‘I said I’ll come in a minute.’ But Esther was already standing up.
Caleb made no effort to stand himself; it would take a bit of manoeuvring, and he had no intention of floundering around in front of her.
Whether she understood this, he didn’t know, but thankfully she made no offer to help him up, merely saying, ‘It’s been nice talking to you, Caleb.’
He smiled up at her. ‘Likewise. Perhaps we can do it again sometime.’
‘I’d like that.’
They regarded each other for a moment and her face was unsmiling, but her eyes were soft.
He didn’t turn and watch her as she joined her friend and they went back into the dance, but, once the night was quiet and still again, he let out his breath in a deep sigh. Now that she had gone, he wondered at his nerve in speaking to her in the way he had. She was out of his league, big-time.
But she’d seemed to like him, another part of his mind suggested, before he countered it with: Don’t be so daft, man. Esther would act that way with anyone. She was kind, courteous. No doubt she felt sorry for him too; pity would force her not to rush to get away, in case it hurt his feelings. He ground his teeth for a moment. Oh, to hell with it.
Shaking his head at himself, Caleb struggled to his feet with the aid of his crutches and stood for a moment, his face set. No barmy ideas, lad, he told himself grimly. By her own admission, she was a married woman with a bairn; and if her husband had any sense at all, he’d make things right, but even if he didn’t, a woman like that wouldn’t look the side he was on. Except as a friend, if he was lucky.
He decided not to go back into the hall, but made his way to the low stone wall surrounding the grounds and sat down to wait for his friends. He shouldn’t have come tonight, he’d known it was a daft idea; but he also knew he would come again.
Chapter Eleven
Theobald Wynford sat on the edge of the black satin sheets, pulling on his clothes, and when a soft hand caressed his naked back he jerked away. It was then that a voice said, ‘It doesn’t matter. It happens to everyone at some time or other. Don’t take it to heart. Do you want to try again?’
‘No, I damned well don’t.’ He reached for his shirt.
‘I still want my money.’ The voice was hard now, abrasive. ‘It’s not my fault. I did everything you wanted me to. It’s down to you that you couldn’t perform.’
Theobald swung round, his fist clenched. The middle-aged woman with the painted face scrambled back against the stack of pillows as she said, ‘Any of that, Mister, and I’ll scream to high heaven, and Dickie’ll come running. He’ll rearrange your face soon as it look at it, so I’m warning you.’
Slowly he lowered his fist. He had seen the said Dickie, and the man was built like a gorilla, with arms on him to match. Standing up, he pulled on the rest of his clothes and then tossed some money on the rumpled covers. ‘To hell with you.’
‘Aye, you an’ all.’ The prostitute’s lined face grinned at him as though their farewell had been harmonious. Her voice was congenial too as she said, ‘Come back for another try, dearie, when you want. I don’t bear no grudges.’
Theobald didn’t bother to reply. He couldn’t wait to get outside the brothel, away from the smell of cheap perfume and sweat and stale alcohol.
Once in the street outside the establishment, which was situated a stone’s throw from the old Chester-le-Street graveyard, he took a moment to compose himself. He’d been mad to go there, he told himself, but he’d been three sheets to the wind and not thinking straight. It was the first time he hadn’t been able to get it up, but he’d never been to that brothel before – it wasn’t his usual haunt. The place had been grubby and that had put him off, and as soon as he had gone in, he’d begun to wonder who might have noticed him entering its doors. Had that been the problem, or the old hag he’d got landed with, damn her? She’d been fifty if she was a day, and it was young flesh that stirred his juices these days. The younger, the better.
Swearing softly, he made his way down the street to the public house where his horse was tethered in the inn’s yard. He was untying the animal when the publican appeared at the back door of the premises. ‘Oh, it’s you. That’s all right then. Took yourself off for a stroll, did you?’ Theobald stared at the man in the deepening twilight, and such was his gaze that the publican turned away muttering, ‘I was only checking the horse wasn’t being nabbed.’
Theobald knew why the publican had come into the yard, and it had nothing to do with the horse’s welfare. The man had been trying to be clever and let him know that he knew where he’d been.
