Autumn Softly Fell

by Dominic Luke

  If she ever got there.

  But she mustn’t think like that. She mustn’t get too far ahead of herself. One step at a time.

  She left her room and opened the green baize door which marked the frontier of the nursery. She took one step, then another. Now she was beyond the pale. She was trespassing. She was at large in the forbidden parts of the house. The endless maze of stairs and corridors was a daunting prospect, but she knew that if she kept her head she wouldn’t get lost. She just hoped she wouldn’t run into the menacing figure of Mrs Bourne. She was in no hurry to meet her again.

  She was tiptoeing along the corridor to the stairs when the sound of a voice made her jump out of her skin. She half expected to see Mrs Bourne sweeping towards her to grab her arm, drag her screaming back to the nursery. But nothing happened. The corridor was empty. There was no footstep on the stairs.

  The voice came again, faintly. ‘Nurse! Nurse! Where are you?’

  It was not Mrs Bourne or even Nanny. It was not an alarming voice at all. Just the opposite: rather feeble and peevish. A child’s voice. It was coming from the room away on the left: the very room, Dorothea now remembered, into which the bald man with the black bag had gone on her first morning. The bald man was Dr Camborne. He had called to examine her soon after her arrival. She had not liked him much.

  ‘Nurse!’

  Perhaps the child in the room was ill. It would explain the doctor’s visit. Nobody had mentioned a sick child in all the weeks she had been here, but then nobody told her anything. They wouldn’t even tell her about her papa. ‘Ask me no questions and I’ll tell you no lies,’ Nanny said.

  Dorothea hesitated at the top of the stairs. She felt an urgent need to get on, to make good her escape. But what if the child needed help? You couldn’t ignore a cry for help. Mickey would no doubt say that she was being soppy but what about the Good Samaritan? Papa had told her that story many times. People should help one another, he said. It was the Christian thing to do.

  Reaching a decision, she walked quickly along the corridor and pushed open the door on the left.

  She found herself in a room like her own, or perhaps a little bigger. It was very gloomy for the curtains were closed. Lying in a large bed – dwarfed by it – was a pasty-faced boy with deep-sunk dark eyes and coal black hair. He did indeed look ill, as feeble and peevish as his voice, his head lolling and listless, but his expression changed when he caught sight of Dorothea. His head jerked up, his mouth fell open. His big dark eyes looked as round as saucers in his thin face.

  ‘Hello.’ Dorothea found her smile had deserted her.

  ‘Who are you?’ the boy whispered.

  ‘My name is Dorothea. I … I heard you calling for a nurse.’

  ‘The nurse. My nurse. Where is she?’

  ‘I … I don’t know.’

  Dorothea glanced over her shoulder. Every second’s delay increased the danger of being caught, but for some reason she could not tear herself away just yet. Perhaps it was because the boy looked so helpless. She felt sorry for him.

  She took a step nearer, managed a smile at last. ‘What’s your name?’

  ‘It’s Richard.’

  ‘Are you alright? Why were you calling for the nurse?’

  ‘My pillows are out of place. I’m not … not comfy.’

  She wondered why he couldn’t rearrange his pillows himself. Perhaps he was too weak. He certainly looked it.

  ‘Let me help,’ she said. She moved his pillows as he directed, holding him up as she did so. He was limp in her arm, very warm, with a bony back. She was close enough to see herself reflected in his big dark eyes.

  As she stepped back, he said, ‘You have your coat on. Have you just come, or are you going?’

  ‘I’m going.’ There were questions on the tip of her tongue, but time was pressing. She could not afford one question, let alone the dozen or more piling up in her head. ‘I have to leave now. I’m sorry.’

  ‘Must you? Will you come back? I wish you would.’

  ‘I can’t. I’m going away. I’m going away forever. I have to.’

  She felt it was mean of her to leave him like this, ill in bed, all alone. And to think she had considered herself hard done by in the nursery! But the escape was more important than anything. For once, she had to put herself first. Even the Good Samaritan would have done the same.

  ‘It was nice to meet you. Goodbye.’

