Touch the Silence

by Gloria Cook

  ‘Good heavens!’ Tristan said under his breath, before responding to Sara Killigrew’s polite curtsey.

  ‘Yes, we were taken aback on our first sight of her,’ Emilia said with satisfaction, for she felt a sort of maternal pride towards the girl with stunning Nordic looks. A snowy-haired beauty with large eyes the colour of cornflowers, slender and shaped with grace. ‘Her mother was a local woman, her father a sailor. She’s a good worker, as is Jim, although he’s a bright spark and takes a bit of handling.’

  ‘I think I can carry on by myself, Miss Em, if you want to go in for a yarn with Cap’n Harvey,’ Sara said, as if awestruck. Jonathan’s account of his father, on his return from London, stretched his being a hero to a saviour.

  Tristan was astonished by the sweetness of her voice.

  ‘You should hear her sing. The rector trained her to sing part of the Messiah and she’s performed it in church for the war fund. It’s funny, but it seems like she and Jim have always been here,’ Emilia said, as she and Tristan walked through the yard.

  He was devouring the familiar sights. His old home, the well, the barn, the stables, the animal and store houses. The pigs, the goats, the pond, the cackling poultry bidding him a raucous welcome. It was good to see Pip chasing the cats. Tristan was striving for normality, for a little peace in his soul.

  ‘Does it seem you were always meant to marry Alec and not Ben? To me, nothing at all seems real. And here’s the other surprising-looking individual you have here now.’ Archie had come out of the washhouse, where he had been keeping the furnace fuelled for Tilda. He touched his forelock to Tristan. Tristan hastened as best he could to him and grasped his hand. ‘No, no, I won’t accept that from you. We have a lot in common. My brother’s told me about you. I’m pleased to meet you, Mr Rothwell.’

  Emilia watched, pleased, as Archie answered in quiet respect, not guarded, not pulling away. The sound of Sara’s singing flowed out of the dairy. Archie’s eyes drifted that way. Emilia frowned. At every opportunity Archie watched Sara.

  * * *

  ‘I don’t like the look of you one bit,’ Alec told Tristan at supper, which, for his homecoming, was being eaten in the dining room. Alec wouldn’t hear of the table being waited on, and Tilda and the Killigrews were eating there too. ‘After this, a good drenching with brandy will help set you up.’

  ‘Thank you, but I thought I’d spend some time with Jonny.’ Tristan had been adding to the jolly talk, but he wanted only to be alone with Jonathan. If not for Jonathan, he’d wish only to drift off to sleep and never wake up, now he was finally facing life as a deserted husband.

  He smiled at the boy who had been allowed to stay down late for the occasion, and who, at regular intervals, slipped his hand inside Emilia’s. ‘You still don’t know what to make of me, do you, son? I know I look little better than when you saw me in London, but it’s definitely me, your daddy.’

  ‘I know,’ Jonathan said, shuffling his knife and fork.

  ‘He’ll come round,’ Alec said.

  ‘I know,’ Tristan replied, but his dejection was plain.

  ‘I think Grandma recognizes you, Tris. See how content she is? It’s all due to Emilia.’

  Emilia would be content now Tristan was home, presently safe, if it weren’t for her concern about Honor. If Ben could change so much, would he be good to her? Honor had written to her, asking for her understanding over her and Ben’s engagement, and stating that she was too busy for the moment to call at Ford Farm. Was Ben insisting she stay away? Ben’s treachery, to Alec’s delight, had not gone all his way. The two labourers of Tremore Farm had turned up asking for work, saying they didn’t trust their new boss. Bernard Vickery was now living in Wayside Cot. Midge Roach had always lived with his wife’s family in the village, but now took a different direction to work.

  ‘Excuse me,’ Tilda said self-consciously. ‘Would you like some more beef pie, Captain Harvey?’

  ‘Aha! Now there’s a look of determination to build a fellow up, if ever I saw one,’ Tristan grinned, as if he was suddenly his old self again – how he wanted to be. He patted his stomach, which appeared hollow even in his uniform. ‘The doctors say I must take things quietly at first, Tilda.’

  Jim Killigrew pushed his plate forward a fraction. Everyone heard Sara catch her breath. Raised for half their life in the workhouse in Truro, they were partly institutionalized and usually waited for permission to do even the simplest thing. The restraints were fast losing their hold on Jim.

