by Amy Myers
At last they were ready, assembled with candles and torches in the drawing room, the only room now with lights. To Caroline’s surprise, her grandmother still remained in the drawing room to watch the proceedings.
‘Alas, alack,’ called Laurence, ‘during our festivities his lordship’s bride has disappeared. Let us seek for her!’ And the stampede began.
Caroline decided to keep as far from Reggie as possible; bumping into him by mistake would be terrible. She thought she saw him going upstairs in the dark, so started her own search in the stables outside. Her nerves were on edge, however, and when she bumped into someone, she screamed. Luckily it was only Eleanor, and her pounding heart subsided.
‘You’ve been quiet today.’ Caroline said to her when she caught her breath. ‘Is anything wrong?’
‘Martin’s been called up. He attested, you know, and though there’s no general call-up yet under the scheme, there’s a need for vets in the Army Veterinary Corps. He goes off on Monday week.’
‘Oh, Eleanor, I’m so sorry.’
‘So am I. We carved his initials on the tree last night.’
‘And what about you?’
‘You mean us?’ Eleanor made a face. ‘We wanted to get married before he left.’
‘You’re not going to let your mother stop you?’ Caroline asked in alarm.
‘She asked Father to talk to Martin and he managed to convince him it wasn’t honourable to marry me before going to war.’
‘He didn’t convince you, I take it.’
‘Of course not. I know very well it’s nothing to do with honour; Mother doesn’t want me to marry a vet. The Prince of Wales might do at a pinch.’
‘Can’t you talk to Martin about it?’
‘I’ve tried. But now he’s got this idea about bally honour stuck in his mind. Look at Reggie, he says. He went off to war without—oh, Caroline, I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have mentioned that. Does it still hurt very much?’
Look at Reggie, indeed, Caroline thought bitterly. What a splendid example of honour!
‘Would it be crass of me to kiss you under the mistletoe, Tilly?’ Simon crept up behind her while she was searching the wardrobe in Caroline’s bedroom.
Tilly shut the wardrobe door, very conscious of how near Simon was in the dark. She looked at his face, flickering in the glow of the candle. ‘There is none in this room,’ she pointed out.
He kissed her lightly, then harder, finding her lips more welcoming and eager than he had expected. ‘It’s not easy sleeping in this house,’ he said as he released her. ‘I want to be in your bedroom, not mine.’
‘Then let’s swap rooms.’
‘Don’t laugh at me, Tilly.’
‘I apologise,’ she said contritely. ‘That was crass of me.’
‘Is it a defensive weapon?’
‘No. Or, if it is, I’m not sure whether it’s permanent.’
‘Because of your war work?’
‘Yes, but also because of me.’
‘Has anyone made love to you before?’ he asked gently.
‘I’m fifty-one.’
‘That’s not an answer.’
Tilly sighed. ‘Someday, I promise you, I will tell you the story of my life. But not today, and not here.’
‘Very well.’ He took her hand and kissed it. ‘I’ll hold you to that promise. Be sure of that.’
‘Come down, Felicia,’ Daniel hissed up the narrow winding staircase behind a well-camouflaged door that led to the secret room they had all used as children for meetings. ‘I know you’re there, and I can’t bally well get up. Is that why you chose it?’
There was silence.
‘If I get my peg leg in the New Year,’ he continued, ‘I’ll come over and climb the Eiffel Tower for you, but for now you’ll have to indulge my infirmities.’
Still silence.
‘Damn you,’ he shouted. Angrily, he hunched his tall body over the crutches, but there wasn’t room to manoeuvre himself up the narrow staircase on them.
‘Blast you to blazes, Felicia.’ Tears of anger combined with self-pity came to his eyes as he hurled one of the crutches away. The anger won. He collapsed on to one of the steps, threw the other crutch away too, and sitting on the step heaved his weight by his arms, up and back to the next step. And the next, and the next. It took him ten minutes before he reached out and found no step behind him, only a woman’s foot and a long silk dress.