  ‘Goodbye,’ the boy whispered. His dark eyes followed her as she left the room.

  As she returned to the head of the stairs, Dorothea heard another door open behind her and quickly dodged down before peering back round the corner. A strict-looking woman appeared in the corridor, entered the sick room. She shut the door firmly behind her. Dorothea wondered if that was the nurse. She would never know.

  Hurrying down the stairs, treading softly, her mind was in a whirl. Who was the poorly child? Why had no one spoken of him in all the weeks and weeks she had been here? It was almost as if he didn’t really exist, as if he were a ghost.

  She was so busy with her thoughts that she reached the ground floor almost before she knew it. There in front of her was the big front door. It was shut. She knew that it was only kept locked at night, but would she be able to open it?

  To her relief, the handle turned easily. The door moved smoothly and soundlessly on well-oiled hinges. Cold air came shivering into the hall – cold, but fresh. It was wonderful! She breathed deeply as she slipped outside, pulling the door to behind her. Her heart leapt as she skipped down the steps. Out in the open again after so long, she really felt that she was on her way now.

  Her joy was short-lived.

  Away to the left, across the space of gravel, there was a high red-brick wall with a doorway set into it. Through the doorway came a crusty old man wearing an apron and a weatherworn cap and pushing a wheelbarrow. He saw her at once.

  Her shoulders slumped. She hung her head. To have got all this way, right out of the house, only to be caught on the doorstep! All her plans lay in ruins.

  ‘Morning, miss.’

  Something in the old man’s tone made her look up. He was looking at her with deep brown eyes as he passed, but there was no sign of disapproval or vexation on his face, just mild curiosity. He nodded, touched his cap, went on his way. Before she’d had time to gather her thoughts, he’d gone, wheeling his barrow round the corner of the house.

  She could hardly believe her luck. She was still free, her escape still possible. Quickly, she set off across the gravel – not without a twinge of guilt, for she had been rather rude, had not said ‘good morning’ in return. (‘Good manners cost nothing,’ as Papa often said). She felt that she might have liked the old man if she’d got to know him. She never would now. She would never even find out who he was.

  She reached the far side of the gravelled space. The driveway led off sharp right down an avenue of evergreens. Here she had her second wobble. Her feet slowed and stopped. She wondered what Nora would think, finding her gone. And the boy in the bed, the old man with the wheelbarrow: would she really never see them again?

  She looked back; and in doing so she saw the house properly for the first time.

  It was a very big house, square and symmetrical with a great grey façade. There were many windows. High on the roof were rows of chimneys with smoke curling up into the overcast sky. The front door was still ajar as she’d left it. The steps swept grandly down. To the right of the door, ivy climbed the wall. Adjoining the house on this side was a sort of add-on in red brick with an archway leading to a courtyard. This was where the old man had gone with his wheelbarrow (she could see no sign of him now). To think of all the rooms behind all the windows made her dizzy. There was so much to discover, so many mysteries and secrets hidden away. The poorly child, for instance. She could not see his window, of course. It would be round the other side of the house (there would be more windows round the other side, more!), but one of those high windows on this side must be hers, the roo
m she’d abandoned. She looked up again at the spiralling smoke. It made her think of the nursery fire and the warm, snug day room.

  She shook her head. The nursery had been a prison. She must remember that. And she couldn’t afford to dawdle. She had to go now, immediately, before anyone else saw her. Any number of people might be looking out of the windows – Nanny, or Mrs Bourne, or even that remote presence Aunt Eloise.

  She turned hurriedly away and set off down the drive at a run. The wind buffeted her. Stones and clods of earth flew up as her booted feet hit the hard ground. The evergreen trees seethed and swayed, their branches dipping down as if to grab her. She ran and ran. At last, at long last, puffing and blowing, she came to the end of the drive. Here she stopped to catch her breath and gather her thoughts. There was a road in front of her running at right angles. To the right it sloped down to where there was a glint of water amongst the fields and trees – but Dorothea remembered that she had to turn left. That was what Nora had said.

