Rosemerryn

by Rosemerryn (retail) (epub)

  ‘You have an understanding with Spencer Jeffries, haven’t you? Marry him and have a family.’

  ‘Just like that, Tressa?’ Laura was astounded. ‘But—’

  ‘But nothing. You’re already as much a mother to Vicki as any woman can be. When you’re not working in the shop you spend practically every minute on Rosemerryn Farm. You’d like to be Vicki’s legal stepmother, wouldn’t you?’

  ‘Yes, of course I would, but…’ Laura was at a loss to know what to say. She tenderly kissed the baby’s cheek. ‘I love Vicki more than anyone else in the world. I quite like Spencer – well, I like him a lot, he’s saved my life twice, but…’

  ‘If you’re worried about sleeping with him, don’t forget Spencer is very good-looking,’ Tressa pointed out.

  This was unexpected from the new mother who hadn’t harboured a single romantic thought until she’d fallen in love with Andrew. Laura countered in grudging tones, ‘And he’s stubborn, inclined to be bad-tempered, and despite it being his idea that we have this understanding, he can get jealous of my closeness to Vicki.’ She sighed at the irony of life. ‘Sometimes I think that if only Vicki was Ince’s child, it would be so much easier.’

  ‘Well, she isn’t,’ Tressa said, sounding like a stern matron. ‘Granted Ince is a kinder and gentler man altogether but your brief romance with him didn’t work out, remember? And you must have seriously considered marrying Spencer, you wouldn’t have an understanding with him otherwise. Think about it. It could be the answer to all your prayers.’

  Laura looked at the alarm clock on the bedside table and chided herself. ‘I must go. Vicki will be getting worried about me.’

  ‘Don’t change the subject, Laura.’

  ‘I wasn’t going to, Tressa,’ she said, handing Guy to her. She grinned ruefully. ‘But it isn’t as easy as going up to Spencer and saying, “Hey, I want a baby, let’s get married now.” But if it makes you happy, I promise I’ll go away and think seriously about it.’

  When Laura had gently closed the door behind her, Tressa listened to the light steps descending the stairs. She pictured Laura running into Rosemerryn Farm and hugging and kissing the six-year-old girl with the perfect heart-shaped face, flawless skin and white-gold hair, a girl so like Laura she could be her own daughter. Tressa gazed down adoringly at the child in her arms, and after the fierce new feelings she had experienced within the last hour, whispered knowledgeably, ‘A woman will do anything for the child she loves.’

  Chapter 2

  Laura had to wait to share her joy over the new baby with little Vicki Jeffries. When she leaned her bicycle against a granite wall at Rosemerryn Farm, she was frightened to hear Vicki screaming and a lot of urgent shouting coming from the kitchen.

  First, however, she had to get past Barney, Spencer Jeffries’ irascible big Border collie who made a point of leaping out at her from behind barns, farm vehicles and the tops of grey moorstone walls. Strangely, Barney was nowhere in the yard but thoughts of Vicki being hurt or terrified would have given Laura the authority needed to order him off today.

  She ran through the mist into the farmhouse and found Vicki, Spencer, and Ince Polkinghorne, Spencer’s farmhand and closest friend, at the sink.

  ‘Keep your hand under the water, Spencer!’ Ince was saying roughly. ‘It’s the best way to stem the bleeding.’

  ‘No, it isn’t,’ Spencer returned angrily, struggling to get free of Ince’s strong grasp. ‘You’re supposed to tie a cloth or something round it.’

  ‘What’s going on?’ Laura raised her voice over the hubbub.

  Vicki, who was still screaming and jumping up and down, turned round first. ‘Laura!’ she squealed, running to her. ‘Help Daddy! He’s nearly cut his hand off.’

  ‘What?’

  Her heart in her mouth, Laura rushed to the sink to see for herself. Spencer had a deep gash across the back of his left hand and due to the men’s struggles, blood-streaked water was splashed on them, all over the sink, the mat under their feet and the well-worn linoleum. There were spots of blood on Vicki’s cotton dress and cardigan too.

  ‘Let go of him, Ince,’ Laura ordered, tugging on Ince’s hands. ‘You’re thinking of the right treatment for a burn. You need to put pressure on a cut that deep.’

