Disputed Love

by Margaret Carr

  Back in the cottage again, she lowered the bags and closed the door. Jack had climbed down from the rocker and was standing looking up at his father. Belle held her breath.

  ‘The stairs are through there,’ he said, nodding towards an inner door. ‘There’s a room for him on the left at the top.’

  Angered by the man’s ignorance, Belle flew across the floor and snatched the little boy up in her arms. She talked to him in a soft voice as she collected one of the bags in her other hand and headed for the door that led into a small hall at the bottom of a flight of stairs.

  Jack began to whine as she dumped the bag by the bedroom door and groped for the light switch. Harassed to death when she couldn’t find one, she crossed the room by the light from the unshuttered window. Then she took off Jack’s coat, trousers, jumper and boots before she tucked him up in the bed after making sure it wasn’t damp.

  Hauling the bag in from the landing she took out a battery night light and a torch which she had packed for the journey. She placed the night light on the small table by the bed, drew the curtains and hung his clothes on the back of a chair. She kissed him good-night after telling him a story and crept back out on to the landing, torch in hand.

  She tried the handle of the room next door. The door opened. It was a large room with two windows. The furniture was sparse but the double bed was made up ready and she sighed with relief. The reason she hadn’t been able to find the switch became obvious when the beam from her torch found the gas light in the centre of the ceiling.

  Grimacing, she went forward with the intention of closing the curtains. Halfway across the room, the torch caught a shirt across a chair in its beam. Flashing the light around she discovered a towel across the foot of the bed. On closer inspection she saw a pile of dirty laundry on the floor in a corner of the room. Hastily she withdrew from what could only be Jeffrey Carlton’s bedroom!

  There was one other door on the small landing. Belle closed her eyes and prayed as she turned the handle. It was a bathroom with yellow walls and a gas geyser over the bath. Her heart sank. What was she supposed to do now, she wondered. Did he expect her to share a bed with Jack? She stood there quite a while pondering on what to do for the best, then decided that she had better go down to the kitchen again. She would just take it from there.

  When she reached the kitchen, Jeffrey Carlton was standing in front of the fire range.

  ‘I must thank you for bringing the boy all this way.’

  His gruff voice sounded as though it was being dragged, with reluctance, from the bottom of his boots.

  ‘Are you from the solicitor’s office?’ he added.

  He swung round, a dark scowl across his brow.

  ‘No. I was engaged as Jack’s nanny three and a half years ago, by Mrs Carlton. I’ve always had the care of him.’

  ‘Why did you turn up in the vet’s vehicle? Didn’t you come by car?’

  His voice had sharpened, as though he thought her incapable of successfully travelling any other way.

  ‘My car skidded off the road a mile the other side of the village. Mr MacDonald was kind enough to rescue us and give us a lift once the snow was cleared.’

  ‘What’s being done about the car?’

  Belle was cold and tired and rather cross at all the questions.

  ‘Well, nothing at the moment. It’s late, but Mr MacDonald said he’d get on to it first thing in the morning.’

  ‘Well, it’ll be a cold walk back to the village but as you can see, I’m in no state to be of much help even if I had the inclination.’

  Belle stared, uncomprehending. Something peculiar happened to her as she watched his large frame fill the chair by the fire. Her heart changed its rhythm and a lump rose in her throat to inhibit her swallowing. His hair was black, surprisingly neatly groomed. In profile his face was as hard as granite, long straight nose, thin lips and chiselled cheeks and a nerve jumped rhythmically along his jaw. The black polo-necked jumper that stretched over wide shoulders hinted at a man in otherwise good condition. His long legs were clothed in dark trousers, the left leg having been cut away to facilitate the only light surface about him, the grubby plaster cast that reached from knee to toes.

  ‘You can leave any luggage that’s yours here until you get your car back on the road.’

  Belle bit back the comment she felt like making and said, ‘I was hoping you would consider letting me stay and look after Jack, while you are incapacitated, I mean.’

