“A woman who does figuring,” she said. “Do all the women do that where you’re from?” She looked up to the sky. “Stands to reason that a woman from a different place would look different. But we never thought she’d be doing the work of men.”
“The bookkeeping?” Li-Na asked, startled to realize that was why they thought her odd.
“And painting. Does everyone there paint too?”
“Everyone who can paints,” she answered. It was the basis of their language. If one could read and write, one could paint because every character was evaluated on its beauty as well as its meaning.
“It’s a strange thing, to be sure. Just so you know that. You look different to them, you talk different, and you do different.”
“But not to you?”
She snorted. “You clean up after yerself, don’t you? You took care of his lordship when he was sick, didn’t you? That’s all I care about, and so I told them.”
Li-Na looked at the sour woman and all the pieces fell into place. “That’s why they were so polite to me when his lordship was ill. It was because you told them to mind their manners.”
“I told them you were good to his lordship, and you knew your place. Didn’t put on airs, didn’t expect special food, and you took care of him when he was down with a fever. Something I wouldn’t do for anyone but my man and my babes. But you did it.” The woman eyed her narrowly. “You’re not sick, are you? Not come down with the same fever?”
“No. I’m very hale.”
“Then I don’t see why you couldn’t come to the pig’s wallow. Though, mind me, you’ll be looked at up and down if you do.”
She was looked up and down wherever she went. And she had the sneaking suspicion that so long as she stayed near Mrs. Hocking, the worst behaviors would be kept in check. As far as she could tell, the woman always wore a sour expression, was curt in her words, but she saw things in a practical way. That was an attitude that Li-Na could appreciate. And so she smiled and pointed at the lady’s overflowing basket of meat pies.
“May I help carry anything?”
“Lord, no!” she cried as they started walking. “His lordship would have my head if I had you fetching and carrying for me. He pays me good money, he said, good money and then some to do a job. And if I ask you to do my job, then you can’t do your job. So he said, and so I know. I’ll be carrying my basket, and you’ll be smiling sweetly at everybody in the village. If they say something cruel to you, just smile like you don’t understand their words. You can’t say the truth like I can. Just be a foreigner and act polite. They’ll leave you alone.”
“I don’t always understand them,” she confessed.
“Don’t matter. They don’t always understand me, but that’s their fault. I speak plain as can be.”
Li-Na smiled, feeling her heart lift. This woman who had seemed churlish nearly every time they’d interacted, now seemed to be her biggest supporter, and she’d never even known it. And since they were talking comfortably, she decided to get her most pressing questions answered.
“Can you tell me how many men are paid to re-dig the pig wallow?”
“Paid? What nonsense is this? We are none of us paid. It’s our Christian duty and the vicar told us so.” She shot a hard look at Li-Na. “You’d know that if you’d been to church, but I told them all you were tending to his lordship. But that won’t work again come Sunday.”
“Oh. Of course. I didn’t think I’d be welcome.” At least that’s what Mrs. Dove-Lyon had told her. There was always a vicar or someone coming to the women and men of the gaming hell, asking them to church. Bessie never stopped anyone from praying, but anyone who went to church came back ashamed or angry. Except for the few who never came back at all, and that was more frightening to Li-Na than anything else.
“It’s a house of God,” Mrs. Hocking said. “You’d not benotwelcomed, if you catch my drift.”
She did not, but she supposed she would find out.
Then the woman grunted. “Go with the countess. Tell her you’ll help with the boy. I’ve heard you have a way with him. If you keep him quiet, we’ll all be grateful.”
Li-Na nodded. She would do just as the woman said, but in the meantime, she went back to her original question. “No one is paid then? To help with the pigpen?”
“No one but the widow who gets her new pen. What kind of question is that?”
“Because his lordship pays the steward for that. He said it cost thirty-eight shillings for men and supplies.”
“It costs sticks and manure!” the woman cried, outraged. “And my meat pies.” She lifted the basket with pride.
She turned to Mrs. Hocking. “Do you know the cost of other things? Seed and hay? What it takes for medicines and the like?”
“I do. I can tell you down to the last penny.”
Li-Na grinned. “I will add up—to the last penny—how much Lord Daniel has been over-paying his steward. And,” she added quickly, “I’ll make sure he knows it was you who helped me figure out these things.”
