by Val Wood
‘Wh-what do you mean? Johnny never told me that he wanted to go to military school!’
‘That’s because Grandpa told him that it was all nonsense and he hadn’t to bother you with such ideas because he was meant to be a farmer.’
Wouldn’t you have thought that Mr Laslett would have learned from experience? Jenny fretted. His son wanted to be a soldier and wasn’t allowed to and now his grandson wanted the same; and all he has ever achieved is separation from both of them. ‘If I’d known, Serena, I would have talked to Johnny about it.’ She felt tearful and angry too that her son had been forced to make his own decision without discussing it with his own mother.
‘Well, that’s what I told him, but he didn’t want to upset you, and he knew that Grandpa would make the final decision anyway, seeing as we live here with him. Johnny said we had no money of our own and there would be fees to pay at military school.’
Jenny was silent. So the children had worked it out. At least Johnny, Serena and Christina had. Thomas and William probably hadn’t realized yet that their grandfather paid for everything they had or enjoyed: clothing, food, horses, dogs. They had much to be grateful for, of course, and Jenny asked for very little for herself. She had always made her own clothes and those for the children when they were small, buying material and sewing cottons from the packman when he called. Now Serena and Christina did their own sewing.
‘So.’ Serena glanced at her anxiously. ‘I wanted to discuss something with you. If you say I can’t, I promise I won’t run away like Johnny did.’
‘Oh!’ Jenny stroked her daughter’s head. ‘I hope not. Whatever would I do without you? Bad enough to lose one twin without the other going as well.’
Serena’s expression dropped slightly. ‘Well, it wouldn’t be losing me exactly.’
‘What wouldn’t?’ Jenny frowned. What was Serena going to ask?
‘I’d like to go away to school!’
‘But you’ve had an education!’ Jenny said. ‘You have always done so well. Better than any of the others. Why would you want to go away to school?’
‘Not just any school.’ Serena took a deep breath. ‘Abroad. I’d like to go abroad.’
‘But why?’ Jenny was flabbergasted. ‘You wouldn’t understand what they were talking about! Not with ’scrap of French you’ve been taught.’
‘Let me explain, Mama.’ Serena gave her mother a very grown-up smile. ‘When we were at Aunt Pearl’s a few weeks ago – do you remember, we went to tea and all our cousins were there? Well, we – the girls – went off into the garden,’ she said, as her mother nodded. ‘And Cousin Alice was asking about Johnny and had we heard from him – she’s a bit sweet on him, I think – and then she told us that a friend of hers was going away to school in Switzerland. She was going to learn French and German and how to be a lady.’
‘Goodness,’ Jenny said. ‘Can you learn to be a lady? I didn’t know that you could.’ But why not? She mused. It’s possible to learn most things. ‘Yes – and?’
‘Well, that’s what I would like to do,’ Serena said earnestly. ‘I would like to learn to be a lady. I’ve got a very ladylike kind of name, haven’t I? Serena St John Laslett. It sounds very ladyish, don’t you think?’ She put her head to one side and lowered her lashes. ‘Perhaps that’s why you chose it?’
‘No,’ Jenny said slowly, ‘your papa and I chose your name because it suited you. You were a very serene baby, unlike Johnny, who was the opposite! And Mary as your second name after your grandmother.’
‘I wish I could remember Papa,’ Serena said softly. ‘Christina can remember him. She said he was very kind and loving. Not a bit like Grandpa.’
‘He was very much like your grandfather,’ Jenny assured her. ‘And your grandfather is also kind and loving! He wouldn’t have us all here under his roof if he wasn’t,’ she said sternly. ‘He could lead a much quieter life without us all.’
Serena was chastened. ‘Of course he could. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean that he wasn’t kind or loving. So I suppose you’d have to ask him if I could go? Because he would have to pay for it?’
‘Yes, that’s it exactly,’ Jenny said. ‘He has never grumbled about the expense of us all, but neither have I ever been extravagant, and I think he appreciates that. I’ll ask his opinion. But don’t build up your hopes too much.’
‘And you haven’t enough money then, Mama?’ Serena shook her head in anticipation of the answer. ‘I suppose if we didn’t have Grandpa, then I’d have to go to work as a servant girl like the maids in the kitchen?’
