Erin O'Brady's Daring Escape (standard:adventure, 1290 words)
Author: Ak	Added: Aug 04 2003	Views/Reads: 3801/2445	Story vote: 0.00 (0 votes)
Erin O'Brady longs to escape from the grasps of Madame Matilda. But first she must retrieve her Mother's precious diary.

Erin's O'Brady's Daring Escape 

By Kira Pirofski B.A., M.A. 

“Will you be wanting anything else my lady?” plied Erin with a thick
Irish brogue. “Else, I shall be going to my own quarters.” She held her 
head high as she said the later; her sharp chin jutted slightly 
forward, so that her straight red hair fell just to her shoulders.   
She hoped the wizened gray haired woman lying prone in the canopied bed 
would answer in her usual brusque manner, “Yes, yes Erin, away with 
you,” and dismiss her immediately. 

Erin could then retire to her own sparse room, located in the basement
of the vast castle.   There, among her books and drawings, she could 
begin packing her belongings and prepare for her escape from this 
drafty, stone mansion. 

“Not just yet, girl, I want you to read to me a bit while I have my
soup.  Bring me my copy of the Shakespeare, and start reading.” Madame 
Matilda replied harshly. 

This untimely, although typical command, meant Erin would have to revise
her plan of escape.  “But, it will give me a chance to search Dame 
Matilda's room before I leave,” she thought brightly. 

Searching the room and finding her mother's diary was her goal, she had
to find it, and take it with her on her journey to America.  Leaving 
without taking it back would like leaving her mother, and all her 
dreams behind. Leaving without it would be like letting her mother's 
dreams die, just like her mother had 3 years ago. 

Shauna O'Brady, her lively dark haired mother had died of a rare disease
when Erin was 10.  Before she died, she did two things.  She secured 
Erin a job as personal maid to this ancient French noble woman, Madame 
Matilda, and she left Erin the sole possessor f her most precious 
possession; her diary. 

From the age of 13, seamstress Shauna O'Brady had filled her gold
covered diary with poems, pictures, songs, and dress designs she had 
fashioned.  She had hoped to open her own dress shop in Paris, where 
she and Erin had emigrated from Ireland, and support her red haired, 
fiery daughter. 

Instead, while her ideas were innovative, and her spirit strong, her
body was weak.  She had contracted a rare illness that gradually left 
her paralyzed, and eventually robbed her of all movement and sensation. 
On the eve of her 35th birthday, she died. 

Erin scarcely had time to mourn her mother's passing. Before she knew
it, she had gone from the small cottage in the outskirts of Paris, to 
live in the gray, stone mansion owned by Madame Matilda. 

She had enough time but, to take the diary, and her own collection of
books and art supplies her mother had bought for her. 

The day she arrived at the door of 312 Tempe Rue, Madame Matilda had the
head butler confiscate all of Erin's bags and inspect them. 

Mademoiselle Theresa, a sweet faced girl of 15 handed the diary and rest
of Erin's booty over to the ailing Madame. 

Erin remembered how Madame's face had lit up as she thumbed through the
fading pages of beautiful portraits Shauna had painted.  Madame had 
held her plump hand over her wrinkled mouth when she saw the lovely 
ball gowns Shauna had illustrated.  The rotund old Madame had wept when 
she read the poems, and sand the words of the songs Shauna had written 
in a high pitched, French trill. 

Then, to Erin's horror, Madame had kept the diary.  She had locked it in
a safe located in her room, and Erin had never seen it or her mother 
again. 

At first, she pined for the diary; she had gone to Madame and pleaded
for its return. “But, I am an old lady; it brings me great joy to read 
it.  It is mine now,” was the selfish, curt reply. 


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