of the month the girl was running in the field, where she was picking wildflowers and catching beetles.
By this time the materials needed to rebuild the church had been brought to Walsingham, and there was a loud noise of rejoicing in the village. It seemed to the poor that their lives were about to change for the better, symbolised by the rebuilt church. But Christine did not share the general joy, on the contrary, she increasingly fell into despair, she was afraid of being frozen here: with the work did not work, to save even a small amount of money for travel to London could not be saved, in addition, John Tiley again resumed his courtship, and this made the girl angry. She was unpleasant that this "dirty poor man, who cannot even read, this rude and uncouth bumpkin" dared to think about her and offer her marriage with him.
On the fifth of May the restoration work on the church began: there were more volunteers than before, but as the peasants had never been trained in building, the work was very slow and often had to be redone, which upset Mr. Pilough, who was used to working with trained or at least capable builders. But as Lord Draymore paid generously for the architect's labour and patience, the architect, with a heavy heart, continued to work with the " foolish peasants ". After a week, however, the work had to be put on hold: the weather turned cold and rainy, and it rained from morning to evening. Life in Walsingham seemed to stand still, but none of the devout villagers dared to miss the church masses, which were held in the church, despite the ongoing renovations, because there was no other place in the village to gather. On such rainy days, the roads in the village became real swamps, full of liquid mud, reaching up to the ankles and above, so the men put long planks on the ground, building something like bridges, but more often than not carried their children and wives to church in their arms, making several trips to do so, and then the widows with their children. Many still came on foot, however, and among them were the Glowfords: each resident had heavy wooden clogs for this purpose. Often after the service there was confusion: the clogs left on the doorstep of the church got mixed up, and people often could not make out whose was whose, and then a loud noise was made. The pastor, dissatisfied with the noise, suggested a simple way of solving the problem – to carve certain numbers on each pair, but the peasants refused: it was much easier for them to search for their shoes for a long time, and this occupation brought them some fun.
But soon the rain stopped, the sun came back, and with its warmth it drained the bogs that had formed on the roads, and the Walsingham people returned to their usual chores: tending to their livestock and poultry, gardening, and washing. Unfortunately, the heavy rain that flooded the vegetable gardens killed many of the vegetables, which was a sadness to the whole village, which lived on what it grew. Workers in the church continued the restoration, while other men pulled straw out of the crevices of their houses, dried it in the sun and plugged it back up. Soon the volunteers in the church dwindled, but Pastor Glowford himself took over the work, which shamed and embarrassed those who refused to help and forced them back to work.
The Glowford sisters lived May in different ways. Catherine was all in the cares: she washed clothes, every third day made in the house general cleaning, working in the garden, cooking, mending clothes, in fact, did all the things she always did. Christine sullenly did her share of the work and tried desperately to escape the attentions of the persistent John, while Cassie ran with the village children through the fields and woods, where she picked and ate (secretly from her sisters and father) green apples and berries.