Her mother smiled, and then gave a laugh. ‘Indeed you would, Serena. Now wouldn’t that be a terrible thing?’
‘Dreadful!’ Serena exclaimed. ‘I couldn’t bear it if I had to work all day as they do and have hardly any time off. No, I really must be a lady, Mama, and marry someone rich. Someone even richer than Grandpa so that I can travel to Europe and go to London for the balls and parties and such.’
‘You’re too young to even think about that,’ Jenny admonished her. ‘And probably too young to go away to school. I’ll talk to Aunt Bella about it, see what she thinks.’
‘Aunt Bella! How would she know?’ Serena was scornful. ‘She hasn’t ever been away to school. I don’t suppose she’s even been to London!’
‘She’ll know more than I do,’ her mother replied. ‘She’ll know if it’s proper for you to go when you’re so young – that is if Grandpa agrees.’
‘But you wouldn’t mind, Mama?’ Serena asked anxiously. ‘If he says yes?’
Jenny considered. Why not? Serena wants to spread her wings just as I did at her age. It’s just that her sights are on bigger and much grander things than mine ever were. Her horizons are wider, and she has greater expectations. I only hope, oh how I do hope, that fate doesn’t deal her as hard a blow as it did me.
‘Mama? Would you mind? Would you be unhappy if I went away?’
‘I should miss you,’ Jenny said. ‘Just as I miss Johnny. But at least I’d know where you were.’ She took a deep breath. ‘Not knowing where Johnny is is a terrible worry. But if you really do want to go, then I wouldn’t stand in your way.’ She smiled at the delight on Serena’s face. ‘Don’t start counting your chickens,’ she said. ‘Your grandfather will probably say no!’
She discussed it first with Arabella, for it was quite true that Arabella knew more about society’s rules than she did. She had been brought up in a household where ladies were expected to marry well. Unfortunately, as her own mother had died before Arabella was of marriageable age, she hadn’t been given the opportunity.
‘She should certainly go,’ Arabella declared. ‘It was what I would have liked to do. Pearl never wanted to and Father said that Maud couldn’t, because she wouldn’t fit in, but Laura went away to school. Though,’ she added thoughtfully, ‘I’m never quite sure if it did her any good, for she came home and married a farmer anyway.
‘Would you be happy about it, Jenny? It’s not what you were used to, is it? I suppose all of your brothers and sisters stayed at home until they were married?’
‘They all had to work,’ Jenny explained. ‘The girls as well as the boys, but they lived at home. I left home at ’age Serena is now,’ she confided. ‘I was ’youngest girl in ’family. I could see which way ’wind was blowing and just like you I thought I’d have to stay at home and look after everybody.’
‘So you left!’ Arabella breathed. ‘How very brave of you, Jenny. But what did your mother say? Did she agree to your leaving?’
‘I didn’t tell her,’ she admitted. ‘I found a – a position, and told her afterwards. My father said I could leave if I wanted to.’ This was more information than she had ever given her sister-in-law and she felt she was treading on unstable ground. ‘So, yes, I think Serena could go.’ She switched the discussion back to Serena. ‘But I’d rather she waited a little longer, maybe until the end of ’summer, and maybe’, she sighed, ‘by then we might have heard from Johnny.’
‘It’s what she wants,’ Jenny said. ‘It’s her life, not mine. She already has a different life from ’one I knew when I was a child.’ Except that I wasn’t a child, she thought. I was on my way to being grown up, and maybe Serena is too.
He observed her from where he was sitting by the fire, his booted feet perched on a footstool. ‘And does that worry you?’ he asked. ‘You’re not afraid that the gap between you will become too great? You realize that she’ll be mixing with people from a different society.’
‘You mean am I afraid that she will be shamed or embarrassed by her mother? No, I’m not afraid of that,’ she said softly. ‘I think I’ve taught my children to treat all people equally. They say please and thank you to the servants as well as to others.’ She said this with a deal of irony, for John Laslett did not always. The servants, in his eyes, were there to work and fetch and carry on his behalf, and rarely were they thanked for it. If they displeased him then they were given notice, which was why his workers didn’t stay with him for more than their yearly tenure. ‘And if she is, then it will be a loss to both of us.’