Cursing the publican and the rest of the world, Theobald hauled himself into the saddle and rode out of the yard. He’d first entered the inn just before lunch, and had drunk his way through a bottle of whisky and two bottles of wine during the afternoon. Then, his loins burning, he’d left the inn and walked unsteadily to the establishment on the corner, which had a red lamp burning in the window. Strangely, he felt stone-cold sober now, and angry. How dare that scum look at him in the way he had? But it was a warning to be more careful. Perhaps he ought to think about having the girls brought discreetly to the house?
Shortly after Harriet’s death, his mistress at the time had had the idea that Theobald should make an honest woman of her, now his wife was no more. He’d refused, for the mere idea had been preposterous. Cissy was good for one thing only, and she did that extremely well. But within the month Cissy had taken herself off and married a shopkeeper – a man Theobald suspected she’d had on the go at the same time as him. He hadn’t been too concerned. A mistress expected a degree of consideration, and he’d found that increasingly irritating. And so had begun a new era. He’d been able to indulge his predilection for younger flesh and the more depraved acts that common whores allowed, if the price was right. And he always made sure it was.
The August night was a hot one, a warm breeze rustling the ripening ears of corn in the fields on either side of the road, but Theobald was wrapped up in his thoughts and oblivious to the lovely evening.
A couple of days ago French tanks had led the Allies into Paris and, after four years of brutal Nazi occupation, the swastika was no longer flying from the Eiffel Tower. This had made little impact on Theobald, beyond how it would affect his business interests. He’d prospered during the war and had fingers in various black-market pies; he wouldn’t like to see them fall by the wayside if the war ended. Selfish to the core, he was concerned by something only if it touched him on a personal level – like his plans for Monty to join him, as his son-in-law, in the Wynford businesses. Nevertheless, he hadn’t completely given up on that.
He clicked the horse into a canter, his mind chewing on the problem of Monty, as it was often apt to. The Grant name carried weight; furthermore it opened doors to influential and powerful sections of society, and that wasn’t to be sneezed at. He had kept the lines of communication with his son-in-law open, as far as it was within his power to do so, and thus far he had heard nothing about a divorce between Monty and Esther.
The horse was now trotting up the drive towards the house, and Theobald rode the animal around the building to the stable block, where he saw to it himself. The stable boy had long since joined up. All the younger members of Theobald’s employ had either been conscripted or had joined up of their own volition; or, in the case of the housemaids and one of the kitchen maids, had hightailed it off to work in a munitions factory in Newcastle, where they could earn the sort of money they had only dreamed of before the war. The house was run by a skeleton crew these days, consisting of the older members of staff: Mrs Norton and the butler, Osborne; Fanny Kennedy, the cook; and Fanny’s twin sister, who had lost her husband in the first week of the war and had joined the household as general dogsbody. Under Neil Harley’s expert management, the farm was still fully productive, and the number of outside workers remained pretty much what it had always been, thanks to a party of Italian POWs who were marched to the farm each morni
ng by two soldiers from the nearby camp. Most of them were from farming stock themselves and did their work with a mixture of enthusiasm and happy-go-lucky carelessness, distinctive in their dark-blue overalls with large green patches sewn onto them.
Theobald had been furious to find the Italians making little woven baskets and wooden toys for the local children and young women, when he had made a visit to the fields unannounced one day. And even Neil Harley’s explanation that the men were doing this in their lunch hour didn’t appease him. He would have worked them to death, if he could. Fortunately Neil appreciated the relaxed atmosphere the Italians brought with them, and the fact that they were an important part of the agricultural labour force, so he merely paid lip-service to Theobald’s ranting. If the POWs wanted to make toy tractors and trains out of ration cans and wood for the odd half-hour before they started work again, it was all right by him.
Neil was fully aware that German prisoners tended to be more productive and efficient than the Italians, and kept themselves to themselves and had little to do with the locals, but he’d lost two brothers since the war had begun, and the thought of Germans on the farm made his hackles rise. And so he continued to defy Theobald’s orders to make the Italians’ lives miserable, and the farm ticked along happily.