  There was some sort of little house half-hidden in the trees nearby which made Dorothea uneasy, as if she hadn’t yet quite escaped the clutches of Clifton Park. Taking to the road, she set off once more. The road ran up a gentle incline so she could not see too far ahead. Alongside on the left was a crumbling sandstone wall. This soon faded away and the road ran on between hedgerows where new leaves were growing, with fields beyond, green with bitten grass or ploughed brown. She was too puffed to run anymore so she walked briskly, listening to the birdsong that trilled and rippled down the wind. But that wind was bitter, stinging her face (it was only March, after all) and the sky was grey and wintry-looking. There had been recent rain. Water lay in the ruts in the road. More rain was on the way by the looks of things. She was determined to reach the station before it came.

  She quickened her pace.

  Up she went then down again – and there now was the village ahead, Nora’s village, the place she’d heard so much about. She hurried towards it. Though she knew she must have passed this way with her papa, she had no recollection of it at all. She tried to recall everything that she had learned in the last few weeks.

  The village was called Hayton. Nora had lived there all her life. Which was Nora’s house? The first house that Dorothea saw was empty, half-ruined and overgrown; then came some rather grand houses with garden gates and gleaming windows – far too luxurious to be Nora’s two-up, two-down cottage. After that she came to a meeting of three ways with a space of grass and a tall tree. To the left, set back from the street, was the church with the crenulated tower which she could just see from her window at Clifton. The clock was chiming the quarter hour – the very sound which had haunted her dreams on her first night.

  ‘This must be the Green,’ Dorothea said to herself, recalling Nora’s words: straight on at the Green, cross the turnpike, and take the road to Welby. What was a turnpike? She would soon find out. It couldn’t be far now.

  On one side of the three-cornered Green there was a little shop. As Dorothea passed near it, the door opened with a jangle. An old woman in a black bonnet came out. She was carrying a basket. Standing on the doorstep, she stopped and stared. Dorothea hung her head, tried to be as inconspicuous as possible. Keeping close to the wall of the churchyard, she hurried on, didn’t dare look back.

  The village straggled to an end. Just past the last house, she met a man in a cap coming the other way, leading two enormous horses. She had no choice but to face him, did her best to look as if she was minding her own business. It seemed to work. The man barely gave her a glance. Her spirits soared, she hopped and skipped along the road. She had got all this way – right through the village – and no one had stopped her, no one had even asked where she was going. The railway station had to be very near now. Perhaps she would be able to see it from the next rise!

  She broke into a run, holding her hat with one hand as the breeze tried to whip it away. Puffing and panting, she reached the top of the slope – only to meet with disappointment. There was no sign of the railway. The road ran on and on, curving gently down into a wide shallow valley under the enormous grey sky. Fields, trees, hedgerows stretched away into an unguessable distance. There were perhaps some far-off buildings, but they were so remote as to fill her with despair. She would never have guessed how incredibly vast the countryside was – so lonely and unfriendly, too! London seemed hardly more than a dream, so distant she could scarcely believe it had ever existed.

  Crushed by her sense of despair, lashed by the wind up here on the exposed hillock, she took shelter by the hedgerow, sitting down on the damp grass, her plan in tatters. What next? Go on—or go back? But she didn’t dare go back, too frightened of what they might do to her. As for going on, where would this endless road take her? She might wander lost in the wilderness for evermore. She sat in a hopeless daze, staring at the muddy road, hearing the wind hissing through the grass and seething in the hedge.

  Suddenly her head jerked up. There was something else, another sound – not the wind, not the birds – quite the oddest noise she had ever heard in her life, a growling, chugging, buzzing sound. And it was coming rapidly nearer.

  She scrambled to her feet, pushing the tam o’shanter out of her eyes. Swooping up the road out of the wild blue yonder was a most extraordinary machine. Wheels spinning, black bonnet gleaming, it raced up the incline so rapidly that she had no time to hide. She cowered against the hedge as the terrible apparition bore down on her.

  The machine slowed then came to a stop right in front of her, juddering and growling. An outlandish figure was sitting on it, swathed in coat, cap, scarf and goggles.

