Every morning at 5:30 Lucy would rise, dress herself and go outside to meet her father in the milking barn. Her father - who had never once insisted, nor insinuated, that she should help him out about the farm - had long stopped being surprised to see her there each day, standing at the door with her little wooden stool and her little tin bucket. Now he just let her get on with it.
In silence she would pitch up next to a cow and milk it until her bucket was about one third full (for this was as much as her five year old frame could carry). She would then take it to her father and leave it next to him without saying a word and return to the cow to pat it and offer it an officious, congratulatory “Good girl.”
Her milking duties complete, she would then go to the chicken coop, take up a scoopful of feed and scatter it about. Her father would feed them properly later - Lucy had no idea about the quantity of feed that chickens need to stay alive - but she would walk around to check that they were all awake and moving about.
It was an unusual sight to see this young girl dressed in wellington boots and waxed jacket mucking in with the chores like any old farm hand. She conducted herself in such a way that, were it not for her size or her youthful face, there was nothing at all to suggest that Lucy was in fact a child. She did not stop to pat the ducks as they gathered around her feet. She did not chase the lambs around the field, or laugh, or point, or call to her father to watch as they clumsily tried to find their feet. Neither the pigs, nor the horses, nor the flapping chickens frightened Lucy; she treated them more as if they were odd-looking colleagues than she did animals.
It filled Lucy’s father with a curious pride, seeing his child at work. To him, it was like having an angel help on his rounds and often was the time that he would stop and wallow in the immeasurable joy these mornings brought him.
Lucy similarly loved working. She loved nature, the large green fields, the early mornings and she loved each and every animal on the farm. Yet, of all these beautiful creatures that she was constantly surrounded by, Lucy’s heart belonged to only one. Misty, her cat.
The family had acquired Misty as a kitten the Christmas before last. Lucy - who was, at that time, three - took to the grey little tabby instantly and would cry and work herself up into the most tremendous tantrums if anybody else tried to play with him.
It would sleep in Lucy’s room in a small basket by her bed and, once the cows had been milked and the chickens fed, Lucy would spend the rest of the morning playing with him, until it was time for school. She would go and then when she returned home later in the afternoon, Lucy would drop her bags down in the kitchen and retire to her room once more to play with Misty.
For hours on end Lucy would sit and and do nothing more than simply brush his coat, running her fingers through his soft, fluffy fur. Afternoons and evenings were whiled away dangling bits of cotton in front of Misty’s nose, watching him jump and catch it in his claws. And, no matter how many times she was caught and scolded by her mother for doing so, Lucy continued to raid the pantry for the richest foods she could find - the goose livers, the smoked kippers and the thick, creamy milk - to feed to him.
It was clear to even the dullest of wits, how much Lucy cared for Misty.
One day, Lucy’s mother was cleaning the shower in the master bathroom when she heard a commotion in the kitchen. The sounds of screeching and crashing pots and pans echoed through house and she called down to check that everything was OK. Lucy called back that she was. Her mother asked her what she was doing. Lucy replied that she was cooking. It wasn’t until the smell began to fill the rooms - a smell like thick, burning hair - that she dropped her cleaning ran to the kitchen.
There she found Lucy, standing on her little wooden stool, trying to peel potatoes with a large carving knife. There was a thin but pungent mist through which her mother could see blood. Blood all down Lucy’s front, all over the work surface, spilling into the sink, all over the floor.
Snatching control of her hands, Lucy’s mother picked her up and checked her once over for wounds. Finding nothing more than a few scratches on her arms and wrists, she shrieked,
“Lucy! What happened?”
Calmly, Lucy replied.
“Misty,” she said pointing the gleaming knife towards to the smoking oven. “He’s ready for the table.”
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