‘No, I want to have enough to send to the fulling room tomorrow ‒’
‘We won’t do any fulling. That’s not the question we’re trying to answer, Jenny. We want to know if the colour will stand the heat of the steam press.’
‘That’s true. Then I want it to go to the press-room tomorrow. One day to go through, one to dry and breathe, and then …’
‘Then we’ll know.’
She rose from the loom, then all at once came close and leaned against him. She needed the comfort of his touch. ‘I’m afraid, Ronald, I’m afraid it will go wrong. And then I shall have to tell the Queen …’
‘Nothing of the sort,’ he said, putting his arm about her. ‘Come along now, put on your bonnet and I’ll walk you home.’
As they approached the railway station her conscience smote her. Ronald’s inn was only a step or two beyond. ‘There’s no need for you to see me home, Ronald. You’ve had a long day too.’
‘Don’t be daft. I’ll see you to your door. Unless …’ He paused. ‘Have you eaten at all today?’
She shook her head.
‘Come in and let me give you a meal. Then we’ll call a hackney from the station to take you to Gatesmuir.’
‘Well, I …’
‘Are you expected? Is there a meal ready for you?’
‘No, no, I’d no idea what time I’d be home.’
‘Then come and share my evening meal.’
They were standing in discussion under the streetlamp. A passer-by raised his hat, calling good evening as he recognised her. She thought how different things were now. She didn’t care who saw her with Ronald. She gloried in his company.
She took his offered arm and went with him to the Abbotsford Inn. But no one was about in the little lobby, and, as if by some previous agreement, they went together up the carpeted stairs to his room. After she had gone in and begun to untie the cord of her cape, she heard him turn the key in the lock.
She flew to his arms. She wanted to wind herself about him so that he could never, never be free. Utterly lost to everything except each other, they made love.
A long time later, when some home-going roisterer roused them from the light sleep that comes afterwards, they lit the oil lamp and studied each other in its golden glow.
He was thin but muscular, with a down of tawny hair on his chest that she found delightful to kiss. She felt his hands caressing her shoulder-blades. When she looked up, she saw his thin lips were curved in a smile of deep amusement.
‘What are you chuckling to yourself about, Ronald Armstrong?’ she demanded.
He gave a little laugh. ‘I was just thinking, Jenny Corvill … If you were to ask me to marry you now, I very well might say yes.’
Chapter Twenty-four
Ronald had been so confident of his own abilities that he had ordered a large enough supply of the necessary dyestuffs before he even left Perth. They arrived at the mill on the Friday morning, the day that Jenny looked at the length of new tartan on the table in the packing room and knew it was perfect.
The mill at once began work. A large stock of fresh yarn had to be dyed to replace the batch that had proved imperfect, and this would take much longer than the time Ronald had taken to dye the sample on Tuesday. Jenny called in the foremen of the departments to explain the situation. It would be a week before they could set up with the new purple yarn. That would give them less than three weeks to weave and finish the order for the regiment. It could only be done by working double shifts ‒ and the tradition forbade evening shifts during the dark months.
‘Ach, we’ll thole it the once,’ said the weaving foreman. ‘The lasses will want to do it for the sake of Her Majesty and the Prince. Aye, aye, we’ll do it.’
All other work was set aside. The mill swung into production, concentrating only on the Grantown tartan.
The day the machines were switched on with the new warp ready, Ronald walked through the weaving shed with Jenny. They came through the double doors at the far end, out into the fickle sunshine of a March morning.
‘Theoretically,’ he said, ‘I ought to go back to Perth.’
‘But you will not,’ she countered.
‘No, I won’t. But on the other hand, what am I going to do?’
‘Stay here and marry me.’
‘Och, I take that for granted,’ he said, catching her round the waist and swinging her towards him. ‘But what am I going to do once we’re wed? I canna spend my life being Mistress Corvill’s husband.’
She had known this moment would come. ‘You must manage the works.’
‘But I’m a dye-master.’
‘Well, nobody’s stopping you from mixing dyes! But you must manage Waterside Mill. And that will leave me free to concentrate on the designing.’