  ‘Oh.’ Ince let the arm go so abruptly that Spencer lost his balance and fell to the floor. He roared with rage. Vicki jumped in fright and clutched Laura’s skirt. Laura hugged her close.

  ‘That’s enough of that!’ Laura shouted at Spencer. ‘You’re frightening Vicki.’ She wouldn’t allow any behaviour that was detrimental to the peace and security of the little girl she had grown to love so much. She snatched a tea towel off the draining board and tied it swiftly and tightly round his hand. ‘You’ll have to take him to hospital and have it stitched, Ince.’

  ‘I’m not going to the damned hospital,’ Spencer bellowed, using his good hand to lever himself to his feet.

  ‘You’ll have to,’ Laura asserted, ignoring the fury building up behind his stone-grey eyes. ‘Don’t be silly. You can’t work on the farm like that and you’ll have to have treatment to stop your hand getting infected.’

  Spencer muttered something foul under his breath; he hated what he felt was Laura’s occasional superior attitude with him.

  ‘Daddy said a bad word!’ Vicki exclaimed, putting a hand to her lips.

  Laura wanted to dig him cruelly in the ribs; Vicki overheard a few too many ‘bad words’ from her father. It was time she had a word with him, but not right now.

  Ince had heard it too, wasn’t prepared to wait, and tut-tutted at him. ‘Watch your mouth, Spencer.’

  Spencer was sorry his daughter had heard him swear but was too stubborn to admit it to the two adults.

  ‘Oh, very well, I’ll go to the hospital if I must,’ he uttered ungraciously. Then he turned on Laura in a tone that was designed to make her feel guilty. ‘Where have you been? You should have been here ages ago. If you had then this wouldn’t have happened.’

  Laura glanced guiltily at the ormolu clock on the mantelpiece but she was cross that he should blame her. Rather than argue with him, she looked at Ince for an explanation. He shot Spencer a look full of pique and shook his head scornfully.

  ‘He collected Vicki off the school bus then left her in here playing. We’re going to pull down the old trap house, it’s getting far too dangerous, and he came to help me with some junk I was turning out. He was complaining he was hungry and was peeved that you were late cooking the meal. He was tossing things about in a temper—’

  ‘I wasn’t!’ Spencer protested tartly.

  ‘You were.’ It showed in Ince’s honest, dependable face that he wouldn’t be shifted from his own irreproachable stance. ‘And that’s when a box of old rusty nails and tools fell from the top of a wobbly shelf and hit him. He put up his hand to save his head and was struck by a chisel. He’s probably got bruises on his arms and shoulders as well.’

  Spencer retreated into an indignant silence. He felt that his best friend had betrayed him and made him look a fool in front of Laura and his daughter; Vicki had adopted the same exasperated expression on her sweet little face.

  Laura was wondering, as she sometimes did, how she could ever have seriously considered marrying this man.

  ‘Would you run upstairs and fetch Daddy a clean shirt, please, Vicki?’ Laura said in an imperious tone. ‘He can’t go to the hospital looking like that.’

  ‘I’ll go up and change my shirt too,’ Ince murmured.

  When Ince and Vicki had left the room, Spencer let out a loud huff.

  ‘What was that for?’ Laura asked, surveying him impatiently.

  ‘I don’t like being treated like a bloody child.’

  ‘That is not my intention,’ Laura said in a voice as if she was trying to explain something to a difficult adolescent. ‘You’ve received a serious injury and you need all the help and consideration you can get. You’re trembling. You’re probably shocked. L
et me help you sit down.’

  Spencer realised he was shaking from head to toe. If he didn’t sit down soon he’d probably fall down. Laura put her hands firmly about him and he was grateful for the warmth and comfort they gave. Feeling ashamed of his outbursts and bad language, he allowed her to lead him to a chair at the table.

  Relieved that he was at last acting sensibly, she began to unbutton his shirt. ‘This is ruined. There’s oil on it and it’s badly torn.’

  ‘Better than losing my hand,’ he sighed, gazing at the blood-soaked tea towel wrapped round it. He grimaced as a sharp pain shot through his hand. It would have been good to rest his face against Laura’s soft, fragrant body, but their relationship hadn’t progressed in twelve months beyond the friendly understanding that one day they would get married for Vicki’s sake, the understanding coming hard on the heels of Laura’s rescue of Vicki and eight other children from the village school which had been burnt to the ground.

