Everything sparkled as they walked down to the tube station. The heavy rain in the night had washed the dust off trees and scrubbed the pavements clean. Even dogs out on an early morning cruise of the neighbourhood looked happy.
‘I wish I’d taken my bike from Mum’s yesterday, we could’ve gone for a ride today,’ Gareth said. ‘I’ll have to go home tonight and collect it. I’m not looking forward to that.’
Rosie was so happy this morning she felt big enough to even feel a little sorry for his mother.
‘Tell her I’m sorry,’ she said. ‘Maybe I’d better write her a little letter too?’
‘Leave well alone,’ he said with a shrug. ‘She’ll come round eventually. Now, how about going to Petticoat Lane Market and afterwards I’ll show you the Tower of London?’
It was a wonderful day. The sun shone, the Thames glittered, everyone in the market seemed to have a smile on their face. Rosie tried on fancy hats on one stall, making Gareth laugh as she posed and pulled faces. He tried first a bowler and then a trilby, and she laughed until she had a stitch. They ate huge bacon sandwiches from one stall, then tried jellied eels from another. She told him how down in Somerset the eels came slithering out of every ditch and river at a certain time of the year when they had to mate. Gareth said he would slither on his belly all the way to Mayfield next time he had the urge to mate with her.
Late in the afternoon they caught a bus to St James’s Park and lay on the grass to cuddle and kiss, along with countless other couples. A band was playing to a large audience in deckchairs, while children fed the ducks and played hide and seek around the trees. A stop-me-and-buy-one man came round on a bike and Gareth bought Rosie a triple-sized cornet.
It was just about six, an hour before her train was to leave from Victoria, and they were sitting in the tea house in St James’s Park. Gareth was relating a story about his first day at school in London, when Rosie was brought up sharply, remembering that she’d intended to tell him the truth about herself today.
His face was crinkled up with laughter, his eyes so tender, and she knew she couldn’t spoil the day by telling him now.
On their way to the station they stopped to look at Buckingham Palace. Bright sunshine made the scene so much more beautiful than it had been on Coronation Day. The Guards’ red jackets and black busbies stood out in sharp relief against the white of the palace, and every window twinkled. It was peaceful too, only a handful of tourists looking through the railings and so little traffic passing by.
‘I knew you were meant for me even then,’ he said, looking across at the spot where the police had tried to bundle Donald into the Black Maria. ‘My heart sort of lurched when I saw you.’
He turned to her, cupping her face in both his hands, and his eyes weren’t laughing now but were filled with tenderness. ‘I love you, Rosie,’ he said.
Rosie felt winded. She knew without any doubt that what she felt for him was love too. ‘You don’t know enough about me,’ she blurted out. ‘You mustn’t say such things until I’ve told you everything.’
‘I know everything I want to,’ he said, kissing her on the nose. ‘You are bright and beautiful, you’re kind and giving. All I want to know now is, do you love me?’
Her head was telling her to make a joke, break the spell and then make him listen to the whole truth before he committed himself any further. But she couldn’t. She didn’t want that tender look to fade from his eyes. She wanted him to kiss her and convince her they really were made for one another.
‘Yes,’ she whispered. ‘I love you too.’
As he kissed her she knew she had passed the point of no return.
Chapter Fourteen
Thomas slumped down on to the grassy path around the edge of the recently cut wheatfield. It was the end of August and he’d come down to Mayfield to stay for the weekend.
‘Is your leg hurting?’ Rosie was instantly solicitous, although she’d been forcing the fast pace on this walk across the fields. ‘I’m sorry. I didn’t think. I just so much wanted you to see everything.’ She put two fingers in her mouth and gave a very unladylike whistle for Donald, who had gambolled on ahead of them to climb a haystack.
Thomas thought Rosie was priceless. Since his arrival yesterday she had shown him so many different sides to her character. The zealous gardener who went down to the greenhouse to water her seedlings even before breakfast. The little mother fussing over Donald because he had a splinter in his finger, then immediately after the shrew who shouted at him for knocking over the cat’s milk. The cook who’d made a superb steak and kidney pie for dinner last night, and the loving, caring companion who guided Donald’s hand so carefully when he tried to write his name. She had come in from picking runner beans for lunch today with mud-streaked legs, hands and face, and even before she’d washed it off spoke of cultivating a more sophisticated image because she thought Gareth liked girls like that.
