The Cobweb Cage

by Marina Oliver

  Since the middle of July he had carefully hoarded every reference to the war, when the Professor had finished with the paper and he had been able to carry it away from the library.

  He was compiling a scrap book, or rather, she thought with a shiver af apprehension, a series of them. The first was already full with reports of the diplomatic activities during July, and once war had been declared he had started another, which was rapidly filling up.

  'May I read them?' Marigold asked breathlessly when he finally appeared.

  'You haven't shown the slightest interest before,' he replied suspiciously. 'What's happened to change your view?'

  'I didn't think it was important earlier, and – my brother has enlisted, or is about to,' she replied. With an indulgent smile, for no-one else had taken any notice of his labours, he offered her the first book.

  'Read this first, then you can have the next,' he suggested.

  Marigold carried it away, and spent long hours poring over every account. The following day she borrowed the second book, and learned about the movements of the various armies, and the British Expeditionary Force, of which Edwin Silverman was a member.

  It was difficult to understand at first, but gradually she began to recognise the names of commanders and locations, and piece together a picture of what had happened. It kept her from madness, she thought afterwards.

  Having something to do gave her a purpose, made her feel closer to Richard. He was by now, she assumed, on Salisbury Plain, though she had as yet heard nothing from him. At some time he would be going to France, and at least she had an idea of the sort of conditions he would face, the type of country he would be flying over.

  Until the end of August she was convinced it would all be over swiftly. Maybe Richard would not even have to go to France. It could all finish before he'd completed his training.

  Then came the 'Amiens Dispatch' on the last Sunday of August.

  *

  'Marigold! There's a special edition of the Times!'

  Jim Dangerfield, his normally calm demeanour having deserted him, caught at Marigold's arm as she was carrying the children's breakfast tray upstairs.

  'Careful! Please!'

  'My dear! Oh, you saved it, thank goodness. What could I have been thinking of? But the Times! A Special Edition! On Sunday!'

  This was unheard of.

  'And look!' He waved the folded paper in front of her face. 'It's on the Front Page!'

  This was even more remarkable.

  'Has The Professor seen it?' she asked practically.

  'Not yet. He won't be down for half an hour or so. And it is on the front page. If we were very careful we could read it without unfolding it before I put it in the dining room. After all, he's not expecting the Times today, it's Sunday!'

  Marigold had seen the headlines and was not concerned whether she had to wreck the paper in order to read it. Instead of the usual page of advertisements the news item was starkly displayed.

  'The truth from the British Army. Tidal Wave. Our soldiers overwhelmed by numbers,' it read.

  'May I read it too? When I've taken up this tray?'

  'Of course.'

  Marigold was speeding upstairs. Minutes later she was back in the kitchen, where Jim had spread the newspaper carefully out on top of a clean white linen cloth.

  Together they pored over the details.

  'Then all they've been saying is a lie,' Jim groaned. 'Look at this! "The Germans advancing incessantly, while all the rest of France believes they are held near the frontier." How far have they penetrated? The troops are retreating.'

  'All of them? "The Staff had left. The artillery had left. The French were falling back." And look, still worse, "The tidal wave of German troops which has swept over North-Eastern France will spread still further unless a miracle happens." How far can they have got?'

  'This is dreadful. Look, it says we must send reinforcements, many of them. "We want men, and we want them now." But thousands have already enlisted.'

  They looked bleakly at one another, and Marigold thought of her vain hopes. It did not appear likely, if this were true, that the war would be over by Christmas. Richard would have to go to France. She might never see him again.

  *

  'Why can't I go and live with Lucy while you're in the army?' Ivy demanded.

  Johnny sighed. It must have been the tenth time she'd asked the question since he'd come home to make his farewells.

  'Lucy is living with her Mom,' he explained patiently. 'When it's all over you can come and stay with us, when we have our own home, I promise.'

  'But that might be years. Why can't I go now? She wouldn't let me be a bridesmaid,' she reminded him petulantly, 'she doesn't love me!'

