Fallen Skies

by Philippa Gregory

  “A good old-fashioned nanny,” Muriel said with sudden enthusiasm. “What an excellent idea, Stephen! A sensible firm woman who can show Lily how to go on. Enough of this sloppy spoiling of the baby. A good nanny who can get them both into a routine.”

  Stephen did not warn Lily of this decision. He advertised under a box number and then wrote to the best of the replies inviting them to an interview at his office. John Pascoe raised an eyebrow at the office waiting room, filled with half a dozen dark-coated women with overwhelming black hats.

  “Nannies,” Stephen said to him on the stairs. “Lily came out of the hospital in such a rush that I’ve only now been able to start looking for one.”

  “I thought Lily was coping on her own?” John asked.

  Stephen shook his head. “She’s having a go,” he said. “But she really doesn’t know which way to start. She’s got no mother of her own of course, and she’s not got the sense of a kitten. She really needs a sensible woman to get her sorted out.”

  John Pascoe nodded. “Start as you mean to go on with babies,” he said. “We always did. Nanny and proper schoolroom hours from the first week.”

  Stephen nodded. “That’s what Mother says,” he said. “But Lily had to try it her way. She’s been overly involved with the baby. Smothering him, y’know.”

  “Well, a first child . . .” John said tolerantly.

  Stephen shook his head. “It’s not just that,” he said. “She’s hysterical. She won’t let it sleep alone. She won’t put it down. She feeds it all the time and won’t hear of a bottle. She’s not quite right where the baby’s concerned.”

  “Oh,” John said, at a loss.

  Stephen smiled. “We’ll get it sorted,” he said. “A good sensible woman. I’ll have her live in. There’s a big room on the first floor she can have as a nursery. Then we can all get back to normal.”

  He chose the woman that afternoon. She was to be addressed as Nanny Janes. She was to be served all her meals in the nursery. She would do light darning but no laundering. She would provide her own uniform and she was to have every other Thursday afternoon off. She explained to Stephen that she must have absolute control in the nursery. “I normally like to see Mother,” she said, “to make sure she understands how we are to go on.”

  “My wife is at home with the baby,” Stephen said. “I thought it would be more convenient for us all if I did the interviews here.”

  “I’ll take a trial month then, if you’re agreeable,” Nanny Janes said. She was a formidable woman, dark-faced and brown-haired. She carried an umbrella despite the warm sunshine outside the window. “A trial month, seeing as I have not had an opportunity to see Mother. She’s a young mother, I take it?”

  “Yes,” Stephen said. “And rather nervous.”

  Nanny Janes nodded magisterially. “I’m familiar with this sort of situation,” she said complacently. “I think you will find that I can put matters on a proper footing.” She deposited a thick wad of papers from her large handbag on to Stephen’s desk. “My references,” she said. “You are fortunate in finding me available at once. Owing to a Death.”

  “I’m sorry to hear that,” Stephen said, glancing through the letters. There were a number of crested papers, and Stephen felt a frisson of satisfied snobbery. The nanny for his son would have wiped the bottoms of young lords.

  “I take it I can contact your former employers?”

  Nanny Janes nodded. “My last place was with the Harcourt family, their address and telephone number is there.”

  “You had the care of their baby?”

  “Twins,” Nanny Janes said. “They died in an accident while boating. I did indicate to the father that I thought them too young to be taken out on a yacht. But I was overruled.”

  Stephen put down the papers abruptly. “What happened?”

  “They drowned,” Nanny Janes said, without a flicker of emotion across her brown face. “Aged three years and eight months. Their mother was most distressed. Their father was saved but the boys went under. I was not present at the time.”

  Stephen looked at her impassive face and felt his familiar rage building at the woman’s detachment. She was like all women. She could see horror and remain untouched. “How inconvenient for you,” he said spitefully.

  Nanny Janes shook her head. “At the age of four I should have handed them over to a governess,” she said simply. “I had only four more months with them. And they provided me with an extra remuneration in recognition of my services.”

