The White Riband; Or, A Young Female's Folly

by F. Tennyson Jesse

With a high heart Loveday began her quest for the work which was to earn for her the coveted white satin sash. She had but three weeks in which to make a matter of several shillings, and this meant that she must sell every moment of the time which was hers when her duties about her aunt's were discharged for the day. In the morning she was busy with cleaning and cooking till almost mid-day, and in the evenings she had the milk to fetch, but in the afternoons she could be sure of a few hours if Aunt Senath did not guess she wanted them for herself and invent tasks. On Mondays, of course, the washing kept her all day at the tub, and on Fridays at the mangle, on Saturdays there was the baking of the bread, while Thursday, being market day, she was supposed to keep house while Aunt Senath went in to Bugletown—a task that slut of a woman was too fond of for its chances of gossip to send her niece in her stead. On Thursdays Loveday was wont to stay in and see to the mending, but she reflected that, by sitting up in her bed at night to darn and patch by the light of the wick that floated in a cup of fish-oil, she might take charge of some neighbour's children on that day instead and Aunt Senath be none the wiser. Loveday had a sad lack of principle, doubtless an heritage from her heathen father.

On the afternoons of Tuesdays and Wednesdays, she hoped to help in some house with the cleaning, or in some slattern's abode with the weekly wash, for, as all know, there are some such sluts that the washing gets put off from day to day, till Saturday finds it still cluttering the washhouse instead of being brought in clean and sweet from the gorse-bushes.

Then there were always odd things to be done, such as running errands, at which she hoped to earn some pence here and there. The white riband seemed no impossible fantasy to Loveday when she started on her quest.

She went first to visit old Mrs. Lear, at Upper Farm, for no one had shown such a kindly front to the girl in all the village as she. Loveday started out for the milk half-an-hour earlier than was her wont so that she might have time to discuss her hopes with the farmer's wife, and this time she did not meet young Mrs. Lear or her friend Cherry on the way. But she did come upon both Mrs. Lears in the big kitchen, the younger seated in the armchair in front of the fire and the elder anxiously regarding her. Primrose had been fretful ever since hearing from her mother-in-law of Miss Le Pettit's visit of the day before, and of the unaccountable interest the heiress had shown in that faggot of a Loveday, and by now her fretfulness had assumed the size of an indisposition. In vain did Mrs. Lear try and cosset and comfort her with potions both hot and cool; Primrose knew well that beneath the kindness of the farmer's wife lurked the feeling that it was not for one in her station to indulge in such vapours as might well befit the gentry, and that she would be cured sooner by taking a broom to the best carpet than by sitting and keeping the fire warm. Primrose sulked, and even handsome Willie, leaning by the window, wanting to be away yet dreading the outburst did he move, could not persuade his wife that nothing ailed her but too much idleness. Neither, though to their robust health it would have seemed so, would it have been all the truth, for Primrose was taking her condition more hardly than most girls who have had the good fortune to wed with a prosperous young farmer, and the thought that she would not be able to dance in the procession with the rest of the world at the Flora had for some time past embittered her. To enter the house, after her anger with Loveday and the flash of fear that the strange half-foreign girl had filled her with, only to find that the great Miss Le Pettit had offered that very girl to dance with her ... this was poisonous fare indeed for one in the discontented mood of Primrose Lear. The heaviness of her mind matched with that of her body as she hunched over the fire.

Sight of Loveday, a Loveday oddly changed from that of the day earlier, did not ease her sickness; the light in Loveday's eye, the fresh exhilaration of her step—she, who was wont to slip along with so much of quiet aloofness—stung the other girl anew. Loveday greeted Mrs. Lear eagerly before she saw that Primrose was sitting half-hidden by the wings of the big chair, her face, paler than its wont, in shadow, pallid like a face seen through still water. Then she saw also handsome Willie, dark against the small square panes of the window, the April sun gilding the curve of his ruddy cheek and making the pots of red geraniums along the sill blaze as brightly as the beautiful blossoms of painted wax that, under their glass shade, held an example of neat perfection up to Nature.

Willie nodded at Loveday with a trifle less of sulkiness in his manner, took a step forward and relapsed once more. A little silence seemed to catch them all, broken by good Mrs. Lear saying:

"You'm early to-day, Loveday. Milken's not over yet."

"I'm come to see you a moment, if 'tes possible," said Loveday, some of her shining confidence already fallen from her, she knew not why.

"Well," said Primrose spitefully, guessing her presence would embarrass Loveday, "Mrs. Lear's here and I daresay'll speak to 'ee. Can't be any secret from me, of course, whatever 'tes."

Mrs. Lear, suddenly sorry for Loveday, although Primrose on entering the day before had told her a tale that had angered her, said: