Black Road to Heaven

Chapter 9: Emily

When I woke up in the morning, the first thing on my mind was Sam. This was rarely the case anymore; I usually woke up to a rumbling stomach thinking of food. Then my mind would wander to Freda for a second, and then drift along to Sam and his celestial bread and cake stall.

I stepped out onto Baker Street and as always, I saw him setting up his stall. A basic wooden carved table with a slate board propped up against the front, stating prices for various goods in chalk. I would often look at that chalk board from the other side of the street on a quiet day where the street was sparsely populated and my view of it was clear. I would try to guess what each neatly written out name said, but of course it was no use. I could not and probably never would be able to read anything beyond three lettered words, and my own name. Sam had tried to teach me how to read last year, but we did not get enough time in the mornings and I was too tired at night so we gave up.

“Emily, top o’ the morning to you!” Sam greeted me in the usual way. “I have a surprise for you!”

My eyes widen, “I do not think anyone has ever said that to me before! What is it?”

He broke me off the usual hunk of bread that he gives me every morning and I smiled. Then, out of seemingly nowhere he pulled out a very small cake-looking thing and I looked at it for a while, trying to guess why it was so small. “What is it?” I eventually asked him when I could not guess.

He laughed at my ignorance and then told me, “It is what people call a bun. It is a small cake and I make an awful lot of money selling them; here, try it.”

I ate it, getting my fingers very sticky and then said, “I say, that was the nicest thing I have ever eaten in my life! Thank you very much Sam!” And I did mean it!

He said that he was jolly glad I liked it and then I told him all about Freda, how I now knew her name, how she had approached me to give me a shilling, how she said I sounded like a maid, and lastly, about the way she looked at me with Lady Catherine Beaumont yesterday.

“Freda even smiled at me from her carriage! I didn’t imagine it, I swear!” I said excitedly.

Sam looked at me and laughed. Whilst he began to lay out some cakes, he said, “Well who would have thought it; my little Emily being noticed by the royals?”

“Sam!” I giggled childishly. “They are not royal, just rich!” Sam could always make me laugh, even if what he said was not particularly funny.

Then some of the early risers began to appear and a few people looked dubiously at Sam’s stall. Like every morning, I say goodbye to him and ran away, only this time, my stomach was still rumbling in appreciation from the bun.