The Winter Promise

by Rosie Goodwin

  ‘Oh yes?’ She could tell that he was only listening with half an ear, but her next statement made his head snap up.

  ‘The thing is . . . your mother encouraged me to see the doctor this morning. I’ve been feeling unwell for some time and he told me . . . that I – we – are going to have a baby!’

  ‘What?’ A look of incredulity crossed his face and for a moment he seemed lost for words before he blustered, ‘But . . . are you quite sure?’

  She nodded. ‘Very sure. The doctor thinks it should be born early in June.’

  It took a lot to make Henry lose his appetite. Usually he could eat like a horse, but suddenly he pushed his plate away and, hurrying round the table, he dragged her from her seat and waltzed her round the room.

  ‘But . . . but that’s wonderful!’

  She was delighted to see how thrilled he was. He had paid her so little attention for the last few weeks, but now he was elated.

  ‘There is a nursery already prepared for when my last . . .’ His voice trailed away and he hurried on. ‘But of course, I give you free rein to redecorate it as you see fit. I want my son to have the best of everything – the best clothes, the best education . . . just everything!’

  ‘But it could be a little girl,’ she gently pointed out.

  But nothing could spoil his good mood. ‘Then if it is, we shall perhaps have a boy the next time,’ he said stoically, and Opal felt happy – really happy – for the first time in some long time.

  That afternoon when he had reluctantly gone back to work, she passed on the good news to the staff, and asked Mrs Wood for the key to the nursery. She had never ventured in there before, but now she wished to see it. Everyone apart from Mrs Wood seemed thrilled that there was to be a baby in the house, and the woman reluctantly handed over the key saying spitefully, ‘Let’s just hope the same thing doesn’t happen to you as to the last Mrs King.’

  But even her spite couldn’t dampen Opal’s spirits that day and, taking the key, she walked away from her.

  The minute she entered the nursery, her mood became sad as she thought of the poor dead baby it had been prepared for. Clearly a lot of thought and money had gone into it but Opal wanted to put her own stamp on the room and she began to plan how she wanted it. I shall have white walls, she thought, and then it won’t matter if it’s a boy or a girl. And I shall order a new crib too. It seemed just too sad to think of putting her baby in the crib that had been bought for another. That very afternoon she walked into town and bought some wool. Cook had told her that she would teach her how to knit and she wanted to make some little matinee coats.

  Charlie was disgruntled at being left behind, but today all Opal’s thoughts were centred on the baby.

  ‘I think we should throw a little dinner party to celebrate,’ Henry told her that evening as they sat by the fire after dinner.

  Delighted that he was so happy with the news, Opal smiled at him indulgently. ‘Of course, if that’s what you’d like. I’ll speak to Mrs Wood about a menu. You just let me know how many people will be coming.’

  He reached across to pat her hand. ‘I have a feeling this is going to be the best Christmas ever!’

  Opal could only hope that he was right.

  The next week passed in a pleasant blur, and Opal found that Henry had once again become the man he had been before they were married: kind, considerate and generous.

  ‘I’m going to start paying you a monthly allowance. You’ll need new clothes when you, er . . . you know?’

  Opal giggled. ‘Get fat, you mean?’

  She had already had two enormous Christmas trees delivered, which she had decorated with candles and shining glass baubles and now with vases of holly everywhere the house was looking very festive. Then one morning, she woke and lay there waiting for the usual nausea to set in, but it didn’t. Usually the second she opened her eyes she would end up leaning over the bed heaving into the chamber pot, but this morning there was nothing. She lay still for a few minutes more, hardly daring to hope the morning sickness had passed then tentatively sat up and swung her legs out of bed, but there was still nothing. If anything, to her delight, she felt as fit as a fiddle and suddenly she was ravenously hungry.

  The dinner party was set for the following week, the week before Christmas, and Opal started to look forward to it, although she doubted that their good news would come as a surprise to any of the guests. Henry was so thrilled at the prospect of becoming a father that he was telling anyone that would listen, and Opal suspected their guests would already know by then.

