'Photographic equipment is his line, of course.'
That brought a check. She gave him a look of sharp distrust.
'Mr. Ben told you about Tony?'
'Oh no,' said Neil, too quickly. 'I just happened to hear he was out in Kenya.'
If not Mr. Ben… He could see her putting it fair and square on Samuel Cragill's shoulders, and she hated that. Head up, eyes proud and hostile, she said: "Yes, he's out in Kenya and doing very well. It's late, Mr. Haslam, and I must ask you to go.' Then she did a quick double-take. 'Before you leave, perhaps you'd like to have a good look at the bookshelves and satisfy yourself Mr. Smart knows his job.'
Dark red in the face, Neil stayed where he was.
'Can't you give me credit for a little decency? I've told you already, I don't intend shutting down the joinery class.' Goaded by that defiant look, he added rashly: 'And if your friend Adam Kershaw wants to keep in business…'
'He does, Mr. Haslam. That class matters more to him than you guess. And the numbers will go up. I'm joining, and I shall bring along two of our copyists. You'll have no excuse to close the register.'
'Close the register! Damn it all, do you think I want empty classrooms? I'd like to see the Institute going at full pressure.'
'But you're not making any promises.'
"You know I can't.' His mouth tightened. 'Certain standards are laid down and I'm determined they shall be kept. I'm determined to rule out inefficiency and waste. If numbers drop, a class has to close.' He glowered at her, standing foursquare and formidable, just as he had first appeared to her in the doorway of the old path lab. 'And don't you dare suggest I should cook the books like…' But he would get nowhere by accusing old Cragill of dodges and fiddles, though the evidence was overwhelming.
Sharon's face, against all that dark hair, had gone shockingly white.
'And don't you dare bring my brother's name into this!'
'Good lord!' He stared in dismay. 'You can't imagine I meant… Look, I give you my word I was thinking only of Cragill and those blasted class registers.' She didn't believe him. He took a step towards her and held out his hand, palm upwards. 'When I tell you the old twister has got himself co-opted on to the board of governors, you'll realize what I'm up against. You'd never believe the muddle I found in that office. Give me time, and I'll make the Roxley Institute a place where my staff will be proud to teach. But I simply must cut out the dead wood first… That doesn't mean your friend Adam Kershaw. He'll do great things.' The sudden, attractive smile broke the darkness of his face. "You're joining the class? That's splendid. And when I move into my new house I'll get Smart to fix up the bookshelves. How's that for a peace treaty?'
He got the full blaze of angry blue eyes.
'But that's all nonsense about your new house, isn't it? You're not staying.'
He was struck silent, seeing a mental picture of Samuel
Cragill, equipped with burgling kit, picking the lock of his desk drawer. But no, the thing was simpler than that. This girl read his heart.
When his feet had crunched down the path and the car had spluttered and snarled and driven off, Sharon went on standing there, her hands clenched into tight fists.
Why had he picked on Roxley? There were so many other places where he could have worked off his unhappiness!
She couldn't wish her words back, for nothing less than the truth would do between them. She resented him, pitied him; she tried hard to despise him. And she hated herself for sending him away.
CHAPTER FIVE
Sharon had never felt so restless, so confined by these steep fells. There was no getting away from the people you knew, no being just yourself. How deeply she envied her brother Tony whose last letter racily described a drive through the game park where he had photographed the family of cheetahs, ending up with a sundowner at the house of friends. 'And what a house! Dead modern and the last word in comfort. As for the spread they laid on to go with our iced rum punch… These Jensens are in the safari business and they must have struck it rich. Perhaps I've mentioned them before.'
Yes, he had mentioned them many times - but never a word about work! So many of her hopes and fears were tied to Tony's future, her heart would be light indeed if he showed half the enthusiasm of Frank Roberts, for instance, whenever he launched into shop talk.
He had come back bursting with new ideas and Sharon could have listened to him endlessly. At Mr. Ben's dinner party it had been hard to concentrate on carpets, so many other things were buzzing in her head; but at the mill she found excuses to consult Frank in his studio, snatched odd moments in the canteen to coax from him more details about his tour and the people he had met. When Mr. Ben called a conference of the whole design staff she had a hundred questions to ask.
