Broken Threads

by Tessa Barclay

  ‘Tuesday? But I thought you were staying until the end of the week.’

  ‘No, I shall go to the Board of Trade tomorrow morning and see the MPs’ committee in the afternoon ‒’

  ‘But weren’t you going to see the factor, Jenny?’ Ned put in.

  Wilson, the cloth merchant who handled their London orders, had Thamesside premises. Jenny always enjoyed a visit to this rascal and the game of wits that ensued. But on this trip she had decided to deny herself the pleasure.

  ‘Ronald is coming down after New Year for lectures at the College of Science on anilines. He can see Wilson then. I’d like to get back, Lucy, particularly as it looks as if the weather is breaking up.’

  This was true enough. Grey clouds reflected a dim light into the dining room, so much so that the table candles were lit for the midday meal. Snow in London was a matter of draggled skirts and thicker boots. In the Borders it could mean real problems.

  ‘It would be very inconvenient,’ Lucy objected. ‘There are things I want to do. And I’ve invited people for Wednesday, and we have tickets for ‒’

  ‘You can write notes this afternoon,’ Jenny broke in. ‘If you explain you’ve been called out of town, no one can object.’

  ‘But people will think ‒’ Lucy fell silent. In front of her husband she couldn’t say, ‘People will think I’ve left because of Maud Massiter,’ because that opened up a subject of which he was ignorant.

  ‘I certainly think it would be best to go as soon as possible,’ Ned remarked. ‘If the weather is really turning wintry at last, it’s best to get up to Gatesmuir and be snug and comfortable with Mother and little Heather before it breaks.’

  Lucy looked mutinous, but she always gave in in the end. Jenny knew her sister-in-law well. Open rebellion was beyond her.

  Obediently, Lucy wrote notes of apology that afternoon. She ordered her maid to begin packing. But when Jenny came home from the day’s business on Monday, it was to find Lucy had gone out. There was, perhaps, nothing unusual in that; Lucy had many social engagements.

  When Lucy came in there was something secretive about her entry. She started back in surprise when Jenny came out of the morning room to greet her in the hall. ‘Oh! Jenny! I didn’t think you’d be back until six.’

  ‘Things went more quickly than I expected. I see it’s still snowing.’

  Lucy gave her cloak to the parlour maid. ‘Shake that well, Gibbons, and hang it in the warm.’

  ‘Not the best choice for a cold day like this,’ Jenny observed, watching the maid carry off the light cloak trimmed with watered silk.

  ‘Heavy cloth is so unbecoming,’ Lucy said, going into the morning room to warm her hands at the fire.

  Jenny understood the truth that lay beneath the remark. Lucy had wanted to look her best this afternoon so had put on a pale, light cloak in which she looked fragile and appealing.

  It was an easy guess she had been to meet Massiter.

  They settled by the fire. Jenny poured the tea which had been brought just before Lucy came in. ‘Sister-in-law,’ she said conversationally as she handed Lucy her cup, ‘I’m glad to have this chance for a quiet little chat. When we go up to Galashiels I want it understood that you’ll be staying on there for a month or two after New Year ‒’

  ‘That wasn’t the arrangement ‒’

  ‘It is now. I want you to stay until any little problems here in London have faded away.’

  ‘There are no problems ‒’

  ‘What was the meaning of that little episode on Saturday night, then?’

  ‘Oh, I knew you’d blame me for that! As if it’s my fault if that absurd woman ‒’

  ‘This conversation isn’t about blame, it’s about discretion. I don’t ask the reasons Mrs Massiter behaved so badly the other night. All I say is that it will be better if you are not present when she loses her temper next time.’

  Lucy’s mouth trembled. ‘I won’t be spoken to like this. You’ve no right …’

  ‘The one who has the right is Ned. One day even he will come down out of the clouds and notice what is going on. Do you want that?’

  ‘Ned is far too busy with his good works to ‒’

  ‘Quite. And so you’d better come back to the safety of the Borders for a long stay.’

  ‘But it’s so dull there!’ It was a cry of despair.

  Jenny sighed, eyeing her sister-in-law over her teacup. What was to be done with Lucy? She needed to be amused, entertained, made much of, admired. She needed activities that came easily ‒ parties, picnics, shopping, theatres. She needed male companionship. It wasn’t the first time Lucy had been involved with a man ‒ there had been occasions before now when Jenny had feared for her reputation.

