‘When you go to school there’ll be lots of boys like Danny Eland. You’ll have to learn to put up with being teased.’
Kate looked up at her mother. She had stopped crying now, though salty lines still streaked her face. ‘I don’t think I want to go to school, Mamma.’
Esther smiled down at her. ‘You’ll like it when you get there. You’ll learn all sorts of things – how to read and do sums and . . .’
‘But I don’t want to be teased – I don’t like being teased.’
‘No,’ Esther murmured. ‘No one does, but if you greet their taunts with a smile and a cheeky answer back, they’ll soon give up. You see, they’re only trying to upset you, to make you cry. If you don’t cry but laugh at them instead, they’ll give up.’
Kate seemed thoughtful, solemnly analysing her mother’s advice in a peculiarly old-fashioned way for one so young.
‘When do I start school? Danny says he’s going next year.’
Esther sighed. Danny, Danny, Danny – always Danny Eland. ‘About the same time, I think, though you’re a bit younger than him. I’ll have to see the teacher.’
‘But Danny and me – we’ll go to the same school? We’ll be together?’
‘Yes,’ Esther was obliged to tell her. ‘You’ll be going to the same school as Danny Eland.’
Kate scrambled up from her mother’s knee and ran across the grass towards the yard and the gate into the lane.
‘Kate. Kate, where are you going?’
The child shouted back over her shoulder as she skipped across the cinders, ‘To tell Danny I’m going to school with him.’
‘Well, really!’ Esther said, half-exasperated, half-relieved that childish quarrels could so soon be forgotten. Yet Kate’s association with Danny Eland brought Esther no comfort, no peace of mind whatsoever.
It was late afternoon before she saw Jonathan.
She had walked across the marshland beyond the road opposite her farm and up the rise of the far dunes. From here she would be able to see the houses at the Point and the Seagull. She could see the children playing round Ma Harris’s cottage, Kate amongst them and undoubtedly Danny Eland too. She could see Robert Eland on board his boat home spreading his nets, examining them for holes that would let the fish slip through.
She thought briefly of Beth. It was strange how they never seemed to run into each other. She could remember having seen her only once or twice since Danny’s christening, then only in the distance and Danny was four now. Certainly they had never met and spoken even though they lived only a few hundred yards from each other.
Then she saw Jonathan.
He was standing at the end of the Spit – her own special place. A lonely, motionless figure just staring out to sea.
As she watched him, the familiar fluttering began just below her ribs and she felt as if, even though she was out in the open, there was suddenly not enough air to breathe.
Then she was running, running. Bounding over the tufts of grass, jumping the sandy hollows, splashing through the rivulets winding across the marshy ground.
A little way from him she slowed, panting hard, watching him. Now she moved slowly towards him.
‘Jonathan.’ She breathed his name like a prayer. A prayer for forgiveness, for understanding.
He did not move.
His name caught in her throat on a sob. ‘Jonathan!’
She saw him jump physically and turn swiftly. She caught a fleeting glimpse of the sadness that was in his face before his joy at seeing her there filled his eyes with love.
He held out his arms to her and she ran into them. In that moment both of them were oblivious of the fact that they could be seen plainly from the cottages even though they were quite a distance away – and even more easily seen by Robert Eland on his boat if he cared to shade his eyes against the dazzling water and look in their direction.
Jonathan was kissing her mouth, her eyes, holding her fiercely in his arms.
‘I thought you’d gone,’ she gasped. ‘Gone away and left me. Forgive me . . .’
Between urgent kisses, he murmured, ‘We shouldn’t – we’ll be seen . . . Come – let’s go in the dunes.’
They ran along the narrow bank, clutching at each other, laughing with nervousness, with mutual joy. They gained the dunes and came to their special place, a natural hollow, sheltered from the sea breeze and safe from prying eyes, hidden even from the coastguard’s look-out.
They sat down in the sand and she snuggled against him. He wrapped his arms around her and laid his cheek against her hair.