She’d disappeared upstairs later and come down in the pretty pink cotton dress she was wearing now, moaned that her nails were a mess and said in future she would wear gloves for gardening. They were hardly out of the door for his walk before she asked him if he thought it was possible for her to become a gardener, and if she would need to go to college or some kind of training place. Then she’d proceeded with this forced route march, talking non-stop about Gareth.
The loud whistle somehow put the cap on it. Such a dainty, feminine little thing resorting to such loutish tactics!
‘What’s so funny?’ Rosie asked, looking down at Thomas on the grass laughing his head off.
‘You,’ he spluttered. ‘You are the most extraordinary girl I ever met. Part tomboy, part beauty queen. Nurse, gardener, urchin and mother. Just teach me to whistle like that. I always wished I could do it.’
Rosie sat down, waving to Donald to come and join them. ‘It’s about the only useful thing I learned from Seth,’ she said with a grin, and demonstrated how to roll up her tongue, then blow. ‘Tell me seriously, Thomas. Could I be a gardener if I wanted?’
‘I believe you could be the first woman to set foot on the moon if you really wanted to be,’ Thomas replied. ‘But it’s no good asking me about such things, I’m a townie. Ask Mr Cook. He’ll know.’
‘But he might think I want to leave, and I don’t,’ she said earnestly. ‘I sort of thought I might be able to learn a bit at night school, and be with Donald during the day. I’ve been reading all these books about famous gardens and how they designed and laid them out. I’d give any thing to be able to do that.’
Thomas looked at Rosie. Her cheeks were flushed bright pink, not from the brisk walk in the sun, he realized, but because of how passionately she cared about the subject. Frank and Norah had already pointed out the difference she’d made to their garden. Now Thomas could see for himself she really was seriously committed.
‘Well, tell Frank all that,’ Thomas said. ‘I’m sure he’ll do what he can. Meanwhile you can learn a lot from books,’
Rosie stood up and moved away a few feet, shielding her eyes from the sun to check where Donald was. Thomas looked up and saw that, with the sun behind her, her thin cotton dress was almost transparent. He could clearly see her small breasts, the faint curve of her belly and the outline of her buttocks. His mouth went dry, his stomach turned over. It was one of the most beautiful pictures he’d ever seen, but one he wouldn’t even dare contemplate, let alone paint.
‘God help me,’ he muttered as he turned away and struggled awkwardly to his feet. It wasn’t paternal or brotherly love he felt for her, such feelings were calm and pure. What he felt inside him was a dormant volcano, bubbling away, biding its time before it would rise up and spill over. He didn’t think there was any way to keep it down.
Six weeks later, Rosie and Mrs Cook were bottling plums in the kitchen. It was October now and a wet and windy evening. Mr Cook and Donald were in the sitting-room watching television.
At the sharp crack of a branch against the window, Rosie pause
d in packing the fruit into Kilner jars and went over to the terrace doors to look out. The kitchen lights cut a golden swathe through the darkness, right out across the rain-soaked terrace and on to the lawn. Leaves were swirling feverishly around, unable to settle on the ground because of the strong wind.
The scene prompted an immediate and sharp memory of the previous autumn. During her father’s trial the weather had been just like it was now, and she had spent a great deal of time staring out of the windows at Carrington Hall, feeling unutterably miserable. Yet as unwanted as the reminder was, it served as a kind of milestone. She could look back and see how far she’d come since then.
Turning away from the window she half smiled at Norah Cook, who was stirring a pan of syrup on the stove. ‘I never used to like autumn,’ Rosie said. ‘I always thought it was a sad time because everything died. But I don’t feel sad this year for some reason.’