  Easing off his shirt, Laura looked at Spencer’s broad shoulders and muscular torso. ‘You’ve got a few grazes and bruises and a small cut on your neck. The nurses will clean you up.’ She could have washed off some of the dust and oil from his body and his thick fair hair herself but felt it might not be appreciated. Most of the time he was unapproachable and it seemed too intimate a thing to do.

  Spencer sighed in contrition. ‘I’m sorry I shouted at you. You were only trying to help. I shouldn’t behave like that in front of Vicki.’ For Vicki’s sake he always brought their arguments to a quick end. Vicki adored Laura and her constant presence at Rosemerryn gave his daughter, peace and security. And while he wanted this beautiful young widow’s influence in his daughter’s life, he was also greatly attracted to her.

  ‘No, you shouldn’t, especially using such bad language,’ she replied, then her face softened. ‘But I understand how you must have felt, Spencer.’ She never stayed angry with him for long. When he dropped his habitual guardedness, like now, and relaxed his chary bearing, his bold fair features, weathered arrestingly by thirty-seven years of moorland life, looked so much more like Vicki’s. She had a sweet outgoing nature and Laura felt a similar one in Spencer lurked not too far below the surface.

  The nation was in the grip of tight petrol rationing but Ince calculated there was just enough in the tank of Spencer’s old but reliable Ford to get them the nine miles to Launceston and back.

  While the men were at the hospital, Laura cleaned up the messy sink area, scrubbed the mat and washed the bloodied clothes. She had a meal cooked and keeping hot for all of them when the men got back.

  Vicki, now in her nightclothes, made a fuss of her father, who in her imagination, instead of suffering an accident, had got the wound on his hand by bravely fighting off a screeching spirit that had risen from the marshes on the moor. She climbed gingerly up onto his lap as he sat in his chair by the fire, while Ince helped Laura dish up the pork casserole.

  ‘Did the doctor sew up your hand the same as when Laura darns our socks, Daddy?’ Vicki asked softly, cuddling into Spencer’s neck while staring at his expertly bandaged hand. The love between father and daughter was deep and manifestly clear.

  ‘Yes, pipkin, but he gave me something to take the pain away.’ He kissed the top of her white-gold hair.

  ‘Does it hurt now?’

  ‘No,’ he lied.

  He glanced at the pair at the table and was extremely irritated to see a warm look pass between them. He had seen them exchange many such looks, too many for his liking, and he wondered if the brief romance they’d had soon after Laura had moved into Kilgarthen was really over. There was definitely a spark of something left between them and he feared it might be rekindled. Ince was quiet and unassuming but he must know he was stepping on Spencer’s feet, and as for Laura, she had no right to flirt. It might be old-fashioned, but she was promised to him and maybe it was time he did something to remind them of it.

  He forcefully interrupted their cosy talk. ‘Why were you late getting here today, Laura?’

  Vicki suddenly sat up straight and her sharp movements hurt his hand. ‘I can tell you that, Daddy,’ she piped up excitedly. ‘Laura told me all about it. Tressa had a baby boy and Laura fetched him for her.’

  ‘The Macarthurs have a son?’ Ince said delightedly, looking at Laura as he carried the empty casserole dish to the sink. ‘That’s wonderful. Praise the Lord. Did I hear Vicki right? You delivered the baby?’

  ‘That’s right,’ Laura replied, once more washed over with the emotions she had experienced a few hours ago on Tregorlan Farm. ‘The baby arrived just before the midwife and Andrew did.’

  ‘Goodness. Jacka must be over the moon. Male kin on his farm again since his sons were killed in the war.’

  ‘That’s good news,’ Spencer said unenthusiastically, narked that Ince had taken over the conversation. Seeing the food was ready on the table, he motioned for Vicki to get down off his lap. ‘You and Vicki should have eaten,’ he chided Laura as they approached the table. ‘It’s late for Vicki. She has to go to school tomorrow.’

  ‘Sorry,’ Laura said, but she wasn’t really. ‘We didn’t know how long you would be at the hospital and she wouldn’t have been able to go to sleep until she was sure you were properly patched up.’

  She wasn’t prepared to eat under Spencer’s disapproval and talked to Ince, mindful of what she said because young ears were listening. Vicki thought she had brought Guy to the farm in her shopping bag and she felt it wasn’t her place to tell her anything different. ‘I think it’s got to be the most moving experience of my life. Thankfully Tressa had an easy time. The baby was well over eight pounds and is the image of Andrew. They’ve called him Guy.’

