Emma's Secret

by Barbara Taylor Bradford

  There was her darling Robin, handsome as the day was long, very dashing in his air-force uniform, his sensitive, finely drawn face quick and alert as he listened to everyone and talked to everyone, as usual the genial and articulate host. Robin sat between his sister Daisy and his Aunt Charlotte, who had always been drawn to him because of his similarity in appearance to Winston.

  For a moment her eyes rested on her elder brother, and her heart overflowed with love for him. He had always been her good right hand: devoted, loyal and hardworking. How happy he looks tonight, she thought, because Randolph, Georgina and baby Winston are here. He loved his family deeply.

  Now it was her nephew’s turn to undergo a moment of her fixed scrutiny. Randolph, sitting next to his wife, was tall, a little broader in the chest than Winston, and good-looking; it was obvious he was a Harte from the shape of his face and his colouring. He had eyes only for Georgina. A lieutenant in the Royal Navy, he wore his uniform with great aplomb.

  And so did Ronnie and Mark, David’s sons, who were both in the army, and seated on either side of Natalie. Handsome young men, dark-haired, with lively, intelligent blue eyes inherited from their grandmother Janessa Kallinski. How good that family had been to her when she had had no one except Blackie.

  David caught her studying his sons, and he smiled at her and winked. She was seated at the head of the table, and he was on her left. Blackie was on her right, as he usually was.

  ‘Quite a gathering of the clans, Emma,’ David murmured. ‘We’re all enjoying this wonderful meal, it’s delicious. And just look at all the boys…they’re practically smacking their lips. I bet they haven’t had food like this in a while.’

  She laughed, her green eyes sparkling. ‘I’m quite certain it’s a bit different from their usual fare,’ she murmured and, hearing Daisy’s sudden lilting laughter, she looked down the table, saw the fervent happiness on her daughter’s face, and her heart sank. Daisy was sitting next to David Amory, and she was absolutely fascinated by him, totally absorbed in the young Royal Air Force pilot. And I fully understand why, Emma thought, for a moment concentrating on him.

  David Amory was undoubtedly a charmer, and his looks were guaranteed to make him a target of women. Robin had described him as ‘a real pin-up boy, Ma, but he’s genuine, very sincere’. Robin had grinned at her and added, ‘It’s Daisy you should watch.’ It was his uncanny likeness to Paul which had first startled Emma when he had arrived with Robin last night. But slowly she was growing accustomed to him. It struck her again that he was as interested in Daisy as she was in him, and she wondered if he knew her daughter was only seventeen. She would make sure Robin pointed that out to him later. David was quite obviously well-bred, with impeccable manners, and Robin had told her he was from an old Gloucestershire family.

  As for Matthew and Charlie, the other two pilots from Biggin Hill, they were having a wonderful time, she could see that. Matthew had made her laugh uproariously earlier, when he had given her a rave review about the bathroom adjoining his bedroom, which was on one of the upper floors of the maisonette. He kept going on and on, exclaiming about the marble walls, the size of the bath, which he pronounced gargantuan, and the hot water. Not to mention the heated towel rail. ‘A bit different from our billets,’ he had explained.

  Matthew Hall, a lanky young fellow with brown hair and a sensitive face, seemed much more serious than the others. And yet he did have that lovely sense of humour, a wicked grin and a somewhat wry approach to life. She had taken to him immediately.

  Emma’s eyes moved to his friend. Charlie Cox, who was seated next to her niece Rosamunde, was obviously an experienced raconteur, and he was engaged in a long story which Rosamunde was listening to with obvious interest. He was a pleasant-looking, clean-cut young man, with the same fair-complexioned English colouring as Kit, and deep brown eyes, rather soulful. Emma decided that his quiet, almost ordinary looks belied a fatal charm. He’s deceptive at first glance, she thought, but she liked him.

