The Lock-Keeper's Son

by Nancy Carson

  Chapter 33

  Two days after Aurelia had left Benjamin, Algie received a brief note. It said simply:

  Dearest Algie,

  Just a line to let you know that I am staying for the time being with an aunt at the address written above, and having a very interesting and busy time of it. So busy and so interesting, in fact, that I’ve hardly had time to consider what I’ve done. However, I have found time to sneak to my room to scribble this note.

  Please do not write to me here under any circumstances. I shall write again in a few days’ time, once things have settled down, when I hope we shall be able to meet.

  Love always,

  Aurelia.

  Although Algie waited patiently for his promised next letter, it did not arrive until the 1st of May, a Friday. Nearly two weeks had elapsed since Aurelia had left her husband. Again, the note was brief, requesting him to meet her on the Saturday at noon, not at the Eagle Hotel, but at the entrance to Stourbridge Junction Railway Station. At once he was concerned that she might be unwelcome where she was, and going away to stay with some other relative, more remote, hence the station. Saturday came and noon approached. He cleaned himself up, left his new workshop where he had been installing a hand press, and rode to the station to meet her. There had been no time to change, so he still wore his working clothes. When he arrived Aurelia was already waiting, looking as straight-backed and elegant as ever, but a little pale and unwell, he thought. He rested his bike against the wall and greeted her with a kiss and an anxious smile.

  ‘I thought you were never going to write.’

  ‘I found it quite difficult, Algie,’ she replied ambiguously. ‘I see you’ve come straight from work. How is your new venture going?’

  ‘Very well, to tell you the truth. I’ve been able to pick up some machinery ever so cheap. A small steam engine, a lathe, a tube-bender—’

  ‘I asked you to meet me here,’ she said, interrupting him, ‘because I have something very important to tell you.’

  ‘What?’ he said, uneasy at what it might be.

  ‘Shall we go up to the station platform and find a bench to sit on? I think it will be better if we sit down.’

  ‘If you like.’ She took his arm as they entered the station, ascending the flight of steps to the nearest platform. ‘When I read your letter and you asked to meet me here at the station, my first thought was that you wanted to say goodbye. I thought you were going away. Are you?’

  She smiled enigmatically. ‘No, I’m not, Algie. Some things you cannot run away from. A difficulty has arisen which affects us radically. I have to talk to you.’

  A score or more folk were milling about. The rasping huffs of a departing train punctuated the atmosphere.

  ‘You look pale,’ he said. ‘Are you unwell?’

  ‘Oh, I’ll survive.’

  He regarded her anxiously. It was unlike her to be so morose. She was normally so cheerful, with a natural, ready smile and sparkling eyes. ‘Has leaving Benjamin been a big cause of worry for you?’

  ‘Of course,’ she replied candidly. ‘Of course it has.’

  ‘And how’s little Benjie?’

  ‘He’s well, thank you.’ She smiled in acknowledgement of Algie’s thoughtfulness in asking.

  ‘Is he missing his father?’

  ‘More likely missing Maude. After all, he spent a lot of time with her.’

  They reached the platform and stepped out, squinting against the brightness of the springtime sky. Shafts of sunlight were penetrating obliquely through the swirling smoke and steam exhaled by the departing locomotive. It had rained overnight and the new leaves on the tall trees around the station were glistening with moisture. Stourbridge Junction was set in a shallow valley, and to one side the hills reared up higher than the other, up to the pale sky. In the rising distance the hedges were tinted with greening shoots, and looked for all the world as if somebody had thrown a gauze veil over their dark undergrowth.

  They headed towards a vacant bench and sat on it, Aurelia primly erect, Algie leaning back, his arm stretched across the backrest behind her.

  ‘So, what do you want to tell me that affects us so radically?’

  She turned towards him so that her knees were touching his, and took his hand in hers. He thought how serious, how sad she looked.

  ‘I am going back to Benjamin,’ she announced softly. ‘It will be for the best.’

  ‘You’re going back?’ he queried incredulously. ‘You’ve hardly given it a chance, Aurelia.’

  ‘It will be for the best, Algie.’ Tears welled up in her eyes.