He nodded thoughtfully. ‘Let’s wait a month or two,’ he said. ‘And if she’s still in the same mind, then yes, I think she should go.’
CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
‘Gramps! If Serena is going away to Switzerland, could I have some pigs? Please.’ William looked up earnestly at his grandfather. ‘I don’t think they would cost as much, and I could probably pay you back when I’ve made a profit.’
‘What has Serena to do with pigs?’ his grandfather objected. ‘I don’t see how the two go together!’
‘Well, it’s just that if Serena is going away to learn to be a lady and Thomas is going to be a farmer now that Johnny’s not here, then I’d like to keep pigs.’
‘We grow crops and keep sheep and cattle. Why should we want pigs?’ John Laslett stared quizzically at William.
‘No. Not we!’ William explained patiently. ‘I’d like some of my own. I know there’s a score over at Mr Dobson’s farm and Mr Elliot has half a dozen, but I’d like to breed some myself.’
‘Ah!’ John Laslett scratched his beard. ‘And do you intend selling any of these pigs, or will you be keeping them for home consumption?’
‘I thought I’d have two sows for breeding,’ William clarified, ‘and when they’ve farrowed I’d keep one piglet for fattening for the kitchen, or maybe two, and sell the others at Driffield market when they were ready. But I intend to start small and build up gradually. I like pork,’ he said solemnly, ‘but I don’t think there’s been the flavour lately.’
‘I see,’ his grandfather said wryly, and raised his eyebrows. ‘So what will you feed these pigs on to give flavour? Always supposing I agree!’
‘Well.’ William put his hands behind his back and expounded. ‘Mama said that when she and Papa lived at Lavender Cott, they kept a pig in the orchard. It grubbed about in there and lived mostly on fallen apples, and I thought that was such a good idea! But I thought that I’d fatten mine on barley and scraps from the kitchen as well, and we’ve got loads of apples in the orchard, so that would give a really nice taste. Course,’ he continued, looking serious, ‘there’d be loads of pig shit, but then that could go on the vegetable garden.’
John Laslett put his hand over his mouth, but his eyes twinkled. ‘And you’d clear that up, would you? Your aunt Bella wouldn’t like walking in the orchard amongst that!’
A crease appeared above William’s nose. ‘She wouldn’t, would she? I hadn’t thought of that! Well, I’d have to clean it out and let her go in say just once a week.’
‘The sow, you mean?’
‘No! Aunt Bella.’
‘It seems’, said John Laslett, as he came into the sitting room later that day, ‘that we have a pig breeder on our hands, as well as a farmer and a lady.’
Jenny was sitting with Serena and Christina and looked up with a happy smile on her face. ‘And a soldier.’ Her voice broke. ‘We’ve just heard that Johnny is safe and well.’ She put her hand to her mouth and swallowed and began to explain. ‘Johnny wrote to his cousin Alice and enclosed a letter for Serena. He was too nervous to write here in case we tried to fetch him back. Alice kept the letter hidden until today when her mother discovered it and brought her over with it.’
‘Cousin Alice didn’t think to send it on to me,’ Serena said. ‘The silly girl is so besotted with Johnny she didn’t want to get him into trouble. She was waiting for me to go and visit.’
‘Never mind all that!’ her grandfather bellowed, making her jump. ‘Is the boy all right? Has he signed up for the army?’
Serena nodded. ‘I’ll read it, shall I, Mama?’
At her mother’s assent, she started to read aloud. ‘“Dear Serena, I’m sorry I’ve taken so long to write to you, but there’s not much time for such pleasures. It’s marching and drilling and shooting practice and being sworn at, and all other things that you wouldn’t appreciate being a girl, so that all I want to do is sleep at the end of the day. Some of the other fellows go out chasing girls and drinking, but that doesn’t interest me greatly at the moment, though I’ve had to pretend that it does, otherwise they’ll cotton on that I’m not as old as I’ve made out.