Norah nodded in agreement. ‘I know exactly what you mean, my dear. It’s usually my least favourite season too. But this year I feel positively invigorated. I’m so looking forward to Harvest Festival, Guy Fawkes’ Night, cosy evenings by the fire, starting the Christmas puddings and cake, everything autumn offers. But then I’m sure you know why. They all seem so much more special now Donald is home with us.’
Norah couldn’t explain to anyone just how much her life and marriage had been enriched by having her son back home again. To do so would mean admitting how empty it had been before. For in the nine years Donald had been away from her and Frank it was as though a blight had slowly crept over their once almost perfect marriage. To others, including their two older children, they still appeared to be the ideal couple, but their deference to one another in public was just force of habit. Alone in their home they barely spoke to one another; often they were like strangers, both wrapped in private guilt and resentment which they couldn’t air.
Almost as soon as Donald set foot back in the house, his presence seemed to banish that blight. At first it was through sharing the anxiety about his difficult behaviour, wondering if they’d done the right thing by bringing him home, but slowly as their son settled down, their anxiety turned to joy and in their happiness they turned to one another again like young lovers.
Rosie was in much the same position as her employers, unable to adequately describe the state of bliss she found herself in daily. Each morning when she woke up in her pretty room and looked out over the garden and the fields beyond, she gave thanks for finding herself in a beautiful home where she was valued and needed. She had real freedom now, of choice, of expression, without any fear of being belittled. She could plan each day for Donald knowing she would get his parents’ full support, and they made her feel as if she was a member of their family.
She had Gareth who loved her too, and a new friend called Judy who worked in the village baker’s. They usually went to the cinema together one evening a week, and if Judy’s Saturday off coincided with one when Gareth had to work, the pair of them spent the day shopping in Tunbridge Wells. But now, on top of all that, Rosie was about to embark on a small gardening business with Donald.
‘Who would have thought six or nine months ago that Donald would be capable of working for his living?’ Rosie went on. ‘I’d almost like to see Matron again, just so I could show him off.’
Norah winced at the reminder of that awful woman who’d lied to her and Frank so often and so plausibly. She didn’t like to dwell on the unnecessary suffering she’d caused the other patients.
‘I do hope for your sake Gareth won’t be difficult about your business,’ Norah said thoughtfully as she stirred her pan. ‘You’ve put so much effort into getting it organized, and I know how much it means to you, but I get the impression he doesn’t much like the idea.’
‘But why should he mind?’ Rosie asked. ‘I mean, it won’t affect him in any way. I’ll still be living here, and Donald will be with me all day. You and Mr Cook are the only ones who might be put out. Not him. Whenever he comes down at the weekends I’ll still be here, sitting in the kitchen as always!’
The kitchen had become Rosie’s favourite room at The Grange. By day it was a light, sunny place, and by night the Aga kept it snug and warm. It was a cheerful room for long chats after meals, or lounging on the old settee listening to the wireless.
Paintings of Donald’s had joined those of the grandchildren up on the walls. The pretty china on the dresser shared space with Robin’s baby toys and old letters, and a partially completed jigsaw puzzle stayed on a wooden board, ready for anyone who had the time or inclination to add a few more pieces. Rosie often wondered what houseproud Mrs Jones would make of the clutter. She thought she’d probably sniff with disapproval.
‘You’ve got a lot to learn about men,’ Norah replied with a touch of cynicism, wiping her hands on her apron. ‘Most of them don’t like their women to have ideas or aspirations which don’t include them. Look at Susan and Roger. She had that secretarial job she loved and when her boss asked if she would accompany him to America on a business trip, Roger sulked until she turned the offer down. So her boss found a more ambitious secretary and now she’s been relegated back to the typing pool.’
‘But Gareth isn’t sulking exactly,’ Rosie said defensively. ‘He just thinks I’ll get overtired and when I see him I’ll have dirt under my nails.’
‘Too tired for him, he means. Maybe he’s afraid you love gardening more than him.’
‘I’m not going to be put off by something as daft as that,’ Rosie said with some indignation. ‘You do think the gardening is a good idea, don’t you?’