  'Of course it won't be years, girl! And stop pestering poor Johnny, for heaven's sake!'

  John spoke sharply. He hated the very thought of his only son risking his life on foreign soil, and Ivy's persistance aggravated this feeling.

  Ivy stared at her father in surprise. He'd not had many of his inexplicable rages for some time. She was used to Poppy's bad temper, and Mom was sometimes tired and might speak crossly, but unless he was ill Pa always had time to listen to her, time to spend with her, admiring her drawings or helping her make brews and concoctions from the flowers and herbs she collected.

  'I'm sorry,' she whispered contritely, and went to kiss him.

  'We're all nervy,' he replied. 'Come and sit on your Pa's lap and be a good girl. Maybe we could all go and see Lucy one Sunday. Would she like that, young Johnny?'

  'Yes, she told me to say you'd be welcome any time. Not to stay, Ivy, because when I'm gone they'll have to let my room again, or they won't have enough to live on,' he warned, and was obscurely unsatisfied when Ivy smiled at him, her head on one side, and nodded.

  He glanced over at Poppy. She was getting thin and he wondered guiltily if she was having enough to eat. There was no shortage of food in the house, and it was better food than many people ate, but he'd noticed at dinner she left most of it on her plate.

  She seemed taut, her nerves ready to snap at any moment. He wasn't normally a very perceptive lad, but marriage had matured him rapidly, and he was more aware of the feelings of others since he and Lucy had achieved such a brief, if tenuous happiness. And yet when she cuddled her puppy, Scrap, she looked contented, almost happy, completely different from the sullen, apathetic girl who didn't appear to care for anyone or anything.

  'I'm going to see Tammy,' he said a few moments later.

  'Tammy' was the name they always gave to the pig. John swore by the Tamworth reds, and always had one in the sty at the end of the garden, fattening ready to kill before Christmas.

  Johnny was leaning over the wall, tickling the bright red fuzz of bristles on Tammy's back, when Poppy came and leant beside him.

  'When I'm fourteen, would Lucy help me find a job in Birmingham?' she asked abruptly.

  'Do you still want to go there? I remember the letter you wrote me years ago.'

  'I can't stand Hednesford much longer!' she groaned. 'Johnny, you escaped, you don't know how awful it is with Ivy mythering me all day, and never being able to go out, no friends to go with, and Marigold away, no one even to talk to except my darling Scrap. Without him I think I'd die!'

  By now she was sobbing and hiccuping, and Johnny awkwardly patted her on the back, muttering consoling words.

  'Will she? It's my turn. not Ivy's!' Poppy gulped, when she was more in control.

  'I'm sure she will,' Johnny reassured her. He didn't know what else to say. 'You write to her. She'd like to have letters from you, I know. She'll feel more part of the family then. Cheer up, now, and dry your eyes. It'd worry Mom to see you've been crying.'

  Poppy regained control, and nodded. She gave him a rather watery smile, blew her nose hard, and when they went back into the house made an excuse to busy herself for a while in the scullery.

  *

  Marigold was so intent reading the news of the
war, the initial battles and severe losses, and watching eagerly, hoping every day to receive one of Richard's hurried letters, that it was the middle of October before she gave a thought to herself.

  When it occurred to her that her monthly bleeding was long overdue, she was at first disbelieving. It took several days of nausea in the mornings before she admitted to herself that she might be pregnant.

  She relapsed into the numb resignation she had endured before her interest in the newspapers had awoken. For a week she didn't even try to think about the future. What was the point? What could she do?

  Then a few days passed when she quivered in panic, starting at every noise, and unable to think straight.

  Of one thing she was utterly determined. She would never regret loving Richard. Afterwards came a stubborn, perverse pride. She would be glad to bear his child, proud of the evidence of his love for her.

  Eventually she began to wonder how she could manage. Without help she would be doomed to a life of poverty and degredation, shunned by all decent people, never able to find another good job.