‘“I’ve decided that I’m going to work really hard and stick this out for a twelvemonth, then confess my age and apply for a commission. I’ve discovered that I’d not be able to go up through the ranks as quickly as I’d thought; but in twelve months I’ll be old enough to apply for military school. They select and promote officers on merit now and not on purchase. It’s a hard life but I’m determined to see it through. Please give my love to everybody, Christina and Thomas and William, and Aunt Bella, but especially Mama, and Grandpa too and tell them I’m sorry I had to do it this way. Oh, by the way, I miss you too. Your twin, Johnny.”’
John Laslett blew hard on his handkerchief and Christina wept into hers. ‘Well, he’s safe,’ he said gruffly. ‘Does he say where he is?’
‘Y-yes.’ Serena glanced at her mother and then down at the letter in her hand.
‘It’s all right,’ her grandfather said. ‘I’ll not fetch him back. I just thought I’d write to him, tell him how we’re getting on, and that if he ever wants to come back, then he can.’
There was a silence whilst they digested this unexpected pronouncement, then Serena said in a quiet voice, ‘He’s in London, Grandpa, and I thought that when I go away I could call to see him, on my way to Dover, I mean.’
‘Yes. Yes, of course. If they allow it,’ her grandfather muttered. ‘Don’t want him breaking any rules.’ He sighed, and as he caught sight of Christina wiping her eyes, he turned to her. ‘And what about you, young lady? Do you want to go off and leave us too, or are you content with this simple life?’
She shook her head. ‘No, thank you, Grandpappy. I’m quite grown up anyway, and although I can’t speak French or German, which Serena will learn, I don’t think I’ll have the need for it. Besides, I’d rather stay here with everyone that I know. I don’t really want to live with strangers.’
‘Mmm,’ he said. ‘Good. Because we don’t want to lose everybody, do we, Jenny?’
Jenny blinked. She’d been wrapped in a reverie as they were speaking, wondering what life did have in store for her eldest daughter. She had Lavender Cott as her own, and she would be for ever grateful to Stephen for that, but what Christina really needed was a kind and gentle husband who would take care of her. Christina wasn’t self-confident or assured like Serena and the boys were, and that’s my fault, she mused. I’ve always been so protective of her, even since before she was born. A sudden flash of recollection seared her mind and she battled to repress it as her father-in-law spoke.
‘So, I think you should take her about more,’ he w
as saying. ‘Go off to York for a day or two. Bella will go with you. She’d like that. She’s a bit of a gadabout. Or take the carriage and go to Beverley. You’d have a nice day out there. Might even come with you myself.’
‘Take – Christina, did you say?’ Jenny asked. ‘Sorry, I didn’t quite catch –’
‘Yes,’ said the old man. ‘After Serena has gone off, take Christina out to meet people.’ He looked across at Christina and said wryly, ‘Your mother must look around to find you a suitable young fellow for a husband. How would that be?’
‘Do you want to marry me off, Grandpappy?’ Christina said, her voice low. ‘Because I don’t really belong to you, do I? Not like the others do.’
‘What?’ John Laslett looked shaken. ‘Of course you do! No, not in blood, that’s true, but come here.’ He put his arms out to her, and with sudden tears springing to her eyes she came towards him. He put his arm about her and kissed her forehead. ‘Don’t let me hear such nonsense again,’ he said gruffly. ‘Of course you belong.’
‘Mama! What?’ Serena looked stunned. ‘What does she mean? Not belong!’ Her voice dropped. ‘Christina! Why do you say that?’
John Laslett turned to Jenny in astonishment. ‘Do you mean you haven’t told them? Good God, woman! Why ever not?’
Jenny bent her head. ‘There never seemed to be a right time. We – Stephen – always treated Christina as if she belonged to him. And because he wasn’t here when ’children were growing up, there didn’t seem to be any need to say anything. They didn’t know him, after all,’ she said, raising her head and glancing from Christina to Serena.
‘I have a different father from you,’ Christina told Serena. Her eyes were moist and a tear trickled down her cheek. ‘He died before I was born, so I never knew him. But Papa – Stephen – I do remember him and I know that he loved me.’ She put her fingers to still her trembling lips. ‘And I loved him and I still miss him.’