  ‘Feed him up, Tilda,’ Alec bawled down the table. ‘He’s already built like an ox, but like any chap his age he can do justice to his meals. Eh, darling?’

  ‘What? Oh, yes, Alec.’ Emilia was still getting used to his public endearments. She saw to Lottie, who was intent on stirring her dessert spoon round and round in the remains of her dinner.

  Tilda nodded at Sara and they began to clear the dishes. Tristan said, ‘I’ll go over to see Ben and his bride-to-be

  tomorrow. I’ll take Jonny and Grandma with me. Now I’m home, I’m hoping you and he will make up your differences, Alec.’

  Emilia shot a look at Alec. He clamped his mouth shut.

  Tristan breathed heavily. He’d say no more about it for now.

  ‘I’m glad Uncle Ben’s gone. I don’t like him,’ Jonathan said, sharp and grumpy.

  ‘Why’s that, Jonny?’ Tristan asked.

  ‘I don’t think he liked me. Can I go up to Jim’s room after pudding, Daddy? Just for a minute? He’s got something for me.’

  ‘And what is that?’ Tristan asked the older boy. Jim Killigrew didn’t possess the same perfect quality of features as his twin, but his blond unruly hair and deep blue eyes hinted that a good face would be reached in time.

  Jim shifted but looked Tristan in the eye. ‘’Tis a model aeroplane, sir. I carved it out of wood, copied it from a picture in a book Master Jonny showed me.’

  ‘Just for a minute then, Jonny.’ Tristan forced a smile at his son. It hurt to his soul to see how Jonathan had moved on with his life without him.

  Emilia was in bed when Alec slipped in beside her. ‘You can’t stay tonight,’ she said, sitting up in panic. ‘It’s too much of a risk with Tristan in the next room.’

  ‘I know, but I hate it when I can’t say goodnight to you like this.’ He pulled her down, and his kisses made her forget the fear of disgrace if they were discovered.

  Then she was wriggling away from him. Alec knew so many ways to make love and every way to make her respond to him. ‘If we go on like this you’re going to have to talk to Dad again.’

  ‘With all my heart I hope so. Now Tris is here I’m going to try to persuade Edwin to let us marry before the six months’ mourning for Billy is over. A wedding would cheer Tris up more than anything else I can think of, and I’m sure Billy wouldn’t have minded.’

  Emilia recalled Billy’s appearance on the Newquay cliffs. ‘No, he wouldn’t have.’ She snuggled back into Alec’s warm, sensitive body. ‘Sometimes, Alec Harvey, you can be so smug.’

  ‘I’m happy at last, that’s all.’

  She caressed his neck and chest, knowing he liked soft fingertips there. ‘Alec, I’ve been thinking.’

  ‘About what to call our first child? I want at least half a dozen noisy brats tearing about the place. Think we can manage that?’

  ‘I don’t doubt it for a moment. Seriously though, considering what might happen if Tristan returns to battle, and weighing up what’s really important, shouldn’t you think about what he said about you and Ben making things up? I mean, it’s not pleasant, us not speaking while we live in the same parish. I miss Honor so much. I’d like to go over to Tremore with the others tomorrow to see her – your gran will need me to care for her anyway. You wouldn’t mind? Alec?’

  He was lacing his fingers through her hair, something he always did when they were intimate. ‘You may go anywhere you like at any time, Emilia darling, with or without Grandma. Of course you want to see Honor. S
he’s still welcome here.’

  ‘What about Ben?’

  ‘I don’t know anyone called Ben.’

  She raised herself up and looked down on him in the candlelight. He had not tensed, the tone of his voice had not hardened, but there was something unyielding about him. She knew no matter how much she argued or pleaded he would not compromise. Then she had it. ‘You don’t forgive, do you?’ Was this what Ben had meant about her not knowing what Alec was really like?

  ‘It depends…’

  ‘On what? Wouldn’t you yourself have to be flawless for such harshness to be justified?’

  ‘Is there something you wish to know, Emilia?’

  She was facing the rest of her life of sharing a bed with this man, of helping to run his farm. He knew Ben had been her first lover – she had the right to his secrets. ‘Well, I’ve always wondered why Maudie left so suddenly. And this is a bit delicate, is it true you took a mistress before Lucy died?’

