Beggar Bride

by Gillian White

  ‘Ffiona?’

  ‘You better come in.’

  You can tell she finds the state of Ffiona’s unkempt house distasteful, and Ffiona has to admit that the smell of stale smoke and old booze combined outstrips the solitary, smouldering joss stick.

  ‘Won’t you sit down… oh, sorry, wait a minute, I’ll move the tray.’ Ffiona gives a snort of a laugh, irritated at how inadequate she must seem in front of her glamorous visitor. ‘I had a few people round last night,’ she says over-defensively, ‘and of course I can’t afford a woman to come and clean up after me.’

  ‘No, I understand that,’ says Angela. Her handbag must have cost an arm and a leg. But then she’s lucky, she’s got her own money, hasn’t she, she can spend it on whatever she likes, she is not dependent on Fabian as Ffiona was.

  ‘Tea, coffee, something stronger?’ But Angela must have noticed on her way through the kitchen that the only tea on offer is peppermint and the only coffee decaff. There’s really no need for her to put that patronising look on her face. The kitchen might not look clean, but it is, somewhere, underneath. Even Honesty had a go at it a couple of weeks ago, she couldn’t stand to see it that way any longer.

  ‘If you don’t make more of an effort than this you’re going to have to call in the council to have the whole house fumigated,’ her daughter chastised.

  ‘Rubbish,’ snorted Ffiona, ‘you little prig.’

  ‘And you’re never sober these days, Mummy. Your liver must be absolutely shot.’

  ‘Mind your own business, you’re hardly ever here, anyway, so what right have you to come criticising? Now you’ve managed to creep round Angela they can’t keep you away from Hurleston. It’s time you grew out of horses, darling, there’s something rather unpleasant about women your age astride, and still hanging around the Pony Club.’

  Honesty gazed round Ffiona’s kitchen with rude disapproval. ‘It’s quite a miracle, Mummy, that you haven’t already poisoned yourself.’

  To Ffiona’s mild distress things haven’t worked out as well as she’d hoped between them. Ffiona enjoyed telling her friends that her daughter had chosen, she had eventually chosen to come home at last, to leave Fabian and be with the parent who really loved her, who had always cared, who had suffered her only child to be ripped from her arms at the tender age of six. To be fair, Ffiona herself had conveniently forgotten that Fabian had actually requested that Honesty live with her mother, back in the early days, he thought the child would be happier there than at boarding school in spite of her so called immoral way of life. But Ffiona had been far too busy fighting the divorce settlement, falling hopelessly in love, travelling the world… there’d been no room in her life for a daughter. And she couldn’t get over, even now she finds it repugnant to contemplate, the base means to which Fabian and his henchmen resorted in order to set her up. Sending that message from a drunken old friend supposedly ‘in trouble’, getting her to visit that hideous Soho sex den, positioning a photographer outside the door to catch her when she realised her mistake and hastened out. Oh God, she’d been so naive! The publicity was horrid. All her friends turned against her. They’d even bribed a little receptionist to say she was a regular caller, and none of the other clients cared to reveal themselves, none chose to stand up in court and swear Ffiona had never been there before.

  So is it any wonder that Ffiona, deprived of status and adequate funding, is still bitter?

  What has this mannequin-thin, Vogue-faced, exquisitely groomed cow come here to do—gloat?

  If only Ffiona had got up earlier, put some clothes on, washed her hair, bothered with just a dab of make-up. And her house has never looked worse.

  And is that cat crap she can smell? The bugger has gone behind the sofa again.

  ‘I’m not staying so I won’t sit down,’ says Angela, seemingly fighting with anger and grief to maintain some kind of control. Ffiona sees, with some satisfaction, that her rival’s hands are shaking. ‘I have merely come here to tell you not to send any more of your sick and ridiculous letters and to let you know that I am going, which is what you wanted. You have won your pathetic campaign, but what good it’ll do you apart from the dubious joys of revenge, I really cannot imagine.’

  ‘Sorry? What letters?’ This has obviously been rehearsed. Angela must be congratulated for sticking so rigidly to her script under this kind of intolerable pressure.

