She inhaled a deep breath and let it out slowly. “I don’t know the answer to that at the moment. And for now it’s not important. You aren’t well enough to go anywhere yet. There’s still time to consider that. Did the man say where he was taking you?”
Farley’s face relaxed. He shrugged and turned back to the window. “’E didn’t tell me anything. One of the boys said ’e was taking us to a place where we would work, get paid, and ’ave something to eat every day. But another one said we’d never get paid a halfpence and we’d be beaten if we didn’t work.”
Loretta’s heart constricted and another shiver shook her. She’d heard a little about workhouses where the very poor were given a place to live and food in exchange for labor, but had never seen one and certainly had never met anyone who was destined for such a place.
“So what happened?” she asked. “Did you escape from the workhouse?”
“No,” he said, to her surprise.
“How did you get away?”
“’E threw me out on the road and left me, ’e did.”
She covered her mouth with her hand to silence her gasp as she heard his words. Old feelings of abandonment flooded her. She’d felt them years ago when her mother had died even after promising Loretta she wouldn’t leave her. And more recently when her uncle had banished her to the loneliness of Mammoth House.
“What a vile soul that man must have to throw a young boy along the side of the road,” she said with a shaky voice. “And out here in the middle of nowhere.”
“Said it wasn’t ’is fault. ’E had to do it. I was sick with fever and I’d give it to the other boys. Said we’d all die if I stayed in the wagon with them. Then ’e wouldn’t get any money for us.”
Anger grew inside Loretta. She wanted to find the man and have him punished.
“So he just left you beside the road in the freezing rain! That was a wicked thing for him to do to you.”
“I didn’t care. ’E was a cur. I didn’t want to go wherever ’e was taking me anyway.”
She blinked at his swearing again but only asked, “How did you find Mammoth House? There’s no distinct road leading here anymore.”
“I followed the road for a while, until I saw the manwalking ’is ’orse and followed ’im. I figured ’e knew where ’e was going.”
“So you followed the Duke of Hawksthorn here?”
When she said the duke’s name, Farley looked over his shoulder at her with distrust in his eyes. “’E don’t like me.”
“Who?” she asked cautiously. “The duke? I know it may have seemed that way when you first arrived. I didn’t think he liked me the first time we met, either. He can be rather strong and commanding. But he’s a fair person.”
“’Is kind got no use for someone like me,” Farley said as a determined expression settled onto his face. “I seen it in ’is eyes, I did.”
“That may be true for some gentlemen but not the duke,” she defended.
“’E’s like all the gents, ’e is. They just soon give ye the backs of their hand as a penny. They brush you away like dust off their fancy cuffs.”
She gasped. “The duke never struck you, did he?”
“’E grabbed me and wouldn’t let me go.”
“That’s because he knew you were in peril. He saved your life that night. If the duke hadn’t gone out into the storm and brought you back, you probably would have—well, there is no telling what may have happened to you. As it is, you were saved from the storm and the fever and you’re getting stronger each day. And you don’t have to go to a workhouse, either. But if you have no parents, where do you live?”
He looked back out the window and defiantly said, “Got my ownself a place under the steps of an old building near St. James Park. Dug it out my ownself. Even found enough wood for a floor and a blanket, too.”
“That’s good,” she said softly, her heart feeling heavy and thinking that she couldn’t imagine anything morehorrible than not having a home to live in, nor a bed to sleep in. And not even a fire to warm her during the freezing winter nights. Just a cold wooden floor and a blanket.
“Where do you get food?”
He looked at her with his big brown eyes and calmly said, “Wherever I can find it. Got no one to bring it to me like you do.”
Loretta felt the sting of what he said, though she knew he didn’t mean it as a rebuke—only an observation. Knowing he had so little, she wondered if she’d ever truly feel hungry again. She was overly blessed compared with Farley and so many children who’d been abandoned by the good side of life.
“Ye don’t need to look sad for me. I don’t mind.” Farley started coughing. He turned away from her and bent double as he struggled to recover his breath.