  Alec leaned against the bedstead and pillows. ‘Someone’s obviously been saying things about me. Very well, I’ve got nothing to hide. Lucy accused Maudie of flirting with me and she flogged her. Went up to the attics one night with a horsewhip. The rage Lucy was in, the poor girl might have lost half the flesh on her back if I hadn’t intervened. The next day I escorted Maudie to the railway station, saw her off to Redruth, to a cousin’s, and I had to pay her not to report Lucy to the police. As for the woman I was seeing, the widowed Eugenie Bawden, yes, I started with her before Lucy’s death, but not until I’d done my best to make my marriage work. It was for company rather than sex. Someone’s been trying to turn you against me, Emilia. It has to be Ben. If you still have doubts about me, ask yourself if any woman in the village, or even yourself, has ever been bothered by me.’

  ‘If I’d thought you were a libertine, Alec, I wouldn’t have stayed downstairs with you in Winifred’s house.’ Emilia was sorry she had brought the issues up. Ben’s lies would reinforce Alec’s reasons not to forgive him. She didn’t like Alec to brood.

  ‘Do you want to know about Lucy? I never loved her. At the end I think I hated her. There was nothing to admire about her, as there is you. I’ve wanted you for a long time, my darling angel. I intend never to be without you.’

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Emilia drove the trap over to Tremore Farm. While Tristan and Jonathan were helping Lottie down, she wondered how Honor, if she was here, would receive her.

  Then Honor came running and waving, skirting around Sully, leaping over a startled clucking hen, out into the lane. She looked so pretty and excited, and out of place in front of the ancient, weathered, inadequate farmstead. A rescued damsel brought not to a castle, but a hovel. She shouldn’t be wearing an apron over an old dress. Her glorious hair should be flowing free down her back, not restrained by a headscarf, tied gipsy-style. Then Emilia realized these were her own expectations for Honor, and she had no right to them. Her friend had endured this from others all her life. But what plans did Ben have for her?

  ‘Em! What a lovely surprise. I saw you coming from upstairs. Aunt Florence and I are here most days helping out, although I think Eliza would prefer it if we left her to it.’

  Eliza Shore, the only female living and working at Tremore Farm was putting two buckets on a yoke across her broad shoulders to fetch water inside from the well. ‘S’pose you’ll be wanting tea?’ An insincere offer. Blunt and coarse, a tower of a woman, about forty, heavy-footed, dressed like a man, her hair chopped off at ear-length, she nodded hello to Emilia.

  ‘I’ll see to it, Eliza. You carry on,’ Honor said.

  * * *

  ‘Goodness, Em, that woman scares me. She drinks and smokes and swears. Aunt Florence wants Ben to dismiss her but he won’t hear of it. Mind you, she’s capable and hard-working. Makes a light loaf and delicious butter, does good work with the laundry, and fetching and carrying, but she doesn’t dust a thing.’ Honor added in a whisper, ‘And she smells.’

  Emilia took her friend in a tight hug. ‘Are you going to be happy, Honor?’

  ‘Yes, I think so. I’ll make it work. We must talk, I know. I wasn’t going to leave it much longer before coming over to see you, honestly. How’s Tilda? And Archie?’

  ‘They send their regards.’ Emilia linked her arm through Lottie’s.

  ‘Well, well.’ Lottie stared at a tuft of brownish grass growing out of the wall. ‘I had one just like that.’

  ‘That’s lovely, Lottie.’ Emilia patted her gloved hand. Florence Burrows appeared at the front door. ‘Captain Harvey! God be praised for your safe return. And Mrs Harvey and Mrs Harvey-to-be are here as well to visit the other Mrs Harvey-to-be, how splendid. And Master Jonathan, you must be thrilled to have your daddy home?’

  ‘He’s a hero,’ Jonathan said, making faces at the poor surroundings.

  Florence flushed and cleared her throat. ‘We’re going to be terribly busy for some time, as you can see. Has Honor told you about the renovations and extensions planned for Bracken House, Emilia? We’re going to change the name to Tremore House, more in keeping, of course.’

  ‘It means we’re going to have to move in here for a few months,’ Honor said. ‘I can’t say I’m looking forward to it, especially with the deepest of winter still to get through.’ ‘But the sooner it’s finished, the sooner Honor and Ben can get married,’ Florence broke in. ‘Come along everyone, into the sitting room. Honor, you run along and fetch Ben.’

