The Lock-Keeper's Son

by Nancy Carson

  ‘You don’t mind that little Rose was born out of wedlock, do you, Mother?’

  ‘Oh, our Algie, it makes no odds to me, so long as you wed the dear girl and love her, and take care of her. You’re Rose’s father, and you’ll be Rose’s mother’s husband. Sounds like a perfect arrangement.’

  Sunday the 31st of May 1891 saw Algie Stokes and Marigold Bingham made man and wife. Clara had delved deeper into the small inheritance her late husband Will had bequeathed her, and found another fifty pounds. Some of it would pay for the wedding, she said, for it was certain the Binghams could not afford the expense. It would also pay for a new suit and shoes for Algie, a new dress for Marigold, a new outfit for herself, and a small party at the Bell Hotel afterwards.

  The knot was tied at the Church of St Michael in Brierley Hill by the young curate of the parish. He delivered a nicely worded but predictable homily, felicitating the happy couple on the excellent judgement each had displayed in selecting the other as a life partner, and gently hinting at the advisability of cultivating mutual adaptability.

  It was a pretty wedding, but couldn’t fail to be with such a beautiful bride, dressed as she was in blue, matching exquisitely the colour of her eyes, which was manifestly noticeable when she lifted her veil. Both Clara and Aunt Edith felt that white would have been inappropriate in the circumstances.

  Those attending included the whole tribe of Binghams who had contrived that work brought them to Brierley Hill at the proper time. Aunt Edith was there, as were Clara’s sisters and others of the Bunn family, various Stokes, as well as friends of the bride and groom, in particular Harriet and Priss Meese, Clarence Froggatt and, not least, Aurelia and Benjamin Sampson. Algie realised it would be an interesting mix, and queried with Marigold, for obvious reasons, whether Aurelia warranted an invitation.

  ‘She’s my sister,’ Marigold had replied doughtily. ‘And my cousin as well, you said. So she’s got two claims. I can’t not invite her, can I? ’Specially when she was so kind to me.’

  ‘Do we need to invite her husband?’

  ‘You can’t invite one and not the other, Algie,’ she reasoned. ‘It wouldn’t be right or proper. Aunt Edith says so, and she knows about these things. Anyway, you want to invite that Harriet and her sister.’

  ‘Only because Harriet’s always been a good friend.’

  ‘Yes, and I shan’t get the huff about her no more,’ she said with a grin. ‘I promise.’

  ‘Good, I should hope not,’ he answered good-humouredly, ‘especially now she and Clarence Froggatt are courting strong. I told you in the first place you’d got nothing to fear from her. Anyway, she might well turn out to be a good friend to you as well. She’s like that.’

  The ceremony progressed. In due time they signed the register and stepped back down the aisle, nodding to the guests with smiling faces, first to one side then the other. Algie was relieved to see Aurelia smile at him with apparent goodwill as he and Marigold passed the pew she and Benjamin occupied. She looked delicious in a cream outfit and fetching toque with a projecting front brim, a feature Algie considered would render her very kissable lips difficult to access, a challenge which he immediately dismissed now that he was a married man with responsibilities. Benjamin, however, avoided his eyes, though he did glance assessingly at the bride.

  Outside in the warm afternoon sunshine the newly married couple and their guests mingled. Aunt Edith and Clara Stokes had held little Rose by turns throughout the ceremony. Once they were outside it was the turn of Hannah Bingham, the child’s maternal grandmother. She was in a rapture of pure joy as she became better acquainted with her delightful granddaughter. The three women eventually vied for possession of the child throughout the rest of the celebrations, as envious as schoolgirls of whoever was holding her, though always evincing smiles of approval. Rose’s parents were now married, and sentimentality nullified any remaining stigma over the child’s illegitimacy.

  Waiting till last, Aurelia and Benjamin Sampson stepped forward to offer their congratulations. Till then, she and Benjamin had dallied in conversation with Aunt Edith and Clara, who was the soul of discretion. Algie, for once, felt decidedly uncomfortable in Aurelia’s presence.

  Aurelia planted a kiss on her new sister’s cheek. ‘Congratulations, Mrs Stokes,’ she said cheerfully, emphasising her new name, and anxious to keep the envy out of her voice. ‘Congratulations to you, too, Mr Stokes, for picking such a beautiful bride.’

