THE SHORTEST MONTH

If any month of the year can be forgiven for being truculent, it is February. It is the shortest month and two of the big 31-day months dwarf in on either side. As well as that, February could get confused about exactly how many days it can lay claim to. Is it 28 or 29? Wouldn’t it be better to have a twenty-eight and a quarter day month and forget about the leap year? Sometimes it was even reduced to 23 days. It was the last month of the year until some Roman busybody decided to move it – without even asking if it agreed. In English it’s hard to spell and hard to say. Why do we do mess about with poor little February?

February, from the Tres riches heures du Duc de Barry.

The name February comes from the Latin for purification which also seems a bit derogatory of the Romans. ‘Go purify thyself, February. And wash my toga while you’re at it.’

There is one main anniversary in the month, Saint Valentine’s Day. Typically for February, we’re not even sure which saint we’re talking about. There are three men who may have been him. Whichever one was the real deal, he was hauled in front of a judge for trying to convert too many people. Luckily for him, he escaped execution by healing the judge’s blind daughter.

His luck didn’t last, however, and he came up against a sterner guy and was again sentenced to death. On the 13^th February he wrote to the daughter of the first judge and signed it: ‘From your Valentine.’ The next day he was clubbed to death.

So if you have a lovely, Romantic Valentine’s Day, remember old Val’s curative powers and his cheery letter to the child. If it’s a rotten one with no cards and no kisses, console yourself by knowing that the man was beaten to death

A 19th Century Valentine’s Day card.

The Anglo-Saxons called February Sōlmōnath, wet mud month which is pretty ruddy miserable if accurate. However, keeping with the poor month’s sense of confusion they also gave it the more cheerful name of Sol-monaþ, return of the sun month. I leave it up to you to decide which you prefer.

The Finns are more poetic, calling it helmikuu or ‘month of the pearl.’ This is because February is when snow melts on tree branches and forms droplets. When they freeze again, they look like pearls of ice.

I don’t know much about Chinese astrology but February we move into the year of the Wood Snake. It’s been hard to locate much about the year but the South China Morning Post says, The Wood Snake is a charming, intelligent and creative sign, but also secretive, cunning and sometimes ruthless. So yet more ambiguity for this most confused of months.

My latest book Hinterland begins in winter and this is definitely my most enigmatic novel. This extract shows is when things start to go awry.

STERN FATHER

February 14th 1872

Daisy raced into the kitchen, late from spending too much time gazing out of her window at the cathedral. It was wonderful watching it emerge as night melted into dawn, seeing it surge out of the earth like a vision of fairyland.

She riddled the ash from the range, laid wood chips and small coals on the embers and fanned the flames with her apron. She had a knack for building fires and it was soon blazing. She emptied the kettle of yesterday’s water - something Miss Croft had always insisted on - and went into the scullery to fill it with water from the pump.

There was a knock on the front door and she hurried out to find the baker’s boy with a basket of bread. ‘What do you want this morning, miss?’ he asked. ‘It’s Saint Valentine’s Day. How about a kiss?’

‘Cheeky thing,’ she answered, although she adored any sign of admiration, from anyone.

‘In point of fact,’ he continued, ‘this being Leap Year, I expect you’ll want to propose to me in a couple of weeks. Girls are allowed to on the 29th February. What do you say to that?’

‘I say I’ll have one loaf please, like yesterday.’

He grinned at how she had ignored his comment, wrapped the bread in a slip of paper and handed it to her. ‘The name’s Jim, by the way.’

‘Thank you, Mr Bytheway,’ she said with a smile.

He blushed. ‘I didn’t mean ‘by the way’ is my name.’

‘I know,’ she said and shut the door.

She went back to the kitchen and loaded a tray with the butter dish and a jug of milk, a pot of marmalade for Mr Makepiece and a second one with jam for the girls. The clock sounded six as she carried the tray into the dining room. She was just in time.

She hummed her favourite song, The Daring Young Man on the Flying Trapeze, as she laid the table with crockery and cutlery and the items from the tray. She had learnt in the last few weeks that Mr Makepiece demanded that everything be lined up neatly. She stopped humming. He was an odd one.

Her initial view on his place in the family were little changed. He was devoted to his wife and deferred to her in most matters concerning the girls, who he adored. Yet he was harder on his son, as if showing him affection would make him grow up too soft or gentle. Or perhaps, she concluded with sudden insight, it might reveal the embarrassing fact that he himself bore these qualities. ‘That’s it,’ she murmured. ‘He wants everyone to think he’s a stern father figure.’

Her thoughts were interrupted by a yell from the garden. She ran outside in alarm. There came the sound of knocking on the privy door and Clarabelle’s cry of: ‘Help me someone.’

‘Are you locked in?’ Daisy asked, rattling the door handle.

‘No, but there’s no paper.’

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Thanks for reading and for your support. Have a great February.