  But it was better not to speak of that. Better to stick to the present problem. ‘Look on the bright side, Lucy. Christmas will be here almost as soon as we get home, and then there are all the parties for Hogmanay, and the Burns Nichts …’

  Lucy began to cry, but in a quiet manner. She knew she had to accept Jenny’s dictum. But that didn’t mean she would do nothing on her own behalf.

  After they had had tea, Jenny went upstairs to attend to her packing. She thought Ned had come home a little while later but when she went down to speak to him, she found it wasn’t so. Yet the front door had opened and closed, she was sure.

  ‘Did Mrs Corvill go out?’ she asked the maid.

  ‘Yes, ma’am, a quarter of an hour ago.’

  ‘Did she say where she was going?’

  ‘No, ma’am.’

  The family sat down to dinner at eight. Lucy was ready with the information that she had slipped out to buy the new ribbon she was wearing round her throat, a piece of expensive French embroidered moire. It would have been convincing except that Jenny had seen her sister-in-law wear it the last time she had been in London.

  There was no need to ask where she had been. She had slipped out again to see Massiter or to get a message to him, to let him know she was being taken home a prisoner for the next few months. From her composure, it seemed that Massiter had been able to assure her he would never cease to think of her while she was in durance vile.

  The hills were clothed with snow when the train steamed stolidly into Galashiels. It was dark, street-lamps gleamed, and stars twinkled overhead in a black frosty sky. The little town presented a pretty picture.

  But Lucy refused to be cheered until, on going indoors, she found that the baby had been kept up so as to welcome her mother home. The little girl was clad in a warm short frock of white flannel liberally decked with lace, and with at least four layers of lace-edged petticoat underneath. Her feet were in little kid boots. When the travellers arrived, she turned from her nurse and took two or three determined steps towards them in the hall.

  ‘She can walk!’ Lucy cried in delight. ‘Why didn’t you tell me? I had no idea! Oh, precious, so you come running to welcome your Aunt Lucy? There’s my angel!’ She swept her up in a hug.

  Heather, delighted to be made much of, crowed and waved her arms and legs. Jenny stood by, trying not to be put out at being made to wait. After all, what did it matter? Heather was an outgoing child, ready to love everyone. One day soon she would understand that Jenny was the one she should love most.

  At Christmas there was a cornucopia of goodies from Lucy, though she bewailed the fact that she hadn’t bought wheeled toys for the toddler to trundle to and fro.

  Jenny spent as much time as she could with her daughter, playing the simple games she loved.

  ‘This is the way the weaver goes,

  A-rickelty-tick, a-rickelty-tick,

  The treadle down with his heel and toes,

  A-rickelty-tick, a-rickelty-tick …’

  Heather giggled as her mother took her hand and with it patted her heel and then her toe, first one foot and then the other as the verse was repeated.

  ‘This is the way the weaver goes,

  A-rickelty-tick, a-rickelty-tick,

  The wool
on his ears and on his nose ‒’

  ‘I do wish you wouldn’t teach the child those vulgar songs,’ Lucy interrupted, her manner full of reproach.

  ‘It’s just so she’ll learn the name of her heels and toes and so forth ‒’

  ‘It’s the kind of thing suitable for a workman’s children. Come along, Heather, play with your lovely drummer boy.’

  The toddler’s father watched all this with some perplexity. ‘You’ll no doubt correct me if I’m wrong,’ he said to Jenny, ‘but I thought the whole idea of taking the house in London was to get Lucy away at a safe distance from the bairn?’

  Jenny looked up from the book she was reading. She frowned at Ronald. ‘When did you work that out?’

  ‘It came to me as a voice out of the burning bush,’ he said, amused. ‘Will you explain to me why she’s not only back for Hogmanay but talking as if she’s here till spring?’

  ‘She’s here to mend a broken heart.’

  ‘Is that a fact? Whose heart got broken?’

  She drew him down beside her in the quiet of her father’s old reading-room. She liked to come here sometimes, to think and plan, to look at his books, to let tranquillity seep into her.

