A Chance Meeting in Glasgow

Chapter 45

“Mrs. Gregorson, welcome to the home of Miss Katherine Cameron.  Rev. Shanks recommended you highly.  The reason I have hired you is that Miss Cameron wants to open a place where poor women who can’t afford their own sewing machines will have access to the use of some.  Miss Cameron will need some assistance, of course, and to that end here is Ceana.  I need you to teach this young woman everything there is to know about using and maintaining a Model 12 Treadle.”

“Your fee is very generous, Mr. Spears.  I hope I can earn a half of it.”

“I also require you to be discrete, Mrs. Gregorson.”

“Yes, sir.  It’s unusual for transportation to be sent into my neighborhood, sir.  There may be questions.”

“Answer with the truth.  An eccentric rich man has hired you for an exclusive sewing project, Mrs. Gregorson.  Beyond that: discretion.”

“Of course, sir.”

“Very good.  Ceana, pay attention; work hard.  The important thing is for Miss Cameron to be happy.”

Ceana, whose eyes had never left Andrew’s face through the whole exchange, nodded.

“Katie.”  Anne whispered into the darken room in the direction of the muffled crying.

“Go away.”

“No.  We’re sisters.”  Anne knelt next to the bed.

Katherine peeked out from under the pillow at her, and broke into fresh, loud sobs.

Anne reached out and began stroking her back.  They let the time pass.

Finally Katherine lifted the edge of the pillow and whispered, “I’m a whore, Anne.  I sold myself like a girl on the streets.”

“Katie, I don’t understand what you’re talking about.  You’re peerage, and a sweet, kind woman who cares for others.  Everyone who knows you loves you.”

“No one knows me, Anne.  I’m my father’s daughter.  I have no morals that I’m not willing to sell.  My life is a sham.  I’m a whore.”

“That’s not what your life is, Katie.  You’re going to have to explain yourself, or I’ll worry you’re becoming mentally unbalanced.”

“Anne, the plan Taylor and I came up with to save the family seat required the London and Edinburgh properties to be sold.  We needed to raise enough money to get the loans current and also to cut enough future expenses that the income from the estate could service the balance.  With father dead the only one who had the power to sell any real estate was Huff, but we couldn’t find you two.”

“Torrington said he had written his father about our travels.”

“Well, father didn’t tell anyone else.  It was right in middle of planting and lambing and shearing and everything else that goes on in the spring on the estate, and the three principle bankers began to pressure us.  Taylor had just been ill, and there was so much work to organize and oversee, so finally I went to Sterling to plead with the bankers.  It’s supposed to be all right to visit respected men about business matters, at their offices, during the day, alone and unaccompanied – that’s what society says, Anne.  A young woman is supposed to have some protection afforded by basic principles.

“But they were so filled with hate, and frustrated that father had died and they no longer had an opportunity to humiliate him or make him suffer.  It wasn’t just the money father owned them - he’d cheated them and belittled them and rubbed their noses in his position in society above them for decades.  There was also a girl from one of the families that father…well, anyway, every one of them had borne personal insults and injuries from father in the past.