  Stephen felt chilled with an instant powerful sense that he was betraying Lily by handing over their son to this woman who could speak so calmly of the death of two children in her care. He quelled it almost at once. The very thing Lily needed to learn was detachment. This woman would be an excellent teacher.

  “Start tomorrow then,” he said briskly.

  Nanny Janes rose from her chair and extended her hand to take back her sheaf of references. “Tomorrow at nine,” she said.

  • • •

  Stephen tried several times to tell Lily that he had engaged a nanny for Christopher. When he came home from work Charlie was at the piano and Lily was leaning against it singing. “No, no!” Charlie said as Stephen came in. “More purity, Lily! Deep breath and get that top note and hold it!” He broke off when he saw Stephen. “Hello, Stephen! Good day at the office?”

  Stephen nodded to him. “Charlie,” he said in greeting. He looked around. Christopher was sleeping on the sofa, wedged in with cushions. He was wearing an exquisite white pin-tucked gown, his fair hair was growing slightly, his eyes were gently closed, his cheeks were rosy. One small hand, clenched in a fist, waved at his dreams from time to time. “I wonder he can sleep with you singing away in his ear, Lily,” Stephen said.

  Lily put a hand on his shoulder as he leaned over their child. “He’d have heard it in the womb,” she said. “It must sound quite right to him. He always goes off the moment we start.”

  Stephen shifted uneasily at Lily saying the word “womb” in the drawing room. “Really, Lily!”

  Lily’s hand dropped from his shoulder and she did not replace it.

  “That was nice, what you were singing,” Stephen said, straightening up and turning to the mantelpiece. “What is it?”

  “It’s a lied—” Charlie started to say but he caught himself in time. “A love song,” he said mendaciously. “Old English. Lily’s been invited to sing at a concert of classical music, in aid of charity. We were just running through the programme in case she wanted to do it.”

  “What charity?”

  “War-wounded,” Lily said. “One of your mother’s friends is organizing it. The Earl of March will be there, we’ll probably have to be introduced,” she added cunningly.

  Stephen nodded. “Oh, very well,” he said. “It sounds an awful bore.”

  Charlie shrugged. “That’s the price you pay for marrying a talented woman!” he said, smiling. “Lily has quite a few invitations to sing on the concert circuit. She’s even been asked to Goodwood House in the summer.”

  Stephen could not hide his pleasure. “Well, I suppose that’s virtually a royal command,” he said.

  “And useful for your work,” Charlie pointed out. “You make all sorts of contacts at a place like that.”

  Lily crossed to the fireplace and rang the bell for tea.

  Charlie got up from the piano. “I must go,” he said.

  “Oh, stay for tea,” Stephen said carelessly. “And then we’ll have a drink.”

  “Very well,” Charlie said. “I must tell you the gossip from the Troc, anyway.”

  Lily picked up the baby and laid him gently along her knees. He stirred a little in his sleep and opened his eyes. They were a deep luminous blue. “Hello, Christopher,” Lily said, her voice full of tenderness.

  Charlie told Stephen some story about a friend of theirs from the Troc while Lily and her baby, almost nose to nose, communed in whispers from Lily and little gurgles from her child
. Charlie never faltered in his anecdote, never took his attention from Stephen, but all the time he was smiling inwardly at Lily’s easy contentment.

  Browning came in with the tea tray with Muriel behind her. She took in Lily’s absorbed play with one glance. “I suppose I had better pour,” she said irritably.

  Lily scarcely glanced up. “Oh, do.”

  Charlie told them about the new shows planned for the summer season at the Kings which would start at once. Madge was to have a solo in the variety show which would then go on tour.

  “Will you tour too?” Lily asked, her attention recalled.

  Charlie smiled at her. “No,” he said. “I’m fixed at the Kings now. We play for the shows while they’re with us but they’ll take their own touring musicians when they go away.”

  “And will you stop working at the Troc?” Stephen asked. “I hope not.”

  “I’ll play later,” Charlie said. “After the show, and only one session. I like working there, it keeps me up to date. They’ve got all sorts of bands booked this summer. A couple of French singers too.” He and Stephen exchanged a knowing wink.