Felicia swung the lantern she had been given in honour of her starring role, and he saw her long dark hair framing the pale face. ‘I suppose this was an obvious place. I hoped it was so obvious no one would bother to look,’ she said.
‘What the hell do you think you’re playing at? I thought the Lady of the Lamp was supposed to show some kind of womanly gentleness towards injured soldiers, not put them through torture.’
‘You’re here,’ Felicia pointed out, sitting down beside him.
‘No thanks to you.’
‘Why come then?’ Her voice was gentle.
He was aware of every inch of her, breathing quietly beside him. Desire was in the mind, the eyes and the heart, not just in the body. How easy to say, ‘I wanted to reach you.’ But he wouldn’t do it for there could be no future for them. ‘I wanted to win the game,’ he said instead.
She sighed. ‘You have, Daniel.’
He had to touch her, so he kissed her cheek. ‘When I get my artificial leg and the war’s over, I shall travel, just like I wanted to. And I shall owe it to you.’
She did not comment. ‘Do you want to go down to claim the prize for finding me?’
‘Not yet. Tell me about your work, Felicia.’
‘I can’t.’
‘Why not?’
She tried to answer his question. ‘To do so would make it seem unreal. This is one world, that is another. They co-exist, and one is as real as the other.’
‘I’ve seen a battlefield, Felicia, and I can guess something of what it’s like out there. Perhaps you need to talk to someone.’
‘I have Tilly.’
‘Are you shutting me out?’
‘You have done that to me.’ There was no bitterness in her tone.
‘I had to.’
‘But you made your decision without understanding anything of me.’
‘Then tell me about what you’re doing,’ Daniel pleaded. ‘About the men you look after, about the life, anything. I may not deserve it, but I want to hear about it and, in return, I’ll bore you with tales of ancient Greece.’
In the dark of the room, with only the lantern lighting them, how could she resist him? She felt his lips on her cheek, his hand lying over hers. Perhaps any bridge was better than none? Felicia took a deep breath and began to talk.
‘Simon—’
The name died on Caroline’s lips as she peered into a chest in the glory-hole and a man’s hand was laid on her arm. The chest top banged as she jumped in horror. It wasn’t Simon. It was Reggie.
‘Caroline, don’t go.’
She struggled to release herself from his grasp.
‘You’ve no idea—what it’s been like,’ he continued jerkily. ‘There’s no one left, you see. My battalion lost nearly all its officers at Loos. The gas—we couldn’t see—those awful flannel masks. I looked round and there were only three or four men behind me. We saw the rest after they yelled at us to get back. They were all lying there. Dead. All we had to do was reach a road, then the Hohenzollern Redoubt and a small village; we didn’t reach any of them. I’m a full lieutenant now. Do you know why? Because there’s no one else. That’s why I can’t—’
‘No, Reggie.’ She tried to say it as gently as she could. Only a month or two ago, it had been her making the same plea, a plea which he had humiliatingly ignored. He had rejected her three times. It was not his fault, she laid no blame; but she knew now that the gate to the apple orchard of that last glorious summer was closed forever.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Caroline read the second paragraph i
n the letter from her mother with incredulity; in fact she read it three times to ensure she was not mistaken. It was All Fools’ Day, but surely her mother would not joke about such a serious matter? It was a miracle the letter had reached her at all with the enormous disruption caused by Monday night’s freak gales and heavy snowstorms. Railway lines had been out of service all over the country and many still were, telegraph and telephone communications were cut, houses had been damaged, thousands of trees uprooted, and bridges washed away. Even today, five days later, the newspapers were full of the storm damage. Caroline turned back to the storm in her letter: Mrs Dibble, it appeared, had announced her intention to leave the Rectory.
‘Things haven’t been right since your grandmother came, Mrs Dibble maintains, and she’s decided that enough is enough, and she, Percy and Fred are going to live in Hartfield.’
Thoroughly alarmed, Caroline read on, imagining her mother at the battered writing desk carefully penning the words, resting her left elbow on the desk and clutching her hair at the temple, as she so often did when under strain.
