The Old House at Railes: A heartwarming rags to riches Victorian family saga

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The Old House at Railes: A heartwarming rags to riches Victorian family saga Page 18

by Mary E. Pearce


  ‘Yes, you may well look surprised,’ she said, giving Martin her hand, ‘but if the mountain will not come to Mahomet … what is poor Mahomet to do?’

  ‘I seem to remember,’ Martin replied, ‘that Mahomet gave thanks to the mountain because it did not overwhelm him.’

  ‘Well,’ Hugh said, in his quiet way, ‘we have come to overwhelm you instead.’

  ‘You have succeeded. My surprise is complete. Do please come indoors.’

  In the hall, as he led the way, he took his jacket from the hallstand and put it on. The twins followed him into the parlour, sat together on the settee, and accepted a glass of Madeira wine. Ginny, with frank curiosity, looked all round the room.

  ‘So this is where you live now? And alone, I hear, now your sister is married? What a very pleasant room, and what a lot of books you have in it. Do you ever have time to read them, being so busy as I’m sure you are?’ Her glance came to rest on a watercolour that hung on the wall above the fire-place. ‘Oh, look, it’s a picture of Railes! The west front from the top of the Knoll. Did you paint it, Martin? I’m sure you did. From memory, too. How clever you are!’ And, fixing him with her bright gaze, she said: ‘It seems you do think of us, then, sometimes?’

  ‘Yes,’ Martin said, ‘sometimes I do.’

  ‘We heard you had been to Saye House and had tea with Kate, and we were hurt ‒ weren’t we, Hugh? ‒ because you never come to us.’

  ‘I met Mrs Yuart quite by chance ‒’

  ‘Yes, and wheeled old Mr Yuart home in his chair. We heard all about it, you may be sure. And now we have come on a special mission, with an invitation to dine with us on Friday week. Kate and Charles will be there, with the old gentleman, of course, but no other guests besides you because Kate is expecting a child, you know, and it’s only two months to her lying-in. So it’s just an informal family dinner and you can’t possibly refuse or you will give the gravest offence ‒’

  ‘I am not refusing,’ Martin said. ‘I’m honoured to be asked to a family party and I shall be delighted to come.’

  ‘Very well. It’s settled, then. And now perhaps you will realize that we Tarrants are a stubborn breed, who are not to be cast aside easily, as though we were an old glove. Isn’t that so, Hugh?’

  ‘Absolutely,’ her twin agreed. ‘Polonius speaks for us when he says, “Those friends thou hast, and their adoption tried, grapple them to you with hoops of steel”.’ Hugh took a sip from his glass of wine. ‘Ergo, my dear fellow, consider yourself well and truly grappled.’

  ‘We dine at six,’ Ginny said, ‘but come earlier than that ‒ between four and five if you can ‒ and then we can walk in the garden before dinner and it will be like old times …’

  They stayed only a short while because they were on their way to visit other friends at Craye and were expected there at eight o’clock. But they lingered with him in the front garden, on their way to the gate, and Ginny, looking back at the cottage, complimented him on its neatness.

  ‘You keep it all most beautifully, inside and out, and it is such a pretty spot to be in, even if you can hear those awful stocks pounding away in the valley down there. But no doubt in time, when you become rich, you will buy yourself a larger house.’

  ‘Shall I?’ Martin said, amused.

  ‘Well, won’t you?’ she said, with a little frown. ‘Why, with all that stone at your command, you could build yourself the finest, most beautiful house in the whole of the county. That’s what I’d do if I were a man.’

  Here her twin put in a word.

  ‘You wouldn’t like it, Ginny, I’m sure. A brand new house would have no soul.’

  ‘It’s all very well for you to talk! You can live at Railes all your life. It will be yours in the course of time. But I’m only a wretched girl and Papa has always made it clear that he won’t have much to settle on me.’

  ‘Well, you will marry, of course. You’re bound to do that. I can’t imagine you remaining single all your life. Now come along. We’ve stayed long enough. We’ll be late at the Stewarts’ if we don’t watch out.’

