It was one of those crisp, sunny autumn days when the leaves are proudly displaying their finest colours of russet, gold and saffron, and white clouds danced across a brilliant blue sky. A perfect Lakeland day.
The walk took them past Serpentine Woods, which brought painful memories of the happy times Livia had spent there with her sisters, but she made no mention of those sad feelings now. This must be a happy day, and mark a new beginning in her life.
Skirting the woods, she led Jack up a steep incline then along a grassy path from which there was a good view over the town to the Howgill Fells and Whinfell. From here they traversed several fields, scrambled over walls and outfaced a few cows, Jack laughing at her nervousness as the animals plodded after them in typically curious fashion. After an hour or two of walking they reached the cairn at the top of the fell, and with the wind in their faces, turned to gaze back over the town nestling in the valley below, and at the vast panorama of mountains all around. Jack pointed out Coniston fells, High Street and Shap, Bowfell and Fairfield.
‘Would you ever live anywhere else?’ Livia sighed, feeling a swell of love and pride in her home country.
Jack said, ‘A man would give his life to protect such a land.’
Livia slipped her hand in his. ‘Don’t say such things. We won’t speak of death, not today, not any more. Only life and…’
He smiled knowingly at her. ‘And what?’
She laughed. ‘Come with me. I want to show you something.’
Spinning on her heel she ran up the hill, Jack racing after her, both giggling as if they were children. Breathless now, she stopped only when she reached an old iron kissing gate. It gave access to the open fell and a path leading over the crest of Scout Scar. Leaning over the gate she demanded a kiss before she would let him through.
He laughed. ‘Is this what you wanted to show me, this kissing gate?’
‘It is.’
‘And this is the toll I must pay, just one kiss?’
‘And cheap at the price. Not that I am cheap,’ she corrected herself.
A shadow crossed his face. ‘No, Livia, no one could ever say you were anything but the finest quality. High class, and very beautiful.’
She smiled provocatively at him, her heart racing with the fear of rejection. What would she do if he turned away, if he didn’t ache for her as she ached for him? And then his mouth was on hers, his arms were tight around her and it was as if a whole cascade of emotion erupted inside her. Livia had never known such bliss, such complete happiness. Except that it was over far too quickly.
‘Oh, that wasn’t nearly enough. I should have demanded more. The toll has just gone up. The price today is two kisses.’
Jack chuckled. ‘Make it three if you like, or four, but no more while we’re standing here with this iron gate between us. Let me through, Livia, and you can name your price and I’ll double it.’
They found a sheltered spot beneath a stunted old thorn tree, and sat with their arms about each other. From here they could have admired the view south to the Lyth valley, to the Kent estuary and Morecambe Bay. Or west to Coniston Old Man, Black Sails and Wetherlam. North to Kentmere, where Ella was even now preparing Sunday dinner for her husband and stepchildren. But they had eyes only for each other.
Jack was kissing her again, her eyes, her throat, her mouth, as if he would devour her. And Livia was matching his passion with her own. They fell back into the long grass and she gasped with pleasure when he slid his hand over her breast, wanting more, needing him, knowing this was the man she’d been waiting for all her life. Jack Flint.
She helped him to unbutton her blouse, revealing only a chemise and no corset. Livia had never been one to follow the rules.
Nothing would stop her from loving this man, certainly not an accident of birth, or her bully of a father. He may well be a humble working man, but he was worth two of the likes of Josiah Angel. She felt proud to know him, and while they took care not to have any unwanted repercussions from their coupling, Livia gave herself up to loving him without a moment’s regret.
From that moment, Livia made no secret of the fact that she and Jack were lovers. Since the gossip-mongers of Kendal assumed they were already living shamelessly together as man and wife, what did they have to lose? In any case, marriage, for the moment at least, was quite out of the question.