‘Now I am writing to you, dearest, so that you may consider this very carefully, rather than making the instant decision I know you would, were I able to telephone you.’ The Rectory telephone was out of service due to the storm.
‘I have talked to your father,’ her mother continued, ‘but he sees no way of dislodging your grandmother for the moment, especially now the Zeppelins have started their antics once again.’ Antics was an understatement. Only last night there had been a heavy raid on London and East Anglia with many people killed and injured. Caroline had been at Drury Lane, enthralled by the magnificent new American film Birth of a Nation, and hearing about the raid on her return home had been a grim reminder of last October’s horror. The film had been about the American Civil War, and had made her wonder if America would be joining the Allies in their fight against Germany.
‘There is some relief, however. Your grandmother has begun to appear regularly at church, which pleases your father, though I doubt if it is for the reason he imagines.’ Caroline remembered the rivalry between the Ladies Buckford and Hunney on Christmas Eve. ‘She presides also over a tea for wounded officers in the Rectory drawing room. This has proved an unexpected success since Miss Lewis has an astounding aptitude for thumping out cheap music on the piano, which (unaccountably!) has proved more popular with the soldiers than teas at the Dower House. It has become a regular arrangement, and develops into quite a rowdy sing-song. It deflects your grandmother’s attention from Phoebe, George and myself, and I encourage it. Your father is less enthusiastic, however, as on more than one occasion I have been forced to remind the soldiers that they are in a Rectory!’
‘Come on, Mother.’ Caroline was growing impatient at this rambling.
‘After great persuasion, I have managed to persuade Mrs Dibble to remain.’ Thank goodness! Caroline relaxed—but only for a moment. ‘There is, unfortunately, a condition. Mrs Dibble insists that I resume my role as mistress of the Rectory. I have therefore decided to give up my place on the local Women’s Agricultural Committee.
‘Caroline, my darling, could you bear to return and take my position on the WAC? Phoebe, I am sure, will continue to assist us on the Ashden rotas, so that you may still have the time to help the cause of women’s work locally, if not in London.’
Go back to Ashden? Rather to her surprise, Caroline found she was weighing the matter up objectively. Outside in the London streets the flowering almond trees were in full bloom, the hooping season had begun in the parks, and the people she passed in the streets looked more cheerful. Nevertheless, she was finding her work for the WSPU increasingly frustrating. It certainly hadn’t been dull—in February, Scotland Yard’s Special Branch had again seized copies of Britannia, this time raiding WSPU premises in Mecklenburg Square. Why, she asked herself despairingly, when the Pankhursts seemed proud of having aroused so much attention, did they waste time fighting the Government?
In February too, the new Women’s National Land Service Corps had been formed. An offshoot of the Garden and Farm Union, it had full Board of Agriculture support. And Lord Selborne had announced a scheme for village registers of women ready to undertake farm work. Letters to the newspapers also reflected a need for more help from women on the land. Now, with her mother’s letter before her, Caroline knew her choice was clear. In Ashden, she thought with excitement, she could join the local WAC and help with organising similar rotas in other parishes.
Then she remembered Reggie.
For a moment she had almost forgotten her most pressing problem. It was true that Reggie would not be there all the time, but Isabel would. Caroline looked at her mother’s letter with its oh-so-innocent request, then into the bleakness of her own heart. Somehow or other she had to face it. If she let Reggie and the Hunneys continue to stand between her and what she wanted to do, the pain would never go away. She would go!
She ran to the telephone in Simon’s entrance hall, remembering belatedly it was out of action because of the storm. She decided to try anyway. To her delight, the operator was able to put her through to the Rectory and, less than a week later, she was back at Ashden in time for Friday luncheon.
To Caroline’s surprise, the first person to greet her, as she opened the front door, was Eleanor Hunney.
‘Martin and I are to marry.’ Eleanor’s face was pink with excitement. ‘Martin’s talking to your father now. The service is to be held tomorrow, Caroline.’
‘I’ve been away too long,’ Caroline laughed. ‘I thought Martin had left for the Army already.’
