All the boys adored Miss Prentice; like the dead David Thompson, she was a caring and thoughtful influence in the school, and like him, gave Sunday afternoon tea parties, organised treats for the boys’ birthdays, kept a kindly eye on the small new ones, and generally made the rather bleak school life warmer and more bearable. The thought of leaving Miss Prentice behind was another source of sadness to Giles. Although she was so old, twenty-three now, she was more like an older sister than a teacher, and actually talked to them all over the Sunday tea and toast.
‘What I really want,’ she said one day, ‘is to have a school of my own. A bit like this, only for boys and girls.’
‘Girls!’ someone said incredulously. ‘Girls in a school?’
‘Yes, why not. Well, I’m a girl aren’t I?’
‘Not quite,’ said someone else, and they all giggled; Miss Prentice laughed too.
‘All right. Well I was a girl once. Anyway, that’s only one idea, I’ve got lots more, most of which would horrify the head and Mr Hardacre.’
‘Like what?’ asked Giles.
‘Well – it would have lots of scholarships for a start. So that poor children could benefit as well.’
‘I don’t know that that would work,’ said Giles.
‘Why ever not?’
‘The other children, the ones who weren’t poor, might not be nice to them.’
‘Oh Lytton, what a ridiculous thing to say. Of course they’d be nice to them. We’re talking about children, not a lot of prejudiced adults.’
‘I know we are,’ said Giles soberly.
‘You can just stop snivelling and pull yourself together. And you can’t need the bedpan again, I’ve only just emptied the last one.’
‘I can’t help it,’ said Billy. His voice was low, his face flushed with embarrassment.
‘Of course you can help it. You seem to me to lack self-control in every way. I don’t have Major Hawthorne calling out for bedpans all the time. I can only imagine it’s—’
‘Sister, please fetch Corporal Miller a bedpan at once.’ Celia Lytton’s voice, at its most ice-edged and autocratic, cut into Sister Wright’s monologue. ‘And when you have done so, and he is comfortable again, perhaps you would like to come and inform me. I shall be in matron’s office?’
‘It was so awful,’ she said to her mother, ‘poor Billy has some problem with – well with his stomach. It’s the morphine, apparently. Binds them up and then they need medicine to unbind them. So of course he needs the bedpan a lot. And that witch of a sister won’t let him have it. Makes him wait and suffer. And when I got there, he’d obviously been crying.’
‘Crying!’ said Lady Beckenham.
‘Yes, and she was vile to him about that as well, told him to stop snivelling. Well, wouldn’t you cry, if you were little more than a child and only had one leg, and it hurt you all the time, and you had no prospect of any kind of future in life? I certainly would.’
‘No you wouldn’t,’ said Lady Beckenham. ‘You’d buckle down and get on with it. As you have over the past three years. Can’t have been easy. Only thing to do of course, but I’ve admired you for it.’
‘Oh.’ Celia stared at her mother. She couldn’t ever remember being praised by her for anything in her entire life, except once, when she had fallen off her pony out hunting, broken her wrist, had to have it rather painfully set and insisted on going out again the very next day.
All her mother had said, even then, had been ‘Thank heavens you didn’t make a fuss in front of the master,’ but Celia had recognised it as approbation nonetheless; this was effusive by comparison, almost shocking.
She rallied. ‘Well anyway, he’s so wretched. In pain and utterly miserable. And the staff are just taking it out on him.’
‘Taking what out on him, Celia?’
Celia ignored this. ‘I reported Sister’s behaviour to Matron. She was horrified, said she would speak to her.’
‘She probably wasn’t horrified at all. But I daresay a few brisk words will be said. Anyway, I agree, there is no excuse for unkindness. I might go down there and visit him myself. He seems a pleasant enough lad. And it would keep Matron on her toes, let her know I’m aware of what’s been going on. Dreadful woman.’
‘She’s better than Sister Wright.’
‘No she’s not,’ said Lady Beckenham. ‘She’s extremely common.’ Three days later she arrived in Billy’s room. Barty had begged to be allowed to come too, but she refused. ‘I want to talk to your brother alone. Tell me a bit about him, Barty, what does he like doing?’
‘Oh – well, he likes playing cards. And he used to be good at drawing. But he does quite like reading. Those adventure stories Aunt Celia took him really cheered him up.’
‘Yes, but what are his interests?’ asked Lady Beckenham impatiently.
‘He—’ Barty stopped. She really didn’t know what Billy’s interests were. She had left Line Street when she was far too tiny to be aware of such things, and they had effectively cut her out of their lives soon after. She didn’t want to admit that though. And – what was it he’d been looking at in the Daily Mirror the other day, and talking about? Oh, yes, horses. Saying how he’d hated seeing the horses suffering out in France more than anything. ‘Poor beasts. At least we know why we’re there. They don’t.’
‘He likes horses,’ she said quickly.
‘Horses? Does he now? I’m surprised he knows anything about them at all.’
‘Well, there were a lot in France. Apparently.’