  The said Mr Stokes felt his colour rise as she allowed him to kiss her on the cheek. Her perfume was so poignantly familiar. ‘Thank you, Aurelia. But you can call me Algie, you know, especially now that you’re my sister-in-law …’ His smile lingered fondly for a second, as he tried to read her eyes. He turned to her husband, aware that he must acknowledge him sooner or later. ‘Which also means, Benjamin, that you and I are brothers-in-law.’

  ‘So it would seem,’ Benjamin replied evenly.

  ‘Then shall we make the best of it, and shake on it?’

  Benjamin managed a smile, and nodded. ‘All right, Algie,’ he said with resignation. ‘Let’s agree to let bygones be bygones.’

  They shook hands. Some bygones, Algie thought.

  Murdoch Osborne crossed Aldwych in London to reach the restaurant at the Gaiety Theatre. Kate Stokes skipped along beside him, hurrying to avoid a hansom cab which threatened to collide with her. Dusk was falling on the busy streets and a lamplighter, stepping off his ladder, touched his cap and nodded as they stepped onto the pavement.

  They reached the restaurant and Kate passed regally into its glowing yellow interior, with Murdoch tagging behind in her wake. He looked hardly the man of the world he used to be, but rather a lapdog anxious for a kind word, or even some acknowledgement from Kate that he still existed.

  At once the head waiter made a great fuss of Kate, and she revelled in his admiration. ‘Miss Stokes,’ he cried in his fawning French accent. ‘You are very beautiful tonight, and we are pleased to welcome you and your farzer in dining wiz us again zis efening. I ’af a splendid table for two all ready for you, if you will follow me.’

  ‘We shall be three,’ Kate, the light of the London stage, informed him impatiently, taking on a very superior English accent, which she had been typically quick to learn and to adopt after her early success in London. ‘We are expecting Sir Lionel Chesterton to join us very shortly.’

  ‘Ah, Sir Lionel …’ The head waiter sounded surprised, and bowed deferentially. ‘So, you are ze guests of Sir Lionel zis efening. He already reserved a table … Please, come zis way …’

  ‘Has he arrived yet?’ Kate asked.

  ‘Not yet, ma’mselle.’

  As he led them away, Kate caught sight of herself in a gilt mirror and loved what she saw. Her eyes gleamed. She was an icon of youthful feminine sophistication. She nodded and smiled imperially to two men she recognised, one with a waxed moustache, one clean-shaven, who were already seated with a pretty girl, painted and overdressed but flaunting an overabundance of alluring cleavage.

  They arrived at a table discreetly situated in a velvet-draped and velvet-upholstered alcove, well away from sight and sound of the street.

  The head waiter smiled obsequiously. ‘What would you like to drink?’

  ‘Champagne,’ Kate was quick to reply with a charming smile. She loved the expensiveness of it, especially as she could afford it, but even more especially since Sir Lionel would be paying, and he could afford it even more easily. ‘Piper-Heidsieck, if you please.’ Piper-hide-seek was thankfully easy to remember, reminding her of her childhood by its reference to the childhood game she used to play. She sat back on her seat in a delicious fever of anticipation …

  However, amid the hushed conversations and tinkling, chinking restaurant sounds, Murdoch looked around him in a fever of foreboding, fidgeting, tremulous. He had felt this way for some weeks now, ever since Sir Lionel Chesterton had appeared on the scene. Murdoch sensed from the outset that Sir Lionel was trouble, t
hat he was about to lose the love of his life to him. But Murdoch had no defence, no protection from what must surely befall him, sooner if not later.

  He had noticed Kate’s instinctive reactions to the man with increasing trepidation. Every time Sir Lionel entered a room where she was sitting she would wriggle with anticipation, until he acknowledged her. And when he did so, she would blush deliciously and cast her eyes down virginally. Murdoch saw too that Kate had a similar effect on Sir Lionel. It was obvious that here was a love match in the making.

  So Murdoch resigned himself to losing Kate. Naturally, he did not relish the prospect, rather he absolutely dreaded it, since he had renounced all for her. He had been a fool, an utter fool, and he recognised the truth in the old adage that there’s no fool like an old fool. Quite possibly, there had never been such a fool as himself in the whole of history.