  The figure spoke. ‘Good grief! Dorothea, isn’t it?’

  A gauntleted hand pulled down the scarf, pushed up the goggles, revealing surprised green eyes in a plain yet pleasant face. It was a face she recognized. The voice, too, she knew.

  ‘You’re the last person I expected to meet,’ the voice said. ‘What are you doing all the way out here?’

  The cat had got her tongue. All she could do was shake her head.

  ‘Don’t you remember? We met on the night of that party. It’s me, Henry Fitzwilliam!’

  Of course she remembered. How could she forget? She’d sat on his bony knees. There’d been a fizzy drink with a nasty taste. But what stuck in her mind most was his soothing voice and gentle smile. The smile was the same out here in the wild, but his face rather different. He had a black eye that even Mickey would have been proud of.

  Finally she found her voice. Pointing to the machine, she said, ‘What is it?’ She had to shout above the preposterous noise.

  ‘What’s what? Oh, you mean my autocar! Have you never seen one? They’re all the rage!’

  ‘But it’s … it’s…. What makes it go?’

  ‘That’ll be the combustion engine. It’s, er, all rather complicated. I’ll explain it sometime, when you’ve a few hours to spare.’ He rubbed his chin with his gloved hand. ‘Would you like a ride? I could take you to wherever it is you are going. Where are you going, by the way?’

  Dorothea bit her lip. She was reluctant to tell him her plan. He might think it silly. She did not want to look silly in Henry Fitzwilliam’s eyes.

  He jumped down from the autocar. ‘You look perished, poor thing. Here, put on my dust coat. That’s the ticket. And my hat too. It’s warmer than yours. Look! It’s got these little flaps to keep your ears snug. Now, up you get!’

  He lifted her onto the shuddering machine then swung himself back into the seat beside her. Reaching for a big lever, he said, ‘Right-oh. Where is it I’m taking you?’

  She had to tell him now. It didn’t matter whether he thought her silly or not. ‘I’m going to London. I’m going to find my papa.’

  Henry looked at her circumspectly. ‘London, is it? I say. That’s rather a long way on your own! How were you thinking of getting there?’

  ‘On the train, of course.’

  ‘Ah yes, of course. You’ve got the money for your ticket,
I suppose?’

  Dorothea felt her cheeks burning. Henry had seen the flaw in her plan at once. Even if by some miracle she had reached the railway station, she wouldn’t have got any further. She didn’t have a farthing to her name.

  So much for Mrs Browning and taking one step at a time.

  Henry was rubbing his chin again. He looked thoughtful, wasn’t laughing at her. ‘London’s a bit far for a jaunt. I doubt Bernadette would make it.’

  ‘Who’s Bernadette?’

  ‘This is Bernadette. My Daimler.’ He patted the contraption fondly. ‘Listen. I’ve an idea. Why don’t I run you back to Clifton? You can get warm in front of a fire and if you decide you still want to go to London, it can all be arranged properly. What do you say to that?’

  What could she say? She had no plan now and no choice. She nodded glumly. Did Henry realise he was taking her back to gaol?

  He set the machine in motion. At once, Dorothea forgot everything else, was consumed by terror. She clung to her seat as the autocar bowled along, bumping and jerking over the ruts in the road, the roar of its engine and the noise of the wind deafening. There was an oily, smoky smell that made her feel sick and the hedgerows flashed past in a way that made her giddy. Yet all the time Henry kept up a flow of chatter as if he hadn’t a care in the world.

  ‘…quite a decent little machine … speedy too…’ (Many of his words were blown away by the wind). ‘…twelve miles per hour is the limit … the police hide in ditches with stopwatches … quite ridiculous, but there’s nothing one can…. Oh rats, what’s up with her now?’

  The last words came out loud and clear as, without warning, the engine coughed, spluttered, and died. The autocar ground to a halt, one wheel lurching into a rut. Dorothea’s head was still spinning. All those miles and miles she had walked – through the village and up the rise: and they had covered them in just a few minutes. They were almost back at Clifton already. She recognized the crumbling sandstone wall on the right.