Livia would have been more than content to become Jack’s wife and live with him in a rented cottage somewhere, with not a penny in her pocket and nothing but the clothes on her back. But Jack wouldn’t hear of it. He insisted they couldn’t marry until he’d gained promotion at the factory. He wasn’t earning enough yet to support a wife, or the children that would surely follow. They must be patient, he warned her. They must save up. Where was the rush?
In the meantime they were careful. They loved each other deeply and made the most of each precious hour, every single moment they had together.
Livia was aware there were other matters – more serious issues – still to be resolved with regard to her father. Not that she spoke of these to Jack. She did not allow herself to dwell on them much at all, knowing that the rumours of her love for Jack Flint would infuriate and offend her father to distraction.
There was some pleasure in that, at least, and one day she would have the satisfaction of getting justice for Maggie, she was sure of it. Her moment for revenge would surely come, one way or another.
Chapter Twenty-Five
Ella nursed the little girl day and night, piling on blankets when she shook with cold, soothing her hot aching head with a cold compress of vinegar and water when she burnt with fever. Amos insisted they soak a sheet in vinegar and hang it over the bedroom door to help prevent the spread of whatever infection she might be suffering from.
‘We don’t know that it is an infection,’ Ella told him, pooh-poohing the notion, but he was adamant that this must be done. He also insisted they keep a bowl of warm water and lye soap in the bedroom and wash their hands before and after they touch her.
‘She doesn’t have the plague,’ Ella said. ‘It’s only a bad chill, because of the soaking she got. Which might not have been so bad had you gone to collect her in the cart, or carried her home.’
Amos looked stricken, but stuck to his point over the washing ritual. ‘You do as I say in this.’
‘Call the doctor if you’re really worried.’
‘Doctors do no good at all,’ he growled. ‘They’re more likely to bring infection into the house than cure it. Soap and water and vinegar, that’s what we need.’
Seeing his agitation and anxiety, Ella agreed to do as he suggested, and these sensible precautions were duly put in place.
And then the coughing started, harsh and bronchial, which caused the little girl considerable pain and distress, making it quite impossible for her to rest. Mrs Rackett now proved herself to be a veritable expert on old country remedies, and Ella welcomed her assistance as she was at her wits’ end.
The old woman plastered Tilda’s skinny little chest with goose grease and pounded cabbage leaves, kept in place with a layer of brown paper. She also made a concoction from the flowers of the hoarhound, sweetened with honey, which Tilda was expected to drink four times a day. For sustenance she was given beef tea flavoured with thyme, considered to be an excellent remedy for bronchial ailments, as well as an antiseptic for the throat.
‘If’n she don’t start to show any improvement soon, we’ll boil up some thyme and give it to her on a spoon every two hours.’
This they did as nothing seemed to be working and with each passing hour the little girl grew ever more exhausted by the coughing, sinking further into a torpor, her skin pale and waxy looking, and with big purple bruises beneath each eye. There were times when Ella feared for her life. She was terrified the child might suddenly start having convulsions or the bronchitis might turn into pneumonia.
Amos finally agreed to call the doctor the night she started hallucinating. Tilda was convinced rats we
re running around her room, even on her bed, which terrified the little girl and frightened the life out of Ella too. She herself had never quite recovered from her experience with a rat, despite its aftermath. But it was all in the child’s imagination. Ella called for Mrs Rackett to fill the hip bath with cold water and they sat Tilda in it in a desperate bid to bring down her temperature. By the time the doctor arrived she was back in bed sleeping peacefully for once, and he congratulated them on having done the right thing.
He produced a tincture for the cough, instructed them to keep the child warm and give her plenty of fluids, making sure they always boiled the water first, and left.
‘You can get some rest now,’ Amos told Ella, but she shook her head.
Mrs Rackett went off to her own bed, Ella having reminded the old woman that she’d need to be up early as she must continue to manage the dairy and the other chores on her own until Tilda was better. Then she made herself comfortable for the long night ahead, too afraid to leave her alone for a second.
