Promo: Sarah's Destiny by Vicky Adin
Today, I'm delighted to welcome author Vicky Adin to Ruins & Reading. We're sharing an enticing excerpt from her compelling new novel, Sarah's Destiny. If you enjoy sweeping historical women's fiction, you'll want to read on.
Sarah's Destiny is currently on blog tour with The Coffee Pot Book Club. Find other fascinating tour stops HERE!
Sarah’s Destiny
March 1861
Nonplussed, Sarah sat staring at the enumerator, trying to take in what he was saying.
“I need to list the details of everyone who resides in this dwelling on this day: their names, age, gender, marital status, occupation and where born, starting with the Head of the Household. Who is the head?”
She struggled to know how to answer, not the actual questions, although she sometimes wondered who the head was, but the intent. According to law, ostensibly her father was the head because he was the oldest male, but in fact, she now ran the business, even if someone else held the licence. Incensed the brewery had taken away their licence, she struggled with how overlooked she’d become in the process.
“My name is Sarah, I’m 26, I live with my parents, Jacob and Elizabeth, at The White Hart Inn, and I’m a ...” She hesitated. What else could she say? The facts were so cold and didn’t remotely tell the story of her life.
“I’m a widow. No, no children living here.” Not that day. Not the day he was asking about.
The man wrote down everything she told him and left, moving on to the next house, the next family, the next set of records.
After he’d gone, she thought the details she’d provided of the transient sailors who currently lodged upstairs would tell a greater story of their comings and goings than that same information would act as a witness of her life. What none of it said was how her life had disintegrated, and she had no idea how to put it back together.
When John left on that cold winter’s day over two years ago, she’d known – or rather suspected – she was pregnant again. As she watched him walk away, she chose not to tell him. Deep in her heart, an instinct, an unsettling gut feeling, told her it would be the last time she would see him.
From then on, she’d never heard from him again. No one had heard of him. No one knew where he was. Eventually, two ships from the same line were declared wrecked at sea – a storm had claimed both vessels, the cargo and all lives were lost, or so they said. But was one of them John’s ship? She didn’t know. She’d received nothing from the authorities to confirm the reports. Nothing to say John was actually dead.
Was she a widow? Or an abandoned wife? Would she ever know for certain? She knew there was no hope he would return, but the thought lingered. Without a body, without someone verifying they’d seen him dead, without proof, she would have to wait seven years before he would be declared officially deceased. With each passing year, loneliness and despair ate deeper into her soul.
The only good that had come from their relationship was the children; or specifically, her son John Jacob, whom she had promptly nicknamed JJ. He’d gone his full term and was a big, hearty boy when he arrived in the autumn of ’59. He immediately brought joy to the household, but less than three months later, she clutched Mary Jane tightly in her arms and mourned. ‘Oh, please no. Not my baby girl. Not so soon. I promise I will never forget you.’ Sarah keened as she’d heard her mother keen, as other women had keened for children taken too young. Heart-wrenching sobs racked her body.
Two weeks before Christmas, Mary Jane succumbed to the terrible whooping cough killing children throughout the city. Sarah rocked the girl to and fro, murmuring sweet nothings in her ear, words she would never hear. Sarah remembered the Christmases when she had happily decorated The White Hart with garlands and swathes of greenery, Mary Jane at her feet playing with the coloured pieces of paper. She doubted she would ever feel that euphoria over Christmas again, not without her daughter.
Sarah swore it was one of the mariners who brought the illness to her door, and the poor child suffered because of it. Coughing and coughing until she couldn’t breathe. Sarah would never forget the frightening sound of the horrible whoop as the girl gasped for breath. The three-year-old’s nights were fraught with coughing, followed by vomiting. Her eyes rolled into her head with exhaustion. Nothing Sarah did helped. The girl couldn’t even swallow to drink enough to sustain her.
Night after night, Sarah sat with her, unable to leave her side, unable to rest and unaware of anything going on around her. She assumed Ma and Da were managing the pub downstairs, but she’d not set foot in the taproom for weeks, deliberately. It wouldn’t be good for custom if she gave the cough to everyone else. Nor did she want to. She was bereft – and alone.
Long after the census keeper had left, she still sat vividly recalling the moment she gave her son up. ‘Mary, please, I beg you.’ Tears flowing unhindered down Sarah’s cheeks. She wiped her nose on the sleeve of her blouse. ‘You have to take ’im. He can’t stay here.’
‘But Sarah, JJ needs his mother. He needs your milk.’
‘I’ve nothing to give ’im, Mary. Nothing. I’ve no energy. No milk. I’m so scared of giving him this disease and losing him too, that I’ve not been near ’im.’
‘Tis true that,’ said Aunt Nettie, nursing the wee babe in her arms at the other side of the room. ‘We’ve been managing but ...’ She let the sentence drift. Her meaning clear.
Sarah knew it was a lot to ask. Mary was grieving, still in official mourning, having been widowed less than a year before. On top of everything, she now had to earn her own living as a seamstress. She’d lost weight and seemed taller and thinner than ever. But Ted was home again. Ted would help. Sarah was desperate.
Mary looked at her distraught sister, at JJ in Nettie’s arms and, after a pause, nodded.
‘Oh. Ta, Mary. Ta ever so much.’ Sarah sobbed, keeping her distance, although desperate to hug her sister in gratitude. She didn’t know how the cough was passed on but she was taking no chances. ‘I’ll come get him back as soon as Mary Jane is well, and I’m back on my feet,’ Sarah promised. Except that had been 16 months ago. Mary Jane had never recovered, and her precious boy was still with Mary ...
Young Sarah Daniels is the heart, soul and future of The White Hart Inn on the Welsh Back. Alongside the quay and wharves on Bristol’s floating harbour, she dreams of finding love, and a destiny where she can escape the drudgery and tragedy that life usually delivers Victorian women. But dreams are free, and few share her ideals. When reality strikes, and Sarah learns the hard way that life is unkind, one man offers her hope.
Through many decades of heart-aching loss, false promises and broken dreams, the young widow clings to that one hope. With six children to care for, she takes risks few others would consider. She breaks conventions and makes sacrifices to keep that hope alive.
Will her wishes come true, or is she destined to be another unfortunate in the sea of many?
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This title is available to read on #KindleUnlimited.
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