The Traveller’s Daughter. Michelle Vernal

I’m hungry after school not at school.” Kitty had replied perfectly logically in her opinion, her chest puffing up self-righteously as she added, “And Tracey doesn’t have to sit at the table until she’s cleaned her plate up. If she doesn’t like something, her mummy says she can give it to the dog. I’d rather play with my friends than eat a yucky old school dinner any day.” Her bottom lip jutted out; the conversation was not going the way she’d planned. She had thought that by telling her mother what Mrs Hennessy used to do her mum might have decided to tell her what it was she had done before she married her dad. She did not want to be reminded of the stinky stuff that had been plopped on her plate at lunch time. Or the unfair way in which she was never allowed to leave anything on her dinner plate, not even peas, and she hated peas, thank you very much.

      Sitting there staring at her mother’s back as she bit into her toast, butter dribbling down her chin, her eyes widened as a thought popped into her head. Maybe she had been a princess once upon a time. She was pretty enough to have been one when she took her glasses off and brushed her hair properly.

      Maybe, her evil stepmother the Queen had been mean to her, but then daddy had rescued her, and the stepmother had been so angry that she waved her wand and cast a spell. Just like in Sleeping Beauty, and if her mother ever spoke of having once been a princess she’d fall asleep for a hundred years! Her mother dried her hands and left the dishes to drain. She sat down at the table with the cup of tea she’d abandoned on hearing her daughter come in. Kitty wondered if it was normal behaviour for princesses to dunk biscuits in their tea.

      “Your friends aren’t going anywhere Kitty, and you need to eat the meal provided at school if you’re to be able to pay attention in your afternoon lessons. Sure, how can you expect that poor brain of yours to concentrate on learning when it’s being distracted by your rumbling tummy? As the old cock crows, the young cock learns.”

      Kitty frowned; she hated it when her mum spoke in riddles. She looked at the soggy biscuit she was about to pop in her mouth, it was only a plain old digestive, not the chocolate ones she liked. Still, she wondered what her chances of both toast and a biscuit before dinner were. “It was only boring old maths this afternoon,” she answered, deciding the odds probably weren’t very good. She wished, as she finished her toast, that next time her mother did the shopping she would buy some of that yummy chocolate spread stuff. Tracey said she got to have that on her toast every single morning. As she chewed, she began to ponder how she could swing the conversation back round to where she wanted it to be when her mother interrupted her plotting.

      “It’s not boring old maths and boring is a word that only boring people use. Maths is very interesting when you pay attention because we use it for all sorts of everyday reasons.”

      Kitty had raised a sceptical eyebrow at her the way she had seen Tracey do to Mrs Chalmers this morning when the teacher had informed her class that dolphins sleep with one eye open. It had been such a cool thing to do but then that was because Tracey was so cool. She paused in her chewing to send up a silent prayer that she would be invited to the social event of the school year, Tracey’s tenth birthday. She’d given Tracey her best Strawberry Shortcake Rubber, so she was confident that guaranteed her an invite.

      “Don’t give me that look, young lady, you’re not a teenager yet, and it’s true you know, you need maths for all sorts of things like telling the time and handling money. A penny gets another penny. Sure, when you work out how much of your pocket money you are going to save and how much you are going to put aside for sweets you’re doing maths.”

      Kitty scowled. “I knew you would mention saving.” Her mother was big on drumming the importance of saving into her. It was right up there with the importance of paying attention in class because both, she told her daughter regularly, would allow her to be independent when she was older.

      “Alright then here’s another example, you need maths to be able to bake.”

      “No you don’t, you just use that measuring thingy for the sugar and an egg. Oh and usually you add some flour too.”

      “Okay, Little Miss I Know Everything, when you have finished your toast how about you and I make some of those cupcakes your daddy is so fond of? Then you will see what I am talking about.”

      “Can I lick the bowl?”

      “I suppose so, though you’ll never eat your dinner.”

      “I will if it’s something yummy.”

      Having washed her hands, Kitty donned an oversized pinny that her mother wrapped around her waist twice before standing on tiptoes to stare at the open cookbook. That was the afternoon she learnt how to read a recipe as she made her first batch of cupcakes. Her mother oversaw the proceedings watching as she followed the instructions to cream the carefully measured butter, sugar and vanilla until it was light and fluffy before cracking an egg into the mix. She’d turned the handle on the old fashioned beater until her arm felt like it was going to drop off and was relieved when her mother said it was time to measure the flour and baking powder out. Sifting was much easier than beating, she’d decided, tapping the side of the sieve until it was empty and a mountain of white sat on top of the wet mix. Tired of standing on tippy-toes, she’d pulled a chair in from the dining table and kneeled up on it. She’d watched with her chin resting on her clasped hands, elbows on the bench as her mother demonstrated how to fold the dry ingredients into the batter adding a bit of milk as she went.

      “See it needs to be a dropping consistency like this.”

      Kitty was transfixed as the mixture plopped back into the bowl. She was hoping there would be plenty left in it for her to scrape up with her finger once the cakes were in the oven. It was time her mother said to spoon the mixture into the paper cases lining the patty tin.

      “Too much in that one Kitty, three-quarters full. Aha!” she clapped her hands. “There do you see what I mean? That was a fraction right there.”

      At nine years of age, Kitty was not too old to concede that her mother was right, and she decided tomorrow she would try not to drift off when Mrs Chalmers made them chant their times tables. Fifteen minutes later when she donned the oven gloves and pulled the plump cakes from the oven, she puffed up with pride. She couldn’t wait until her daddy got home from work so she could tell him she had baked the cakes all by herself. “Can I taste test one, please?”

      “I suppose so, sure as a rule of thumb a good cook should always taste what she makes. Food is a good workhorse.”

      Kitty couldn’t believe her luck. She peeled the paper off a little hot cake and leaving half the mix stuck to the wrapper, popped it in her mouth. That was the moment that her life-long love of baking had been born.

      The thing with baking was that at the fundamental core of a good batch of anything there was the need for a reliable recipe. Despite this, and no matter how measured and precise her ingredients were, now and then something would go wrong with the mix, and her cakes wouldn’t rise. It was the same with life Kitty thought as her eyes refocused on the photograph this Christian Beauvau person had attached to his message. For the most part, each day ticked along much like the one before but now and then something would be tossed into the mix and it would test her ability to rise to the occasion.

      She shivered, the house had that unlived in temperature that seeps through to your bones she thought as her phone beeped another text’s arrival. Closing the photograph, a quick glance revealed the message to be from Mr Baintree, her stomach flip-flopped and despite her nerves at what he might have to tell her, she was glad of the distraction. Crossing her fingers and hoping it was good news she scrolled down and breathed a sigh of relief, the auction had closed four thousand pounds above reserve! He finished his message by saying he would meet her back at his office in an hour. Kitty’s face broke into a grin; it had not been a wasted journey. She was buoyed by the news and decided she’d rather wait in the agency’s warm reception area than sitting here freezing.

      Quickly flicking back to Christian Beauvau’s message, she forwarded it through to Yasmin adding the good news regarding the house’s sale. Let Yas mull it over, she decided. She’d talk to her later about what she should