She rose from the stool and went to the wardrobe to change her dress to go to Newcastle in order to dine with Mr Kemp, when undoubtedly before, during and after the meal, business would be discussed, and this would include her latest move.
So much for the suitor.
It was a week later and late on a Saturday evening when Jessie, opening the drawing-room door, said, ‘Mr Douglas has called, miss. He would like a word with you.’
Bridget had been on the point of going upstairs to bed and she found herself pausing before she said, ‘Show him in.’ The pause had not been occasioned by the fact that it was late, nor that she was tired and ready for bed, but because, since the day he had seen her home after her last visit to Joe, he had never called; in fact, this particular visit was the first time she had seen him since her outburst in the carriage, whereas she had expected him, knowing the state she had been in and imagining he would be concerned enough for her, to visit her the next day.
He came in hurriedly, saying, ‘I’m…I’m sorry, Bridget, to be calling so late but I’ve just arrived back from Allendale, where I’ve been for the last five days. I went to see a friend who lives up in the hills. Just a little cottage. We don’t see much of each other but…but she’s a dear person.’ At this he stopped, drew in a long breath, then said, ‘I’m gabbling on, but I thought I should explain my absence.’
‘Five days; but it is some time since I last saw you, Douglas. I thought you must have been very busy with your work.’
He took a step nearer to her and again he drew in a long breath before speaking: ‘I wasn’t too busy with my work,’ he said. ‘There was a reason for my not calling, even though I know I should have, for when I last saw you, you were in distress. But there was a reason, I assure you, and I really am sorry I can’t give it to you. For that matter I wonder if I ever shall.’
She was not a little puzzled by his answer, and also that he had a friend, in a little cottage and that she was ‘a dear’. He was saying now, ‘But enough of me. What is this I’m hearing, that you are leaving this house? Why, Bridget?’
She walked away from him and sat down on the seat she had left only moments before, and, pointing to the couch, she said, ‘Sit down, Douglas.’ And when he was seated, she tried to answer him: ‘Like you, I cannot give an honest or full reason for my actions, but I can tell you this much: I want to house Lily and see that her child is well brought up.’
‘Oh! Well, yes, I can understand that, and yet only in a way because it isn’t Joe’s child, and you’re doing this for…for Joe.’
Why was it, he asked himself now, that he always found it difficult to voice that man’s name? He had already implied that he understood her feelings for the man, but he still couldn’t fully accept the fact that she could have fallen in love with one of her own workmen, one who had apparently worked in the blacking factory since he was a child, because she had a dignity about her. She always appeared to be a superior person, unmistakably class. And so he was surprised now when she said harshly, ‘I know it wasn’t Joe’s child, but it was someone’s, wasn’t it?’
‘Yes, it was someone’s. He apparently knew who the father was but he wouldn’t say.’
‘No, he didn’t say because he didn’t want to hurt anyone.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘Just what I say, Douglas: Joe didn’t want to hurt anyone. If he had named the man he would indeed have hurt a number of people. As he saw it, and as I thought I also saw it, it wouldn’t have done his case any good. Yet, I don’t know.’
As she turned from him, he came back at her harshly, saying, ‘Well, as I see it now, you know much more about the matter than you did earlier. Has his wife confided in you?’
‘Perhaps.’
‘Oh, Bridget’—he turned his head to the side—‘she has, or she hasn’t; perhaps means she has. But even so, I cannot imagine how the revelation, even if it had come earlier, could have hurt anyone outside…well, their own circle.’
‘Oh, you can’t, can you not? So you think it is impossible for a girl to be seduced by anyone outside what you call her own circle? If that’s the case you must be very naive about the facts of life.’
He laughed. ‘I’m a very naive fellow altogether,’ he said. ‘I should have thought you had found that out by now: I believe everything I’m told.’
‘Oh yes’—she nodded her head vigorously—‘I know that.’ Then she went on, ‘Well, you can believe this. I’ll be very glad to leave this house and this district. I’ve never felt at home here. My home is in Shields, and that’s where I’m going.’