‘Yes. Yes of course there were. Well, that’ll give us something to talk about.’
Billy was lying staring at the window when she got there. He turned his head to her, said, ‘Good afternoon,’ and then went back to the view.
‘Good afternoon, Corporal Miller. How are you?’
‘B1 – pretty awful.’
‘Really? Leg hurting you?’
‘A lot. Got to have some more off.’
‘Oh, I’m sorry.’
‘Not as sorry as I am,’ said Billy, and burst into tears.
Lady Beckenham passed him a handkerchief and sat in silence, while he composed himself.
‘Why is it necessary?’ she said.
‘Ain’t healing. And they can’t make it. So it’s got to come off above the knee, the doctor says.’
‘I see. Well – I’m sure he knows what he’s talking about.’
‘He’d better,’ said Billy. He blew his nose. ‘Sorry.’
‘There’s no need to apologise. I can understand you being upset. But the only way is to be positive, you know.’
‘Positive!’ said Billy. ‘Positive, when me life’s over before it begun. Who’s going to give me a job, eh? What girl’s going to look at me? I don’t think you know what you’re talking about. With respect,’ he added, after a pause.
‘Oh yes, I do’ said Lady Beckenham. ‘My grandfather lost a leg as a young man. Out in India. During the Mutiny. Know anything about all that?’
Billy shook his head.
‘Well I’ll tell you about it one day. It’s a good story. But he fought at Delhi and had to have his leg amputated on the battlefield. Not pleasant. Anyway, he came back, got the Military Cross and won my grandmother’s heart. She was a great beauty too. They had a wonderfully happy marriage, and she had thirteen children. And he rode to hounds until he was sixty. So let’s have no more despair. Now then, Barty says you like horses. Is that right?’
Billy nodded silently; he was altogether beyond speech.
‘Where did you get to know anything about them?’
‘They had them at the brewery. Where I worked.’
‘Oh, the dray horses. Beautiful creatures.’
‘Yes. I used to give ’em apple cores sometimes. And once I helped hold one while it was being shod. Shoe come off, just as it was going out. Stood like a rock.’
‘And in France?’
‘Yeah, well, that was horrible. Seeing them there, in the mud, struggling. I see a mule
drown once, in that mud. We all tried to drag him out, but wasn’t no good. And then hearing them scream in battle, watching them lying there, dying. Officers always shot ’em if they could of course. That was something. But still horrible for them. And they’re so nice-looking, horses are. And so brave.’
‘Yes. Yes they are. Well now look. When that leg is on the mend – and I’m sure it will be, I’ll have a word with the doctor myself – you can come out and see my horses one day. Would you like that? Not that there are many of them now. Just a couple of hunters, and they’ve been on nothing but grass for years, terribly out of condition. We don’t get out much these days, of course.’
‘Out?’ said Billy.
‘Yes. Hunting. And then we’ve a few farm horses still. And I thought I might try and get a pony for the children. So we have a few for you to meet. How does that sound?’
‘All right,’ said Billy. ‘Yes, thanks.’
‘Fine. Now, you mustn’t allow yourself to despair. It’s very important. Half the battle is being positive, you know. Keeping your spirits up. Not brooding. At least you’re not blind. So many of those poor chaps are. That would be far worse now wouldn’t it?’
Billy nodded.
‘Good. As soon as you’re up to it, I’ll take you over. You’ll enjoy it. Good to have someone to talk to about horses. Know anything about bloodlines?’
‘Not a lot, no,’ said Billy with the shadow of a smile.
‘Well you must learn. Half the trouble with you, I’d say, is you’ve not got enough to think about. And it’s a fascinating subject. I’ll send you some books over with Barty. How would that be? I think she said you could read.’
‘Course I can read,’ said Billy indignantly. But he didn’t really mind. He was transfixed by her.
‘Good. Right then. And I’ll send some stuff on the Indian Mutiny as well. There are some terrific yarns about that, you know. Including my grandfather’s diary. You’ll enjoy that enormously. He couldn’t spell too well, but you won’t mind that, I don’t suppose. Good heavens, look at the time. I must get back. Dozens of animals waiting to be fed. I came on my motor bike, it’s my new toy. Uses less petrol than the car.’
‘A motor bike!’ said Billy. ‘Cor!’
‘Yes, it’s jolly good. It’s got a sidecar, thing you can sit in. You could come over to Ashingham in that, now I come to think of it. Goodbye, Billy. Chin up.’
From that day on, Billy was Lady Beckenham’s slave.
‘You know,’ said Celia, ‘these aren’t bad. In fact they’re quite good.’
‘What?’ asked LM.
‘That woman’s poems. Felicity Brewer. You know, Robert’s partner’s wife.’
‘Oh – oh yes, I remember. Really? I’m very surprised.’
‘So am I. Although I don’t know why we should be. She’s as likely to be able to write poetry as anyone else, after all. Here, have a look at them. I think we could include a couple in that anthology we’re doing. Wouldn’t that be nice?’
‘The standard’s hardly high,’ said LM.