  Hugh helped her into the governess-cart and climbed in himself. Martin stood alongside and they were exchanging a few last courtesies together when Hugh suddenly looked up at the sky. A lark was singing somewhere above and he tilted his head until he found it: a tiny dark speck of a bird, soaring on small fluttering wings, throbbing with its transcendental song, which came, a fast-trilling tumble of sound, down to those watching and listening below.

  ‘I envy that lark,’ Hugh said, ‘expressing its joy so easily, and with such perfection … taking itself up into the sky and singing straight from the heart like that.’

  ‘Perhaps you will write your own ode,’ Martin said.

  Hugh, smiling, shook his head.

  ‘No, I will spare you that,’ he said. ‘I should probably fall into the same error that Shelley does. “Bird thou never wert”, he says, and compares it instead to glow-worms and raindrops and clouds of fire and ‒ let me see, now, what else? ‒ maidens singing from a lofty tower! When all the time the whole point of the lark lies in the fact that it is a bird. That is the miracle of it. ‒ The thing itself. Don’t you agree, my dear fellow?’

  ‘Yes. Perhaps.’

  ‘It’s gone out of sight now,’ Ginny said.

  ‘Has it?’ Hugh looked up again, raising one hand to shield his eyes. ‘No. Not quite. It’s there ‒ look ‒ veering over to the left.’

  ‘Oh, yes, I can see it now. But only just.’

  Sitting together in the governess-cart, brother and sister looked up at the lark, and Martin in turn looked at them: at the two faces, so absurdly alike, the young man’s as delicate as the girl’s, his complexion as pure; except where, under his chin, the mottled burn-scar spread up from his neck, relic of the accident in early childhood, when a candle had set fire to his cot. Now, because his face was upturned, and the evening sun was full upon him, the scar could be seen very clearly: an angry red blemish, puckered at the edges; all the more startling, Martin thought, because of the beauty of the face. Then Hugh looked down at Martin again and the scar was almost completely hidden in the shadow cast by his jaw.

  ‘The lark is gone and we must follow its example.’ He took up the reins and began turning the governess-cart. ‘But on Friday week we meet again. Five o’clock. We’ll be looking for you.’

  ‘Earlier, Martin, if you like,’ Ginny said, glancing round at him.

  The governess-cart moved slowly, making a crescent shaped turn on the green that brought it round again onto the track. Martin watched it drive away, and in the garden next-door-but-one, his elderly neighbour, Mrs Colne, stood at her gate and watched it, too. Hugh, as he passed, raised his wideawake hat to her, and Ginny gave her a nod and a smile; and Mrs Colne, quite overcome, bobbed a deep curtsey to them. She knew who they were, of course, and her round pink face was alight with pleasure; and the moment they had passed from sight, she turned to call across to Martin who, by now, was back in his garden.

  ‘Such a nice young lady and gentleman, to acknowledge me in that gracious way. And to think of their coming to call on you ‒ driving themselves up to your gate just as any friend might do! I heard when you first came here that you were acquainted with the family and now I know it is really so. And you are to see them again, it seems, for I couldn’t help hearing what the young man said just as he was driving away ‒’

  ‘Yes, I’m invited to dine with them.’

  ‘Goodness me! How very nice. Invited to dine at Newton Railes! Such an agreeable young lady and gentleman, and so very attractive, both of them.’

  The old lady was full of it, but she went indoors eventually, and Martin took up his hoe again. His own surprise, not to mention his pleasure, was scarcely less than his elderly neighbour’s, and he was obliged to laugh at himself. So much for his stern resolve in keeping away from Newton Railes! Where was it now? Well, the circumstances were changed, of course; the case was altered, as the old phrase had it; an
d all because they had sought him out. Hitherto he had pictured himself calling at Railes and feeling himself a stranger there. Now, at a stroke, that fear was dispelled. And oh, how simple it was, after all! For them, how perfectly natural! And he found himself making a new resolve: that in future he would do his best to behave without fear of rebuff.

  In ten days’ time he would dine at Railes. Later, after a few weeks, perhaps, he would ask the Tarrants to dine with him. If they did, well and good. If not, there would be no offence. Friendship was like a precious cloak, but he must learn to wear it more lightly, he thought. It was easy enough with Edward Clayton; with Mr Godwin and his daughters; and with his neighbours here in Church Row. Why should it be any different with people such as the Tarrants?