‘It sounds as if it’s ordained. Is this what you had in mind in the first place?’
‘Well, it was a good idea then and it’s a good idea now.’
‘And what will your brother say?’
‘Ned?’ The idea that Ned would say anything startled her.
In the week that had gone by since they became lovers they had had long talks, confiding in each other. She had told him that he was not the first man she had loved, and he had nodded at the words. ‘But I’m the last, Jenny lassie,’ he told her warningly.
‘The last and best.’
He for his part had confessed a passing liaison with a girl in Perth, regretted now. ‘It was only because she reminded me a little of you, my pretty merle.’
When they talked of her family, she had to tell him the secret they tried so desperately to keep ‒ that Ned was a hopeless drunkard.
‘So that’s why he’s given up the great temperance campaign,’ he mused, tugging at his chin. ‘I realise now, he’s not been mentioned in the newspapers for a time or two.’
‘Since New Year. He took drink again at the party to celebrate the Grantown tartan. I blame myself ‒ I didn’t look after him well enough.’
‘Good sakes, Jenny, a 26-year-old man doesn’t need to be looked after.’
‘He needs something ‒ I don’t know what it is. He’s had a drink problem since he was a boy. Even then, I tried my best to look after him.’
‘I thought that first evening, he looked ill, Jenny.’
‘Yes, I think it is an illness, but people don’t recover from it easily. He took a cure, with a doctor in Glasgow, but …’ She sighed deeply. ‘If you’re marrying into my family you must understand what you’re taking on.’
‘Every family has skeletons in its cupboards, my dear.’ Now, as they walked away from the busy mill, Ronald spoke of Ned again. ‘I ought to consult him about our marriage. After all, he is the head of your family.’
‘I suppose so … Not that it will make any difference what he says.’
‘Perhaps that’s what’s wrong with him, Jenny.’
The interview took place that evening, after a family dinner to which Ronald was invited. Lucy sat at her husband’s right hand being rigidly polite to the guest, Millicent beamed over all because she could see Jenny had solved her great problem and Ned, in a momentary spell of self-discipline, drank nothing but water.
When the meal was over Ronald asked to speak to Ned in private. Surprised, the master of the house led the way to what had been his father’s reading room.
‘What is it you want to discuss, Armstrong?’
‘My marriage to Jenny.’
Ned’s mouth fell open.
‘Jenny would like an Easter wedding ‒’
‘The end of this month?’ Ned cried, astounded.
‘There’s no reason to wait. Jenny and I know our minds. All I want is your agreement.’
‘Agreement! But … but … this is the first I ever heard of it!’
Ronald nodded. ‘I suppose it takes you by surprise. The fact is, I’ve been in love with your sister for years.’
‘That’s not the point! Look here, Armstrong ‒ you’re hardly the sort of match ‒’
‘What were you hoping for? A rich landowner? A colonel of the regiment? It so happens Jenny wants me. And I want her. That makes it a very good match.’
‘I’m damned if I think so! Good God, I never thought Jenny would be fool enough to fall for a man who was obviously after her money!’
Ronald had been standing by the book table. He came up to Ned and laid a hand on his shoulder. ‘Listen, laddie … I may be about ten years your senior but I’m twice as strong. I’ll knock your teeth back into your thrapple if you ever say a thing like that to me again. Is that understood? I don’t want Jenny’s money. In any case, she doesn’t have any ‒ does she? You own the mill. Jenny gets an allowance and nothing more.’
Ned drew back from under the calm touch on his shoulder. ‘All right. She doesn’t have any actual money. But you … you …’
‘I’m not good enough for her? I quite agree. Who is? But the fact is she wants me, and it’s time she had a man to look after her.’
Ned’s face flamed. ‘I look after her,’ he said. ‘I’m the head of the family.’
‘Are you, indeed? And how long do you think you’ll keep the role? In six months or a year you’ll have drunk yourself to death.’
