'The House at Old Vine' (5) - Ethelreda's Tale Quiz

Answer: Mons

Ely is the cathedral city of the area, and lay, according to Ethelreda, just to the south of their home. Withy was another, larger, island which was inhabited by more people than the island of Mons on which Elthelreda had been born and grew up with her father.

Answer: Pretty Amy

Mrs Briggs gave Ethelreda one of her dresses and her husband provided her with basic shoes so she could take work at the Inn in Bywater; it was some time before Ethelreda was to realise what a sacrifice it was to Mrs Briggs to give up one of her three dresses - it was a long time before Ethelreda actually had another dress of her own!

Answer: Dumb Ethel

Because Ethelreda had lived her entire life in the company of just one other person her speech was not as that of the people who lived in Bywater. Not only was the regional accent different, but there were many words which were unknown to her as such did not exist on the island of Mons.

Her ear was sharp, so she was able to understand other people, but they were generally unable to understand her.

Answer: Mr Flowerdew

Antony Flowerdew had gone to the God Save Mariners to collect two boys who had arrived in Bywater some days previously, and was in the kitchen dealing with a toothache when Ethelreda came dashing in, running away from one of the men. Seeing the way she was treated, and recognising in her an oddity which would interest the intellect of his friend, Canon Edward Hatton, he offered her a job with the school, paying Mrs Towler two guineas for the transfer of labour.

Answer: Ellen and Bess were mature women, not prankish girls

While in the inn, Ethelreda had to share a large basement with the other girls, but it was not the single room which was mentioned as a bonus, but the difference between her workmates.

'For me the change from the Bywater inn to the Baildon school was entirely for the better, despite the fact that Ellen and Bess never liked me and put upon me as much as they could. I found them easier to live with than the girls had been, they were both respectable women and too old to take pleasure in teasing or playing pranks.'

Answer: Christianity

Ethelreda was taught the Ten Commandments, the Creed, the Sermon on the Mount and the Lord's Prayer. She was then, in the Canon's opinion, sufficiently a Christian to be baptized. She went to St Mary's Church for the ceremony, but felt no different afterwards. (This paragraph put in third person from the book's text).

Answer: to do his shopping

The Canon was a greedy man who did not want to share his wealth, or to partake of the very basic fare as served in the school. Under the guise of friends sending him presents, he bought his own food and ate alone in his study (although sometimes he did invite Mr Flowerdew, and Mr and Mrs Kentwoode to share with him).

The boy who used to do the shopping was about to leave the school, and he asked Ethelreda to do the job instead.

Answer: a guinea

Ethelreda chose, at the very last moment, to throw the bet, and made a worse job of her reading than the boy, even though she was a better scholar. She decided, in a split second, that the Canon could well afford to lose a guinea, but Mr Flowerdew could not - it could have meant the difference between buying a load of logs or not.

This decision was to lead on to a far-reaching consequence involving the whole school, for it was as she was running away from the Canon that she bumped into Mr Kentwoode with her hair loose and so began a brief affair.

Answer: a fortnight

'I was a wild Fenwoman, born and bred. Putting shoes on my feet and a pen in my hand didn't alter my nature. My father had gone down to Withy one day and seen a woman who roused longing in him, and he took her; I have no doubt she felt for him in the same way or she would not have let herself be taken. Free unions of that kind were my heritage. So now I longed for Christopher Kentwoode . . . I faced the truth. From that brief contact on the stairs I knew that I wanted him, that he wanted me.

But we weren't on some lost island, we were in the world, more than that we were in a small world within the world; and he was married . . . And then, soon after Christmas, Mrs Kentwoode went off on one of her visits.'

Answer: Rupert

'Afterwards, almost as though the wedding had been a marker between two periods, a blight seemed to set in.' Too soon, Ethelreda was left alone in the kitchen, doing the work of three women, and after Christopher Kentwoode died his wife left. With just Antony Flowerdew teaching, and Edward Hatton remaining in his study, the school declined, but remained a going concern, if only just.