‘I couldn’t sleep last night,’ he said. ‘I stood at the window of my room in the Seagull, looking out towards your home.’
She giggled nervously. ‘I stood at me scullery window half the night watching the lane. I didn’t sleep a wink.’
He stroked her hair.
She rested her head on his chest. ‘We won’t quarrel ever again, will we, Jonathan?’ she murmured sleepily, for the sun was high and here in the hollow it was sheltered and warm. They lay back in the sand.
After the sleepless night tormenting herself that he no longer loved her, Esther just wanted to stay here safe and warm and happy for ever.
When they awoke the fickle sunshine had disappeared and a cold mist had crept in from the sea and surrounded them as they slept.
‘Jonathan – oh, whatever time must it be? There’s the milkin’ to do. And Kate will be looking for me!’ Esther scrambled to her feet and rushed headlong towards the twisting track which led back across the marsh and the dunes to the lane.
The mist swallowed her.
‘Esther – Esther, wait.’ He was instantly fully awake. ‘You’re going the wrong way. Esther!’
She could hear his voice but she could not see him. The mist swirled about her obliterating her sense if direction completely. ‘Jonathan,’ she shouted, ‘I can’t see you. Where are you?’
Suddenly Esther knew real fear. She had never been lost like this. She heard his voice just once more. ‘Now just stand still, Esther, and keep talking to me and I’ll come to you.’
There was silence.
‘Jonathan,’ she shouted. ‘Jonathan! Jonathan!’
There was no answering shout.
Twenty-six
ESTHER called his name until she was hoarse. She stumbled over thick tufts of grass, fell into sandy hollows, until she was almost weeping with fear. Her heart was pounding and her breathing painful. She ran first one way and then stopped, unsure, turned and ran another way. Prickly sea-buckthorn loomed out of the mist and scratched at her hands and forearms. She thought she had found the footpath which led back across the marshland to the lane and began to follow it, still calling his name all the time. She shivered in the dampness of the mist and yet she was sweating with fear.
She trod in a rabbit burrow and twisted her ankle, giving a cry of anguish as she fell to the ground. She pulled herself up again and plunged on blindly. The path she was following gave way to a stretch of sand and she knew she was on the beach. She turned around and began to go in the opposite direction which she now knew must lead her back to safety. Then she stopped. What about Jonathan? She could see nothing but the grey, clinging mist all around her.
Suppose Jonathan, who didn’t know the beach and the ways of the sea at all, were to wander in the mist out towards the sea? What if he was caught by the incoming tide as it swirled inward, forming creeks and sand islands? That much at least she had learnt about the sea and the tides since coming to live here. Jonathan knew nothing. He would be cut off, caught by the rushing water . . .
‘Jonathan,’ she cried, fearing more for him now than for herself.
There was silence all around her, the mist wrapped itself about her like a shroud.
She stood still and listened intently. Was that a seagull crying?
Suddenly it was clearer, though faint. ‘Eeestheer!’
‘Jonathan, Jonathan – I’m here. Where are you?’
His voice was n
earer and now she continued to call his name and steadily he was coming closer and closer, the sound of his voice in answer to her own becoming stronger and louder. ‘I’m coming, Esther. Stay where you are and I can come to you.’
The mist cleared a little and his dark shape came towards her. She was so thankful to see him that she flung herself against him, winding her arms about his neck, kissing his face, crying and laughing all at the same time.
‘I thought you’d gone towards the sea. I thought you could have drowned.’
Jonathan’s arms were about her, tight and protective and thankful. Their mouths were warm against each other, whilst the cold mist enclosed them.
‘Oh, darling, my love, my dearest love,’ she was murmuring, her endearments echoed by his deep voice. She was shivering as much from fear as with the cold. Jonathan took off his jacket and wrapped it around her, hugging her close to him. He kissed her, soothing away her terror. His lips were gentle, but as she returned his kisses, his mouth became more urgent.