‘Don’t you dare ‒’
Ronald shrugged. ‘If you want to get angry and protest, go ahead. But the first evening I came here you were suffering from a bad case of the shakes, and I hear from the townsfolk you stagger out of the taverns most nights. Why do you do it?’
Ned Corvill turned away from him. ‘What business is it of yours?’
‘Well, I’m going to be your brother-in-law and, according to Jenny, I’m going to manage your mill. Naturally I’m interested in why you want to pickle yourself in alcohol.’
‘Don’t speak like that … I don’t … You wouldn’t understand!’
‘Try me.’
Ned shook his head, wavered, then sat down suddenly with his face in his hands. ‘It’s all so hopeless,’ he sobbed. ‘At first I used to find it made everything seem brighter, easier … My father had a stern view of life, you see … But now I need it because after all, what else is there?’
‘Do you mean, as a way of killing yourself?’ Ronald said in a conversational tone. ‘I’d have thought it was kind of long-winded. If you really want to finish yourself off, come to me. I’ve things in the dye-room that could see you into the Hereafter in ten minutes flat.’
‘You see?’ Ned cried. ‘You make fun of it. But there is no Hereafter. It’s all a lie, we know that now. Dr Murdo and all he believes in are mere childishness.’
Ronald took a seat, leaning forward so as to glimpse the younger man’s ravaged features. ‘And if that’s true, what of it? Other people have faced it, you know. They see the world is harsh, and perhaps now some of them feel there isn’t another world where they’ll find compensation for the hardships of this one ‒ but they go on.’
‘I don’t know how they do …’ cried Ned.
‘I hear you read philosophy at university?’
‘What? Yes …What of it?’
‘Wasn’t there a group called the Stoics?’
‘What could you know about them?’ Ned said, in tearful scorn.
‘Oh, I’ve read a wee bit. Not as much as you, but I think I read they had good laws to live by ‒’
‘But they too were duped ‒ they believed in God ‒’
‘But a god who didn’t meddle in human affairs, and because they couldn’t call on his help if their corn failed or their ships sank, they lived by … what was it called … equalness of temperament ‒’
‘You mean Equanimity of Mind.’
‘Yes, and the Power of the Will, I remember ‒ that was another one.’
Ned sat up straighter, staring at Ronald. ‘You’ve studied it.’
‘Years ago. I don’t remember it, really. All I’m saying is that they were men who lived by believing in themselves. It’s what you do, if there isn’t anything else. Wouldn’t you agree?’
The younger man looked as if he might say yes. Then he said, ‘You think it’s easy. But I can’t give up drink by myself. I’ve tried. Sometimes I’ll go as long as two days without a drink. But in the end …’ He threw up his hand in a gesture of hopelessness. ‘And I can’t go back to Dr Murdo in Glasgow because he goes on and on about how the Almighty is just at my elbow to help me, and I know now that it isn’t true.’
‘Ach, man, you’re a simpleton,’ Ronald said in contempt.
‘What? You’ve no right to ‒’
‘Do you think Dr Murdo is the only man who runs a clinic for alcoholism? If you really want to find a cure, you can find a better place to go.’
‘I do want to!’ Ned exclaimed. ‘You must believe me, I hate myself the way I am! And I’m so afraid Lucy will leave me.’
‘Then use your intelligence. Find someone to help you. And rely on yourself like a Stoic.’
When the two men came down to the drawing-room, Jenny sought Ronald’s eye. He gave her a faint smile. Ned for his part looked strange ‒ as if he’d been through an ordeal and come out weak yet the better for it.
‘Mr Armstrong, that’s to say, Ronald has something to tell you, Mother,’ Ned announced.
To Jenny’s amazement, her self-possessed lover blushed. ‘I thought you would tell them, Ned!’
‘No, no, this is your prerogative. Go ahead.’
‘Well … er … I’ve been speaking to Ned about our marriage. Jenny’s and mine, I mean.’
‘Marriage?’ Lucy echoed in a stifled tone.
