Read Online Fourpenny Flyer by Beryl Kingston - Free Book Online

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    â€˜Except in Mayfair and Bloomsbury.’
    â€˜Um,’ she said. ‘Peace may be preferable to war, but it sells fewer newspapers. Should we venture that second shop in Piccadilly, think ’ee?’
    â€˜On balance,’ he said gravely, ‘it is my opinion it would be a justified risk.’
    â€˜Then we will risk it,’ she said, brushing the palms of her hands against each other, swish swish, the way she alwaysdid when she’d made a decision.
    â€˜What news of Mr John?’ the lawyer asked.
    â€˜Still in Cambridge,’ his mother said. ‘I had a letter from him this morning. He means to come home to us via Ely, so he says, which seems an uncommon circuitous route to me, but all done to give him two days to inspect his new shop there.’
    â€˜He is thorough,’ Mr Teshmaker said. ‘That you cannot deny.’
    â€˜Unlike my harum-scarum Billy,’ his mother said, grinning at the thought of her elder son. ‘He spends every spare moment in Bury these days a-courting Miss Honeywood. I tell him I’m beginning to forget what he looks like.’
    â€˜Indeed, yes,’ the lawyer said. ‘He does seem much enamoured of the lady.’ And he wondered whether a wedding might not just be possible, but forbore to speak of it in case he upset his old friend’s feelings, which must be tender, in all conscience, considering how recently she’d parted from her lover. He had the greatest respect for Mrs Easter, and would never willingly do anything to cause her pain.
    â€˜â€™Twould be a good match,’ she said, grinning again. ‘Mr Honeywood is almost as rich as I am and Matilda quite as fond and foolish as my Billy.’
    â€˜So it is rumoured.’
    â€˜Well we shall see,’ Nan said, opening her account book as a signal that their business meeting was about to begin. ‘Billy is a loving creature, in all conscience, but he lacks seriousness. ’Twas Johnnie took a double portion of
that
commodity.’
    â€˜And makes good use of it, you will allow,’ Mr Teshmaker smiled, gathering his accounts together in a neat pile.
    â€˜â€™Twon’t win him a wife,’ his mother said, grimacing. ‘Nor a lover I’m thinking. And that do seem a pity to me. Now that he’s a manager of this firm a wife would be timely. Howsomever, I en’t seen the slightest sign of any interest in that direction.’
    â€˜Still waters, Mrs Easter?’ Mr Teshmaker suggested diplomatically.
    â€˜Lack of inclination, Cosmo. Now as to last week’s sales …
    *
    It was an opinion she shared with Miss Harriet Sowerby, although of course neither of them knew it. All through that summer Harriet had been reminding her Maker of the possibility that He might help her to see Mr Easter again. She said regular and heartfelt prayers about it, tentatively suggesting possible lines of action: that the gentleman might drive up Churchgate Street as she and her family were walking to church, perhaps, or arrive by stagecoach at a time when she’d been sent on an errand that would take her through Angel Square, or meet her when she’d been sent to escort Miss Pettie on her weekly trip to market. But there was no answer. Mr Easter remained elsewhere.
    His brother Billy came rollicking into town every Saturday night as regular as clockwork, as Miss Pettie reported to Mr and Mrs Sowerby equally regularly every Sunday after the service.
    â€˜Visiting again, my dears,’ she would say. ‘’Twill be a match. Depend on’t. Mrs Thistlethwaite tells me they went riding this morning. Down to Rattlesden to visit with his sister, Mrs Hopkins, I shouldn’t wonder. The romance of it, my dears!’ And Harriet listened to the conversation, hoping that this time he’d brought his brother with him. And was constantly disappointed.
    Finally when ten weeks had passed and twenty-one earnest prayers had been ignored,