  Within a few days of her arrival in London, Kate had badgered Murdoch to present her to the great and influential impresario he knew, Zadok Lipman. So he dutifully wrote, extolling the virtues of his daughter without exaggerating either her wonderful looks, her fine acting, or her propensity for the stage where, Murdoch assured Zadok, she had a scintillating presence. He enclosed a photograph taken of her, dazzlingly wearing the costume she’d worn in The Forest Princess. If Zadok would agree to see Miss Kate Stokes – her stage name – he, Murdoch, would be only too happy to accompany her for an introduction and an audition.

  Murdoch received a reply later that week. Zadok Lipman presented his best wishes. He must have been impressed by the photograph and Murdoch’s glowing reference, for he said that he would be happy to receive Miss Stokes on Monday of the following week, at ten o’clock in the morning at his office in Leicester Square.

  Mr Lipman liked Kate even more when he saw her in the flesh, and recommended her for a part in a burlesque show, Carmen up to Data, being staged at the Gaiety Theatre. She shone brightly in one of the minor roles, got to know by heart every other part, every song. She practised those songs in the privacy of their rented apartment till she was perfect. She had a wonderful singing voice, too. It soon became obvious that she had the potential for greater things and, when Miss Florence St John was indisposed, Kate was a brilliant stand-in for the leading role of Carmen. She received ecstatic reviews and several offers of marriage from the young mashers she charmed. When that show closed after two hundred and forty-eight performances, she was chosen to play the lead in another burlesque, Cinder-Ellen, Up Too Late, again at the Gaiety. Now, in April 1892, she was already an established young star of the London stage, fulfilling her dream that everybody back home had tried to talk her out of. Well, what did they know?

  Her freshness, her looks and her performing ability had also ignited a flame somewhere in Sir Lionel Chesterton, a young baronet who, still unmarried, had recently inherited his father’s title and estate near Cromer in Norfolk. He followed Kate Stokes’s career with an early avid interest. Whenever he was in London he never failed to see her shows, and was quick to send bouquets of flowers to the stage door and eventually to request a private audience. Kate, after playing hard-to-get for a decorously lengthy period, eventually acceded, and received him in her dressing room one evening after her show in February. He was the very essence of aristocratic charm and politeness, which quite took Kate unawares. But he left without any reference to another meeting, which intrigued her. It never occurred to her that he was also playing hard-to-get. She later saw him a few times at receptions and in this very restaurant, when they would exchange a few polite words and agonised glances. It was at these haphazard meetings that Murdoch feared there might be something untoward afoot. What he did not know was that romance had already blossomed, romance which Kate had managed to conceal from Murdoch at first.

  But Murdoch, wily old Murdoch, had got a whiff of what was in the air. Ostensibly, he and Kate were father and daughter. The world did not know how they lived and slept together as lovers in their apartment at Lincoln’s Inn Fields. Kate’s declining interest in Murdoch only signalled her burgeoning interest elsewhere – in Sir Lionel especially – and he perceived that the end of his own romantic interlude with her was in sight. The prospect made him miserable. He worshipped Kate, idolised her. He had given up everything for her; his home, his wife, his business, his leadership of the Brierley Hill Amateur Dramatics Society – his pride. And for what? To be ditched in favour of some young upstart?

  ‘He’s here,’ Kate said.

  Murdoch was about to light his pipe.

  ‘No, don’t set that thing a-going, it’ll stink us out,’ she said, reverting to the Black Country girl.

  A tall, handsome man, wearing tails and a white muffler approached, beaming. He carried his top hat and white gloves in his hand and looked every inch the aristocrat. When he reached the table he bent down to kiss Kate on the cheek and, in so doing, knocked her hat a little askew. He apologised profusely, and she set it right again with a practised hand, and smiled graciously with instant forgiveness. That over, he offered his hand to Murdoch.

  Murdoch stood up and they shook. ‘Good evening, Sir Lionel.’

  ‘And a very good evening to you, Mr Osborne.’

  ‘Glass of champagne?’ Kate enquired.

  ‘Oh, yes, capital.’