‘So he had. He’s a week’s leave and a special licence, and then he’s going overseas.’ Eleanor pulled a face. ‘Still, as a vet he won’t be in the front trenches, will he?’
‘Has your mother relented?’
‘I’m afraid not. She has refused even to attend the wedding, though Father says he’ll try to come down. Daniel will be there, of course, prancing around on his new leg. And your mother is holding the wedding breakfast. She’s—’Eleanor choked slightly, ‘she’s always been as much of a mother to me as my own; more in many ways. You’ll find her in emergency conference with Mrs Dibble in the dining room.’
‘And the wedding’s tomorrow? Oh, Eleanor, I’m so happy for you. But what will you wear?’
‘I haven’t even begun to think,’ Eleanor said cheerfully. ‘I suppose you wouldn’t come over and give me some advice? The Dower House is like an ice-house at the moment; I could do with some friendly warmth.’
Caroline tried to sound enthusiastic. ‘Of course I’ll come—if your mother will let me past the door.’
In the event, Caroline found that going to the Dower House no longer caused her any concern. Lady Hunney had done her worst, and there was nothing more to fear. Nor were there happy memories of former times with Reggie to distract her. Once in Eleanor’s bedroom, however, Caroline looked through her friend’s wardrobe with increasing concern. Nothing was suitable; everything bore the hand of Lady Hunney and not a skirt was off the ground.
‘I could get married in my trousers,’ Eleanor suggested hopefully.
‘Let’s go into Tunbridge Wells. Now,’ Caroline said.
‘Ready-made? My dear, the skies will tumble. All right, but I’m not, not, having a long white dress with bones and lace. Martin wouldn’t recognise me.’
They compromised. Eleanor bought a cream turban hat with a veil, and a fashionably short cream silk and wool afternoon frock with a full skirt.
‘Legs,’ said Eleanor, peering down at her ankles. ‘They’ll be surprised to feel the air.’
‘We haven’t finished yet,’ Caroline declared. ‘We need stockings, shoes, and gloves, not to mention a trousseau.’
Her friend groaned.
True to her word, Lady Hunney did not make an appearance at Eleanor’s wedding, and caught by an emergency on the Verdun front in France, Sir John had to send his apologies too. It was left to Daniel, now walking merel
y with the aid of one stick on his new wood and metal leg, to give the bride away. Grandmother Buckford, Caroline noted, from her proud position as bridesmaid (in the fashionably smart blue jumper dress Eleanor had insisted on buying her) took the opportunity the Good Lord had sent and sat in the front pew on the bride’s side, taking precedence even over Mother. For once Caroline applauded and when, back at the Rectory, a photograph was taken of the group, she encouraged her grandmother to take a central position. Eleanor winked at her, fully aware of what she was doing.
A wedding was always nice. Mrs Dibble contemplated the plates of sandwiches with satisfaction, remembering the last wedding here twenty months ago. Miss Isabel’s, and what a day that had been. Still, everything had all gone off well today, even if Miss Eleanor was marrying beneath her. Miss Caroline didn’t seem to mind a bit that her friend was wed before her. Poor Miss Caroline. Still missing Mr Reggie, she could tell that.
With some surprise, she remembered that only a week or two ago she’d been set on leaving the Rectory. My word, she was glad she hadn’t. It would have been dull in Hartfield, just keeping Muriel company while Joe was away. She brightened at the thought of Joe. He’d come home on a week’s leave in March, and what a grand time that had been.
‘Mrs Dibble!’
Agnes rushed in, looking agitated. What was it now, Mrs Dibble wondered. Had they run out of tea in there, or was it Fred and the baby again? Fred had taken a fancy to Elizabeth Agnes and, despite Agnes’s initial concern, he had been allowed to look after her now she was beginning to walk; he took the same care with her as he devoted to his wounded animals and birds.
‘Jamie’s coming home!’ Agnes cried, waving a telegram. ‘I thought it was to tell me he was dead, but instead he’s on his way. He’s got leave. He’ll be here tomorrow for a whole four days.’