She continued to look at him, waiting for some response, and when none was forthcoming, her manner changing and her voice soft now, she said, ‘The only thing I’ll miss, Douglas…will be your visits.’
‘Oh, shall I not be allowed to visit you in Shields?’
‘Of course, of course, but…but the distance, it’s more than a ten-minute canter.’
‘Well, there are still the trains and the horse bus and, lastly, my legs.’
She smiled now at him as she said, ‘You’ll be very welcome any time, because, of all the people I’ve met since we’ve lived here, you are the only one I can call friend.’
‘That’s good to know, Bridget. But I think you could have made many more friends, at least from our house, if you had given them the chance. Father, you know, is quite fond of you. He admires you tremendously. And Lionel…well, I feel he would have been only too pleased to call in with Victoria if…’
Not only was he startled by her response but her reaction startled herself, for she actually shouted at him, ‘Make a friend of him! Don’t you mention his name to me. That man…that man! He’s the reason…’ Her hand was on her throat now, checking the flow that had been vehement.
As Douglas in some amazement watched her struggling for breath, his thoughts were leaping back over the conversation that had passed between them since he had entered the room. He knew, of course, and with reason that she didn’t like Lionel; and who would, when she had practically to pay him, no, not practically, actually pay him to marry her cousin in order to keep that feather-brained girl happy? But she had scarcely met him since. Yet a moment ago she had been enraged at the mention of his name. Why? As if working at a jigsaw, his mind began picking up pieces of conversation that had passed between them. It ranged over the reasons she had given for leaving the house, and then the defence of that girl and her baby. Then it stopped, as he recalled her attitude when she had suggested that the girl had been seduced not by one of her own class but…
She had turned from him, and her head hanging now she muttered an apology, ‘I’m sorry. I’m sorry. It’s inexcusable. I…’
When one hand came on her shoulders and the other lifted up her chin and he said, ‘Look at me, Bridget, and go on from where you stopped in your tirade.’
‘It was nothing. I didn’t mean…I just…Well, you know I don’t care for your…your brother.’
‘Yes, I know you don’t care for him. But dislike and hating are two different things and, coming on top of our conversation, I’m going to ask you a straight question, and it is this: was Lionel responsible for this girl’s condition?’
She looked into his eyes. The expression in them was one she hadn’t seen before: there was no trace of kindness or humour or the critical enquiry that sometimes accompanied a question; the look in them now made her feel afraid of imparting the truth. Yet, she knew that the truth had already pierced his mind, and so, for answer she muttered, ‘Yes, he was.’
He withdrew his hands from her and stepped aside while his gaze still remained on her, then turned away and stood at the head of the couch with his back to her. His body was straight and taut and he appeared to her at this moment to have put inches on to his height. She was suddenly full of concern at the outcome of what she had inadvertently revealed to him. Going quickly to him, she said, ‘Please, Douglas, will you consider this just as something between us two? If you don’t, the
re’s going to be more unhappiness.’
When he didn’t answer, she went on talking, quickly now, almost at a gabble. ‘She wouldn’t have told me…I mean Lily, but I offered to bring her here, and the child, and to take care of them. And her response to this was much the same as mine a few minutes ago: she knew if she were to come and live here she would, some day, come face to face with him. Then there was the child, his child. And you can see now that this is why Joe kept quiet because the revelation would certainly have put an end to Victoria’s engagement, as it was then.’
When still he didn’t answer, she began to plead: ‘Please, Douglas, I don’t want to hurt her. We have fallen out. She is really unhappy; she hasn’t settled into your home. Please.’
‘All right. All right.’ He was patting her hand in a way that showed his own agitation. And he added now, ‘I’ll promise you that she won’t be hurt; but I must face him with it. And to think’—he now put his hand to his head—‘they discussed it at the table…well, at least Father did when the man was hanged. And the conclusion he came to, as did others who were there, was that the child was his brother’s, and that’s why he had killed him. And everybody thinks the same.’