  ‘Lucy has a heart, Ronald, though you don’t seem to think so. She wants to love someone ‒’

  ‘There’s always Ned,’ Ronald put in. ‘You do remember Ned, don’t you?’

  She shook her head. ‘She was never in love with Ned. He was an escape from being poor and having to help her mother run a boarding house. Sometimes I think she even bears him a grudge ‒ when she first came here she expected a fine country estate.’

  Ronald glanced out of the window at the winter trees on the hillside. ‘Well, it’s not a bad estate, at that.’

  ‘But she expected grouse moors and liveried footmen. We’re a lot more workaday than she’d imagined. It’s difficult to explain. But she’s never really happy, never content ‒ except perhaps when she’s in love.’

  ‘And who is she in love with at the moment?’

  ‘His name is Harvil Massiter. Very much the man-about-town. It was really very important to get her away from him, even though … Well, she needs someone to spend her affection on, and at the moment it’s Heather, I’m afraid.’

  ‘Humph. Heather’s got to be spoiled to death to help keep Lucy happy? Have I got it right?’

  ‘It’s not for long, Ronald. Just a month or two. When the London season begins, I’ll go back there with Lucy.’

  He looked discontented at that. ‘You mean you’re going to stay there, acting collie-dog to keep her out of mischief?’

  ‘I’ve a sort of a plan … I haven’t done anything about it, but I think of asking Lucy if she’d like to be presented at court.’

  ‘Eh?’ Ronald said. ‘That’s only for eighteen-year-old lassies.’

  ‘No, I believe married ladies can be presented too, wives of the county gentry and the town gentry as well as the military and the aristocracy. I’d have to find someone willing to sponsor Lucy ‒ there are society ladies who have the right to present others at court, I’m not sure of the ins and outs but I think I’ve heard something along those lines.’

  ‘Presentation at court … Lucy would love that.’

  ‘Yes, and you see, the sponsor has to supervise her and guarantee her ‒ I believe the Palace is quite strict about status and behaviour. So I could deliver Lucy to the general overseeing of some elderly dragon and leave her with an easy mind for two or three months.’

  ‘All this, of course, would cost money,’ Ronald said, with a look of cynicism on his long face.

  ‘We’re not short of money, my dear. What we’re short of where Lucy is concerned is peace of mind.’

  ‘Aye. It might work. You’d better put out feelers as soon as you can. Maybe there’s a waiting list for a place under the wing of these old society hens?’

  ‘Just let me get Hogmanay over and one or two other things.’

  ‘Perhaps I could take a letter with me to London when I go next week?’

  ‘No, this is women’s business, my love.’

  ‘I might run into Lucy’s sweetheart ‒ I wouldn’t mind a look at him.’

  ‘You’ll find him at Tattersall’s, I imagine.’

  ‘Not at the College of Science lectures?’

  ‘Only if the lecturer is a young and elegant woman.’

  ‘No such luck,’ said Ronald.

  After the festivities of New Year the world settled down to routine. Ronald went to London for ten days, Ned was in Liverpool welcoming an American delegation concerned with funds for educating freed slaves, and Jenny had to go to Newcastle-upon-Tyne over the non-arrival of a cargo of valuable wool.

  The weather was cold but the snow had for the moment gone away. Instead a period of rain set in. Coming back on the train from Newcastle, Jenny looked out at the dripping landscape. She was depressed, she had been unsuccessful in tracing the lost cargo, and by the time she got to Gatesmuir it would be late and Heather would be in bed.

  Worse yet, the rain caused a landslip at Coldstream. The line was blocked for several hours while men called out from the soldiers’ barracks worked by lantern light to clear it.

  By the time Jenny got to Galashiels it was well past midnight. The station was still open but all the hackney cab drivers had gone home for the night.

  ‘I’ll send someone up to Gatesmuir to fetch out your carriage, Mistress Armstrong,’ the station-master offered.

  She shook her head. The idea of sitting yet longer, waiting, was anathema. The rain had stopped, though there was still a cold breeze.

  ‘I’ll walk up, Mr Gowan. Keep my luggage here till the morning, will you? I’ll send for it.’

  ‘I’ll put someone with you to light the way, mistress.’

  ‘No, no, I know the way fine. Never you trouble yourself, Mr Gowan, I’ll be home in a quarter of an hour.’