From Frank Roberts' report it was clear that the revolutionary new loom developed by the group to which Halls- worth's belonged put them way ahead of their Continental rivals. The loom produced a rugged loop pile with the appearance of fine tweed. It was hard-wearing and looked wonderful in plain colours. And these, Frank thought, fitted wall to wall would go like wildfire in France where buyers were just becoming carpet-minded after centuries of natural flooring in wood or tiles. He had brought back samples of a foam-backed carpet, fifty- five per cent nylon, which was starting to flow like a river through the modern French home.
'All textured,' commented Sharon, fingering the samples and sketches. 'No floral designs?'
'In the birthplace of Aubusson? Elegance is a status symbol and of course there are floral designs. Way-out abstracts, too. There's ideas stirring, I'm telling you, girl! They can't equal us on design. No, I didn't see a single one to get excited about. But we've a lot to learn about their new dyes and fibres.'
So then they were deep in yarns, loom breadths, tufts per square inch.
'And these new import restrictions?' remarked Mr. Ben, damping down the Celtic fire of his chief designer. But for Sharon the atmosphere was charged with something new and vital. Her fingers itched to start doodling. She saw Frank's eyes on her and quickly shut his sketchbook, pushing it across the desk towards him.
'I promise not to pinch your Aubusson '69!'
He chuckled. 'You're welcome to the lot. You know I'd see an idea in abstract and you'd come up with something naturalistic. Fun to try that out some day.'
Astonishingly enough, among all this professional material and the report on useful business contacts, he had brought back a message for Amelia Frith.
At a reception given to the British party by the French Textile Association, this Monsieur Priolly of Lyons had sought Frank out, hearing he was from Roxley, and sent his regards to dear Mademoiselle Amelie. Miss Frith was thrilled to bits. A flood of reminiscences of those happy times gushed forth every morning, as, with Barbiole clad against the cold in a tartan jacket, she accompanied Sharon part way to her studio. Then, a fortnight or so after Frank's return, came the letter. Hurrying earlier than usual to meet Sharon, Miss Frith waved it jubilantly in the air.
'Wonderful news!' She was happily flushed and now a shade of doubt crossed her face. 'Not entirely wonderful. From Monsieur Priolly's point of view I suppose it is tragic.' She bobbed along beside Sharon under a large and practical umbrella. 'Silk is doing badly; lace and tulle, in which Monsieur Priolly also has an interest, are doing even worse. Partout du chomage… People out of work everywhere… Mr. Hallsworth explained to me that it's all part of the international situation and the streamlining that results is a sort of progress.' She tilted the umbrella to peer up at Sharon and rain dripped off her nose and chin. 'I'm not clever, Sharon dear. I don't understand these things. People are suffering and it's hard to see it as progress. Think of Zola at the turn of the century. You remember his little draper standing in a Paris street, as the great new department store goes up which will certainly ruin him - just as we see the brash, impersonal supermarkets ruining the friendly corner shop in our time - and he says: Our distress is the manure of the future. How terrible! But I would
have set fire to the store and perished in the flames!'
Sharon stopped dead and looked at Miss Frith, so small and so fierce, as if seeing her for the first time.
She said cautiously: 'Men felt much the same, I expect, in our valley when the water-wheel and the cottage handloom gave way to steam power and great mills.' Standing side by side in the rain, they gazed across the river at the black, squat bulk of the carpet mill. 'But they were wrong, you know. Because steam power brought the most tremendous increase of trade throughout the world in cotton and wool, cloth and blankets and carpets, employing far, far more people than handwork ever could.'
Drip, drip from Miss Frith's long delicate nose; anxiety clouding her gentle eyes. 'Sharon dear, I hope the embroidery machine will not throw you out of a job.'
'Never!' Sharon laughed with real mirth. 'Between you and me, a great deal of it is handwork, though it's called machine embroidery. You can set your machine to perform certain stitches, but you must guide it and it needs great skill.'