Theobald wasn’t thinking about his farm manager, and what he considered the man’s ridiculous weakness with the POWs, as he entered the house by way of a side door from the gardens. He refused to use the kitchen door – the more direct route from the stables – considering it beneath him. He was still smarting from his ignominious failure with the prostitute, and if he’d had a dog, he would have taken great pleasure from venting his anger and giving it a good kicking. As it was, he stormed across the hall towards his study door, yelling for Osborne.
He had the door knob in his hand when Osborne came hurrying from the direction of the kitchen, saying, ‘Mr Wynford-Grant is here, sir. I’ve just asked Cook to prepare him a light repast.’ Osborne was always very careful to use the double-barrelled surname, knowing it pleased his master.
Theobald swung round, visibly taken aback. Since the birth of the child he had written to Monty twice, expressing his outrage at Harriet’s deceitfulness, his understanding of his son-in-law’s actions and his desire that Monty would still consider him a friend and ally. He had even hinted that Monty’s place in his business was as secure as ever, once the war was over, should he choose to avail himself of the offer. He had received two short replies back, which had been non-committal. ‘Where is he?’
‘In the drawing room, sir. I thought it best to suggest he wait until you return, but he’s been here over two hours now and—’
Theobald cut off his butler’s words with a wave of his hand. ‘Bring me some coffee. Strong. Black. And something to eat too.’ He was already walking across the hall.
When he thrust open the door of the drawing room, his son-in-law rose to his feet. He had been sitting on a couch in front of the huge fireplace, which, even though the August day had been a hot one, had a wood fire burning in the elaborate iron basket.
Theobald stared at the young man who had left his house all those months ago, in the company of his furious mother. On that occasion Clarissa’s last words had been regarding the divorce, and they had been in the nature of a threat: the divorce would proceed exactly as she determined, she’d warned; and Theobald would see to it that Esther did as she was told. A few well-chosen words in the right quarter and Theobald could find himself in the position of a pariah socially, and she didn’t need to tell him the result that would have on his business interests, did she? No, she thought not. And so Monty’s solicitor would be in touch. But he never had been.
‘Hello, Theobald.’ Monty forced a smile as he looked at the man he had never liked. And, as he saw his father-in-law’s eyes move to his bandaged hands, he said quietly, ‘Burns.’
‘I’m sorry. Bad?’
Monty thought of the eleven operations that the third-degree burns had necessitated to date; the skin grafts taken from the inside of his thighs; the days and nights of what amounted to fiendish torture, when the stinking pulps of rotten flesh and oozing pus had made every minute seem like an hour. He shrugged. ‘Not compared to some.’ Which was true. He hadn’t had his hands amputated at the wrists, like a couple of the pilots he’d been with in hospital; and his face was unmarked. It had only been in the last few weeks that he could think like this, though, when the pain and misery had become bearable, and the beautiful surroundings of the cottage hospital in the soft Sussex countryside where he’d been sent for treatment had begun to heal his senses.
Theobald tried not to stare. Monty looked ten, twenty years older than he had when he had seen him last. The young, dashing lad was gone for good, and in his place stood a handsome man, but a man with deep lines carved around his mouth. Again he said, ‘I’m sorry. The war’s over for you then?’
Monty nodded. ‘You heard about my parents?’
‘Your parents?’
‘Last week. One of those damned doodlebugs. Direct hit on the London house. I’d told them to steer clear of the capital, but because they’d got the use of one of those new, purpose-built deep shelters – the ones for ticket-holders only – Mother wouldn’t listen. And of course Father went where she led. They never even got out of the house, let alone to the shelter.’
Theobald had read that the second mass wartime exodus of children from London had been under way for some weeks, as the Germans intensified their buzz-bomb attacks on the south-east, but they hadn’t seen much evidence of doodlebugs to date in the north. Churchill had declared, ‘London will never be conquered and will never fall’ at the start of the launch of the flying bombs, but people were beginning to wonder how much the beleaguered capital could take. For the third time in as many minutes, he said, ‘I’m sorry, I didn’t know.’ Personally, he considered Clarissa and Hubert Grant’s demise no loss; in fact, their deaths might well work to his advantage. Keeping any trace of his thoughts from showing, he gestured to the couch. ‘Sit down, lad. I’m glad you waited to see me. Can you stay the night?’