  Before Ffiona can protest any more, Angela sneers. ‘Don’t bother to deny this, Ffiona, the letter writer could only be you. I didn’t expect any sensible response, I certainly didn’t expect any kind of rapport, or the sort of person I could sit down with.’ And the bitch has the nerve to glance at the state of the stained old chair behind her. As she swings out of the house, all high and mighty and managing to look down her nose at Ffiona, she finishes off with, ‘Get a life, why don’t you? Your own daughter is ashamed of you. All anyone feels is sorry…’

  ‘Oh fuck off,’ says Ffiona, slamming the door.

  Visitors? They don’t have visitors like they used to, it’s hardly worth baking a cake. Oh, occasionally Honesty will pop in, and Fabian, when he has time, and Angela has been known to bring little Archie over when she comes to collect her face creams from Maudie. But life at Halcyon Fields is a quiet one. Nanny Tree made it abundantly clear when she first moved into the nursery that any undue interference by Nanny Barber was out of order.

  Fair enough.

  Too many cooks.

  And Nanny Barber used to loathe interference when she herself was in charge.

  Little Archie is a real card! Lively! Into everything! Big for his age, big and bonnie and bright, there’s never been such an intelligent child.

  Maudie Doubleday tells Nanny Barber not to be so silly, she says the same thing about every baby she sees, cooing and drooling and giving them far too many sweets for their own good. ‘Sweets were perfectly acceptable in my day,’ says Nanny Barber firmly. ‘So were fireworks, and cigarettes, so was butter and salt,’ and she shakes her little white head. ‘Oh these are frightened times.’

  ‘I think Lady Angela is frightened,’ says Maudie—a bolt from the blue.

  ‘What do you mean, dear, frightened?’

  ‘I can’t put my finger on it, Gwen.’

  ‘But you must! I insist! You can’t make a remark like that and then not go on to explain it.’

  But Maudie is a close one. She has always played her cards close to her flat and frumpy chest. Given time, she will often come out with everything at once in a rush, a delayed explosion, as if she’s kept it under wraps for too long and she’s got to air it or die. But Nanny Barber waited in vain to hear about Maudie’s secret diner eight or nine years ago.

  It was all the result of a letter, a letter which Maudie kept secret, and put in her pocket when Nanny Barber came downstairs for breakfast. This was behaviour so unusual in itself it caused Nanny great consternation, Maudie seemed devastated, but clammed up. What if Maudie had become overdrawn at her bank, for instance, or taken up gambling and was being chased for the money by dreadful men with cauliflower ears and tattoos, too prideful to ask for help? Oh dear.

  The following week Maudie, taut and gaunt, made a great effort to underplay a particular visit to Exeter and when Nanny Barber said, quite reasonably, that she’d quite like to go with her as she could do with a visit to Marks for a new beige cardigan and pair of slacks and they could have lunch at the Royal Clarence, Maudie was visibly disconcerted.

  ‘You don’t want me to come, dear?’ Nanny Barber was non-plussed.

  ‘Well,’ said Maudie, her honest brown eyes turned to the ground, ‘I had planned to go alone.’

  They never go shopping in Exeter alone. ‘Any particular reason?’

  ‘Should there be a reason?’

  Nanny Barber was hurt. ‘No need to take that attitude, dear. I wouldn’t dream of coming if you felt you needed to go…’

  ‘Well I do, Gwenda, actually, there are some personal matters to which I must atte
nd.’

  ‘Fine! Fine! We’ll leave it at that then.’

  So off Maudie set one fine day looking as if she’d already seen a ghost, or been damned, tall and spindly, more drawn than ever, and she’d tried to tinge her cheeks with rouge which was a terrible mistake in Maudie’s case, she could have done with a browner colour. Maudie has never taken so long to get ready. She must have tried on every skirt in her old mahogany wardrobe.

  She was gone all day.

  She didn’t return until after dark and Nanny beside herself with worry.

  ‘I went to the pictures,’ Maudie lied. She went straight upstairs to bed, ignored the cocoa and digestives Nanny Barber had prepared for her return.

  Nanny Barber is quite used to dealing with childish lies. The answer to lies is to ignore them, never confront them… the truth will always out in the end. But Maudie’s truth never came out and Nanny is not one to prod, not where she’s not wanted.

  The truth almost came out, quite casually, by accident, when Honesty mentioned to Nanny, ‘Who was that woman I saw Maudie having dinner with the other day?’

