‘I hope you won’t be offended but I’d like to give you this.’ Celeste held out a five pound note.
Taking a mighty gulp, as if she was giving up all her pride, Dolores took the money and pushed it down the top of her dress. ‘Thank you.’
‘There’s no need for that. I hope it helps.’
Celeste returned to the fete with a smile on her face. Dear Ada Prisk and Jacka Davey. Because of her big, spiteful mouth and his gentle, truthful nature, Celeste thought her hopes for the Uren children might be quickly realised. She could not stay here much longer but with any luck she would see her plans come to fruition before she left.
‘Does that sort of thing happen every time you have an event in the village, Mother?’ Bruce Tambyln chuckled. He and Daisy had left the little shop stall to listen in on the proceedings. He was feeling cocky because he had tried to harass Harry Lean but Harry had ignored him. Bruce thought Harry wasn’t as brave as he had sounded at the time of the car incident in the lane, but Harry was keeping on his best behaviour today and he felt the brute would keep.
‘Well, there’s always a bit of gossip and sometimes the odd tiff but we’ve had nothing like that before,’ Daisy tut-tutted, sorry she had missed the beginning of the row. ‘Good for Jacka though, it was about time somebody said something like that. Oh, look, here comes Joy and her family. Doesn’t she look nice today? Joy seems to be getting younger these days. Must be having regular money in her purse with both her and Bert working.’
‘Yes, that must be it.’ Bruce picked up a packet of Spangles from a box on the trestle top. ‘I’ll pay for these, Mum. They’re for Joy’s kids.’
‘You are good to them, Bruce.’
‘I’ve only met the children a couple of times and they seem such a lovely family. Makes me realise what I’m missing out on. Look, Mum, why don’t you go and have a look around the stalls, get yourself a cup of tea or something, have a chat to Laura. I can manage here.’
‘Right then,’ Daisy said gratefully. ‘I’d like to meet Les Tremorrow’s granddaughter. I must say Les looks delighted. Angela must have done well for herself. Eve Pascoe is very well turned out.’ It was so good having Bruce with her. He more than made up for the loss of her late friend Bunty. Picking up her purse, Daisy went off to find someone who could fill her in on all the details of the row.
The Millers arrived at the stall and Joy, giving Bruce a secret look, introduced him to her husband. ‘You haven’t met Bert before. This is Mrs Tamblyn’s son, Bruce, Bert.’
Bruce wanted to laugh at the sight of Bert Miller. He was wearing his demob suit, a massive paunch stuck out like a ridiculous molehill through his jacket front and over the tight waistband of his trousers. His almost bald head shone like a beacon in shades of nut brown. The flesh on his trusting face looked as if it had given up the fight with the forces of gravity, his jowls hanging down like a bulldog’s. He had big trusting eyes like a puppy’s. He was short and he was ugly, his hands were stained with the earth he worked on and his nails were broken and dirty. He looked as boring as Joy said he was. And he looked stupid, as though he would find it impossible to string two coherent thoughts together. Bruce knew he himself was no great catch but it was no wonder Joy had turned to him, he thought scathingly.
Bert let go of the hand of a nine-year-old girl who resembled Joy in every fine detail and shook Bruce’s hand shyly. ‘Pleased to meet you at last, Mr Tamblyn. We were just on our way to the merry-go-round. We’d best get on, the children hate being kept waiting.’
So you’re intimidated by me, Bruce thought with pleasure. You’ll be a walkover if my affair with your wife ever gets out.
Joy lingered to talk to her lover. ‘He’s going to a Buff’s meeting tonight and Mrs Grean, my neighbour, will sit with the kids while I take a little walk at seven o’clock. And he’s working at Tregorlan tomorrow afternoon. They get very busy at this time of the year. The kids are spending the day with their grandparents. I’ll be taking a little stroll to our usual place, about three o’clock.’
There was now a mother and child waiting to buy sweets. Bruce handed Joy the Spangles, squeezing her hand as he did so. ‘I agree with you, Mrs Miller.’ He left it at that; Joy knew what he meant.