Norah’s mind began to wander. She had liked Rosie right from the first day they met, but over these past months, watching her with her son, liking had grown into love. They would have been perfectly content if she’d just kept Donald happy, but she had gone far beyond that. She’d allowed him to be a real man by teaching him a trade.
He could cut grass, prune trees and bushes, dig and plant. He could follow instructions, but also use his own initiative too if he was alone. Watching him work in a garden, no one would even guess he was mentally retarded. He was as strong as any other young man of his age, having built up his muscles along with his skills. Should anything ever happen to either Frank or Norah, he could not only survive but earn his own living.
But what of Rosie? She was almost seventeen, quite old and confident enough to reach out and grasp what she wanted from life, yet it seemed to Norah that if she had a failing, it was wanting to please too much. She planned every day around others, she didn’t ever stop to consider that she had rights too. While this made her the most perfect of employees, and gave Norah peace of mind because she knew her son was of paramount importance to Rosie, she could also see that others might take advantage of such selflessness.
On the face of it Gareth was the ideal boyfriend, a nice, steady, hard-working lad, head over heels in love with Rosie. But Norah had noticed Gareth called all the shots. He fitted Rosie in between his work, football matches and seeing his friends, expecting her to drop everything she was doing at a moment’s notice when it was convenient for him.
He was a real town-dweller too. He liked pavements beneath his feet, busy streets, crowded pubs and people around him constantly. He didn’t seem to be aware that Rosie was happiest with the wind in her hair and grass beneath her feet and cared far more about nature than trains and motorbikes.
Gareth was no different from most young men of his class and age group. Born during hard times in the thirties, their characters formed by early poverty and growing up through the war years, they hadn’t had the stimulation of books, art or music to give them a yearning for something more than their parents had. Even now in the fifties, when films and television gave them glimpses of the dawning of a new age of prosperity, when there were jobs for all, a National Health Service and new houses replacing the old slums in the cities, lads like Gareth still thought like their fathers.
Gareth’s ambitions didn’t run to mor
e than driving a big steam train, a little house in the suburbs and a dutiful wife at home with the children. Norah wasn’t scoffing at his humble aspirations, but she felt Rosie was entitled to, and deserved, the chance to spread her wings a little before committing herself to a way of life that might prove stultifyingly dull. She would like to see Rosie going out dancing with Judy and indulging in a little more girlish giggling and silliness. She also thought she ought to look around at other young men.
Rosie never said much about her childhood. Norah sensed by the lack of nostalgic stories, and by a certain subservience to men, that her father had been a brute. If so, it would be a crying shame if she allowed herself to slip into another man’s shadow, or allow his dreams to supplant her own.
‘A good idea?’ said Norah, returning from her thoughts. ‘Frank and I both think it’s a brilliant idea. We’re behind you one hundred per cent. I’m not trying to pour cold water on it. I want you to succeed and I believe you will. All I’m trying to do is make you aware that there may come a time when you have to choose between gardening and Gareth.’
Rosie said nothing more as she stacked the Kilner jars on to trays ready to put in the oven. She understood what Mrs Cook was trying to say, but didn’t believe it would ever come to that. Gareth loved her. She loved him. She also wanted this business and she was determined to have both.
The gardening idea had come about soon after Thomas came down for the weekend. Rosie had spoken to Mr Cook as Thomas suggested, and he pointed out that there were college courses in horticulture, but they were directed more at farming than gardening. He thought gaining experience was the most important part of starting a career and he suggested asking around the neighbourhood to see if anyone wanted help with their gardens.
In the run-up to the Harvest Festival many neighbours came to The Grange to discuss the arrangements with the Cooks for the annual party in the village hall. All of them were amazed to see the improvements to the garden. They admired Rosie’s runner beans, the rows of carrots, onions and cabbages. They saw the trays of perennials she’d sown from seeds, took home with them a fresh lettuce or a couple of small plants, and before long word got around that she was a bit of a gardening expert and her assistant Donald was a tireless worker. When Rosie put a card in the post office window offering their gardening services by the hour, Mr Cook was pleased but apprehensive. He knew the prejudice which still existed in the village about his son.
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