  The quietest person at the dining table was her nephew Simon, Frank’s son, and as her eyes slid to him in concern Emma realized that he was enjoying himself after all. She saw how much he was appreciating the food, really relishing it, and there was a happy expression reflected in his light-grey eyes. He was a clever and studious boy, she knew that, and Frank and Natalie had great hopes for him–were planning to send him to Oxford. He looked more like his mother; there was not much Harte in him, she could see that most pointedly tonight. Although he did have Frank’s eyes and his finely wrought mouth and high cheekbones. As for Natalie, Emma decided she had never seen her looking prettier. She wore a silver-coloured silk cocktail suit, beautifully cut and very understated. It suited her extremely well, but Emma couldn’t help thinking how unusually thin Natalie was, and for a moment this troubled her.

  And then her attention was caught by Jack Field, who had appeared in the doorway of the dining room, inviting them to come back to the buffet table in the kitchen to select their desserts.

  ‘There’s quite a lot to choose from,’ Emma told Blackie and David Kallinski as they escorted her to the kitchen. ‘Hilda’s bottled fruits with hot custard, Christmas plum pudding with a brandy sauce, Christmas cake full of sultanas, currants, candied peel and sherry.’ She threw Blackie a quick glance, and added, ‘Just like those fruitcakes Mrs. Turner used to make in that other life of ours.’

  Blackie looked down at her, and put his arm around her shoulder, almost protectively, as thoughts of their past came flooding back to him. ‘I think I’ll be having a bit of each…I won’t be able to resist, and neither will David.’

  ‘Only too true,’ David Kallinski agreed. ‘But I’ve always loved your fruitcake.’

  After dinner, when everyone was replete with food, Robin ushered everyone into the drawing room. ‘For a sing-song, Mother,’ he told Emma, and thought to add, ‘Oh, by the way, I invited some other chaps over for drinks later, Ma; some American pilots I got to know recently. I hope you don’t mind.’

  ‘Of course not, Robin,’ she said, well used to the way her younger son did things on the spur of the moment. Long ago she had decided it was part of Robin’s charm, that spontaneity of his. He had an outgoing personality, a friendliness about him, and he enjoyed meeting new people, making new friendships. He definitely had a ‘hail-fellow-well-met’ air about him.

  Coffee was served in the drawing room by Grace. Georgina, Geraldine, Elizabeth and Daisy passed the cups around; Kit stoked the fire, piling more logs onto it, and Blackie walked over to the baby grand, lifted the lid and tinkled on the keys for a few seconds.

  ‘It’s in fine tune,’ he announced to the room at large, and then realized, much to his embarrassment, that this was rather a silly comment on his part. Anything to do with Emma Harte was always in fine tune, so to speak, whatever it was…exactly the way it should be.

  Robin, Bryan and Randolph acted as bartenders, pouring cognac for Blackie, Winston and Frank, and a crème de menthe for Charlotte. The other women declined, staying with the coffee.

  ‘There’s quite a lot of sheet music in the piano stool,’ Emma began, and stopped as the doorbell pealed loudly.

  ‘It’s my Yanks!’ Robin exclaimed, hurrying across the floor, out into the hall and down the stairs three steps at a time.

  Within a few minutes he came back, escorting the three young American pilots who entered the drawing room rather shyly, Emma thought. Her heart went out to them as they came over with Robin to be introduced to her. They were just boys.

  ‘Gee, thanks for having us, Mrs. Harte,’ Harry Trent said after Robin introduced them, shaking her hand enthusiastically, smiling. He was so tall she had to really crane her head to look him in the face.

  ‘It’s great to be with a family for Christmas,’ Phil Rodgers murmured, glancing around. ‘Beautiful place you have, Mrs. Harte, and thanks for having us. It’s just like being at home.’

  ‘It’s kind of you to have us over, ma’am,’ the third pilot, Ha
rvey Wilson, said. ‘This is better than the officers’ club any day.’

  Emma smiled and nodded and ushered them over to various chairs and asked them if they wanted anything to eat, as usual being her gracious and thoughtful self. None of them were hungry, it seemed, but they did accept the drinks Bryan and Randolph offered, and jumped up when Elizabeth, Daisy and Rosamunde came to speak to them.

  ‘Would you be excusing me, mavourneen,’ Blackie murmured, bending over Emma who was now seated with Winston on one of the sofas. ‘I think it might be a good idea for me to get this sing-song of Robin’s going, sure an’ I do.’

  ‘Oh yes, do do that, Blackie darling. It’ll be lovely. I know everyone’s going to enjoy it.’