  “I’ll take a cup of tea up to your father,” Muriel said. “Lily, shouldn’t Christopher be put down?”

  “He’s only just woken up.”

  “I mean, he shouldn’t be played with all the time. You will spoil him.”

  Lily smiled vaguely. “I’ll put him down in a moment,” she said. “But he likes tea time.”

  The absurdity of this was too much for Muriel. “I think you will be sorry for this in a year or two,” she said. “And when he has to go away at seven to boarding school with no discipline, and no idea how to behave, then he will be sorry too.” She went from the room stiff with indignation.

  Lily turned to Stephen. “Boarding school?”

  “Of course,” Stephen said. “I put his name down the day after he was born. Winchester and Harrow.”

  Lily looked completely blank. “Christopher’s not going to boarding school,” she said. “I thought he’d go to the grammar.”

  “Oh really, Lily!” Stephen smiled and looked to Charlie for support. “I think we can do a little better than that! The grammar school indeed! Well, I suppose that was the wildest dream of Highland Road, but my son will need something a little better. Of course he’s going to boarding school.”

  “Can you pour me another cup of tea, Lily?” Charlie interrupted. Lily put down Christopher with care at the back of her chair and leaned forward to take up the teapot.

  “But . . .” she started.

  “Long time to go yet,” Charlie said rapidly. “Seven years. Not worth worrying about now, Lil.”

  Lily closed her mouth and nodded.

  “Where did you go to school, Stephen?” Charlie asked.

  Stephen flushed. “Oh, no-one’s ever heard of it,” he said awkwardly. “My father went there and thought it would be a good thing for his sons to go. Christopher won a scholarship to Winchester so he got a decent public school but they sent me to Father’s old school. It’s called Pitworthy, outside Salisbury. It’s a public school all right, but not many people have been there. What about you?”

  “Marlborough actually,” Charlie said. “But I got thrown out.”

  Lily gave a delighted giggle. “What did you do?”

  “Played the piano all day and wouldn’t play football,” Charlie said. “Kept dropping my rifle in the OTC and wouldn’t drill. Kissed a housemaid and sneaked out at night to play the accordion in a pub. I was a thorough rotter.”

  Stephen looked torn between disapproval and envy. “I say, Charlie,” he said. “You are a bit of a black sheep.”

  “Completely one,” Charlie said easily. “I can’t tell you how nice it is!”

  Stephen put down his tea cup. “I’ll drink to that,” he said. “Anyone for a cocktail?”

  Lily shook her head but Charlie nodded. Stephen rang for the tea things to be cleared and then went to the dining room where Muriel insisted that the alcohol be kept locked in the sideboard.

  “Is he drinking much?” Charlie asked softly.

  Lily shrugged. “He goes out on a binge once or twice a week.”

  “Not at home?”

  “He’ll have a cocktail before dinner and maybe a whisky afterwards. Nothing more than that.”

  Charlie nodded. “Go upstairs, Lil,” he said gently. “I’m off after this drink. Muriel wants you to put the baby to bed, and I don’t want you fighting with him about schools. It’s not worth it. There’s a lot can happen between now and 1928. It’s not worth you getting upset.”

  Lily rose, picked up Christopher and slung him easily over her shoulder, one hand on his back keeping him steady. “See you tomorrow?”

  “Tomorrow,” Charlie said.

  They looked at each other for one long moment, in a glance that was as intimate as a good night kiss, and then Lily went from the room.

  • • •

  Stephen thought he would tell Lily about Nanny Janes at dinner. But the baby cried twice while they were eating and Lily left the table to go to him and finally brought him down and let him lie smiling in her arms while she ate one-handed.

  Muriel was so upset by this that she could hardly speak. They ate fish pie with cabbage in silence. The cabbage was undercooked for once, white and crunchy. Lily ranged the fishbones on the side of her plate. While she was waiting for Muriel and Stephen to finish eating she counted them silently. “Tinker, tailor, soldier, sailor, rich man, poor man, beggar man, thief.” There were so many bones she went around the rhyme three times and then ended on sailor.