Comforted, Miss Frith returned to the subject of Monsieur Priolly's letter. The two elder sons were with him in business already, struggling against that remorseless tide, but he had decided to start the youngest boy, Luc, in another branch of the textile industry.
'He's studying carpet manufacture and under an exchange scheme it may be possible for him to spend a year at Hallsworth's, what do you think about that? He's to go right through the mill and brush up his English at the same time.'
Sharon thought this a wonderful idea. But there was a snag, it seemed. Monsieur Priolly quite took it for granted that the boy would lodge with Miss Frith as a paying guest and she was in a quiver of doubt and fears. With her sister a semi-invalid, they had got into a rut. A lively boy about the place would be 'unsettling'.
'Good for you,' declared Sharon, plodding valiantly through the mud. 'Just what you both need.'
'He'd be more comfortable at the Raven.'
'Oh, that's rubbish and you know it! The lad needs to sample real English home life. He'd be dull and lonely at the Raven.' She thought with an unwilling twinge of sympathy of someone who was just that.
Miss Frith conceded that Luc was very young to put up at an hotel. The bar might be a temptation. Then, pressed by Sharon, she did a little arithmetic and discovered he was twenty. 'Stupid of me! Of course, he has already done part of his college course in textiles. I still think of him as a little boy; the youngest of the family and the most mischievous. You'll help me entertain him, Sharon, dear, won't you? Such a pity your brother Tony isn't here.'
Now it was across Sharon's face that the shadow fell. She was keeping her fingers crossed for Tony. So far he had stuck it out, seemed to be doing well in his job and had made good friends out in Kenya. He spent a lot of time with these Safari people, the Jensens, and had even acted as guide to parties of tourists. But would it last?
She said quickly: 'Luc Priolly could be awfully useful to you up at the Institute. Trot out your real live Frenchman and the students will forget their shyness. You'll have them chattering away, fifty to the dozen.'
'If you think Mr. Haslam would agree…'
'Don't ask him,' Sharon interposed violently. 'We're not slaves. Run the class your own way and give the students something to enjoy. Have fun - and to hell with rules and regulations.'
'Sharon!'
'But the man's a bully and we must stand up to him.' Her cheeks were bright pink and her eyes sparkled. 'If you show him results, he can't grumble at the method. That's what I keep telling Adam Kershaw.'
She couldn't bear to think of Adam, with all a musician's sensitivity of mood, having to face their new Head's brusque, unfeeling criticism. (And he knew nothing about music; it was the criticism of a rank outsider!) With what seemed to her great magnanimity she agreed that the Institute needed a shake-up after the long and torpid reign of Samuel Cragill. But to be so brutal about it! To spare no one's feelings, threaten them with dark perils. He had put a stop to Mr. Smart's little suppers and held the bogey of teaching machines in front of poor Miss Frith. As for her own classes, she preferred not to remember his clumsy intrusion, his sarcasm, that bit about 'junior school work' in particular.
Barbiole was tugging on the lead and yapping shrilly, for they had reached the point where Miss Frith turned back. Walking on at a brisker pace, Sharon thought about Luc Priolly and asked herself what Roxley had to offer a young stranger of sophisticated background — Riviera holidays and five wine-glasses at dinner! She herself knew the valley as a foot knows the right slipper in the dark. She loved it with passion, in between these restless times when the steep fells suddenly seemed like prison walls confining the soaring spirit. How would Luc Priolly see it all? At least, his stay was for a definite period and it had a purpose, which could not be said of Neil Haslam. His motives were complicated and dark and in spite of herself they intrigued her. He had uprooted himself from his old life; but perhaps Mr. Cragill was right when he said Roxley was merely a stepping stone to an ambitious man…
And what of that? He would move on when it suited him, and they would forget him. The thing was not to become emotionally involved in any way. From nowhere came the thought that falling in love with Neil Haslam could only bring ruin and heartbreak - as one woman had discovered already.
The small van coming rapidly round a corner sounded its horn and Sharon leapt wildly to one side. Adam was grinning down from the driver's seat. The van lurched through a large and deep puddle, rocked to a standstill and the young man got down.
'Sorry if I made you jump.'
'I'm splashed from head to foot with revolting mud. Oh, will you look at my coat ?'