  ‘Guy?’ Spencer said mockingly, inadvertently sprinkling too much salt on his meal. ‘A bit highbrow for a farmer’s daughter’s baby, isn’t it?’

  ‘Andrew chose names for a boy and Tressa for a girl,’ Laura retorted, vexed by his sourness. ‘What’s wrong with Guy? It’s a nice name.’

  ‘I like it,’ Vicki said innocently.

  ‘You can’t do better than choose a name from the Bible, I think,’ commented Ince.

  ‘Talking of that,’ Spencer said, ‘you were thinking of offering to help out one of your Methodist friends at his smallholding this evening, weren’t you?’

  ‘Yes, Les Tremorrow’s hurt his back, and as he’s getting on a bit I thought he might be grateful for a hand round the place. But the work here comes first. You won’t be able to do anything much for a few days, at least not until you’ve had the stitches out.’

  This hadn’t occurred to Spencer and he dropped his fork which clattered to the floor. ‘How are we going to manage? There’s ditching and harrowing to do, then the tilling.’

  ‘I’ll help of course,’ Laura said, fetching him another fork.

  ‘Thanks, but you can’t do everything I do.’

  ‘We’ll manage,’ Ince said soothingly. ‘Felicity and Harry will almost certainly come over from Hawksmoor and when folk find out what’s happened, there will be plenty of offers from the village.’

  ‘And I break up from school tomorrow,’ Vicki added, yawning. ‘I’ll help too.’

  ‘Right now, darling,’ Laura said, smiling tenderly at her, ‘you’d better go up to bed.’

  Vicki got up from the table, rubbing her eyes. She moved to her father and he bent his head to kiss her goodnight; it was taken for granted Laura would put her to bed. ‘Tressa’s a mummy now, Daddy. I want Laura to be my mummy. Say she can. I want her to live here all the time with us. And I want brothers and sisters like the other children at school.’

  This was a plea that Vicki brought up often. Although a part of him had wanted to do something about it, Spencer had always withdrawn at the thought and made an excuse, but smarting under the display of affection he’d witnessed again between Laura and Ince, tonight his answer was totally different. He replied in an assertive voice, ‘I’ll see what I can do, pipkin.’

 
Laura tried not to show her astonishment as she headed for the door that led immediately to the stairs. Ince excused himself with an embarrassed look on his rugged face and went outside to get on with the evening milking.

  Laura managed to get Vicki into bed but the little girl was very excited after what her father had just promised her. ‘You will marry Daddy, won’t you?’ she squeaked, clinging to Laura’s neck when she kissed her goodnight. ‘Say you will.’

  ‘It… it’s not as simple as that, Vicki,’ she answered, flustered: even though Tressa had said it was.

  She felt like thumping Spencer for dropping his dramatic sentence on them like that. It struck her then that she often wanted to thump Spencer over his grumpy or contrary behaviour. She had been reading an article in Woman’s World last night about one’s behaviour having hidden motives; the magazine suggested her motive was a secret desire to touch the man in her life. Rubbish, she told herself. But her cheeks were crimson when she asked Vicki, ‘Now what story would you like me to read, darling?’

  ‘I don’t want a story,’ Vicki said, putting on the appealing face that usually resulted in her getting her own way. ‘I want you to say you’ll be my mummy.’ She held up her favourite doll. ‘So does Lizzie. You do want to, don’t you? Can I call you Mummy now?’

  Laura’s heart was torn. She would love to be her mother but there was much to consider before marrying Spencer. She had one bad marriage behind her. Bill Jennings had despised her, using her only as a springboard to the board of directors of her father’s building company. Six months after her father had died in 1947, Bill had choked to death in a hotel fire and it had turned out he had bankrupted the company. Laura had been left with Bill’s cottage in Kilgarthen, a small amount of savings and some valuable jewellery. Months later it had transpired that she also owned half the village shop so she was financially secure. Marriage to Spencer wouldn’t change that but a great many other things would change. She would have to give up her independence, being able to please herself as she came and went. She would be much closer to Vicki, of course, but if life with Spencer proved to be incompatible it could hurt Vicki most of all.