  Would Richard discard her now she was pregnant? Yet how could she worry him? Her parents would be utterly furious and ashamed, but they'd hardly turn her out of the house. Would they? But she'd be a tremendous drain on them, for she'd have to leave Oxford soon, when her body thickened and her situation became obvious.

  She recalled Lucy's quiet determination to accept the consequences if she and Johnny had not been able to marry. What Lucy could do, so could she. She would not permit this momentous change in her life to defeat her.

  Suddenly she was seized with a fierce determination that she would instead force life to give her things never before dreamed of. It wasn't a calamity. This child had been conceived of what, on her part at least, was an overwhelming, tremendous love. It would never suffer. She would work, she would plan and contrive, and make for Richard's child a far better life than she had yet known. She would do anything to ensure he had a good life.

  She would not tell Richard, though. She thought about this for a long time. It was unfair for him not to know, but he was about to go to France, to risk his life. He should not have further problems to face, more worries to distract him.

  He might even reject her, deny he was the child's father. After all, despite their love, he was from a different social class. He could not be forced to marry her, as would have happened if she'd become pregnant by a neighbour's son.

  She shuddered at the very idea. No-one else would ever mean anything to her, and even the thought of making love to another man was so repugnant she hastily thrust the possibility out of her mind.

  He would not wish to marry her. The idea was laughable, and she'd never even considered the possibility before. It was enough that for a time he loved her. To want more would have been greedy.

  She'd known he would one day lose interest in her, marry a girl from his own world, perhaps forget all about her. The parting had come early, that was all. First the war, tearing them from each other's arms, then this untimely appearance of the fruit of their love.

  Marigold began to make plans. There was little enough time, and she needed to know what she meant to do before she had to admit to her condition.

  *

  Mr Dangerfield was still avidly collecting news of the fighting.

  'From what we hear all of France might be overrun soon,' he said one Saturday morning when Marigold was in the kitchen. 'There's been fierce fighting, but thousands of men have enlisted and will soon be following the Territorials. I hear they're providing camps for the soldiers on Cannock Chase, near where you live.'

  'Yes, Pa wrote they've already started making roads and marking out sites. Lord Lichfield is offering land at Brocton, he said. A lot of workmen are lodging in Rugeley and Hednesford. and there's a tremendous amount of work to be done.'

  'I suppose there simply isn't room to accommodate them all in the barracks that exist, even though most of the Regulars have gone overseas. Almost a million men have enlisted, and I fear there'll be a need for many more.'

  'Let the girl go, Jim,' Mrs Dangerfield put in. 'It's her day off, and I'm sure she wants to go out.'

  Marigold was listless, afraid, but she needed to escape when she could from the house and her duties, to have time to think. Usually she went down to the river, to their trysting spot, where she could imagine Richard was with her.

  She'd been there for only a minute when he parted the curtain of slender branches and held out his arms. Hardly believing he was real she almost fell against him.

  'My darling, beautiful Marigold, how I've missed you!' he murmured.

  'How are you? When do you leave for France? Oh, Richard!' she cried, clinging urgently to him.

  'I'm well, and I go in two weeks. That's why I'm here. Time is so short.'

  'Two weeks?'

  'Yes. We have a lot to do. Marigold, I never realised how much I would miss you. Oh, this isn't how I'd planned it these last few weeks! I'm sorry. I meant to bring it up gradually, but it isn't possible! There's so litle time!'

  'You can't announce bad news gradually,' she said in a low voice.'

  'Bad news? Is that how you regard a proposal?'

  'A what?' She couldn't have heard correctly.

  'I'm still not doing it right. I'm trying, my darling, to ask you to marry me. At first I didn't think it would be fair to tie you down. You are still so young, and I was likely to be killed. Then I realised that even if I were, I could provide for you and leave you safely. It simply didn't cross my mind before. You will have me, won't you,' he added slowly.

