Clever Maid Bess

Gentlemen, the flowers of chivalry and nobility, never swept into common country towns and offer for a bride without considering how much they could recoup through her dowry or the quality of her bloodlines. Bess knew this as well as any lass living. 

No town could be as simple and of little account as Arianfal, tucked along the River Wye in the west near the Welsh border. Yet to Bess, Arianfal was everything. Here she lived with her clever father on a dairy farm. Herds of cows had been her family’s only real fortune for generations. 

These days her father bewailed the situation when he thought she wasn’t listening. Bess might be lovely and kind and skilled, but her talents did not outweigh her lack of a dowry. No proper man would have her without one, no matter the value of the dairy and its goods. Bess had slowly begun to outgrow the flush of youth. Time was not on their side. 

But Bess! What a miracle was this beloved daughter. She knew every detail of working in the dairy from getting the very best milk from the cows to making butter so exquisite as to be a tiny taste of heaven on the tongue. She rose from her pallet every dawn to attend prayers at Arianfal’s wattle and daub church before heading out into the pasture and the herds. Without complaint she would go back and forth from the pasture to the dairy to pour milk into the great basin, where her father would work his magic to make cheeses, cream, and butter. 

Everyone in Aranfal relied on these goods, but the village tended towards poverty and so Bess and her father earned just enough to outpace hunger and homelessness. But Bess had a mind that was always at work. Somehow, she believed there was a way to bring greater riches to her father and to the village. She would resolve this mystery. 

On a warm day in early autumn, a stranger came to Aranfal, a man in near tattered clothes and a slight crook in his back. Bess was in the dairy when she spotted the man. She placed the buckets of milk on the ground and ran out to help the newcomer. He looked up at her and smiled with the warmth of an angel.   

“My thanks to you, dear maid,” he said. “I do get so weary.” 

“Come and lean on me.” Bess took his arm and wrapped it around her own strong shoulders. “And tell me how we can be of help.” 

Then Father stood there, extending his hand in friendship. “Sir, do come in and take supper with us. We do not have much, but what we do have is yours.” 

“Again, my thanks. You both are indeed kind.” 

Father brought the stranger to the table as Bess went to gather the meal. She could offer a meal of brown bread, cheese soft and hard, fresh butter, and small ale. The stranger fell upon the food, much to Bess and Father’s pleasure. 

“This is divine!” The stranger cried. “Never have I enjoyed cheese and butter of such excellence.” 

“It is the grass in the pastures,” Bess said. “Sweet, thick, and plentiful. The best grasses make the best milk.” 

“Surely you must sell more than you can produce.” 

Bess exchanged a glance with her father. “In truth, we do not. There is not much coin to be spent in our village, and we have not the means to expand.” 

“But you must.” The stranger thought for a moment, rubbing his chin. “Do you take your cheeses to market?” 

“Going to the marketplace often costs more than we can afford,” Father said. “Our best option is to send what hard cheese we can out to the greater markets, such as London. But our soft cheese and our butter cannot keep for the journey.” 

“And those are what are exceptional among our products,” Bess added. 

The stranger looked at her. “Then secure a stall in the marketplace and take your best. Your village neighbors will recognize the superior quality and the absolute bliss of the flavors. But keep your prices modest. You will sell more at a lower price, you will delight your customers, and they will return to you time and time again.” 

Bess paused to think, and also to reprimand herself for not thinking of it sooner. But Father and she were only human. Perhaps they had allowed their milk to cloud their judgment. 

The stranger stayed in the cottage that night. In the morning, Bess took the mule cart carrying butter and soft cheese into the village square and set up a modest stall. She had devised one more act to attract customers and energize word of mouth. Everyone who approached her stall first enjoyed a sample of the products. 

“By the rood!” one man exclaimed. “There is no butter on earth so fine as this!” 

“Like a taste of heaven on bread!” 

“If you’ve had the butter, try the cheese!” 

Bess was quick to point out how affordable her wares were, how easily these people could take them home to be enjoyed. By noon, Bess had sold out of her goods and had a purse of jingling coins. 

Father took the purse into his hand, in disbelief. “Bess, you’ve done it! This we can make and supply everyone with a taste of pure joy.” 

“And no more of your tawny, hard cheese.” 

With a mischievous grin, Father added, “Perhaps there is a dowry in your future, after all.” 

Now Bess gave a hearty laugh. “Don’t be silly. I have a craft, I have a design, and I see where I can make my own future. What would a husband be to that?”