Chapter 14
Laura had not heard the fierce quarrel between Ada and Dolores or witnessed its consequences. She had gone off in search of her husband and tracked Spencer down inside the house. He was standing in the elegant drawing room, his hands in his trouser pockets, gazing wistfully at a wedding photograph of himself and Natalie. It was normal for Spencer to seek a quiet corner away from a gathering but Laura knew he wasn’t here because of his dislike of crowds.
‘What are you doing in here?’ She closed the door behind her with an unfriendly thrust.
He turned and faced her, his posture, his sullen expression showing he was, like her, in a confrontational mood. ‘Is Vicki asking for me?’
‘No,’ she replied gruffly, ‘she’s quite happy with her grandmother. I asked you a question, Spencer.’
His face closed over. Slowly, he took his hands out of his pockets and clenched his fists at his side. ‘I wanted some peace and quiet.’
‘Why? You’ve only just arrived. Your habitual shyness of public occasions is a bit extreme today, isn’t it?’
‘If you’ve got something to say, Laura, then for goodness sake spit it out.’
‘Very well, I will,’ she retorted, lifting her chin defiantly. ‘I want you to know that I think your treatment of Ince is unfair. It’s gone far beyond a joke now. Ince and I are close, I won’t deny that, but for some reason you will insist on reading more into our friendship than is there. We had a romance once, now we’re good friends, and it’s time you accepted that without question. We’re no friendlier than we were before you and I got married. Why are you so jealous? I just don’t understand it.’
He came closer to her. ‘I never had a stake in your life until we were married. You could do as you pleased before. But now I baulk at the sight of you and my best friend being constantly all over each other.’
Laura had been steadily getting angrier since Spencer had snapped at her and Ince and stormed off. What amounted to an accusation little short of infidelity threw her into a rage. ‘We are not! Ince and I live and work on the same farm, for goodness sake. It’s inevitable that we sometimes share a joke or have a cosy chat. He’s my friend too, damn you.’
‘Andrew Macarthur’s also your friend, a very close friend from way back, but I never see you touching him or fussing over him.’ He was sneering now. ‘Perhaps your friendship with him didn’t go as far as it did with Ince. Just how close did you and Ince become when you had your romance?’
‘That’s none of your business.’ Laura was getting nervous as to where his questions were leading. ‘It’s all in the past and I’m only concerned with the future. Why can’t you be like that too?’
Spencer strode across the room and stood right in front of her. He looked as if he wanted to shake the soul out of her. ‘Look me in the face and tell me exactly what Ince meant to you. Tell me the truth!’
Laura stepped backwards but he came at her step for step. His hot breath scorched her skin. He had her trapped and the truth would have to come out. He had obviously thought this through at length. How long had these thoughts been going through his wretched mind? She tried to muster some dignity. ‘Get away from me. How dare you treat me like this.’
‘If nothing happened between you then why don’t you just say so? It’s all I want to hear.’
Laura’s face was burning. She couldn’t answer him. Spencer let out a demented howl as if he had been kicked in the bowels. ‘You went to bed with him, didn’t you? You were lovers.’
‘What if we were? What’s that got to do with us now and our marriage and Vicki?’
He grabbed her by the arms. ‘How do you think I feel? Knowing that the one man I would have trusted with my life, who sleeps under my roof and sits at my table, had my wife
before I did and you’ve both kept quiet about it? How did it happen? You were newly widowed and he’s very religious, the bloody hypocrite.’
Laura became wild at his outrage which to her was unjustifiable. Wrenching herself away from him, she cried, ‘I may have been newly widowed but I’d been starved of love for five years, remember? And Ince is not a hypocrite. We made love once, the circumstances of which I shall maintain till my dying day are none of your business, and we decided not to carry on with an affair. Ince is religious but he doesn’t pretend to be perfect. None of us are, especially not you, Spencer Jeffries.’
They were out of control now. Laura couldn’t tolerate his unreasonableness. Spencer couldn’t come to terms with the truth of his suspicions.