‘Esther, oh, Esther,’ he whispered and they sank down together into the sand.
In their relief at finding each other safe, having for a few brief moments believed each other in danger, their longing overwhelmed them and they were lost. They yielded to the hunger that had been between them almost since their first meeting – an inexplicable craving that had shocked and engulfed them both.
And now their bodies came together in a flood of ecstasy. It was as if they were the only two people in the world. Swept away on a tide of emotion, there was no Matthew, no Kate – even no farm. It was as if for the whole of her life, Esther had been waiting for this moment, for this man. Her need of him was a physical pain. Her body ached for his. Nothing and no one else mattered . . .
‘I never knew it could be like that,’ she said, lying back on the sand.
Jonathan kissed her forehead, her eyelids and then her mouth, his lips gentle and caressing. ‘Oh, my dear love, neither did I.’
She opened her eyes to find his blue eyes, full of concern, searching hers. She could feel his breath upon her face as he whispered, ‘You’re not – sorry?’
Her own eyes widened. ‘Sorry? How could I be?’ She reached up to trace the line of his jaw with her fingertips. ‘I love you,’ she said simply and no other explanation was needed.
His arms tightened around her and his lips kissed her neck, moving down, down to her breast and she felt the flutter of desire begin again. They made love again, slowly now, exulting in each other, murmuring endearments until again the waves of passion bore them to the heights of exquisite happiness.
Afterwards they still lay together in the sand. The mist enveloped them, but they were oblivious to the searching damp, reluctant even yet to leave. Holding her, Jonathan said, ‘Esther, what about your – husband?’
Esther, her cheek against his chest, said, ‘Matthew doesn’t love me. He never did.’
‘What?’ There was astonishment, and disbelief, in the one word.
‘I think,’ she said slowly, ‘it’s time I told you the truth about my marriage.’ She shivered suddenly, as if for the first time becoming aware of the cold and, noticing, he wrapped his jacket around her and held her close, warming her with his body.
‘I suppose,’ she mused as much to herself as to him, ‘we should not have married. I—’ She stopped as realization came creeping unbidden into her conscious mind. ‘I didn’t know what love was.’ She heard the surprise in her own voice and paused, as understanding at last flooded through her. ‘But now I do,’ she added. There was a sadness too mingled with her present happiness. A sadness for Matthew – and even for Beth. She sighed deeply and began to tell Jonathan from the beginning.
‘I was born a bastard,’ she began bluntly, and felt his arms tighten about her. ‘My mother died at my birth, refusing to name my father.
‘My mother’s sister – my Aunt Hannah – brought me up. She didn’t love me, though I have to admit she taught me all I know and her harshness has made me a survivor. But as soon as I was old enough, I left.’
She told him how she had come to this place, walking through the night to arrive out of the early morning mist at Sam Brumby’s farm. How she had made herself useful to Sam and how, by the time he died, she believed that the old man at least had had some affection for her in his gruff way.
‘From the moment I arrived here, Matthew was – well – after me. I always vowed I’d never give way to any man before marriage.’ Bitterness crept into her tone. ‘I wasn’t going to bring another bastard into the world!’
‘Oh, sweetheart,’ she heard Jonathan murmur.
‘I knew there was something between him and Beth but when the squire refused to give me the tenancy of Brumbys’ Farm in my own name just because I’m a woman . . .’ At the indignation in her voice, he raised her hand to his lips and held it against them. ‘I just never stopped to think. Matthew wanted me, asked me to marry him and I agreed.’
There was silence. ‘But – but why, darling, if you didn’t love him?’
‘I liked him well enough. He was the only one of my own age round here who’d been friendly. But it was the farm. I wanted the farm – a home of my own. Somewhere I could belong, and I had to be married to get the tenancy. It was the only way. The only way.’
‘Then he – he must have loved you, Esther. He wouldn’t just ask you to marry him for no reason.’