  ‘Father will pour it, won’t you, Father?’

  Murdoch poured carefully, and topped up his own flute. Kate’s was still decorously untouched.

  ‘What time does the show start, darling?’ Sir Lionel asked.

  ‘Eight-twenty-five.’

  He pulled out his watch, glanced at it, and returned it to his waistcoat pocket. ‘Seven-fifteen already. Sorry I’m a little late. Have you ordered yet?’

  ‘We wanted to wait for you, Lionel.’ It was a voluptuously sweet, seductive voice that spoke.

  Sir Lionel smiled in appreciation of it. ‘Then let’s order. It’s on me, of course, since I asked you to meet me here.’ He picked up a menu, opened it and glanced down it.

  ‘That’s very kind,’ said Murdoch.

  ‘Not at all.’ He raised a hand to the head waiter who came running. ‘I take it we all know what we want?’

  They ordered their food and the head waiter moved away content.

  ‘Time is rather short before Kate’s show starts,’ Sir Lionel began. ‘So I’d like to get right to the point …’ He fixed his eyes on Murdoch as if seeking permission to continue. ‘I’ve asked you to meet me here for one reason. I am here to ask, most humbly, sir, for your permission to marry your daughter.’

  Murdoch had expected this request, of course, but still it came like a kick in the stomach, and he winced. He understood, naturally, how Kate might benefit from bettering herself as the bride of a baronet, but it rankled nonetheless. He had hoped that he could have retained her as his exclusive lover, but he knew well enough the fickleness, the emotional ruthlessness of which she was capable, especially when a better offer came along. Murdoch was no match for Sir Lionel, could hardly begin to give her what she needed. Sir Lionel offered wealth, security, youth – above all, youth. As his wife, Kate would gain privilege, esteem, position – and a title. What woman would not yield to all that, especially as Sir Lionel was so obviously a decent and honourable chap? Murdoch might be an old fool, but he was not such a fool that he didn’t understand all that.

  Despite his years and all his experience with women, Murdoch was no match for Kate, either. He had no protection from her wiles, or from what was about to befall him. London believed she was his devoted daughter, the fruit of his loins, and what caring father could have any feasible reason to deny her marriage to a wealthy baronet, a very personable and proper baronet at that? Such was the exalted fate of many a showgirl, but he had hoped, wished, prayed even, that such a fate might pass Kate by and spare him the agony he must otherwise endure.

  ‘I’ve got one or two observations to make afore I say yea or nay,’ Murdoch replied, trying to convince himself more than Kate, or the young man sitting opposite, tha
t he wielded the power to stall the liaison. ‘I imagine the two of you must’ve talked about marriage between your two selves already, ha?’

  ‘Of course,’ replied Sir Lionel.

  ‘So I’m just a little upset that Kate has made no mention of it, ha, Kate?’

  It was a pointed question, and Kate avoided his eyes guiltily, acutely aware of his intense feelings for her. She stared into her glass of untouched champagne, saying nothing, then took a sip to try and hide her reddening face.

  ‘Also, Kate, you know you earn enough money to keep yourself in the lap of luxury if you prefer to remain single. There’s no financial reason for you to scoot off with this gentleman and marry him.’

  ‘I know that, Father,’ she said quietly.

  ‘Also, young man,’ he added, discarding all etiquette of address, ‘would it be your intention to allow her to keep on with her work, or would you rob the London stage of one of its brightest stars?’

  ‘If Kate desires to continue working after we are married, then she will be free to do so … at least until her wifely duties render it unwise or impossible.’

  ‘You mean if she gets pregnant, ha?’

  ‘You have to admit, Mr Osborne, that such an occurrence is not beyond the realms of possibility once she is married, even for the brightest star of the London stage.’ Sir Lionel smiled charmingly.

  ‘I only mention it because she has talent, ha? It would be a sin to waste it.’

  ‘I agree,’ said Sir Lionel smoothly, ‘which is why I stress that such a decision must be Kate’s own. I shall not try to influence her one way or the other.’

  ‘Well, Kate?’

  Kate’s eyes met Murdoch’s at last. ‘Yes, I’d like to carry on working … for the time being … It’s what I enjoy. I don’t have to give it up just because I get married. Lionel knows that.’