  ‘I’m afraid staying here is out of the question. I only have the two rooms. Now, if you don’t mind, I’m ready for bed myself.’

  He rose from the chair and swung the plastered leg carefully before him.

  ‘When you have looked your fill you can leave,’ he said, his narrow gaze sliding over her.

  ‘Leave?’

  Anger, fear, tiredness, all culminated to throw Belle into a panic.

  ‘I can’t leave,’ she said firmly.

  ‘I haven’t the room to invite you to stay. Didn’t I make myself clear?’

  ‘I wasn’t invited to bring Jack either, but he’s here,’ she snapped. ‘It’s dark, it’s cold and I have no transport.’

  ‘The road has been cleared. It’s only a mile and a half to the village. I’m sure they’ll put you up at The Ugly Duckling. You’re dressed in warm clothes so you won’t freeze.’

  ‘How kind of you to notice. But I don’t think you are in any fit state to throw me out, Mr Carlton, and unless you do I’m staying right here.’

  She followed up her threat by sitting down abruptly on an old horsehair chesterfield.

  He stared at her, his eyebrows raised questioningly and for a terrifying moment Belle wondered if he was indeed going to attempt to throw her out of the cottage.

  ‘If you must wait for daylight,’ he said, ‘then you must. I have been kept out of my bed long enough. Please don’t linger in the morning. I want you away before the boy gets up.’

  With that, he clumped from the room leaving Belle gazing after him in disgust.

  Well, he could want all he liked, Belle muttered as she aimed a vicious punch at a cushion, raising a cloud of dust as she did so. If he thought for one second that she was going to abandon Jack in this dreadful place to a man like him he could think again, because he was going to have one devil of a fight on his hands.

  At first light, a cockerel crowed, startling Belle from sleep. Her neck was painful. She felt stiff all over and a foot tingled with pins and needles. The surroundings were unfamiliar and for a moment she couldn’t recall where she was. Then the full horror of the night before came back to her. She felt shivery and clammy at one and the same time, for she had slept in her clothes with only her coat for cover and the banked up fire in the range for warmth.

  Pushing back the coat she rose to her feet and crossed to the bottom of the stairs. Now, she thought, would be a good time to claim the bathroom before anyone else was about. She waited, listening for movement from above. There was none. Slowly she mounted the stairs, biting her lip when a tread creaked or she stubbed her toe in the pale light from the unshuttered kitchen windows below. There was no lock on the bathroom door so she pushed a small cane chair under the handle.

  When she had finished washing and tidying herself and was back downstairs there was still no sound from above. Placing her coat back into one of her bags she shoved both of them out of sight between the wall and the back of the chesterfield. No point making it easy for him to evict her. Then she searched around to find out where everything was kept.

  There was a huge kettle on a trivet, waiting to be pushed over the range fire though there was a gas stove next to a deep, old-fashioned sink. The one tap over the sink told her that any water would have to be heated from the kettle, so she pushed the kettle into place. A packet of oatmeal and a tin of teabags stood on the mantle. The pantry door, when she opened it, and shone her torch around, made her purse her lips in vexation. She counted two tins of baked beans, a half-empty packet of sug
ar, a lump of cheese still wrapped in the shop Cellophane, a dish of eggs, a box of mushrooms, half a loaf of bread that looked stale, a tin that had FLOUR written on it, an open dish of butter and a can of milk on the floor.

  ‘Good grief,’ she groaned, curling up her nose.

  She plundered the other cupboards on either side of the range for pans, dishes, utensils, while on a shelf beneath the wooden draining-board she found a selection of cleaning materials, a bottle of washing-up liquid and a packet of washing powder.

  ‘Well, I suppose you could say we have all the basic essentials,’ she said to herself feeling the corners of her mouth tugging upward, for she was never one to be downhearted for long.