Ella was slumped in a half doze perhaps an hour later when Amos returned with a tray. He’d made her a pot of tea and a ham sandwich. It was the first kind act he’d ever done for her through all these long awkward, difficult months since she’d arrived as his bride. Ella was deeply touched.
‘Thank you, that’s most thoughtful.’ She noticed how his ears went pink at the tips from the compliment. ‘Would you like to sit with her?’
Amos did so, sitting in silence, as was his way, his large hands that could birth a calf or coax a lamb to its mother’s teat hanging loose between his knees.
Much as he might lavish care on his animals, he’d never demonstrated any affection for his children, no kisses or cuddles, rarely even a smile or show of interest in whatever they were doing. He seemed to see them only as an extra pair of hands to deal with the chores. Yet Ella saw evidence of that love now. It was clear that he was desperately worried about Tilda.
The face she’d thought bland now looked drawn, and gaunt with pain. The square, capable hands began to fidget. One would scrape over the stubble he’d forgotten to shave off his chin, or both would rub his knees or his thick strong thighs, pluck at the bedclothes or pick up the medicine bottle to read the label for the umpteenth time. He could hardly bear to sit still, clearly wanting to put things right but unsure how to go about it.
At one point his favourite collie, Beth, nosed her way into the room, circled for a moment with drooping tail, then curled up with a quiet sigh at his feet. And for the first time ever, Amos did not automatically respond to her devotion by patting her head or ruffling her ears. He simply sat gazing at his daughter, willing her to get better.
Ella ventured a question. ‘Has Tilda been ill before? Did Esther ever have to sit with her like this for some other childhood disease, measles perhaps or chickenpox?’
Amos shook his head. ‘She’s never ailed nowt until now.’
Ella tucked the sheets closer about the little girl’s chin, worried Amos might be blaming her in some way. If so, he surely had no right to do so. He should have gone to collect the children himself. ‘She’s at that age now, I suppose. She’ll catch everything, I expect, one by one, and we’ll just have to cope as best we can.’
He got up then to go to his own bed as he too had to be up at five for the milking, but at the door he turned to her and said, ‘She’s in good hands. Not even her own mother would have taken better care.’
Ella was so startled by this unexpected praise that two huge tears sprang into her eyes, spilling over on to her cheeks. It was the first compliment he’d ever paid her, and the only time to her certain knowledge that he’d expressed a word of criticism over Esther.
Amos was a strange man, intensely private, slow to respond even to his own troubled thoughts, obsessive over this fetish he had for cleanliness, and with the kind of self-imposed stoicism that seemed to be bred in men in these parts. Yet he was a strong man, and as hard on himself as he was on Ella and the children. In the following days, he began to show signs of softening. He never failed to call in on his daughter two or three times each day, and would sit with her for an hour or more of an evening, his face etched with concern.
And bringing trays of tea or snacks for Ella as she kept vigil became a regular habit. After almost eighteen months on the farm, she was at last given a glimpse of his human side, and marvelled.
The day came when Tilda suddenly opened her eyes one morning and announced that she was hungry.
Relief washed over Ella, and she smiled. ‘Are you, dearest? That’s good. What would you like? Toast and jam or eggy bread?’
The little girl’s eyes lit up. ‘Ooh, eggy bread, please,’ and Ella kissed her.
‘Eggy bread coming up then, and I’ll cut it into soldiers for you.’
She ate every scrap and from that day on, with the resilience found only in small children, her recovery proceeded at a pace. Within twenty-four hours she was complaining about being bored and wanting to come downstairs.
‘Perhaps for an hour or two this afternoon,’ Ella promised. ‘But you go straight back to bed when I say you must, no argument.’
Tilda nodded her agreement, eyes shining.