  ‘Oh, just a friend,’ said Nanny, musing on this, and not wanting Miss Honesty to think the two women had such secrets between them, not after all these companionable years. It would have felt wrong, somehow. Spoiled the image.

  No, they don’t have many visitors now, and their trips to Exeter have become more and more infrequent. Well, it’s such an effort, isn’t it, and what with all those charity places and bland building societies, all the shops look exactly the same.

  31

  ALL HELL IS LET loose.

  Better they flee before Fabian’s return from the States on Sunday evening. Having him away makes matters simpler but even so, chaos reigns.

  Petal’s little voice pipes up, she’s been so good at keeping secrets, no bribing was necessary, she is not a naturally talkative child, ‘But where are we going, Mummy, and why are we going like this? What will I tell Tanya?’

  It might have been wiser to leave Tina at the Broughtons with the kids, out of the way, but it’s too late to think of that now.

  ‘You won’t need to tell Tanya anything because you won’t be going back to school on Monday I’m afraid, Petal, we’re moving.’

  ‘What? Am I never going back? And I was going to take Jacob with me next term.’ The flouted Petal stamps her foot, her troubled chin is belligerently set. Quite a little lady already. How quickly the years have flown.

  This summer is a hot one, filled with a lazy blue beauty, and on their walks Ange and the children have waded waist-deep in goldenness, for the first time Ange could feel an intimacy with her surroundings and a sense of belonging to them. Just as she’s leaving—sod’s law. Elfrida, afraid of burning, has taken to wearing a battered straw hat, more air than raffia, inside the house as well as out. Protection. Ange has been secretly wondering if Jacob would be strong enough, resilient enough to cope with school on a daily basis. He might be approaching infant school age, but he is still so worryingly small, and babyish in his behaviour.

  ‘But there’s nothing for you to worry about, Petal, we’ll be going home!’

  ‘Back home? Oh no, not there?’ Petal suddenly goes all clingy, a habit she has only lately grown out of. ‘Not to the flat?’

  ‘No, not to the flat. Somewhere new, by the seaside, but after that we will buy a little house of our own.’

  ‘Like this one, Mummy, with all the horses?’

  ‘Well,’ Tina gives Ange a rueful look, ‘perhaps not quite as big as this one, but a nice house all the same.’

  ‘And Ed won’t be able to find us?’

  ‘Ed will never, ever be able to find us again, Petal, I swear to you on Jacob’s life. Now you just stop rabbiting on and get some of those bloody dolls in this blasted bin bag.’

  Actually the plan is for Ange and Billy to settle back at the Broughtons using the original cover story, making sure the pushy June Brightly next door understands that Billy has finally been given the push from the caravan park in the west country. That beady-eyed neighbour will, no doubt, be happy to see that number sixty-seven is occupied full-time again, she can stop grousing on about wasted resources. Tina will split immediately, she fancies going to Brighton, she’ll rent a small flat on the seafront until the hue and cry dies down and so that the powers that be, searching for a man, two women and three children, will be slightly more confused.

  They plan to scarper tonight. Tina has already rung and registered at a small Brighton hotel. She warned the receptionist she might arrive late. Billy will drive them there, drop off Tina and Petal, and carry on to London. After he’s dropped Ange and the boys he will get rid of the Range Rover, he knows of a man who will take it in, no questions asked.

  Awaiting their return yesterday was another missive from Aunty Val. Ange is resigned to their regular arrival but every time she opens another of those blue, oblong envelopes she winces, wondering what new shock is contained within, what new secret has been exposed like a jumping nerve at a butchering dentist’s.

  It is like reading a secret diary you thought you had burned long ago.

  Her eyes hold a look of unshared secrets, but they no longer seem old and out of place as they had when she was a child.

  ‘… and then my dear, the time you started taking money from poor Raymond Lewis, not a rich man by any means, and the poor old couple were only trying to do their best for you. The police were involved in the end, wasn’t the whole thing ghastly? And then you spent that period in St Winifred’s, a short, sharp shock they said, but it didn’t work for you, Angela, nothing seemed to work for you quite honestly, did it, dear?

