Under the Willow Tree

Cassandra Waterman was born in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania in 1870 to a tailor father and a housemaid mother. Since the age of 4 her mother insisted on teaching her to read and write. From the moment she started to put words on paper, she knew her true calling was to be a writer.

From the age of 10, Cassandra joined her mother as a housemaid at Aubrey Manor, in the employ if the Aubrey family. The Aubrey’s owed their wealth to their paper mill, and were rumoured to be have a yearly income of at least $10,000.

As a young child Cassandra didn’t care much for the head of the household Jeffery. He was rather intimidating, though never violent, and barely spoke more than a few sentences at a time. Mrs Aubrey was nice to her and her mother, and even let her play with their children Christopher and Penelope from time to time, much to the disapproval of her husband.

Cassandra’s favourite pastime though, was sitting under the Aubrey’s willow tree next to the creak that wove its way past the manor. In these quite moments, she could close her eyes and think of different places and characters she hoped to include into one of her stories in the future Within the front pocket of her pinafore, Cassandra would always carry her small black notebook and a pencil, and this was always prepared for any sudden strike of literary inspiration.

Cassandra longed to own her own house with her own willow tree to sit under. She regularly allowed herself to be swept away by her daydreams of owning her own property, with a simple yet beautiful cottage aside a river. In this dream she no longer had to work, and she would spend her days transforming those ideas from her notebook into book-worthy tales that would earn her enough to support her family. As it was, for now, her meagre child’s income of $4.20 a week would have to do.

As time passed, the Aubrey’s continued to grow their fortune. Their son Christopher took a keen interest in cultivating a political career, as well as his future inheritance. At the age of 20, he had already managed to gain a position as an aid to the Governor of Pennsylvania, and by then his father’s intimidating manner had been passed down to his son. Christopher was not a man to be refused anything, or anyone.

Cassandra was 18 years old when Christopher tried to rape her as she cleaned the study. His arrogance and assumption that he could do as he pleased filled her with complete rage. She was not one to accept such a violation without any argument, and swiftly ended his attack with hard bite to the back of his hand followed by targeted kick to groin.

Cassandra knew of his ambition toward one day becoming the State Governor himself, which provided her the opportunity to demand recompense for his actions. She happened to have a friend Thomas Peter’s, who worked at the city newspaper and made it very clear to Christopher that she would inform her friend of just how ungentlemanlike his conduct was. Gossip is so often the backbone of such publications, and this unfortunate information would become widely known within the fortnight.

Christopher knew any damage to the family name would cause him to lose his inheritance. Without thought, save to rescue his own reputation, he offered Cassandra 2 years’ worth his family’s earnings.

At that moment her mind and heart were at war with each other. How could she allow her attacker to simply purchase his way out of justice, yet on the other hand, what chance was there that justice would be done anyway. With his family’s wealth, they could literally purchase a “not guilty” verdict. Accepting such an offer, while incomprehensible to her moral conscience, would at least give him pause to think twice before making another such an attempt to any other young woman.

Now of course, handing over such a large sum in its entirety would have been noticed, and so a deal was struck – Cassandra would receive $500 a month until the agreed amount had been given.

Upon receiving the first of these payments she immediately gave most of the funds to her father, and she and her mother suddenly left the employ of the Aubrey’s for “undisclosed reasons”. It was agreed that once enough of the payment had been received, the Waterman’s would purchase their own land 2 miles outside of the city and build their own home. Cassandra was her parents only child, and so one day, the home would pass to her. In the meantime, free from the necessity of work, she was free to spend her days as she wished, lost in her own fictitious creations.

It took several years before the home was fully complete, but it was a beautiful and comforting sight.. Constructed with shimmering grey stone, white trimming and gables, and a fiery red tilled roof.

The family took up residence in their new home on Cassandra’s 23rd birthday. As she sat in her new-found favourite place in their garden under her very own willow tree, she opened up her brand new leather-bound notebook, with her pencil in hand, and smiled.