  Seeing she was troubled far more than she was claiming, he put his arm around her, and she rested her head against his shoulder. ‘Best for who? Best for you? Best for me? Best for your son?’

  ‘Best for everybody.’

  ‘Forgive me, Aurelia, but I can’t agree with you. You’ve been miserable with Benjamin – by your own admission – and yet you want to go back to him?’

  ‘Please don’t be angry with me, Algie. It’s more than I can stand.’ Her bottom lip trembled and she began to weep. ‘It’s not because I don’t love you,’ she sobbed. ‘My dear, sweet Algie … I love you more than you’ll ever know … now and always … Always remember that … But not going back to Benjamin would be unforgivably selfish of me. I should never be able to live with my conscience.’

  ‘To hell with your conscience, Aurelia. I never heard of anybody who had a conscience over wanting to be happy. I’ll make you happy, believe me.’

  ‘You would,’ she said, with a great shuddering sob. ‘I know you would … But I know myself better than you do, my love, and I know it would not be fair.’

  ‘Is it because of Benjie, this change of heart? Is it because you think I wouldn’t be a good father to him?’

  She shook her head and pulled a small handkerchief from the reticule on her lap with which to dab her eyes. ‘No, I’m sure you would be an excellent father.’ She looked into his eyes evocatively. ‘A better father than Benjamin.’

  ‘Then I honestly don’t understand. I honestly don’t know what’s got into you. You’ll regret it, you know, going back to him.’

  ‘Perhaps … It’s a cross I’ll have to bear.’

  ‘Have you already discussed it with him? Is it already arranged?’

  She shook her head again. ‘No … I haven’t seen him. I’ve written to let him know where I am, how Benjie is, but I’ve heard nothing from him in return.’

  ‘So you don’t even know that he’ll have you back?’

  ‘Oh, I agree. It’s by no means certain.’ She sniffed, and wiped her nose.

  ‘Then let’s hope he turns you away … If he does, you and I have a chance together. So when do you intend to go back?’

  ‘This afternoon. I have ordered a cab for three o’ clock.’

  He had a thought, and his face brightened up. ‘I presume, then, that we shall go on seeing each other as before, once you’re back there? When Benjamin goes on his business trips.’

  ‘No, Algie,’ she sniffed, and another flood of tears wet her pale cheeks. ‘I shan’t be able to do that.’

  ‘Then it’s all over between us? Is that what you’re saying?’

  ‘It has to be, my love.’

  Algie shrugged, frustrated by her illogical decision. It made no sense at all. He sighed deeply. ‘Only a minute or two ago you said you love me and always would.’

  ‘Yes, it’s true,’ she protested, as if it could never be otherwise. ‘I do love you. More than I can say …’ A renewed and reinvigorated bout of weeping assailed her.

  He held her tight, tenderly. ‘So what you are doing makes no sense.’

  She wiped her eyes again, which were becoming red with her tears, then blew her nose delicately.

  ‘It will all make sense soon, Algie.’

  ‘Oh?’ he uttered. ‘D’you honestly think so?’

  ‘I want you to promise me one thing.’

  He nodded his agreeme
nt.

  ‘And you must promise it on your mother’s life.’

  He looked at her with a puzzled frown. ‘I promise you anything, Aurelia, if it’s within the bounds of possibility to do it.’

  ‘Promise me you will call on my Aunt Edith.’

  He laughed. ‘Why? Are you trying to fix me up with her?’

  ‘Don’t be absurd.’

  ‘Well, she is a widow, you said.’

  ‘I’m being very serious, Algie.’ Her expression left him in no doubt as to how serious she was. ‘Promise me you will call on her tomorrow … when I’m gone. She holds the key to all this.’

  ‘Where does she live?’ he asked resignedly. ‘I’ve forgotten her address, since you told me I was not to write to you there.’

  ‘Number eighteen, Rectory Road, Oldswinford.’

  He repeated the address, memorising it. ‘All right,’ he said. ‘I’ll visit her tomorrow. I’d better wear my Sunday best.’

  ‘Of course, you must. Her name is Mrs Archer. I’ll tell her to expect you at three.’