  She set off, glad of the exercise after so many hours in the train. Buffeted by the wind, she struggled along High Street and up the slope towards Gatesmuir, the night air reviving her as she battled against it.

  The road outside Gatesmuir was awash from the rain. She trod carefully through the puddles glinting in the faint light from the flying clouds. She paused a moment inside the gateposts, to get her breath back for the steep curve of the drive.

  She was leaning forward into the slope when her foot hit something in the middle of the drive. She drew back in alarm, almost losing her balance. She leaned down, trying to discern what it could be. Something longish and low-lying, but … she touched it with her foot … not a log, not a tree trunk, something soft.

  She stooped, put out a hand.

  Soft woollen clothing … flannel … cotton lawn … someone in night clothes was lying in the middle of the drive.

  She knelt down in the mud. ‘Who’s there?’ she said in a quavering voice.

  Her hand touched lace, a lace cap. She recognised the shape of the lappets ‒ it was her mother’s nightcap.

  ‘Mother!’

  Now the flying clouds released enough starlight to let her see that her mother was lying face down in the path. She put her arms about her, turned her over so that she was lying over Jenny’s own knees.

  ‘Mother! Mother! What happened? Mother, for God’s sake ‒’

  She made a faint sound, a moan of returning consciousness. ‘Jenny …?’

  ‘My darling, what are you doing out here? Mother ‒’

  ‘Jenny … Jenny, the baby …’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Jenny … ahh … I tried to stop her … Forgive me, I couldn’t …’

  ‘What?’ Jenny cried, baffled. ‘What are you saying, Mother?’

  But Millicent Corvill had lost consciousness again.

  Chapter Six

  Jenny never recalled the events of the next hour or so. Her personal maid, Baird, told her what happened.

  She and Thirley, the parlour maid, were roused from sleep by a hammering on the front d
oor and a voice screaming, ‘Let me in! Let me in!’

  Very scared, they went downstairs, clutching each other. Baird recognised Jenny’s voice when she heard her own name being called. They unbolted and opened the front door.

  Their flickering candle revealed a dishevelled, mud-stained figure.

  ‘Quick ‒ fetch the gardener and his boy ‒ send Coachman for the doctor. Tell Cook to rouse the fire ‒’

  ‘Mistress, mistress, what ever has come to you? Your clothes ‒’

  ‘Never mind that, you fool! Run for McKeith and the boy. They have to carry my mother in ‒’

  ‘Your mother? But mistress ‒’

  ‘Blankets! Run up and get blankets, Baird. Thirley, why haven’t you gone for McKeith?’

  Next moment Mistress Armstrong had plunged back into the darkness. Bewildered, Thirley and Baird gaped at each other. Then Baird, who knew her employer very well, pulled herself together. ‘Do as she says.’

  ‘But she’s lost her mind ‒ she said Mrs Corvill had to be carried ‒’

  ‘Go for the gardener. God knows why, but go! Use the back path, it’s quickest.’

  Baird whirled round, ran upstairs to the upper floor, and called to the cook, who slept at the far back of the house. When she heard sounds of arousal from her she shouted instructions. ‘Go down, get the kitchen fire going. I don’t know why, just do it!’

  Flying back down, she had a sudden thought. She looked into the bedroom of the elder Mrs Corvill, the door standing ajar. Millicent Corvill’s bed was empty.

  Still bewildered but beginning to understand that there was method in the mistress’s madness, Baird snatched up the quilt and the top blanket before hurrying downstairs.

  The front door stood wide. Someone, presumably Jenny, had lit the gas lamps so that the light spilled out. About ten yards away down the slope of the drive, heads were bobbing. She could hear the mistress’s voice. ‘No, don’t ‒ look at her leg, I think it’s broken. You’ll damage her if you pick her up in your arms, McKeith.’

  Baird flew out with the bedclothes. Mistress Armstrong, McKeith, and John the boy were kneeling by a prostrate figure.

  The gardener took the blanket from Baird. He laid it on the ground alongside the unconscious woman. He had had experience, in his long career as a workman, of injuries to limbs. He stationed the boy and Mistress Armstrong at one side of Mrs Corvill, himself and Baird at the other.