  “I don’t know what you’re smiling at,” Stephen said irritably.

  “Nothing!” Lily said. “Sorry.”

  Pudding was rice pudding with a thick brown skin. Cook had been distracted by someone at the back door and brought it out of the oven too early. It was tepid by the time it got to the dining room and it was served on cold plates. Lily scooped out the white rice from under the skin and made herself swallow. Stephen and his mother both ate with relish and had second helpings.

  “Shall we take coffee in the lounge?” Muriel asked. “Surely Christopher should go to bed now?”

  “I’ll take him up and sit with him till he sleeps,” Lily said. “Would you ask Browning to bring me my coffee upstairs?”

  Muriel nodded with silent disapproval.

  “Don’t you want to kiss him good night?” Lily asked temptingly.

  Muriel’s face softened. However angry she was with Lily she could never resist an opportunity to touch the baby. “It’s dreadfully unhygienic,” she said. “My niece won’t let anyone handle her baby and she never kisses him.”

  “Oh, go on,” Lily said comfortably. “He’s so lovely.”

  Muriel took him in her arms and pressed her lips to his sweet-smelling temple. The soft hair on Christopher’s firm head was warm and smelled faintly of the expensive gardenia guest soap.

  Lily carried him upstairs. As soon as she was past the first landing they heard her singing to her son, her voice growing fainter as she went higher, then they heard her bedroom door shut tight.

  “I’ve engaged a nanny,” Stephen said heavily.

  Muriel looked up in surprise. “Without interviewing her?”

  “I interviewed her at the office.”

  There was a silence while Muriel took in her son’s meaning. Lily had not interviewed the nanny, Lily therefore did not know that a nanny had been engaged. Lily probably had not agreed to having a nanny. There would be a scene when she found out.

  “When does she start?”

  “Tomorrow.”

  “Then you must tell Lily tonight,” Muriel said decisively. “She can’t get up in the morning and find a strange woman here, Stephen. It’s dreadfully bad form.”

  “It’s dreadfully bad form for her to eat dinner with a baby on her knee,” Stephen said. “It’s dreadfully bad form for the child to be dozing off all round the house. He was on the sofa when I came home
this afternoon. No wonder he doesn’t sleep at night.”

  “He does sleep at night.”

  “Well, he won’t go on sleeping when he can rest all day and play all night.”

  Muriel nodded. “A good nanny would be the very thing,” she said. “You’re sure you made the right choice?”

  Stephen smiled. “One of the old school,” he said. “She’ll knock the two of them into shape. But you’re right. I’ll tell Lily now.”

  He did not go straight upstairs but called down the back stairs for Coventry. “Brew up later?” he asked when the man came up to him. “Your place?”

  Coventry nodded and raised a curious eyebrow.

  Stephen nodded towards the stairs. “I’m going over the top,” he said. “I want to secure my line of retreat.”

  Coventry put out a hand, as if he would stop Stephen.

  “No,” Stephen said, correctly interpreting the gesture. “It’s got to be done. The child has to be brought up our way. Lily will have to change.”

  Coventry nodded and went back down to the kitchen.

  Stephen went slowly upstairs, past his father’s room and up to Lily’s bedroom. He could hear her singing quietly in the bathroom as she bathed the baby. Stephen sat on the side of the bed and waited for her to come out. They were a long time. He could hear Lily’s singing and her chatter, and her occasional chuckle at the baby’s splashing. Then the door opened and she came out, pink with heat, her sleeves rolled up to the elbows, and Christopher all warm and gurgling in a bath towel.

  She nodded at Stephen and spread out the towel on her bed, and dried and powdered Christopher with minute and loving attention. Every little finger, every toe, every fold of skin was meticulously dried and then patted with powder. Stephen could feel his anger rising, but could not place its source. He knew he should be pleased at his young wife’s devotion to their child. It would be worse by far if she were careless or neglectful. But something in Lily’s delighted communion with her son set his teeth on edge.

  He said suddenly, “This has got to stop, Lily. You can’t go on like this.”