  Striding over to the piano, Blackie sat down, made himself comfortable, and announced, ‘I’ll start this sing-song off then, and you must all join in…’

  ‘Go for it, Uncle Blackie!’ Kit called out, grinning.

  ‘I will, I will, lad, just give me a moment.’

  Blackie looked through the sheets of music, and then sat back, and began to play…it was a haunting melody, and everyone fell silent, touched by it, waiting for him to begin singing.

  In an instant Emma recognized it, and as Blackie started to sing the words her throat tightened with emotion, and she leant into the cushions and closed her eyes, let herself be carried back to the very first day she had met him. And she remembered what a shabby, starveling little creature she had been as she had hurried over the cold and windswept moors. And how he had come across her, as he walked out of the mist, asking the way to Fairley Hall. He had frightened the wits out of her…

  Blackie’s wonderful baritone rang out, filling the room. ‘“The Minstrel Boy to the war is gone, in the ranks of death you’ll find him. His father’s sword he has girded on, and his wild harp slung behind him…”’

  Not one voice joined in.

  The drawing room was totally silent as they listened to his wondrous voice, and so he sang another verse, and then moved on quickly, thinking that perhaps this first Irish ballad had been overly poignant. And so he sang an Irish jig full of tongue-twisting names, and once again Emma recognized it immediately. He had also sung this jig on that long-ago day, and he had made it his second one then. After the jig he sang ‘Danny Boy’, a ballad that was one of Emma’s favourites–and apparently everyone else’s, too, since they sat listening raptly, not moving.

  Finally, changing the mood, Blackie launched into one of the most popular songs of the day when he began to sing: ‘“There’ll be Bluebirds over the white cliffs of Dover, tomorrow, just you wait and see. There’ll be love and laughter, and peace ever after, tomorrow, when the world is free.”’

  As he started the next verse, Blackie lifted his right hand and waved it around, motioning to the others to join in. Elizabeth leapt to her feet and ran to the piano, and Daisy immediately followed. A second later, David Amory was standing next to her, his arm around her waist, Emma noticed.

  Others came too…Harry and Phil, the young American pilots, Robin and Kit, and then Bryan walked over and stood behind Blackie, his hands on his father’s shoulders.

  They all sang along with Blackie as he started another verse, and then they repeated it, since everyone loved this particular wartime song.

  When Blackie paused for a moment, Elizabeth bent down and said, ‘Uncle Blackie, could we have a Vera Lynn favourite? I know all of them, and I can sing, too.’

  ‘That I know, me darlin’,’ Blackie said, and began to play the song he heard her singing all the time. Elizabeth accompanied him, her voice quite lovely, just as he knew it would be.

  ‘“We’ll meet again, don’t know where, don’t know when, but I know we’ll meet again some sunny day. Keep smilin’ thro’ just like you always do. Till the blue skies drive the dark clouds far away.”’

  The entire room had listened attentively without joining in, and now there were shouts for more, and clapping, but Elizabeth simply smiled and demurred, all the while looking across at Tony.

  Phil began to sing ‘Paper Doll’, and Blackie picked out the tune, and many sang with him; then Matt asked Blackie to play ‘There’ll Always Be An England’, and everyone sang enthusiastically, and continued to do so with many more of the tunes Blackie and then Bryan played.

  Listening to them, watching them enjoying themselves, Emma’s heart was full to overflowing. How handsome the boys look in their different uniforms, she suddenly thought. It had often struck her that there was something rather glamorous about uniforms, and a man wearing one was usually lethally appealing to women. But there was nothing glamorous about their jobs…what they did was terrifying. And they’re all so very, very young…some of them no more than boys. Why is it always the flower of a nation that has to go to war? she asked herself. Her heart clenched as her eyes swept over them, knowing what it was they would be doing tomorrow and the day after. And she looked at Blackie and her brothers, and thought: The young have to go, it’s always been so, because our other men are too old to fight; they could not stand the rigours of war. So it must be the young who put their lives on the line for us…

  It was Charlotte who suddenly spoke up, and said, ‘Blackie, can we have a Christmas carol?’

  ‘Sure, me darlin’, and why not?’ Blackie answered, smiling broadly. ‘Come on, Bryan, me lad, and you too, Randolph. I know you two have often sung together: let’s have a bit of harmonizing here.’