  One of the first to arrive on the evening of the dinner party was Esther Partridge and her mother, and as Opal and Henry greeted them at the door it was clear they had heard the news.

  ‘I hear there is to be an addition to the household,’ Esther commented bitterly, pointedly ignoring Opal as Eve took her hat and coat.

  ‘There certainly is.’ Henry couldn’t stop smiling, and didn’t even seem to notice that Esther seemed to be rather scathing about it.

  ‘Opal has already had decorators in to start work on the nursery and she’s costing me an absolute fortune. Not that I mind, of course.’

  Luckily the doorbell rang again then, and he and Opal turned their attention to greeting the next guests to arrive as Esther stamped into the drawing room. Soon everyone was there and after drinks they were all shown into the dining room. Opal had dressed the table herself and it looked very festive. The mood was light – apart from Esther’s that was, who seemed to be drinking rather a lot of wine.

  They were on the main course when Esther suddenly asked, ‘So when is the child due?’

  ‘The beginning of June,’ Henry answered, and Esther’s lip curled as a silence momentarily settled around the table.

  ‘Hm, so you won’t have quite so much time to spend up Tuttle Hill then? I just wonder what the attraction is there for you.’

  ‘Pardon?’ Opal felt herself blush. ‘I go there because I like walking Charlie along the canal.’

  Esther sneered, but thankfully someone else spoke at that moment and the subject was dropped.

  By the time the meal was over, it was quite clear that Esther was more than a little drunk; even her own mother looked slightly embarrassed as she began to grow louder and slur her words.

  ‘Well, I have to shay for a girl from Rapper’s Hole you’ve done quite well for yourshelf, haven’t you?’

  A deadly silence settled on the room until Mrs Partridge suddenly said loudly, ‘It’s been a lovely evening but I think we should be going, Esther. The snow has held off up to now but I think we should get back in case it starts and I’m rather tired.’

  Esther left without protest, but the night was ruined for Opal and she wondered why Esther seemed to hate her so much. She’d always known that the other woman had had her eye on Henry for some long time, but even so surely there was no need for her behaviour towards her. It wasn’t as if she had forced Henry to marry her, after all.

  As they were getting changed for bed, Opal mentioned it to Henry. ‘I really don’t know why Esther is so rude to me.’ She could still clearly remember the time Esther had tried to make it appear she had stolen her ring.

  He grinned. ‘Don’t worry about it, my dear. Esther made it more than clear to me after the death of my first wife that she would like to become the next Mrs King, but I can assure you she holds no attraction for me whatsoever. To be quite blunt, I wouldn’t marry her if she were the last woman on earth. But there – forget about her and don’t let her spoil the evening. It went well, didn’t it? Oh, and I have a little gift for you.’

  ‘But it isn’t Christmas yet,’ Opal pointed out.

  Henry chuckled. ‘This is my gift to you for making me a very happy man.’ He fetched a long, velvet box from his dressing table drawer and when Opal opened it, she gasped. It was an emerald and diamond bracelet.

  ‘Oh, but it’s beautiful.’

  He laughed as he fastened it about he
r wrist. ‘You deserve it. You are going to make my dream of becoming a father come true, and this will be the first of many.’

  Opal smiled up at him. In truth she wasn’t overly fond of jewellery, but it was nice to see him so happy. ‘You really don’t have to spend your money on things like this for me,’ she assured him. ‘I already have everything I need.’

  But he waved her words aside.

  They got into bed but Henry made no move towards her. In fact, she realised, he hadn’t since she had told him the good news. He was so afraid of anything going wrong that he didn’t want to risk hurting her. Opal smiled into the darkness. Perhaps this would be a turning point in their relationship. She hoped so.

  Chapter Forty

  They spent Christmas quietly at home with Henry’s mother and, despite the fact that Opal often thought of the family she had lost, she enjoyed it. It had started to snow two days before and everywhere looked clean and bright, but Henry was concerned about her going out on walks with Charlie.