  The porridge was prepared, the tea made, the stale bread toasted and buttered before she went to see if Jack was awake. His door was open and she could hear him talking to someone who could only be Jeffrey Carlton. Her brows knitted with worry and her heart jumped as she listened, but there was no response from the man. She drew a deep breath and walked into the room.

  ‘Belle, isn’t it good? I’m going to see some animals, real ones, like cows and sheep and chickens.’

  His little face was bright with expectation. He was sitting on the bed fully dressed while his father bent awkwardly over him, fastening the laces of his boots. The curtains were pulled back and in the snow-bright room she saw the man’s back stiffen when Jack addressed her.

  ‘Run downstairs now,’ he said to the boy giving him a gentle push that propelled him past Belle and out of the doorway. ‘I thought I told you to be gone before the boy was up,’ he then addressed Belle.

  ‘You can tell me what you like but I won’t leave here until I’m satisfied that he’s happy and settled.’

  ‘Strange. I was under the impression that I had been named his guardian and that this was my home and that you, madam, are trespassing.’

  His icy politeness made her blush, for, of course, he was perfectly within his rights to tell her to leave. With last night’s anxiety and tiredness eased by sleep, however uncomfortable and restless it had been, and with daylight chasing away the last of the shadows, he didn’t look quite so unyielding this morning. Without a word Belle turned and proceded him down the stairs. Perhaps when he saw that she had gone to a lot of trouble to make breakfast he would see her in a better light, she thought.

  His eyes narrowed when he saw the small boy sitting patiently at the set table waiting for his breakfast.

  ‘We have our breakfast when we come back. Now climb down and put your coat on.’

  ‘But Belle always makes me have breakfast first, don’t you, Belle?’

  He turned to her for confirmation. Belle’s heart squeezed as she replied.

  ‘Well, now you are living with your daddy we have to change things a bit to fit in with his work. OK?’

  ‘OK.’

  He grinned and jumped down from his seat. Jeffrey in the meanwhile pulled on an old sheepskin jacket and picked up a large battery lamp in his free hand. Belle helped Jack into his coat then the two left the cottage side by side, the little one’s chatter like bird song. Suddenly Belle was afraid. She felt as threatened as a mother watching her only child leave home.

  The fact that her position was an impossible one made it all the worse. She sat down on the chesterfield and searched her mind for a way to make herself invaluable to this man. Her eyes moved slowly around the cottage. It was in a terrible state of neglect. She could threaten him with the social services, but that would only result in them taking Jack away and putting him into care.

  A man on his own couldn’t want the responsibility of bringing up a small child, could he? If she could only persuade him that he did have another alternative, might he not take it? Jack would be much better off with her and her parents in Portugal. Her heart lightened. That’s what she would do. She would speak to him as soon as he had a good breakfast inside him.

  They came in an hour later both smelling of animals and the outdoors.

  ‘My tummy’s rumbling, Belle. Can I have my breakfast now, please?’

  ‘Of course,’ she said sliding a glance at the hard-faced man beside him. ‘Come and have those dirty hands washed then you can sit up at the table.’

  She dished up three bowls of reheated porridge, a jug of milk and a bowl of sugar, then three cups of tea, pouring Jack’s tea into his Pooh Bear beaker which she had brought with them.

  ‘The rest of his things should be arriving by carrier sometime today,’ she said.

  Jeffrey Carlton looked up then, his dark brows pulled down.

  ‘You mean there’s more? How much more? I haven’t got unlimited room here.’

  ‘Of course there’s more. They were selling the house and everything in it. I had to save what was Jack’s.’

  ‘Well, if there’s too much it will have to be stored in the hayshed.’

  ‘It’s not a terrible amount, but it was more than I could get in the car.’

  He gave an exasperated sigh and continued with his porridge. Belle sent up a small prayer because up until now the only porridge she had made had come from an easy-to-make package. It tasted all right to her and Jack was gobbling down his, she acknowledged as she watched his expression. She offered him toast and scrambled egg to follow and he growled that she had wasted half his rations for a week.