  'How – how did you know? No-one else knows!' she said, her voice rising in a mixture of astonishment and panic.

  'Know what? Marigold, what is it? I thought – well, that you loved me. Don't you want to marry me? What is it I should know?'

  It was a dream, she told herself. And it didn't matter what you said in dreams. They weren't real.

  'I don't want you to feel sorry for me,' she tried to explain.

  'Feel sorry for you? Why should I? Marigold, sweetheart, I don't understand.'

  She took a deep breath. 'We're not from the same class, Richard. People would be shocked.'

  'We are not different, Marigold, because I was born into a wealthy family and you were not. And as for other people, it's not their lives, they have no right to criticise.'

  'That's the way the world is,' she said sadly. 'I don't mean just your family and friends, they'd be horrified enough to discover you were considering marrying a servant, but my family would be shocked too. They'd all think I'd trapped you. It wouldn't work.'

  'You're not a servant! That's just the job you do. It doesn't make you worse than anyone else. And I don't see where any sort of trapping enters into it, unless you call your beauty and sweetness a trap! But you'll have another job, as my wife, and one day, please God, if I survive, as the mother of my children.'

  'Then you don't know?' she asked, puzzled. The whole unprecedented situation had, it seemed, make her incapable of thinking.

  'Marigold, I swear I'll shake you if you don't explain yourself,' he said, laughing at her bemused look. 'What is it I should know?'

  'I'm pregnant,' she said baldly.

  Afterwards she was to marvel that he didn't for a second doubt the child was his.

  His eyes lit up, and after a few seconds of stunned immobility he gathered her gently into his arms, covering her face with feather-light kisses, murmuring incoherent endearments.

  They argued for an hour or more, Marigold protesting the unsuitability of herself as wife of a rich man, the scandal a marriage would cause, and the opposition of his parents. All her objections he swept aside with the retort that it was for them alone to choose.

  'My parents will accept you when they know how sweet you are and how much I love you,' he stated confidently. 'I want to marry you immediately, and I have a special licence with me. I am well over age, but we need your father's consent. Let's stop wasting precious tim
e and go and ask him!'

  Marigold felt battered. She could no longer fight. It was, after all, something she had longed for but hadn't ever dare contemplate. Her protests had all been to save Richard from making a quixotic gesture and ruining his life. But he'd asked her before he'd known about the baby, so it wasn't just to save her reputation or legitimise their child.

  She felt drained of everything. Her worries over his imminent departure, about her pregnancy, and her new determination to make a better life for her baby had exhausted her, and now she was prepared to let him assume responsibility.

  He swept her back to Gordon Villa, sent her upstairs to pack her few possessions while he spoke to Professor Roberts, and then whisked her out to his motor car which he'd parked round the corner before he followed her to their favourite spot.

  Then he drove straight into Hednesford, and they talked very little. She directed him to her street, and didn't even notice the following of excited children they collected, until they surrounded the motor car like a flock of eager starlings the moment it stopped outside her home.

  Richard viewed the children indulgently. He beckoned to an older, tough looking boy. 'A shilling if you make sure no-one climbs into it,' he suggested, and was reassured by the immediate response of the lad, who squared his shoulders and bunched his fists, and was marching up and down in martial fashion before they had reached the front door.

  Marigold came to earth with a bump. What was she doing knocking on her own front door? But how could she take Richard along the ginnel and through the communal back yard? Into the kitchen, with everyone unprepared? They weren't expecting her. It was all too complicated.

  When Mary opened the door, she exclaimed in alarm at the sight of Marigold and a strange man, a motor car behind them.

  'Marigold! Are you ill? What is it?'

  'May we come in, Mrs Smith?' Richard asked smoothly, aware of several interested neighbours standing on their doorsteps.

  Flustered, Mary apologised and stepped back. Then she narrowed her eyes and peered shortsightedly at the motor car. Surely it was the one in which she'd seen Marigold before!