  For the moment, there was no difference at all. His mind was at ease; his heart serene; and as he hoed his way along the border, the prospect of an evening at Railes, with all the family gathered there, filled him with pleasure so complete that he could think of nothing else. The spring sunshine was warm on his back; the scent of lilacs filled the air; and, high in the blue sky overhead, Hugh’s skylark was singing again.

  Chapter Six

  Martin, in the time to come, could never think of the skylark, or hear its song, without thinking of Hugh Tarrant. He was always to remember the young man’s face, upturned to watch the bird’s flight, and to hear his light-toned voice saying: ‘I envy that lark, expressing its joy so easily, and with such perfection …’ Martin would also remember Hugh, the soul of natural courtesy, raising his hat to Mrs Colne as he drove away in the governess-cart. All these things Martin remembered because four days later Hugh was dead, killed in a fire that had broken out during the night at Newton Railes.

  He heard the news on Monday morning when he walked down to Lotto Smith’s to collect the pony and trap. It was shortly before eight o’clock, but news of the terrible tragedy had already reached the town, and here and there along the streets small groups of people were gathered, exchanging whatever details were known to them so far. Accounts varied from group to group. The only single definite fact was that young Mr Hugh was dead. Even when Martin drove out to Hainault Mill, he learnt nothing further, except that Mr and Mrs Charles Yuart were with the family at Railes. It was not until almost midday, when he spoke to Dr Brewster, that the whole story became known to him.

  The fire had begun in the servants’ quarters, somewhere in one of the first-floor bedrooms, occupied by Cook and the two older maids. It had spread to the small attic bedroom, occupied by the two younger maids, Alice and Bronwen. The alarm had been raised by Jack Sherard, who had seen the flames from his room above the coach-house. He had woken the other men and together they had roused the whole household. Cook and the two older maids had been brought down to safety by the grooms while John Tarrant and his children, together with Jobe and the other gardeners, had run to and fro with buckets of water, trying in vain to put out the fire, which had already spread to the upper staircase. Hugh, with a wet rug wrapped around him, had fought his way up to the attic where Alice and Bronwen lay unconscious, overcome by smoke and fumes. He had carried Bronwen down to the first-floor landing, where Sherard received her, and had then gone back for Alice; but while he was bringing her down, the burning staircase had collapsed under them, and they had been killed. John Tarrant had been badly burnt, dragging their bodies from the wreckage, and the doctor feared that his lungs were damaged.

  It was the same with all those concerned: each had been hurt in some degree, either by the fire or the smoke, and Katharine Yuart, the doctor said, would be staying at Railes indefinitely, with two servants from Saye House, to help in caring for the stricken household. Ginny’s burns had not been severe but the death of her twin had affected her deeply and she was in a profound state of shock.

  ‘Will she be all right?’ Martin asked.

  ‘Yes, I think so, given time. For one thing, she is very young. For another, she’s being well cared for. Yes, she’ll recover, I’m sure of that.’

  ‘What about Mr Tarrant?’

  ‘That is a different matter entirely. He is in his mid fifties. His body, his hands, his head, were burnt, and he took hot smoke into his lungs. Worst of all, he has lost his only son. He may recover. I just don’t know. But when I left him an hour ago, he confessed he had little wish to do so.’

  The cause of the fire was not known then, but later investigation showed that a beam supporting the first-floor joists had been built into the kitchen chimney. It had caught fire from the inside, where the masonry had crumbled away, and had smouldered secretly for months, possibly years, all through the thickness of the chimney wall and under the floor of Cook’s bedroom, until, on that night of strong winds, draught had fanned the smouldering beam so that joists and floorboards had burst into flame.

  For this was the ‘new’ part of the wing, built some forty years before, when, for the sake of economy, home-grown materials had been used: inferior stone dug on the estate; poor quality timber cut from its woods. The fire, taking hold, had spread quickly; the pinewood staircase up to the attic had been destroyed in a matter of minutes; and long before the firemen arrived, to put out the last of the fire, the two upper storeys had collapsed, bringing down the whole of the roof and much of the outer gable wall.