As he spoke, Osborne knocked and then opened the door. Mrs Norton and Cook’s sister brought in two trays, one holding a coffee pot and cups and saucers, along with cream, sugar and a decanter of brandy, and the other piled high with sandwiches, pastries and cakes.
Monty looked at the tray of food. Clearly rationing hadn’t bitten in this household, but then that was Theobald all over. If there was a way to get what he wanted, he’d find it. For a moment he was tempted to get up and walk straight out, but caution prevailed. He needed Theobald more than Theobald needed him – that was the crux of the matter; and if Esther’s father had meant what he’d intimated in his letters, then he needed to keep things sweet. ‘Yes, I can stay over, if it won’t inconvenience you?’ he said, accepting the plate Theobald passed him, as the servants walked out of the room after being dismissed. ‘I don’t want to intrude.’
‘You’re family, as far as I am concerned, Monty. You know that.’
The elephant in the room was too big to ignore any longer. ‘How are Esther and . . . and the child?’ Monty asked quietly.
‘You know as much as me. She’s been dead to me from the moment I found out the truth, lad. She and her brat.’
Inwardly Monty winced. ‘You must know where she’s living?’
‘Like I said, she’s dead to me.’
‘I wrote to her after . . . ’ Monty swallowed hard. ‘After the baby was born. At the farm. But the letters came back marked “Gone Away”.’
‘There you are then. She’d skedaddled somewhere or other.’
‘Or she didn’t want anything to do with me.’
‘By rights, the boot should have been on the other foot, Monty. She did the dirty on you, remember?’
‘But it wasn’t Esther’s fault, was it? I mean, it was . . . it was your wife who was to blame for everything. Esther was the innocent party. Harriet said so herself.�
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Theobald had stuffed a ham sandwich in his mouth, and now he chewed and swallowed before he said, ‘Them two were as thick as thieves, lad, and if the Archangel Gabriel himself came down and told me Esther didn’t know about her beginnings, I wouldn’t believe him. She knew all right, and that mealy-mouthed nanny was in on it an’ all. Upped and left she did, once the funeral was over. Knew she’d been found out – that was the thing – but tried to dress it up as though it was my fault. I ask you. But I’d got her measure, sure enough.’
‘Rose left?’ Esther had thought the world of the woman. ‘Where did she go? To find Esther?’
‘I don’t know, and I don’t care.’ Theobald had had enough of discussing the past. It was the future he was interested in. ‘Look, Monty, I think a bit of you – always have done. You know how I’m placed; when I thought you and Esther were going to make a go of it, I didn’t pull my punches, did I? Harriet took me for a fool, and Esther did the same to you, but I don’t see why we should fall out. What’s done is done; but, if nothing else, it’s been the means of joining our two names. Am I right?’
It was why he had come – to hear this – but now Monty wanted to shout at the swarthy little man in front of him that he wanted none of it. Instead he asked Theobald to go on.
‘I need someone I can trust to be my right-hand man, and I’d like it to be you. Simple as that.’
His days of flying aeroplanes were over; Monty knew the air force would either invalid him out or give him a limited-capacity job, fit only for ground duties in the United Kingdom. It had been a shock when he’d learned the extent of his parents’ debts after the funeral, even though he had known for years that things were dire. His parents had been the epitome of a lost and dying age; aristocrats wasting away in the grand mausoleum of the ancestral home, which was decaying around them. When he sold everything, there would be nothing left for him, and the London town house was just a pile of rubble. He was suddenly church-mouse poor, and it terrified him. What was the use of being able to trace your ancestors back hundreds of years and having an old and illustrious name, when you didn’t have a penny to that name? If Esther had been beside him, it would have been different. He could have faced anything then. How could he have allowed his mother to browbeat him into leaving her? He’d had several women over the last year or so – he’d found the girls were falling over themselves to bed pilots; even nice girls, who before the war would have been asking for a ring on their finger before they went the whole hog. But everything, and everyone, had changed. However, none of the women he had been with could hold a candle to Esther, in bed or out of it. Always, though, when he had been tempted to search her out, the image of the child had stopped him. If she had looked like Esther, it would have been different.
The Colours of Love Page 14