  ‘Angela, I ask you, what on earth is all this background going to look like in court—and you will find yourself in court very soon, rest assured! What sort of woman could be responsible for such wickedness? And what is it going to do for my poor health? Yes, sadly, just lately I’ve developed a severe bronchial condition and I stay in bed most of the time, staring out of my window at the enchanting countryside and wishing myself fit and well again. The blue bedjacket still comes in very handy. But I mean, when you think what all this is going to look like, how the press will revel in it, all these terrible offences you have now committed, the way you manipulated poor Billy and Tina, bending them to your will in spite of their reluctance to take part in such greedy scheming. Oh yes, Angela, I’m afraid you are the instigator of this mess you are now in, you will be the one they blame… your name, my dear, will stand boldly at the top of the list of the country’s most notorious swindlers and cheats. Your name will become a reviled household word, who knows, you might, one day, end up in Madame Tussaud’s and have you ever seriously considered that you might be insane…?’

  ‘Daft bag! I don’t know why you torture yourself by reading this crap.’ And Billy tugged the letter from her hands and tore it up. This letter must have been posted before Ange called on Ffiona, something both Billy and Tina urged her not to do, but she had to. She felt she had to confront the woman. It had been awful, and she hadn’t achieved anything, either. Now she wishes she hadn’t gone, Ffiona seemed so defeated somehow. Is this how Fabian prefers to take his revenge, or would he rather whop his discarded women on the top of the head with a handy branch?

  Billy stared around him at the mess, exasperated. ‘We can’t bloody well take all this with us.’

  ‘It’s the kids,’ Ange said, laughing uneasily, ‘they don’t want to be parted from all their toys.’

  Time was passing and they weren’t getting anywhere. Anyone could come in, the nursery isn’t out of bounds, they’ve locked the door of course, but anyone could suddenly come in to ask to take Archie for a walk and look at the sodding mess! ‘Tina, why don’t you take the kids out, just for an hour or two, get them out of our hair so Ange and I can get on.’

  ‘Good idea. They’re over-excited as it is.’

  ‘D’you think Tina can be trusted to keep her mouth shut, to leave her money alone until i
t’s safe to start spending?’ This is a worry that weighs heavy on Ange’s troubled mind. She would rather have had Tina back at the Broughtons where she could keep an eye on her, but as Billy says, they’ll be much safer split up.

  ‘She’s been trustworthy so far, hasn’t she?’

  ‘Yes, yes she has,’ Ange is reluctant to admit. ‘But it happens, you know, Billy, it happens. You’re always reading about criminals who have acted too impulsively and that’s how they get caught. It’s just that we have each other, Tina is alone, she’s going to be lonely in Brighton where she doesn’t know a soul, she’s going to want to get out and about.’

  ‘Well, we’ve warned her enough sodding times and we can’t do more than that.’

  Ange returns to packing a suitcase of favourite clothes. She packs in a terrible panic. She can’t take all of them, and the most expensive ones would look very out of place at the Broughtons. Storing them would be too dangerous, no, they’ll have to stay here for the next Lady Ormerod to savour and enjoy.

  But Ange is afraid. And she can’t explain why she feels such a morbid, ominous dread. Some of it is reaction, she knows, a natural reaction to living in constant terror for fear of her shell cracking open to reveal the awful truth within. Anyone less determined than she might have been driven to a nervous breakdown by now.

  Does Fabian know exactly what they are doing? Is he, even now, watching from a distance as he has always watched? Manipulating them all for some evil purpose known only to himself?

  Her heart beats faster and faster until its pounding shakes her body.

  So far she hasn’t dared let herself dwell on Fabian’s reaction to their disappearance. Oh, at first he will be beside himself with worry, everyone will be, their faces will appear on posters throughout the land, Fabian will probably appeal on TV. Mysterious disappearance… child of fortune… son and heir of one of the oldest and most prestigious British families goes missing… and all that. No doubt, hefty rewards will be offered. But the only photographs in existence are pictures of Ange and Archie, nobody ever bothered to snap the nanny or the driver, and they were both careful to avoid being accidentally caught in any casual camera shot and the Ormerods don’t believe in video cameras. Billy and Tina’s descriptions will bear no resemblance to the people they will quickly change into. Tina, so tarty, so jazzed up in her nylon frills and her spiky heels, her eyes almost lost under layers of gaudy make-up, and Billy, not the smart young driver/handyman known to the Ormerods, but a rather scruffy, long-haired loser in faded jeans and tatty old trainers.