‘How can I be sure you only did it once?’ he hurled at her. ‘I think you’re in love, that you only married me because you wanted Vicki. And it suited you because it put you under the same roof as your lover. You’re probably carrying on your affair right under my nose.’ Laura smacked Spencer hard across the face, the sound rapping round the large room and echoing frighteningly in her ears. ‘You’re mad, you’re insane with jealousy. If you think you’re living in the shadow of mine and Ince’s old relationship, what about yours and Natalie’s? I’ve never thrown that up in your face. What did you want to come in here for and stare at her photograph?’
‘My wife wasn’t a slut!’
Laura felt as if she’d received a hammer blow to the core of her being. ‘You bastard, Spencer Jeffries! I should have followed my instincts on our wedding day. I knew it was a mistake to marry you then. You’re no better than Bill Jennings was. In fact you’re a hell of a lot worse.’ Several emotions and expressions vied for supremacy on Spencer’s cold hard face, then he made a choking sound and swept out of the room, slamming the door so violently it made the old house shake. Laura fell down on a settee and burst into tormented sobs.
Spencer pushed his way through the crowds, set on finding Vicki and taking her home.
Ince, on his way to join the male voice choir for their concert in front of the big house, saw his anguished face and hurried up to him. ‘What’s the matter, Spencer, are you ill?’
Spencer slowed down, letting Ince reach him. Then he struck out with his fist and hit Ince with all his might. Totally unprepared for the sudden onslaught, Ince fell to the ground, blood spurting from his nose and a split lip. He didn’t make a sound, he just stared uncomprehendingly at his friend while women screamed and men cried out in shock.
Spencer looked as though he wanted to murder Ince. ‘You’ve got until the end of the day to get your things out of Rosemerryn or I’ll burn everything you bloody own. Don’t let me ever see you on my property again or I swear I’ll shoot you.’
Still Ince said nothing. He knew what Spencer had found out. He couldn’t mention it with all these people around them and Spencer wouldn’t be reasoned with anyway. He felt dizzy and his vision blurred. A pair of soft arms encircled him and soothing words, which he couldn’t make out, were spoken softly in his ear. He wanted to whisper urgently, ‘No, Laura, leave me be. It’ll make matters worse.’ But his muddled brain couldn’t form the words.
‘What on earth did you do that for?’ Felicity demanded angrily of her former son-in-law. ‘Have you gone mad?’
Spencer looked at all the shocked faces. He hated them at that moment, the self-righteous, those who would be understanding, those who couldn’t wait to gossip about his sudden explosion of violence; he didn’t even feel sorry about Vicki’s frightened expression, her little heart-shaped face puckered and ready to cry. Throwing back his head, he sneered, ‘Let’s just say he had it coming to him.’
He took Vicki’s hand from Felicity’s and marched off with her. ‘But I want to watch the gymkhana,’ Vicki wailed, struggling to get her hand out of his. ‘Where’s Mummy? We were going to watch it together.’ Spencer picked her up and carried her away protesting.
A crowd was gathering for a second time around the source of unexpected entertainment. Ince heard them talking above him, a hazy loud hum that hurt his head. His mind began to clear and he gave up fighting against the woman holding him and dabbing at the blood streaming down his chin. He smelled violet scent and without opening his eyes he knew the arms round him were Eve Tremorrow’s.
Celeste went to the drawing room. She found Laura staring into space, pale and numb, trembling, hair all over the place where she’d been raking her hands through it. Laura had seen Spencer thump Ince from a window and she could hardly believe these terrible events of the afternoon had happened.
Putting her arms round her, Celeste hugged her close. ‘I think I know what this is all about, Laura. Were you and Ince lovers? Did Spencer find out?’
‘You’ve got it in one, Celeste Cunningham,’ Laura answered, her throat thick with bitterness. ‘It only happened once and it was a long time ago. I never told Spencer because I couldn’t see what it had to do with him.’
Giving Laura a clean handkerchief, Celeste sighed. ‘I was afraid something like this would happen, although I never guessed it would be so vicious. I think Spencer has been suspicious for a long time. I’ve noticed the way he’s looked at you and Ince, the special closeness you share is so obvious. I think Spencer is insecure where women are concerned after Natalie’s death. He never dated anyone, not even you, in the years in between. To know that you, his wife, and Ince have been as close as a man and woman can get must have undermined his confidence, especially as Ince is the last man you’d believe would make love unless he married first. Spencer always thought Ince was utterly honourable.’