  Martin wrote to the family, and it was the most difficult task of his life. On the day of the funeral he sent two wreaths of flowers to the house: one for Hugh, and one for the maid, Alice Hercombe, because the two burials were to take place together, and there was to be one service for both, in the little church at Newton Childe. The service would be a private one, with only the bereaved families present, a fact made known in a brief announcement published in The Chardwell Gazette.

  But John Tarrant was much respected in the district around, known as a fair-minded magistrate who had served many years on the bench; also as a good landlord to his tenants in the cottages he owned in the town and elsewhere. Added to this, the whole family had always been well liked for their friendliness and their lack of show. Now young Mr Hugh had died trying to save the life of a servant, a local girl from Yateley Bridge, daughter of the farrier there; and this so affected the local people that on the day of the funeral, some two or three hundred of them lined the narrow winding lane outside the east gate of Newton Railes park to watch the sad cortège go by.

  Everything about it was perfectly simple, the coffins borne on an open farm-cart, covered only by wreaths of flowers, with the mourners in three closed carriages following behind. There were no black streamers on the hats of the coachmen. No black plumes on the horses’ heads. Only the carriage windows were heavily draped with black net, shutting out the bright sunshine and completely hiding the mourners from view. Not that the watchers in the lane peered into the carriages. Nor did they follow the cortège to the church. They respected the wish of the two families, to bury their dead in a private manner, with no outsiders to observe their grief. And when the procession had gone past, out of sight round a bend in the lane, the watchers quietly went away, breaking up into small groups, some going homeward across the fields, most going back along the lane to the town. Martin and Nan were among these last, and although she had never met Hugh Tarrant, Nan wept for him most bitterly, because of what she knew of him and because of the way in which he had died.

  ‘How old was he, Martin?’

  ‘He was just eighteen. He had his birthday a few weeks ago. I remember that because it’s soon after mine.’

  ‘The only son, and his father’s heir …What that poor man must be feeling now …’

  A few days later, Martin received a letter from Katharine Yuart, who was still at Railes, thanking him for his letter of condolence and for his flowers. Her tone was restrained, almost matter-of-fact, but it was only too easy for him to imagine that house of mourning. The sense of numb disbelief was conveyed in her plain simple statements; so was her anxiety; for her father, who had borne up well throughout the ordeal of the funeral, had collapsed soon af
terwards and was now keeping to his own room, while Ginny, grieving for her twin, was like a lost child, Katharine said. Still, she was being very good, caring tenderly for her father, and helping to nurse the injured servants.

  ‘Ginny hopes, and I do, too, that when things are better here, you will come and visit us. Meantime, we thank you yet again for your friendship and your sympathy.’

  One day towards the end of June, Martin walked out to Newton Childe to look for Hugh’s grave in the churchyard. He found it beside a cobbled path that ran round behind the church: a simple mound, newly made, covered with neat squares of turf which had not yet knitted together, though the grass on them was neatly trimmed; and at the head of the mound a small wooden cross carved with the initial H.J.T.. Beside the cross was an earthenware jug filled with flowers from the fields and meadows: buttercups, cowslips, and ragged robin, forget-me-nots and cuckoo-flowers; together with sprigs of rosemary, rue, and southernwood, which had come, no doubt, from the Tudor garden at Newton Railes.

  The position of the grave, out in the open churchyard, came as no surprise to Martin, because Hugh had strongly disapproved of the family vault, under the floor of the church itself, and had often said ‒ cheerfully, though in all earnestness, ‒ that he would prefer a grave of his own, ‘decently filled in with earth, and the green grass allowed to grow over it.’ Aged eighteen, he had his wish: the pale Cotswold soil lay over him; green grass covered the mound; and over all was the open sky, where, in the years to come, the soaring skylark would often sing.

  Not far away, between two birch trees, Martin found the second new grave; that of the maid, Alice Hercombe. This too had its small wooden cross, with the dead girl’s initials on it, and beside it a pot filled with wild flowers. The crosses would serve until such time as the earth in the new graves had settled. They would then be replaced by permanent headstones.

 

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