‘My dear child!’ shrieked Millicent, and flew to embrace her daughter. ‘Oh, what a fine thing! Oh, I’m so pleased. If only your dear father could have lived to see it!’
‘Then we have your blessing, Mother?’
‘Of course, of course! Lucy, isn’t it wonderful?’
‘Oh yes,’ Lucy agreed, her blue eyes cold.
‘We haven’t talked it through, but I think it would be a good move to put Ronald in as manager at Waterside,’ Ned went on, smiling on the rest of his family.
Ronald frowned a little. ‘I should like to discuss that before you make any announcement, Ned. We haven’t talked about salaries.’
‘Salaries … Oh yes …’
‘Of course,’ murmured Lucy, ‘money.’
‘I don’t think you’ll have anything to complain of when we come to the point, Ronald ‒’
‘And what is Jenny going to do?’ Lucy inquired with a pricking glance towards her.
‘Why, stay at home and raise a family,’ Ned cried, delighted with the thought.
Stay at home and raise a family. The sentence echoed in Jenny’s mind next day when she watched the first completed piece of Grantown tartan come off the loom. Was that what the future held for her?
She wanted children, of course. She wanted Ronald’s children. But did she want to stay at home to raise them? Could she give up the challenge of the work here at the mill, the comradeship of the mill girls, the conversations with men of business, the planning from season to season of something new and different, the daily routine that had filled her life now for six years?
She had fallen headlong as if over a cliff when Ronald came back into her life. She couldn’t imagine going on without him. But would the time come when she would regret the price she had to pay?
For Ronald Armstrong wasn’t a man who could be wheedled and coaxed as Lucy handled Ned. He was a man with a mind of his own, who would bring different ways to Waterside Mill ‒ changes, improvements perhaps, but differences that she might regret.
Ned had fallen in with the idea that Ronald should be manager. Very well then, he would manage. She would have to subordinate herself to him.
‘You won’t shut me out entirely when you take over?’ she asked him almost timidly.
‘What a question! We decided, didn’t we, that you would be in charge of the design department.’
‘But we haven’t in fact got a design department, Ronald. I should like t
o have a room at the top of the building on the north side, where the light is good.’
‘You mean … come here?’
‘Of course.’
‘But you’d be a lot more comfortable at home with your sketching board.’
They had decided for the time being at any rate to live at Gatesmuir. She pictured herself at home with her mother and Lucy. The prospect was not enlivening.
‘I shall come here every day,’ she said with firmness. ‘Let’s see if we can find a room that would do.’
They walked up to the fourth floor, the eyes of the workers following them as they used to follow Jenny when she went her way among the departments. Soon they would follow Ronald …
I am giving this to him, she thought with a sudden sense of loss. It is mine and I am giving it to him, because there’s no other way, it seems. Does he understand what a gift it is? It’s all I have in the world, except Ronald himself.
On the high floor they found a store room. ‘I can have this cleared, and make the window larger. Then with my drawing table underneath I shall be in business.’
‘I can’t understand why you want to come here at all,’ Ronald muttered. ‘You’d be far better off at Gatesmuir.’
‘But I belong at Waterside …’ To her own dismay she felt her eyes fill with foolish tears. She turned away so that Ronald shouldn’t see them.
But he caught her by the arm and turned her back towards him. With the crook of a finger he caught a tear from her lower lashes. ‘Don’t cry, Jenny. I know it’s a great change, but after all, that’s what life is about, isn’t it ‒ change and growth. It will be different, I can’t help that ‒ there will be good things and bad things, but I promise you there will be more good than bad.’
She saw the room through the prism of her tears. It wavered and changed. A small room, tiny compared with the domain over which she had ruled. And while she ruled she had been Mistress Jenny Corvill of the Waterside Mill. Soon she would simply be Mrs Armstrong. To be Ronald’s wife had become part of the dream ‒ or perhaps her dream had changed. The great plan, the ambition to make Corvill the finest name in Scottish weaving ‒ she had achieved that. And found it wasn’t enough, that achievement without emotional fulfilment turned the dream to a nightmare.
A Web of Dreams Page 34