‘Ince is an ordinary young man. Spencer has the habit of putting people on a pedestal. Are you saying I should have told Spencer about me and Ince, Celeste?’
Celeste pulled Laura’s head onto her shoulder. ‘It might have been wiser, Laura.’
Scalding tears pricked Laura’s eyes. ‘It didn’t seem necessary. My only concern was whether I should marry Spencer or not. I was nervous enough about that. What shall I do now, Celeste? My second marriage is a failure. Spencer called me a slut. He won’t want me any more.’
‘I’m sure he didn’t mean it, Laura. You both must have said a lot of cruel things in the heat of the moment. You’ll either have to walk away from Rosemerryn for good or try to patch things up.’
‘Oh, Celeste,’ she cried freely. ‘I wish I was like you, unencumbered, not looking for love in my life.’
This was so ironic Celeste had difficulty curbing her own tears over her fate. ‘You wouldn’t want to be like me, Laura, believe me. Don’t wish that on yourself.’ She didn’t want Laura to ask questions about her so she changed the subject. ‘Would you like me to make you some tea? I’m sure I could find the kitchen.’
‘N-no. I just want to sit here and wait for all the villagers to go home. Would you mind? I’d like to be alone for a while. I have a lot of thinking to do.’
Celeste kissed her and left the room. She stopped Harry going in. ‘She wants to be alone, Harry.’
‘Isn’t there something I can do?’
‘No, just leave her be, I beg you.’
Harry made a grim face. ‘I’ll go and find Mother. She’s terribly upset. She’s worried that Spencer won’t let us have anything to do with Vicki again.’
‘I don’t think he’ll do that. What happened has nothing to do with you two, but I should tread carefully for a while.’ Celeste recalled Harry’s earlier diplomacy. ‘Listen, Harry, if you were serious about helping the Urens, there’s a meeting at the parsonage on Tuesday evening.’
‘Who’s going?’
‘All the people I mentioned and one or two others.’
Harry stopped the urge to grin. ‘You can count me in.’
Laura sat for a long time in the sanctuary of the drawing room. She couldn’t face the villagers. The sudden appearance of Eve Pascoe and Ada and Dolores’ quarrel had been overshadowed by her husband’s act of brutality. Speculation over its cause would be bounc
ing about like a fierce shower of rain on a moorland pond. Felicity looked in on her, couldn’t bring herself to say anything and rushed away in floods of tears. Laura stayed put and cried long and hard again.
Andrew and Tressa came to her. He lowered himself down in front of her and took her trembling hands. ‘Do you want to talk about it, Laura? When you didn’t appear or leave with Spencer and Vicki, we knew the fight had something to do with you. You know what the obvious rumours are, don’t you? Others are saying that it’s crazy, with the way old Les’s granddaughter went to Ince, and your respectable character.’
She shook her head slowly. ‘How’s Ince? I saw what Spencer did to him.’
‘He’s been taken to Johnny Prouse’s cottage. He only took one blow but he looks as if he was hit by a tree. He can hardly stand up. Mike and the vicar are going to collect his things from the farm.’
‘Would you like to come back to Tregorlan with us, Laura?’ Tressa asked gently.
‘No, thank you. Will you give me a lift to Rosemerryn, please?’
‘Of course,’ Andrew replied. ‘Are you sure you want to go home right now?’
Laura got up and wiped away her tears. ‘My new life is in tatters but I married Spencer for better or worse. I’ve got to face him again at some time and it might as well be now.’
Chapter 15
Laura left Hawksmoor House as the hired help were dismantling the tents, seating and platforms. It was dusk, chilly winds were blowing off the moor and she shivered in her light summer dress. She did not say goodbye to Felicity. She could hear her crying in her bedroom, and from the apologetic look on Harry’s face it seemed his mother was blaming her for ruining the fete. Felicity wasn’t a strong-willed woman and was easily upset, partly a legacy of Spencer’s recalcitrance over her daughter’s death.
‘Don’t worry about what happened, Laura,’ Harry said softly, giving her a reassuring pat on the hand. ‘I think the fete-goers enjoyed the drama. Will you be all right?’
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