  ‘Well, it will take more than you have in there to feed a growing child.’

  She waited for Jack to finish his meal, full of twitchy tension, anxious that his father would rise from the table and disappear out of the door before she could put her proposition to him.

  ‘Jack, I’m going upstairs to make your bed in a minute. Why don’t you go up and hide and l’ll come and find you soon?’

  She knew he would hide in the bedclothes and jump out on her when she went to make the bed. It was a well-worn game that never ceased to keep him happy. As soon as he had disappeared up the stairs she turned to Jeffrey Carlton, but before she could open her mouth he attacked.

  ‘Where did you say your car was stuck?’

  ‘Some men at the pub promised to have it brought up here as soon as they could get it out. There was some mention of needing a crane,’ she answered in a distracted voice. ‘What I wanted to ask . . .’

  ‘Good,’ he said, ‘then I want you away as soon as it comes.’

  ‘I’ve told you I can’t do that. Jack doesn’t know you. He would fret, make himself ill and I’m sure you wouldn’t want to have to cope with him then.’

  ‘He’s young,’ he snarled. ‘I will have to learn to cope with him through all sorts of problems.’

  ‘No, you won’t,’ Belle jumped in. ‘That’s what I was trying to tell you if you would have the manners to listen to my suggestion.’

  His eyes narrowed.

  ‘What suggestion?’

  Belle took a quiet breath.

  ‘I can see how difficult it might be for you to be thrust into parenthood like this, a man on his own, I mean, and I understand how you couldn’t let him go into care. But supposing there was another alternative, some way that would benefit everyone.’

  ‘Go on,’ he said gruffly when she hesitated.

  Belle decided to take the plunge.

  ‘My parents have a nice home in Portugal. It would be perfect for Jack. I know because I grew up there. They would love to have Jack and myself live with them. It would cost you nothing and you would know that Jack was in safe hands and you could visit him whenever you wanted.’

  High colour lay across the top of his cheekbones otherwise his expression was as dark as thunder.

  ‘Like visiting the zoo, you mean. I don’t think so. Won’t you have to be looking for other work now your job with Jack is finished?’

  Belle felt the colour leave her face and she closed her eyes as he slammed the door after him.

  * * *

  It was twelve fifteen and Belle was sitting at the table encouraging Jack to draw her the animals he had seen on the farm that morning. Inside she was worr
ied what food she could find for his lunch. Her greatest fear though was that Jeffrey Carlton would reappear like the evil genie he was, when her car arrived, and hustle her bodily from the cottage in front of a terrified, little boy. She couldn’t let that happen.

  Her fears were realised when, a short time later, her car was driven into the yard by Burt, the vet’s friend from the pub. He was handing over her keys as Jeffrey came into the yard. Burt gave her a quick goodbye salute and hurried back to the gate where Mac’s Land-Rover could be seen waiting for him. Her heart was beating a mad tattoo as she hurried back into the cottage and grasped the back of Jack’s chair as though she would defend the boy to the death.

  Jeffrey Carlton stood in the doorway regarding her and the boy as Jack laughed.

  ‘Look, Daddy, our car’s back.’

  The tension was so thick Belle thought she would choke.

  ‘I’ve changed my mind,’ he said at last. ‘You can stay at least until the boy’s settled. First thing you can do is get some food in, but don’t go mad. I’m not made of money.’

  He handed over some banknotes reluctantly, it seemed to Belle, but she wasn’t bothered, in fact she was nearly airborne with relief. He gave her directions into Moorgate, the nearest market town, after reminding her that he didn’t patronise the village shops. The snowplough had been down the road and cleared it only that morning. A weak sun washed the sky as Belle and Jack set off for the town and shops.

  Moorgate was a small, compact town with two main shopping streets, a market place, park and bus station. The supermarket lay behind the bus station and they pulled into the large carpark and got out. As they were winding their way through the other cars towards the store entrance a voice hailed them from behind.