  ‘What if you slip and fall?’ he fretted.

  She laughed. ‘I’m very careful, and the doctor assured me that gentle exercise is good for me and the baby.’

  He sighed, but said no more. For Christmas, he had bought her the necklace to match her bracelet, and although Opal thanked him profusely, for she didn’t wish to appear ungrateful, she wondered where she would ever go to wear it. It was beautiful and she guessed it must have cost a great deal of money, so she tucked it safely away in her drawer, certain that it would rarely see the light of day. He had bought her a number of costly pieces of jewellery now and she didn’t have the heart to point out to him that she rarely wore them.

  But as it turned out she got to wear them sooner than she expected when on New Year’s Eve they again attended a ball at Peter’s house in Caldecote, and for the first time, as she got ready, Opal noticed that her clothes were getting rather tight about the waist.

  ‘Eeh, I’m strugglin’ to do the buttons up on this,’ Eve said as she helped her into her gown.

  Opal giggled. ‘I’m not surprised; I’m eating like a horse. I shall be the size of a house at this rate by the time the baby comes.’

  ‘Ah, but you’re eatin’ for two now,’ Eve answered with a happy smile. She was looking forward to having a baby in the house.

  When Opal went downstairs, she found Henry waiting for her in the hall, and he smiled when he saw that she was wearing her emerald necklace and bracelet. They complemented the pale-green satin gown she was wearing and with her skin glowing she looked radiant.

  ‘You’ll be the most beautiful woman at the ball,’ he told her as he helped her on with her new fur-lined cape – another Christmas present from him – and smiling they went out to the waiting carriage.

  When they arrived at Peter’s splendid home, Opal scanned the room and was vaguely disappointed when she saw no sign of Matthew – but then she gave herself a mental shake as she kept her smile firmly in place. She was a married woman and an expectant mother into the bargain, so she must put him from her mind.

  It was Emma who explained his absence sometime later as they stood chatting. ‘Poor Matthew couldn’t attend this time,’ she said regretfully. ‘Alicia is far from well again and he’s growing really concerned about her. Still, we won’t speak of sad things this evening. Come along and I’ll introduce you to some of the guests you may not have met.’

  The evening passed pleasantly, although Opal was glad when it was over and they could go home. She still felt a little out of place at such events and was finding that she tired more easily nowadays – no doubt due to the little life growing inside her. At the thought of the baby, she smiled as the carriage rattled along, and her hand fell to stroke the tiny mound of her stomach. In just a few months’ time, she would be a mother and she could hardly wait.

  The winter was harsh and worse still for the people who lived in the pit cottages in Tuttle Hill, for at the end of December the miners went on strike and soup kitchens were opened in the town. At least two or three times a week, Opal got the cook to fill a basket with food that they could share amongst them, which she delivered when she took Charlie on his walk. It wasn’t much, she knew, but she supposed that every little helped. She couldn’t bear to think of the children going hungry. She was painfully aware that Henry wouldn’t approve of what she was doing, but she reasoned that what he didn’t know wouldn’t hurt him, and Cook assured her that he would never find out from her.

  On a wet and windy day early in March, Opal set off with a loaded basket and Charlie on his lead. She was thoughtful as she walked along, for the night before she had woken to find Henry was not in bed in the early hours of the morning, and when she’d gone downstairs to find him she had seen him coming out of Mrs Wood’s room, which she had found rather strange.

  He was clad in his dressing robe and when he had caught sight of her coming along the hallway he had almost jumped out of his skin.

  When she had looked at him enquiringly, he had blustered, ‘Sorry if I disturbed you, m’dear. I was sure I heard something downstairs and thought I’d better ask Mrs Wood if she had. She hadn’t as it happens, so let’s go back to bed, shall we?’

  It was the second time in as many weeks that this had happened, but she put it from her mind as she concentrated on staying upright in the strong wind.

  As soon as the cottages came in sight, she let Charlie off his lead and tapped at the door of the first one she came to.