  ‘I promise I’ll be there.’

  ‘I’d better go, Algie, else I shan’t be ready when the cab calls to collect us. Will you walk back down to the street with me?’

  ‘Course I will.’

  They rose from the bench together, and Aurelia took his arm again as they walked sombrely along the platform to the steps. Out in the street, near to where he had left his bicycle, they turned to each other.

  ‘So this is goodbye?’ he said quietly.

  She nodded, looking at the folds of her skirt, as if she could not bear to look at him. ‘I’m afraid so.’

  Their eyes met again. Hers, normally so bright and animated, made it obvious how much emotional pain she was suffering. Her lids were red and swollen from her weeping, and tears still clung to her beautiful, long lashes. It occurred to him that maybe she’d been weeping long before she’d met him today.

  He threw his arms around her in a poignant embrace. Tears stung his own eyes and he blinked long and hard in an effort to stem them. ‘What am I to do if ever I see you out and about?’ he muttered, his voice wracked with emotion. ‘I shall want to hold you tight, like this.’

  ‘I know,’ she whispered. ‘And I’ll want to hold you. It will be so difficult …’ She sighed profoundly. ‘I must go now, Algie …’

  He unhanded her and gave her a brief goodbye kiss on the lips. To have given her a long, lingering kiss, which he really felt inclined to do, would have served only to prolong the agony.

  ‘I thought at one point that you were going to tell me you were carrying our child,’ he said. ‘I only wish you had.’

  She smiled, all her love exuding from her streaming eyes. ‘Yes, I know. If only …’

  ‘It’s goodbye then, Aurelia? So soon.’

  ‘Yes … So soon … Goodbye, Algie.’

  She touched his hand, turned away from him and, as tears rolled down his cheeks in profusion, he watched her walk elegantly out of his life.

  Aurelia left the tender care of her Aunt Edith that afternoon, together with little Benjie, as she had said she would. The hansom turned onto the drive of the house that had been home since her marriage, the house she believed she had left for good, only two weeks earlier. It came to a halt at the front door with a scrape of shifting gravel under its wheels. She paid the driver and asked him to leave her trunk at the door.

  She sighed with apprehension as she tried the door. It was locked. She pulled out her key and unlocked it, then opened it gingerly. ‘Come on, Benjie,’ she said gently to the child, taking his hand.

  All was quiet. The house seemed dead, save for the slow, heavy pulse of the grandfather clock in the hall, a sound so excruciatingly familiar. She called Benjamin, but there was no reply. She called Mary, the maid. Still no reply. She called Maude, just in case she was still there.

  The house was clearly devoid of any living soul.

  She decided to pull the trunk inside, so propped the front door open with an umbrella stand and lugged it in, allowing it to rest behind the front door so as not to cause an obstruction when Benjamin returned.

  ‘Let’s see if Daddy’s gig is in the stable,’ she suggested to her son. ‘Shall we?’

  The child nodded, and took her hand as they made their way to the back of the house and the outbuildings. She pulled open the wide stable door. The carriage remained, but neither the horse nor the gig was there.

  ‘You see, Daddy’s gone out in the gig,’ she cooed. ‘Perhaps he’s gone to see Grandmamma.’ Perhaps he’d gone to break the news that his wife had left him, if he hadn’t already done so. ‘Let’s go back inside and wait. We can play with some of your toys. Shall we?’

  The child nodded his head enthusiastically and grinned, and Aurelia led him back into the house to his playroom. Nothing there had changed. His toys remained, returned tidily to the box in which they were always kept.

  They played together for more than an hour, with building bricks, with a selection of rag dolls, with a wooden railway engine painted dark green. The grandfather clock in the hall struck five o’ clock. Surely Benjamin would be back soon. She wanted the ordeal of her return to be over as quickly as possible, to feel something approaching normality so that she could get on with her life, so that she could try to forget Algie Stokes. Her amorous adventure with Algie, though gloriously inspiring, had been costly in so many ways. Not that she would have changed anything. Love, the love she felt for him, had been so fulfilling. It had enriched her life. She had experienced emotions she never would have believed possible otherwise. But all things must pass, and her affair was one such beautiful thing. It had been too beautiful to last, like some delicate flower, but at least she was having Algie’s child.