  Bryan and Randolph came around the piano and stood together facing the room, and the others moved back a little to give them space. And as Blackie struck a few chords, Emma recognized the first strains of the carol he had chosen for Bryan and Randolph to sing.

  ‘“Silent night, holy night,

  All is calm, all is bright,

  Round yon virgin mother and child

  Holy infant so tender and mild

  Sleep in heavenly peace,

  Sleep in heavenly peace…”’

  CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN

  It was a glorious day in early October 1943, an Indian summer day. The kind of day Emma Harte could not resist. Golden sunshine streamed in through the leaded windows of the upstairs parlour at Pennistone Royal, flooding the room with incandescent light.

  Emma had been writing in her diary, as she did each day, and now she put down her pen and closed the black leather book. Locking it in her desk drawer, she pocketed the key and stood up, walked across the room, and stood gazing out of the soaring window that faced the moors.

  The sky was a lovely cerulean blue, filled with puffy white clouds, an unusual sky for October. Even in the summer months it was frequently overcast, bloated with dark clouds, as rain blew in from the North Sea. Such was the Yorkshire weather. Today was an exception.

  The heather’s still lingering, she murmured to herself, noting the purplish tinge on the rim of the hills, how they beckoned her…She was a child of those stark implacable moors, had grown up amongst them under the high fells and great black rocks that rose like monoliths to touch the heavens. It had been her world, her most beloved world, and she was always drawn to it, yearned to be up in that desolate country, which was so glorious to her.

  On an impulse, suddenly unable to resist, she hurried out and ran downstairs to the Stone Hall. After changing into a pair of her flat walking shoes which she kept in the armoire, she slipped into a loden-green wool coat and headed towards the office at the end of the hall.

  As she went in, Glynnis looked up from her typewriter and gave Emma a small smile. ‘I was just going to come up and see you, Mrs. Harte. I have your letters ready to sign, and—’

  ‘Would you mind if I did it later, Glynnis? I need a breath of air to clear my head. I’ll only be gone a short while, a quick walk on the moors.’

  ‘That’s fine,’ Glynnis murmured, turning back to her typewriter.

  ‘Is everything all right?’ Emma asked, frowning, staring hard at her secretary. ‘You seem a bit wan today.’

  ‘I’m fine.’ Glynnis smile
d at her once more.

  Emma noticed at once that it was another faltering smile, but she made no reference to it. Glancing at her watch, she said, ‘Why don’t you go to the kitchen, Glynnis dear? Hilda will make you a little lunch, a cup of tea. It’s almost one o’clock, you know.’

  ‘Thank you, Mrs. Harte, I think I will.’

  Nodding, smiling at her secretary, Emma closed the door behind her as she went out. Once outside she walked off in the direction of the moors, passing the beautifully designed parterres as she did so. She paused for a moment to inspect them with her eagle eye, but they were perfect today; she had always loved their geometrical designs, which did need intense care and weeding. As she moved on she saw Mr. Ramsbotham, the head gardener, in the distance. He was with his young nephew, Wiggs, who one day would take over from him. She waved to them. They both waved back, and Mr. Ramsbotham, who was wearing a cap, doffed it to her.

  Within minutes Emma was heading up the steep path, making for her favourite spot under the ‘monoliths’, as she always called them. Although she had not been up on the moors for several months, she did not find the climb hard–quite the contrary. At the end of April she had been fifty-four, but she knew she did not look it and she certainly did not feel it. Thank God I’m so fit and healthy, so strong, she thought as she pushed on up the steep incline. She was anxious to reach the summit, where she felt she could touch the sky if she stood on tiptoe and reached up a little bit.

  She smiled inwardly, thinking of her brothers and Blackie, and how the three of them had always teased her about the moors, and her unwavering passion for them. Long ago she had stopped trying to explain what they meant to her. How could she put into words this almost mystical feeling she had about them? Sometimes she felt as though they belonged to her and her alone…they were a safe place…her haven. Whenever she was troubled she came up here to think, to sort out the problems in her head; sometimes she just came because she loved to walk across them. There were times she craved their solitariness and the solitude that abounded here.