‘Everybody?’
‘Well, that was the opinion that was going around during the trial when he wouldn’t say who the father of the child was. And then there was that barrister. He led up to it, likely thinking it would create sympathy for the man.’ There was a pause in his speaking; then, looking at her intently, he asked, ‘Why should he kill his brother if that wasn’t the case?’
‘He didn’t kill him. I’m more sure of that now. At one time I began to think, too, that if it was his brother, there was the reason for his action. But now I know…I know he didn’t kill him. His last words to me were that he was innocent. He had never done this thing. I told you.’
Douglas walked away from her and picked up his hat, which he had laid on a chair, before turning to her again and asking, ‘When are you leaving here?’
‘A prospective buyer is coming tomorrow to view, but in any case I am taking most of the good furniture down to the other house, and storing it. I have plans for rebuilding some old barns. But until this place is sold, Jessie and Danny will remain to see to things. In the meantime the rest of my small staff will come with me.’
‘Oh.’ He paused and stared at her for a time, then went on, ‘In case I don’t see you again before you leave, will you give me your address?’
‘Yes. Yes, of course,’ she said. ‘It is called Meadow House. It is on the Sunderland road out of Shields. Just beyond Harton village there’s a bridle path. We’re a little way along: there’s a sign indicating the house, you can’t miss it. You…you could get a cab from the station.’ She held out her hand to him. ‘I hope you will come.’
‘Oh, I’ll come. Never fear of that, I’ll come.’ He almost added, ‘If it’s only to tell you I’ve killed my brother,’ for at the moment that was how he was feeling.
As he turned away from her and went hurriedly from the room and out onto the drive, where he mounted his horse, he asked himself why he should be feeling so furious, for he had always known that Lionel had played around, with little discrimination in his choice. That, of course, was before he became enamoured of Elizabeth Porter, an attachment that had gone on for some time, likely because of the little risk attached to it, as her husband was still in India. He would still have been seeing her when he gave that girl the child. It must have been about that time, too, when he cast his sights on what he imagined was the rich Miss Victoria Mordaunt.
And that fellow Joe had kept quiet about the whole affair in order not to hurt Bridget or her dear cousin, who was then so shortly to be Lionel’s bride. However, as Bridget had said, it really had nothing to do with Joe’s case.
Of a sudden he pulled his horse to a stop, and the action must have brought his thinking to a similar state, for the thought that had just a moment before presented itself to him had now fled, and the harder he tried to recall it the further it receded into the distance. The only part of it that was left was something to do with a horse. It was as though he had just woken from a dream.
He jerked the reins again and walked his horse for the remainder of the distance to the house.
After stabling it, he was making his way across the yard to his workshop for there, in the presence of the stone, he always felt relaxed and at peace, and he must calm his inner feelings before he met up with his brother; but this was denied him, for there, coming out of the tack room, was Lionel himself.
They would have passed, without greetings, within a few yards of each other, but Douglas looked towards Lionel and said, without preamble, ‘I want to speak to you.’
‘What?’
‘I want to speak to you.’
‘Oh, you do, do you?’
As Douglas moved on towards the end of the buildings he felt that Lionel must have remained standing where he was, and so he turned and said, ‘This is important.’
‘So is my desire for food at the moment; I have been out all day. If you want to speak to me you’ll find me in the dining room,’ and Lionel made to turn away, only to be checked by Douglas, retorting, ‘I shouldn’t think you’d like to hear what I’ve got to say in the dining room. Exposures are never pleasant.’
Lionel’s head jerked to the side as if he were looking around the yard to make sure there was no-one who could have been within hearing distance; then it seemed he had to make an effort to step forward and follow Douglas, although not immediately, into the now dim workshop. He stood within the doorway waiting for his brother to light a lamp. When, presently, the long low room was illuminated he slowly stepped forward and closed the doors behind him, before moving towards where Douglas was standing near a long bench on whose battered top lay a number of mallets and chisels.
