Matthias Seller had in his hand his week’s wages; eightpence plus tokens for meat and beer. He usually fed his family the meat and drank the beer himself. But this week was a dreadful week, and today felt like the hope he had desperately fanned for decades had finally surrendered to the darkness. Just five minutes earlier his landlord, Mr Turp, had come to find him digging drainage ditches at the back of the Manor Farm where he’d worked since he was seven. Turp had handed him a letter with a hint of self-righteousness: he knew Matthias couldn’t read. “What’s this?” Matthias had asked, his gruff voice barely audible. Old Man Twerp, as he was known in the village, didn’t have time to belittle Matthias today, so he told him straight. “You’re behind on your rent again, Seller. This is the second week in a row and I’m giving you notice to leave unless you bring payment up to date. You’ve been warned and I won’t have your sort taking advantage of me any longer.” Smiling smugly over his shoulder as he turned, he chipped, “Good day to you.” Matthias watched the man leave, picking his way across the slippery mud of the farm track. He looked down at his hands. In one hand he held his wages and in the other a letter that would send them to the Poor House. His wages wouldn’t make the slightest bit of difference. In one hand and out the other, he observed as he clenched his jaw attempting to resist an overwhelming sense of powerlessness. Now in his late forties, his gnarled hands and muscular forearms told the story of more than forty years of ditch digging. He was tired to his bones and although they paid better at the foundry, he didn’t think his body would stick it. Wage contributions from his three sons made the difference. Thomas and John were reliable, but his youngest, Matthew, had just been sacked at the age of ten for back-chatting the farm horseman at Manor Farm. It was a good job, and the bit extra that Matthew had earned helped to meet the rent. ‘How does a ten-year-old get sacked?’ He laboured with the question. ‘Not controlling that mouth on him,’ came his reply. ‘That little sod, he’s too smart for his own good. Telling an experienced horseman how to do his job. No wonder he was given his marching orders. What now?’ The farm manager had said Matthew was a natural with the horses but no one would have him any more, his reputation in the village was set. Standing looking at his hands and the pieces of unreadable paper in them it all seemed so pointless. He set off to look for solace in his ale tokens at the pub. As the hours crept by, it helped him forget the fate he faced, so he drank the eightpence as well. Might as well, they’d be homeless soon anyway. As the clock on the mantlepiece showed just past nine o’clock, Matthias’ wife, Mary, heard him coming. His erratic, drunken conversation with himself as he approached the cottage caused Mary’s insides to tremble. He didn’t often come home drunk but when he did, it was a violent experience. Scrabbling to tidy away the repaired garments for the lady at the manor where her daughter Elizabeth cooked, she looked across anxiously at young Hannah and Matthew. They were curled up with each other on a bed mat on the floor; Hannah was asleep but Matthew was still awake. She needed to keep him out of sight of his drunken father. Although Matthias had been at the pub, she was grateful for a few extra hours to complete more garment repairs and scrub the bare floor of their ramshackle labourer’s cottage. Dilapidated it may be, but nobody could say she didn’t work hard to keep it clean. Mary knew she’d been a good wife and a loving mother, so none of them deserved his dark moods. She had given birth to eight children; only five had survived. Baby Sarah had died within a day of birth. Richard passed away aged two, and Amy just days after him at four. Her two older boys were young men now. Like Matthew, they had inherited Matthias’ solid build; thick, dark hair and bright blue eyes. John at fifteen years and Tom at nineteen, were away at the foundry known locally as the Bedlam Furnace and with good reason. They’d broken their routine this evening to work extra hours to keep the furnaces burning. Britain was in the grip of the Industrial Revolution and the need for foundries and the materials they created were vital to Britain’s growth. The table now clear, she picked up the hot pottage with a practised cook’s hand, and placed it next to the bread on the table. She let go of it with a flick as the heat seared through finger tips calloused from years of seamstressing. The level of fumbling and oaths at the door indicated that Matthias was home and this angry episode was going to be worse than the last time. Despite her trembling insides, she threw her tiny body against the door, bony fingers urgently trying to stop the latch from lifting up. At first, fear throttled her, stopping the breath and silencing her speech and then, from somewhere deep inside, she found her voice. “Go away, Matthias!” she shouted. “Please – take a walk and come back in a bit. You’re out of sorts Matthias, don’t come home like this.” Matthew watched on from his dark corner, bracing himself. He’d felt the power of the back of his father’s hand on