  At ten past five, she heard the sound of wheels and horse’s hoofs on the gravel outside, and she stood up in readiness to meet Benjamin, her heart beating fast. From Benjie’s playroom, with the door ajar, she would see him enter the front door.

  Two minutes later it opened, and she heard Benjamin say, ‘You know, I could swear I locked the door when we went out.’

  We . . . When we went out.

  Aurelia lessened the gap between door and doorframe so as not to be seen, and turned to look anxiously at her son, hoping he would make no sound. The child was engrossed in his wooden railway engine, trying diligently to pull the funnel off. Then there was the trunk … If only she had moved the trunk out of sight …

  Through the narrowed opening she peered again towards the front door. A woman was following Benjamin inside, a slender woman with a well-proportioned and youthful figure. Aurelia knew the hat she wore, recognised the gait, the stance, the set of her head, her delicate mannerisms. She watched, as Benjamin took the woman in his arms and kissed her hungrily.

  Time to announce she had returned.

  She opened the door and stepped into the hall.

  ‘Good afternoon, Benjamin … Maude …’

  Instantly, the couple unhanded one another, decorously allowing a few feet of space between themselves. In so doing, Maude immediately stumbled backwards over Aurelia’s trunk and let out a scream. She ended up on her back, with her legs propped up in the air against the trunk.

  ‘How very inelegant you look with your garters showing, Maude,’ Aurelia declared, amused by the fall. ‘Please do cover yourself up.’

  ‘What brings you back?’ Benjamin exclaimed huffily.

  ‘My two weeks away, Benjamin – our trial separation – has made me realise the relevance of our marriage.’

  ‘The relevance of our marriage? Well, that’s a new one. What do you mean – relevance?’

  Maude struggled to her feet and straightened her hat, which had been knocked askew.

  ‘I mean that I am carrying a child, Benjamin. Therefore, our marriage has more relevance than it did when I went away. I did not realise when I left that I was pregnant.’

  ‘A child?’ Benjamin queried, with some suspicion. ‘Are you sure?’
>
  ‘Oh, I’m quite sure. Do you require a note from the doctor confirming it?’

  ‘But what if it’s not your child, Benjamin?’ Maude hissed. ‘What if it’s out of wedlock?’

  ‘You impertinent hussy!’ Aurelia scolded haughtily, before Benjamin could utter a word in response. ‘So tell me, is it such an impossibility that you might have a child out of wedlock yourself, after you have doubtless been sharing my bed with my husband? People in glass houses, Maude …’

  Maude’s face was a burning peony. She looked at Benjamin, hoping he would reply for her. But he said nothing, at this stage not wishing to incriminate himself more.

  ‘If you are without sin, Maude,’ Aurelia went on, ‘I might tolerate your insinuations, but since clearly you are not, I shall afford them the contempt that they deserve …’

  Benjamin stood there, looking cravenly sheepish. If Aurelia had been unfaithful, so had he. Thus, they were on level terms, he quickly decided. He might well yet have to answer for it if Maude did happen to be carrying his child. To accept Aurelia’s now would mollify any possible trouble later.

  ‘We’ve got some talking to do in private, Aurelia,’ Benjamin said, asserting himself and glancing guiltily at Maude. ‘Maude will leave us while we speak privately in the drawing room.’

  ‘Maude will leave us, most certainly,’ Aurelia conceded, with a coolness she did not feel. ‘Permanently … But while we have this discussion, Benjamin, she will remain, so that she is under no misapprehension. I have returned to this house – my home – after giving due and careful consideration to the entire position. I cannot deprive the child I am expecting of a father, and nor can you, Benjamin. It is up to us to make a fresh start. With this new baby comes a new commitment. We have every chance of making our marriage work. But we shall not need a nanny. I shall attend to my children myself from now on. Now … if you would like a minute to say goodbye to Maude privately, Benjamin, I shall happily grant it … As long as it is no more than a minute … Oh, and by the way … where is Mary?’

  ‘I dismissed Mary,’ Benjamin responded. ‘Should we get her back, d’you think?’