'Oh, I say, I'm most awfully sorry.' He dragged out a handkerchief and began rubbing at a coat sleeve. Sharon wrenched herself away.
"You're making it much worse. This sort of mud has to be let dry before you touch it. And then I'll probably have to send the coat to the cleaner's. Bother! Besides, your hanky is covered with ink.'
'I sat up late last night copying out some of those old monkish carols for the class.'
Sharon forgot to look cross. 'Oh, lovely! I thought we did rather well last week with Es ist ein Eos' entsprungen. It's a sweet thing. Have you had a word with Canon Wismer?'
"Yes, I have. He's enthusiastic about the class members joining the abbey choristers for the carol service on Christmas Eve. Mind you, Mr. Longford had set his heart on something really ambitious: Britten's Ceremony of Carols. But we know our limitations. By gosh, yes! My "furry leaves" lady may not be tone deaf, but she hasn't absolute pitch, not by a long chalk. And that goes for most of the others, too.'
'Present company excepted?' said Sharon, looking at him hard.
'Naturally. Things have looked up since you joined the class and brought those two young girls from Halls- worth's with you. If they don't lose interest__________________________ '
'Why should they? It's a very lively class. And they rather fancy themselves in a candlelight procession in the abbey. By the way, Miss Frith's students are going to have fun, too. One of her boys from Lyons is coming to Roxley to learn about carpets.'
'What? And pinch your trade secrets?'
'It's an exchange,' said Sharon with dignity. 'One can go a long way in mutual goodwill without giving away trade secrets. I mean, it's not like second-rate firms who copy one another's designs as closely as they dare without being dragged to court on a breach of copyright.' Once again her eyes sparkled. 'Oh, that would make me so angry. If anyone pinched a design of mine, I'd tear him limb from limb.'
'Someone ought to warn this French chap… You wouldn't know if he happens to be musical? We could do with another tenor.'
'We'll soon find out. Poor lad, little he knows what Roxley is saving up for him! Music appreciation and Miss Frith's French class - all this and the English weather!'
Into their merriment broke a thunderous knocking on the back of the van.
'Your Uncle Ezra!' said Sharon, appalled. And when Adam unlock
ed the rear doors, there he was in his wheelchair, veritably the deus ex machina about to descend on the stage. He glared at the two young people standing in the rain and said wrathfully:
'If you're changing the wheel, boy, get on with it. If you're fooling with Sharon Birch, this isn't the time and place for it. Dang me, I don't mind being late at the works if Doctor sees me first, but I'll not waste time sitting in that draughty waiting-room of his among a pack of winter snivellers!'
Since she was a small child, Ezra Kershaw had struck terror into Sharon with his mean little eyes, his long, uncharitable nose like a gimlet, the bristly chin and the voice which rasped like some of his own rusty wire. She was in awe of him still and knew exactly how Adam must feel, bound to this surly kinsman by ties of duty and obligation, at the mercy of his tongue all day long. Music was Adam's only refuge - music and his friendship with her. She knew he clung desperately to both.
Ezra had a rug over his arthritic knees and was dressed in the famous herringbone tweed suit. Many years ago he had brought home a roll of cloth from a bankrupt tailor and was still working through it - year after year the same suit which lived through three stages: best, second- best - a little shiny and frayed - and at last workaday, with the trouser turn-ups shorn off, the elbows and cuffs patched with leather; stains everywhere like part of the design. Today he was wearing the second-best suit for Dr. Eastwood's sake.
'Dang me, the fellow won't leave me alone. But if he comes to the house, it wastes his time and mine, and he makes it out a favour, too.' His speech was a little blurred, his colour unnaturally high; but his eyes were as crafty as ever, his tongue as malicious, as he went into a tirade against 'these uppity N.H.S. chaps' who kept you waiting half the day for a visit, complained they were overworked yet found time to play golf at the week-ends. 'If there was another doctor in reach, I'd have crossed myself off Eastwood's list long ago, dang me if I wouldn't.'
Sharon looked shocked. 'Doctor Eastwood does well for you.'
Margaret Baumann - Design for Loving (1970) Page 6