Ella played paper and pencil games with her: noughts and crosses, squares, and crazy mazes. She played I-spy and a silly game, ‘For my dinner I ate ample apples, boiled buttercups, crabby cabbage, dirty dishcloths…’ By the time they reached S for stewed sausages, they were all in fits of laughter, the little girl’s cheeks at last glowing pink, and with no sign of a cough. Mrs Rackett sat nodding and smiling in her rocking chair, watching this healing process with satisfaction in her faded eyes.
‘Esther will be turning in her grave. I’ve never seen that child laugh so much in all her short life,’ she commented when, at four o’clock, Ella lifted Tilda up in her arms to take her up to bed.
The remark touched Ella, and yet she found it deeply troubling. Why was there never any laughter in this house? Why had the wonderful Esther never prescribed it for her children? Did religion have to preclude joy? And would Amos begin to relax a little more, now that he’d finally revealed that he really did care for his daughter?
More than anything, Ella was determined to ensure that Tilda knew what it was to have the love of a father. Would that she knew such joy.
Josiah sat in his office at Angel’s Department Store, staring at the letter in his hand. It was from Hodson, calling in his loan. It had come three months ago and he knew every word by heart. There was no doubt about it, he was facing ruin. He’d done everything he could think of to raise the cash, and now on the last day of October, he had to accept that time was running out. Here was a further message from Hodson, delivered this very morning, asking him to be so good as to call on his way home from the store, saying there were important matters they needed to discuss. It didn’t take a genius to work out what they would be.
Josiah felt as if his world was falling apart. The house echoed with empty rooms. Most of the servants had left for a more congenial establishment, presumably where daughters of the house were not found hanging from the banister. Even his eldest daughter had deserted him.
Whenever anybody asked why Livia had left, he’d say, ‘The poor lass was confounded by grief. Since then she’s got caught up in her own obstinacy and is afraid to lose face by crawling home with her tail between her legs. But she’ll tire of her “good works” and social conscience soon, then she’ll come back home, see if she doesn’t.’
In truth, Josiah suspected that his eldest daughter had learnt something about Maggie’s death. Perhaps she’d found a suicide note or some such. If so, then she had kept its contents to herself. She certainly hadn’t discussed the matter with him, although the very fact she’d vacated the family home within twenty-four hours of the funeral spoke volumes.
The doctor dealing with the post-mortem had quietly informed him that his daughter Margaret Anne had been pregnant at the time of her death. Josiah had managed to appear sho
cked and upset, as any father might in response to this news, and the doctor had assured him that the poor girl’s reputation would be protected by professional confidentiality. The matter would never be referred to again.
Josiah had understood then why Maggie had taken this irrevocable step. He felt no guilt, no sense of blame. She had chosen this way out of her own volition, and had raised few objections to his twice-weekly visits to her bed over the years.
At the beginning she’d been too young to understand, admittedly, and later as she’d grown older she’d fussed a little, almost run off once or twice, striving to show her independence. But he’d impressed upon her how it was her duty, as his daughter, to make her father happy. He’d found it necessary only once to chastise her. On that occasion he’d tied her to the bed head with a pair of her own stockings, face down, and taken her that way instead. It had really been quite titillating.
She’d never objected again, although she was free to leave at any time, should she have wished to do so, so long as she had the funds to provide for herself. The fact she stayed proved she really quite enjoyed their little sessions, despite her feeble protests.
Hodson, so far as he could tell, was not aware of the reason why Maggie had killed herself. Josiah was almost certain that Livia had not told whatever it was she’d discovered. Too ashamed probably, prissy little madam. Gullible Henry probably thought the girl was unbalanced, or depressed. That’s if he thought about her at all. He seemed far more interested in getting his hands on Livia, and on Angel’s Department Store.
Which brought Josiah back to the letter in his hand. He crumpled it up and flung it in the waste-paper basket.
So far as Josiah was concerned, Henry was welcome to the girl, and to use whatever means necessary to win her. But he would never allow him to possess the store, not while there was breath left in his body. Josiah had worked too hard, paid too high a price, to lose it over something so trifling as mere money.
House of Angels Page 21