She buried her face against him, aware of a kind of shame only now when she had learnt the difference between real love and mere physical lust. ‘He – he only wanted me – physically.’
There was a long pause, then Jonathan said quietly, a little ruefully, ‘Well, I can hardly blame him for that, now can I?’
She curled up against him, winding her arms around his waist, pressing her head against his chest. ‘I think Beth truly loved him, and at the bottom of him I think he loved her. But you see Matthew’s the sort of man . . .’ She hesitated for a moment searching for the right words to express a knowledge that she was only just becoming aware of herself. ‘He’s the sort of man who can’t resist a challenge – any sort of challenge. Do you know what I mean?’
‘I think so.’
‘Poor Matthew. It was the same when he volunteered. It was only because Martha Willoughby and her bitch of a sister made loud remarks in church about cowards and that Major Langley . . .’ She paused. ‘God – I’ll never forgive that man! His speechifying altered all our lives. He whipped up such patriotism in his speech at a rally in the town, well, poor Matthew, he couldn’t resist it, could he? If something was out of his reach or denied him, he wanted it all the more. At first I was that challenge, whilst Beth was always willing. When he had married me, he had me whenever he wanted. I never said no. Maybe,’ she mused thoughtfully, ‘it would have been better if I had said no now and then.’
She let out a long sigh and continued. In the circle of Jonathan’s arms, his cheek against her hair, Esther was quietly remembering just how her marriage had been, seeing it clearly for the first time. For now, in this moment in the dunes, she had learnt the difference.
‘Matthew seemed to change. I know he was bitter about the farm and why I’d married him. He knew that it was really me that Mr Marshall gave the tenancy to – not him in his own right but only because he was my husband. It sort of – lessened his manhood. In his own eyes, if no one else’s.’
‘That’s understandable,’ Jonathan murmured.
‘Before we married, when I held out against him, all he could think of was getting me, even if it meant having to marry me. When at last he’d got me, he began to hanker after Beth again. I think he had some funny idea that Beth would still be his even after he’d married me, would always be his. So when she married Eland and was out of Matthew’s reach, it made him want her all the more. Then, of course, she had Matthew’s baby.’
She felt Jonathan’s whole body stiffen and she raised her head to look up at him as he asked, ‘Little Danny is Matthew’s son?’
‘Yes.’
‘I – see,’ he said slowly, trying to comprehend how it must affect the close-knit community of Fleethaven Point. ‘It must be difficult for you – for everyone.’
Esther shivered suddenly. ‘I’ll have to get back to the farm.’
She got up from the sand and held out her hands to him. ‘Let’s try and find our way back to the road and this time I’m keeping tight hold of you,’ she laughed artfully, ‘in more ways than one.’
They stood together for a moment, gazing deeply into each other’s eyes, sharing again that special intimacy.
‘You’ll come to the farm tonight?’
‘Esther, I don’t think . . .’
She placed her forefinger against his lips to still his objection, and whispered urgently, ‘Promise me you’ll come?’
He nodded, his breath touching her fingers in a soft sigh. ‘But only after dark. I don’t want the gossip to start.’
‘I don’t care . . .’ she began, but firmly he said, ‘It would hurt you, my dear. You – and Kate. I don’t want that.’
They parted just before the bank of grass bordering the lane, he to turn off towards the rear of the Seagull and Esther to cross the road to her farm.
She walked as if in a dream. All round her the familiar scene seemed unreal and yet suddenly so much more vibrantly alive. The pungent smell of the yard met her. She breathed deeply revelling in the air around her.
How wonderful it was to be alive – and to be loved.
A smile curved her mouth, softening its hard, set line to tenderness. She hummed softly beneath her breath, and every so often she gave a little skip of sheer happiness.
The farm seemed quiet and unusually still as if waiting for her return. There was no sign of Kate. She would be at the Point with Enid – or Danny.
The Fleethaven Trilogy Page 23