He stopped within a couple of yards of him, but he didn’t speak. And when Douglas said grimly, ‘You are a rotter, a really beastly individual. You know that?’ he winced; then his voice scarcely above a whisper, he said, ‘What d’you mean to do?’ And Douglas answered, ‘There’s nothing I can do. The girl bore your son, and her husband knew who the father was, but he went to his end keeping silent about it so that Bridget wouldn’t be troubled and hurt by the fact that her cousin was marrying his wife’s seducer.’
Douglas now watched Lionel’s head droop towards his chest and his shoulders actually begin to shake. He saw him glance along the bench towards an upturned box, then go to it and flop down onto it. And when he placed his elbows on the rough bench and dropped his face onto his hands, his whole attitude assuming one of distress, Douglas’s feelings towards him almost turned a somersault, and his next words were spoken quietly: ‘Well, it’s over and done with,’ he said; ‘Bridget is going to see to her and educate the boy.’
But almost in the next instant his attitude changed again, to amazement now, as Lionel looked up, his face crinkled with laughter, a gurgle in his voice, as he said, ‘You are a funny fellow, Doug. You really don’t belong in this time. You would do well up in Victoria’s court, you would really. So I have a bastard son? My dear fellow—’ He now rose to his feet, and he actually squared his shoulders as he said, ‘That’s the only one I know of; but the county, in fact the whole country’s dotted with ’em. Not mine, of course, not mine.’ His row of even white teeth were gleaming in the lamplight, and as Douglas stared at him they seemed to grow longer and become fangs.
He watched him now take a handkerchief and wipe the sweat from his brow, and the smile seeming not to have left his face, he said, ‘What’s your next move, brother? Do you intend to inform Victoria of my vileness?’
Douglas found he had to force himself to speak. ‘No. She’ll find that out for herself before long, I’m sure,’ he said. ‘Likely at the same time as she learns you had to be paid to marry her.’
The smile slowly faded from Lionel’s face, and his changed feelings were further emphasised in his voice, low now, as he ground out
, ‘Well, let me tell you something, brother. I’m having to earn that every day. And I wouldn’t care if it was made known to her tomorrow. My God! What I’d like to do at this minute is to knock you flat on your skinny back.’
At this Douglas stepped forward and his voice, too, registered his feelings as he growled, ‘Then why don’t you try? You’d be in for a surprise, because you’re nothing but flab and wind. Your paunch will soon be like Father’s. My skinny back, you say. Well, my skinny arms are flint-hard from working with that!’ And he thrust his arm out towards a lump of stone. ‘So, come on. Have a try. I challenge you. There’s nothing more I’d like to do at this moment but to drive my fist into your face and my knee into your pot belly.’
‘Huh!’ There was scorn in the sound, yet Lionel did not attempt to step forward; but it was evident that his brother’s remarks had struck home, for he seemed to gain height as he pulled his stomach in and thrust his shoulders back before turning away and marching out of the building.
Douglas stood where he was for a moment; then he turned and, going to the bench, he lifted up a mallet and began to beat it on the wood, just small taps as if he were applying it to a chisel; and all the while his mind was groping again at that distant something that was troubling him.
When, presently, his groping conjured up his brother’s face that only a few minutes before had blanched, he asked himself why it should have when seconds later he had shaken with laughter, and that laughter had conveyed relief. But from what? Had he expected to be accused of something else besides giving the child to that girl?
He laid the mallet aside and slowly walked to the door, but there he stopped. He should go into supper, but he couldn’t tolerate the thought of sitting opposite his brother, or listening to his father entertaining Victoria with anecdotes that would become more risqué with each glass of wine he consumed, and listening to Victoria’s giggles when she wouldn’t really be aware of the meaning of the innuendoes.
The Black Candle Page 18