In the quiet village of Stonebrook, nestled deep within the Yorkshire moors, nobody liked old Lydia. She kept herself apart from the villagers, and “apart” was putting it mildly. She despised them, and in that, at least, the villagers agreed. Built like a plough horse—broad-shouldered, towering over most of the local men—she forced them to tilt their heads back just to meet her gaze. But no one sought that gaze. She never returned greetings, just muttered under her breath and trudged past, eyes fixed ahead. Or rather, fixed down—her height was imposing.
Lydia lived in the heart of the village, in an old cottage her father had built, as the elders remembered. A tall, solid fence surrounded it, so high few dared peer over. She was quick to act when provoked. Once, on a summer evening, a group of drunken lads climbed the fence out of curiosity, wanting to see how the recluse lived. Spotting them through the window, Lydia stepped onto the porch with her father’s hunting rifle and fired a warning shot over their heads. After that, her yard was left untouched.
Her homestead was substantial—chickens, geese, rabbits, two goats. The villagers whispered, “Why does she need so much? Her pension’s enough, yet she hoards like a miser.” She slaughtered the fowl and rabbits herself, took them to market in the nearest town, sold everything in a day. The money vanished into her apron, and she retreated to her sturdy cottage. From goat’s milk, she made cheese using an old recipe—expensive, but rumour had it she had steady buyers in the city. Her poultry was plump, rabbits well-fed, eggs large—no cheating. She never haggled, yet her goods were always first to sell.
When the village spoke of her, the old ones recalled: Lydia had always been grim. Her mother died when she was still crawling on the floor. Only she and her father remained—just as hulking and solitary. Years later, he brought home a stepmother from the next county, but she left within a month, suitcase in hand, fleeing to the train station. Some whispered Lydia had driven her away. So it was just father and daughter again. When Lydia grew up, her father went to the city to trade and never returned. Killed? Run off after his wife? No one knew. Lydia stayed behind. Alone. Forever.
She never married. “Who’d put up with *her*?” the villagers gossiped. Years passed, people died, children were born, yet Lydia seemed frozen in time. Even grey hairs never touched her—she always wore a headscarf, beneath which only a heavy jaw, a hawkish nose, and thick black brows, sharp as flint, could be seen.
One winter night, the neighbours, the Owens, found their cottage ablaze. Without a word, Lydia appeared with an iron hook and helped them fight the flames until the fire brigade arrived. She dragged burning timbers aside so deftly that afterward, the cottage was rebuilt mostly from the old wood—nothing had fully burned. The neighbours thanked her, but Lydia only grunted and walked away without a backward glance.
When Lydia died, the director of the Greystone Children’s Home, Margaret Holloway, arrived from town with three carers and a dozen children. The villagers, more curious than grieving, crowded into her yard. What they found was immaculate order: the chicken coop, rabbit hutches, goat shed—everything arranged like a picture from a magazine. Inside the cottage—sterile cleanliness, yet hollow. A table, a chair, an iron bed with a sagging frame, a crooked cupboard holding a single cracked plate, a spoon, a knife, and a mug with no handle. By the window—an old bench, polished by time, and on the hearth—neatly folded clothes. That was all.
On the table lay an envelope, addressed in firm handwriting: *To Margaret Holloway, from Lydia Grace Haverstock*. The director opened it and read a torn sheet of notepaper. Later, she told them: for twenty years, Lydia had sent monthly donations—significant sums that had kept the home afloat. The note read: *“The cottage, livestock, and all possessions I leave to Greystone Children’s Home. The children bear no blame.”*
The villagers stood silent, staring at the empty house. Someone remembered young Lydia, sitting by the river, staring at the water as if waiting for someone. Someone else murmured that maybe her father hadn’t vanished—maybe he’d abandoned her. And she, locking her heart away, had carried that weight her whole life. Until at last, she gave it all away—to children who’d never even known her.