many occasions. His aim was always true and hard. He doubted that his mother’s new tactic of pleading would send his father off. Her tactics rarely worked against the drunken rage of the man Matthew feared most. Then, there it was, Matthias’ hefty, labourer’s boot was in the door-jamb. Mary looked down at his big old boot and realised there was nothing she could do to stop her alcohol-fuelled husband from crashing in. The door burst open and there he stood, weaving gently back and forth. The air static with the expectation of violence. This was the eye of the storm. Matthias Seller, normally a hard-working and respectful man, stood there, an angry drunk. He was looking for a scapegoat; someone to blame for his miserable, relentless life; someone to blame for receiving an eviction notice from that snivelling weasel, Turp. Through the candle-lit gloom in the cottage, he could see the shape of his useless son huddled in the corner. This was going to be all his fault. Mary saw Matthias target Matthew and flung herself in front of him. Lunging to grab him by thick shoulders honed by decades of digging. “Matthias! EAT! Quickly, while it’s still hot.” But Matthias had an acid rage boiling up from his stomach. With a wild and vicious swipe his broad labourer’s fist, powered by a thick, dirty, jacketed arm, impacted on Mary’s delicate cheekbone. Her whole body lifted off the ground and landed with a crash as she took a three-legged stool with her. The unexpected volley of sound sent the mice skittering underneath the floorboards, their tiny claws audible in the deafening silence which followed. Matthias’ halted. The red mist cleared. He looked to where his wife lay crumpled at his feet. The woman he dearly loved lay there shaking and broken. Her body in a foetal position, arms clutched around her head, she was quietly gasping, snatches of sobs, inwardly terrified. Somewhere deep inside a sober part of his psyche won the battle, quelling the rage which had threatened to consume him. Staggering backwards away from her, self-disgust now replacing the fury, he fumbled his heavy wool coat onto the door hook. A cold dose of shame put distance between himself and Mary as she lay quaking on the floor. He lurched towards the only comfortable chair in the room, settled his tired, drink-sodden bones into the lumpy cushions and slept. Matthew observed it all with wide-eyes and held breath. As his father collapsed into the armchair, Matthew wrapped his arms around Hannah who, at two years his junior, had already seen too much of a harsh life. Hannah had lain next to both their younger siblings as they’d died while he’d comforted their mother. Hannah wriggled closer to her brother, seeking reassurance from him. He could feel her stifled sobs as her fragile body leaned into him bringing warmth but also grief. Matthew was torn, he hated to see her so frightened and helpless but he was worried about his mother, too. How badly hurt was she? Then he heard her moving towards them across the floor. Unable to get to her feet, she was half crawling, half dragging herself to the bed-mat. Quietly, she slipped under the blanket next to Matthew and wrapped her arms around them both. She held her children as tight as she could, as much to comfort herself as to reassure them. Her undamaged cheek rested against the back of Matthew’s head, her breath warm but her tears cooling against his neck in the February chill. Matthew’s mind spun in circles. He lay there, wide-eyed, with the two people he loved most in the world as they smothered their sobs. Something deep inside Matthew told him that something had to change. He couldn’t watch his mother being beaten any longer, but what could he do? Where could he work? He’d tried to fit in at the farm stables but he couldn’t stand seeing animals abused as well. He knew enough about horses to know they were unhappy. He did his best to make soothing poultices for the wounds on their bodies. Using herbal balms, he gently treated the patches rubbed raw by hard leather harnesses and collars. Some of the horses were young and struggling to meet the workload. They’d stand at the back of their stables, heads down, their spark for life extinguished so early in their working careers. It was all downhill for them, too. He knew how they felt. The farm horseman was right, he didn’t know the job, but Matthew couldn’t bear to see or feel their pain. He’d told his boss that, too. But now it looked like he had a life just like his father’s and brothers’ ahead of him, digging day in and day out, or heading into the flames of the Bedlam Furnace. The fact was, labouring was not going to get him out of this hell-hole. He wanted good money and he’d heard about engineers who were building canals. With the driving need for iron for Britain’s growth came new jobs. He knew he wasn’t cut out for the white-hot flames and body-breaking work at the iron foundry, or the suffocation and burning lungs at the limeworks. He wanted brighter opportunities and better money. Even at such a young age, Matthew was determined that he was not going to repeat his father’s life of digging ditches and mending fences. He was destined for something different. He believed what he’d overheard one of the travelling players at the pub say, “You make your own fortune in this world.” Listening to his father’s drunken snoring and sensing the relaxed weight of his mother and sister as their bodies gave into exhaustion, Matthew made himself a promise. ‘This stops now for me. I’m going to find and make my fortune. Not in Kemberton, not in Ironbridge; I’ll find better work somewhere else and start again.’ Now. He had to go NOW. He kissed his mother and Hannah gently, slipped like smoke from under the blanket and hunted for his boots. Catching a whiff of the sweetness of the root veg in the pottage on the table, he realised he didn’t know when he might eat again. He quickly swallowed down a portion, casting glances towards his snoring father, then tucked all the bread into his pocket. He wobbled on one foot as he hastily pulled on boots handed down to him by his brother. Planning ahead for his unknown journey, he reckoned his own jacket was no good in the chill February air, so he grabbed his father’s much warmer coat from the door. Softly lowering the latch, he eased the old door open and glanced back at his mother and sister, then towards the snoring drunk in the chair. He knew the time had come. Matthew took the first step of his new life. Emerging into cold dark air, he saw he’d chosen a good night. A full moon shone brightly, illuminating the track and the surrounding farmland. The February full moon was known by most as the Snow Moon. To the Sellers and their fellow villagers, she was always known as the Hunger Moon because in February they’d usually run out of fresh food. All the women of the village had to work their miracles to keep their families fed. On that night, however, Matthew was grateful for the Hunger Moon’s light. He could see clearly, probably more clearly than he’d ever seen before. Matthew was hungry indeed; hungry for change. Reaching the end of the track, Matthew had no idea which way to go. ‘The choice is yours,’ he told himself. Then, in his mind, he heard his mother’s voice. ‘Have faith, Matthew, and know you’ll find the right way.’ Looking upwards, he made his choice. He turned towards the moon as she lit his way onwards, leading him to his fortune. How could he possibly imagine the impact this moment would have on his life and the lives of his descendants, as yet unborn? Mary’s body clock woke her before the sun was up. As she lay still, she sensed that Hannah was also awake. She was used to waking with a leaden heart but Mary felt something was different. As her left cheek and bruised body spoke of physical pain, her heart ached more and told her that something else had happened in the night. She could hear Matthias, breathing heavily in the chair, but Matthew had gone. She turned her head to look at Hannah, her daughter’s innocent, blue eyes looked back at her, filled with dread. Hannah who had always been close to Matthew also sensed that something had changed. Mary gave her daughter a reassuring hug. “Come on Hannah,” she whispered, “I expect Matthew has finally got a job. He’ll be back later.” Despite the throbbing in her cheek, Mary got up. She had to continue and work as normal. No one would look twice at her battered face. It was a talisman for women of that time, reflecting the brutal lives they led on the edge of grinding poverty and starvation. Alongside mending garments, she collected herbs and made them into balms and tisanes, selling them in the village. She would need to find some plantain somewhere for her cheekbone. Making an effort not to wake Matthias, she set about stirring the fire in the range. As she watched the embers glow, she recalled the previous night. Mary had thought she’d dreamt the ghost of a kiss as Matthew slipped away. In her dream she’d heard him eat some of the pottage – leaving enough to keep the nourishing soup going day after day. He knew she fed it with meat once a week, and whatever vegetables and herbs she foraged for free or bought on the cheap. Then she’d heard the snick of the door closing. Mary knew then even in the midst of a troubled sleep that he was leaving, probably forever. As she stirred her thoughts along with the embers, her heart ached with fear and also relief for Matthew. He was a good boy, bright, loving and intelligent, but that did not fit with her other sons; nor did it impress Matthias still slouched in the chair instead of stirring to get up and go to work. As if her thoughts had woken him, his hungover mind surfaced. Matthias heard Mary now preparing some porridge oats for breakfast. The swollen knuckles in his right hand ached a little more than usual. He looked and, seeing the purple hue on his fist, he turned his eyes towards his wife. He wished it wasn’t true, there on her face was a livid, purple-blue bruise and a swollen cheekbone. His heart burst, ‘why can't I control my rage? Why do I have to drink so much?’ He loved Mary dearly. She was a good and kind woman, yet he still took his anger and frustration out on her. Labouring was hard but he was lucky to have work. The family had some money coming in, but so little. The story had been the same for his father and his father’s father. As far as he knew, poverty was a legacy he had inherited and would doubtless continue with the poor souls he and Mary had brought into the world. He and ‘his sort’ as Turp called them were destined for a life of hard work and little reward. Matthias thought about his oldest daughter, Elizabeth, and her contribution to the family. She had done well and he didn’t have to feed her. Her work in the kitchens at the Manor House might help to find work there for Hannah when she was old enough. And his older boys were settled. But, Matthew… that boy just didn’t fit. He was too proud, reckoned he was too good for honest labouring or farming. From a young age, he’d constantly wanted to learn more. He’d been to the village school and learned his ‘three R’s’ reading, ‘riting and ‘rithmatic. Matthias didn’t understand it; their family had no use for book learning. Matthew followed his mother around the hedgerows as she foraged and had learned everything she could possibly tell him about plants and their uses. He’d even talked about running away to the army to fight in France. Matthew was too young for that so he’d done as he’d been told and did the jobs his father sent him to do. Running away! Matthias snorted to himself. As if any of them could ever escape this purgatory. He’d wondered about taking the family to live in the town, but the country air kept him alive and was where Mary’s heart was. Herbs were what she loved and had a gift for; even he had to admit that. Although, having her give them up would suit him. He was under constant attack in the village with others calling her a witch. Sometimes at work, he’d end up in a scrap with some fat-head telling him he should drown his witch of a wife, or burn her. He never told her how much he’d endured to protect her. He knew that she’d put up with spitting from some people, because of what she did. But… when cholera came and she was able to help many of the neighbours they stopped the face-to-face cruelty towards Mary and turned their spite towards Matthias. He took the abuse because he truly loved her. Too ashamed to say any of this to his wife, he rose abruptly, startling her. That look of fear in her eyes flicked annoyance in him. Angry with himself for creating this fear in Mary and angry with her for making him angry – there was no winning with the torment in his head. Managing a grunt in place of ‘good morning’, he approached the table to eat the bread Mary always left for breakfast. Matthias turned and frowned at his wife. “Where’s it gone?” Mary, who was busying herself with the porridge, still hadn’t decided how to tell him that Matthew had taken it. Instead, they both looked at each other and then at Matthias’ thick finger pointing at the empty bread board. Choosing the easy way out, Mary blurted, “Matthew has a job! Yes, he’s been told he can do some labouring at the limeworks. So…he’s left early and must have taken the food, because he will probably be gone a couple of days.” She managed a lopsided smile around the throbbing pain in her cheek hoping to calm the snarl appearing across her husband’s face. Relief that his useless son had found work warred with his hunger and anger. How dare the little upstart take the family’s bread; his food. Determined not to lash out at Mary again, Matthias reached for his heavy coat. “What the blazes?” Matthias erupted. “Where the hell is my coat? Has that little sod taken that, too?” Too late, Mary saw Matthew’s light-weight jacket was still there. This would signal the end of his relationship with his father. Thieving his only warm coat and his bread would be deemed an unforgivable act by Matthias. Mary braced herself for the onslaught of fury from her husband. Her heart and her face were already battered, so she resigned herself to his wrath, but instead of turning on her, he snatched his summer jacket, slamming the door as he left. Mary felt herself quivering inside, no matter how many times these events happened, they always left her shaking. It wasn’t his fault really. Matthias worked so hard to feed them and pay the rent. He cared for her, she knew that. He just couldn’t cope with the endless poverty and constant grind of finding and keeping work. She tried not to keep having babies, she’d lost three of them, but Matthias never seemed to make the connection that removing his trousers in bed often resulted in another pregnancy for her. Turning from her own heartbreak and torment, Mary asked Hannah to help assemble herbs ready for creating preparations; there were also a multitude of tasks that needed doing that day for the family. It was clear Matthew had taken that big heart and clever mind of his and left them to their struggles. This boy, her youngest lad, had been the one who’d helped her when Amy and Richard got sick, administering the teas and bathing their fever as she watched them sweat and purge their young lives away. Matthew had held her hand when they’d buried them. He did this while her husband blocked out the grief and buried himself in work and drink. Even then, Matthew ‘knew.’ He’d always had a deeper ‘knowing’ beyond his years. She closed her eyes, took a breath and as she breathed out, she whispered. “Make a life for yourself my dear boy. I miss you. I love you. Make your fortune. Be everything I know you can be.”