  With the help of Albie Trewin, Ben had pulled down the wire netting, straw and sacking that made up the badly fitting roof of his cowhouse. Next they had emptied the inside, and while Ben lit a bonfire of the rubbish, he had sent Albie to fetch buckets of hot water, soda and antiseptic.

  ‘We’ll do this together today, but you’ll know what to do if I ask you to do something like it again, Albie.’ Patiently, Ben showed the pallid-faced, skinny youth how to dip his broom into a bucket and scrub down the walls and rough stone flooring. They scrubbed until Ben was satisfied any trace of the viral pneumonia that was affecting his small herd had been eradicated. Then they washed away the filthy water with fresh bucketsful drawn from the pump.

  ‘Mug of tea, boss?’ Albie wiggled his cap, which he always wore pushed back from his broad forehead, and nodded and grinned, revealing the gap in his lower teeth, a legacy of the bullying from his greengrocer employer. He was short and stooped and seemed like a wizened old man.

  ‘Hey, you,’ Ben laughed. ‘We haven’t finished yet.’

  ‘Mug of tea, five minutes, boss?’ Albie repeated the nodding and grinning. ‘Miss ’Onor said so.’

  ‘Ten more, Albie.’ Ben held up his fingers and thumbs.

  Albie had no conception of time, but he contentedly whooshed his brush into a bucket, knowing he would get his tea in due course. His mind incapable of holding on to the knowledge of his two former positions, he believed his parents were only recently dead, and he was convinced Ben was his and Cyril’s godfather, the person now responsible for their welfare. Honor, with her golden hair and her caring ways was an angel to him, and he was convinced that Florence Burrows, whom he was in awe of, was connected to royalty. He had addressed her, ‘Duchess, ma’am.’ She had been amused and the label had stuck.

  Honor came flying across the cobbles, holding up her skirt. ‘Ben! Ben!’

  ‘You shouldn’t be here, sweetheart. You’ll get yourself messy,’ he said.

  ‘You’ve got to come. Now!’ She always had a hard task to part Ben from his work. He was determined to get Tremore Farm into reasonable order before Christmas.

  ‘If there’s a crisis inside, then you and your aunt will have to cope with it on your own. I haven’t got time to chase out a wandering cow, catch a mouse or unblock a sink, and nor has Albie. Ask Eliza to do whatever it is.’

  ‘It’s nothing like that, dear. It’s—’

  ‘Your older brother,’ Tristan said, appearing in the yard. ‘Have you got time to stop for me?’

  ‘Tris!
’ Ben threw the broom down and hurried to shake Tristan’s hand. Then he threw his arms around his neck. ‘Did you come straight here off the train?’

  ‘I arrived yesterday. I’ve brought Jonny and Grandma with me. They’re inside.’

  ‘Albie, sweep all the rinsing water out of the cowhouse, but whatever you do, don’t put anything, not anything, inside. It’s got to stay empty for two weeks, a long time. Understand?’

  ‘’Es, boss,’ he said. ‘Mug of tea, Miss ’Onor?’

  ‘I’ll send Eliza out with one for you, Albie.’ Honor walked away with Ben, who wrapped his arm round her trim waist.

  ‘Congratulations to you both,’ Tristan said. ‘I’m sorry I missed your engagement party.’

  ‘It was just a quiet meal with friends at the Red Lion. Honor looked beautiful, of course,’ Ben said. ‘It’s so good to see you, Tris, you obviously took a pasting. You’d do a fine job as a scarecrow at the moment. Listen, about Ursula. I’m glad you got my letter eventually. I didn’t know what to write at first. Kept hoping she’d give him up, then when she left, I thought the plain facts were the only thing I could say. I’m sorry this homecoming isn’t to be a happy one.’

  ‘Well, it’s good to be with Jonny.’ Tristan said no more: it was too personal. He couldn’t help feeling worried about Ursula – despite everything, he still loved her.

  ‘I wish I knew something to say to help you.’

  ‘Time – that’s the great cure-all, isn’t it? I’m sorry about your eye, Ben, but you have a new future to look forward to with your lovely bride. You’re having a few problems, I see.’

  ‘The fields are in pretty good order but Dick Buzza should have retired years ago. This latest problem could have been prevented, of course, if all the draughts had been stopped up. There’s enough good waste material lying about to make a new roof, it will tidy things up at the same time. I’m looking to increase all my stock by the spring. The inspector was here yesterday and he’s impressed. Going to see about getting a Land Girl or two.’