  ‘Hello, luvvie,’ the woman said, her eyes dropping to the contents of the basket. ‘I didn’t expect to see you on such a cold and blustery day.’

  ‘Charlie here needs his exercise whatever the weather,’ Opal told her with a smile as she handed the basket over. ‘There’s a loaf and a few bits for each of the cottages in there, Mrs Green, if you wouldn’t mind sharing them out.’

  ‘Bless you,’ the woman said gratefully. ‘But just mind how you’re going now.’

  ‘I shall,’ Opal promised as she set off again. During the last month, her stomach had swollen to twice its size, and Eve teased her that she now waddled instead of walked. She was smiling as she made her way down the steep lane leading to the canal, and careful to keep away from the edge of the quarry as the drizzly rain had made the path slippery. She had not gone far past the cottages when she happened to glance across her shoulder just in time to see what appeared to be someone in a dark-green cape hurry into the shelter of the trees. She frowned; but then, thinking it was probably just one of the children from the tiny homes she had just passed, she went on her way, laughing at Charlie who was gambolling along some way ahead of her.

  And then suddenly she felt a pressure on her back. She had no time to turn to see who it was for someone was pushing her to the edge of the quarry.

  ‘No . . .’ she screamed but before she could say any more, she slipped on the wet mud. For a moment she felt as though she was flying as the deep quarry below rushed up to meet her. She was vaguely aware of Charlie growling and barking furiously as the bushes and broken trees growing from the quarry face tore at her clothes and then suddenly a tree stump was looming out of the steep sides of the drop. As she crashed into it, an excruciating pain ripped through her and the breath was knocked from her body, and then a welcoming darkness rushed towards her and claimed her.

  Mrs Green had just knocked on her neighbour’s door to deliver the food Opal had asked her to share when Charlie raced back up the lane towards her.

  ‘Hello, Charlie, what are you doin’ back here?’ she asked as she peered past him for a sight of his mistress, but she was nowhere in sight. ‘Where’s your mistress then, boy?’

  The dog was clearly agitated and running around her in a circle, before running a few paces back the way he had come and back again as if he was trying to tell her something.

  Her neighbour opened the door at that moment and she too frowned as she saw the dog.

  ‘So where’s Mrs King then? It ain’t like Charlie to leave her,’ Mrs Green
said, worried.

  ‘I know,’ her neighbour replied. ‘I’m wonderin’ if somethin’ is amiss. It’s as if he’s tryin’ to tell us somethin’. Do yer think we should go an’ have a look where she is?’

  ‘Aye, I do, an’ I’ll get our Will to come wi’ us.’

  Will was her son. He and his father were employed by the local pit and when his mother called him he threw his coat on and went willingly with the women down the lane as Charlie pranced ahead of them.

  Eventually Charlie stopped abruptly and, standing dangerously close to the edge of the quarry, he began to bark even more furiously.

  ‘So what’s to do then, boy?’ Will asked gently as he tentatively picked his way to stand by the dog. As he stared down into the deep quarry his face paled. ‘Mam!’ he yelled, throwing off his coat. ‘Run back home an’ tell me dad an’ any men yer can find to come straightaway. An’ tell ’em to bring a length o’ long rope. The young mistress ’as gone over the edge but she’s caught on one o’ the trees. We have to try an’ get her up afore she falls.’

  His mother was off like a shot from a gun and soon she was back with a number of the miners from the cottages.

  ‘One of us is goin’ to ’ave to go down an’ try to bring her back up,’ Mr Green said and Will instantly volunteered.

  ‘I’ll go, Dad. Tie that rope round me waist an’ lower me down gently as yer can. I’ll try an’ bring her back up across me shoulder. But make sure you all hold on tight, else the two of us could end up at the bottom o’ the quarry.’

  He began to tie the rope securely about his waist and once the rest of the men had a firm grip on it he gingerly swung himself over the edge, finding footholds wherever he could. After what seemed like a lifetime, he finally reached the jutting tree but he realised that this had been the easy part; now he had to find a way to get a heavily pregnant woman back up the steep and slippery incline.