‘I know. But it’s not exactly low, either.’
‘That’s a matter for debate I’d say.’
‘Oh LM, do stop it,’ said Celia wearily.
‘Sorry. Let me have a look. What are they about?’
‘Oh – what I’d call landscapes. There’s one about the skyline in New York, being like – what was it – oh, yes, ‘petrified poplars’. I like that don’t you? And people are much more sympathetic towards the Americans at the moment, now they’re fighting for us. Anyway, I won’t do anything if you don’t agree.’
‘No, no,’ said LM, ‘you go ahead. Robert will be terribly pleased. And poetry isn’t something I can make a judgement on anyway. Heavens it’s cold.’
‘Not as cold as it is out in France, I daresay,’ said Celia sombrely.
Dear Mum,
Worse thing now is the cold. We work nighttime quite a lot which makes it worse. Being moved up to the line and so on, so Fritz doesn’t see us. All in our gas masks, horses included, they don’t like it at all. A cup of tea ices over in a minute . . . And the poor horses get frozen into the mud where they stand. It’s not much fun sometimes, but we’re quite cheerful and looking forward to Christmas. Keep your fingers crossed I’ll be home.
Love to all, don’t worry about me,
Frank
Frank did not come home for Christmas; but Oliver did. Gaunt, pale, exhausted, full of anger at what was being endured.
‘Passchendaele will go down as one of the most dreadful and disgraceful episodes in the history not just of this war, but of all wars. I tell you, Celia, the men are beginning to hate the armchair generals as they call them. They suspect, quite rightly in my opinion, that a lot of the time they don’t know what they’re doing. I’d like to put Haig down in the mud for a week, I can tell you. Those frightful letters he writes to the troops: the boys take a very dim view of them, talking about the need for self-sacrifice and so on. We had quite a few deserters after Passchendaele, you know, and who could blame them. Poor chaps.’
‘What happened to them?’ asked Celia.
‘Oh – caught and shot, most of them. Boys, they are, no more than boys.’
He was often morose, frequently angry; but she comforted herself that at least he was talking to her more. On the other hand, he did not even attempt to make love to her.
Christmas at Ashingham in 1917 was a surprisingly cheerful affair; not only all the Lyttons were there, but several Beckenhams as well, two of the boys as Lady Beckenham still called her sons, and Caroline, all with their children. There were some empty places of course, Caroline’s husband and one of Henry’s sons were both in France and so was one of the girls, nursing with the Red Cross, but the family had been lucky, had endured no casualties.
‘Yet,’ said Caroline, touching the table and closing her eyes briefly: Celia joined her in her silent prayer.
Jack was not home this year: ‘Had a bit of luck,’ he wrote to Celia, ‘been made up to full Colonel, invited to one of the chateaux with the generals for Christmas. I’ll try and rob the cellar to stock up Oliver’s. Best love, thanks again for the last leave, it was marvellous. Jack.’
‘He stayed with you, did he?’ asked Oliver when she showed him the letter.
‘Yes,’ said Celia, ‘he did. We went out on the town one night, it was indeed marvellous.’
‘He’s always had a bit of a soft spot for you,’ said Oliver, smiling at her. His attitude towards Jack was so indulgent that Celia knew if she’d told him Jack had tried to seduce her, he would never have believed it.
Christmas lunch was comparatively lavish: two geese, and several only slightly tough chickens – they had to be kept into old age these days on egg-laying duty and Lady Beckenham had made two deliciously rich and alcoholic puddings.
‘There wasn’t really enough fruit, so I added extra suet and a lot more brandy. You’d have had a fit, Beckenham, literally pouring it in I was.’
She liked making Christmas puddings, it was part of the family tradition and before the war this had been the only time in the entire year she visited the kitchens; now she did rather more.
To Barty’s intense joy, Billy joined them: not for lunch, but for the tenants’ Christmas tea, presents and carol singing in the great hall at Ashingham. Afterwards Lady Beckenham took him to the grooms’ quarters over the stables, insisting he could manage the steps, and producing an old crutch which had belonged to her grandfather.
‘Come along, now, you can do it. You can do anything if you want to – there now, you see. Perfectly all right.’
He and Barty spent the rest of the evening there with the two girls, until he had to go back to the nursing home for the night. He was still in a lot of pain but the further surgery had been pronounced successful and the wound was healing well.
‘Doctor says I should be able to have an artificial leg,’ he said to Barty, ‘might even get me job back, in that case. You never know.’
Barty agreed that indeed you didn’t.
‘Well,’ said Oliver, mellowed into something approaching cheerfulness by the best part of a bottle of port that he and his father-in-law had shared after dinner, ‘well, let’s hope and pray that this is the last Christmas of the war.’
‘Do you really think that’s likely?’ asked LM.
‘I think it’s possible. In spite of everything, I do believe the tide has turned. We’ve had some genuine victories at last, rather than just gaining the odd inch of mud; we owe a great deal to the Australians, they’re a fine bunch of men, and the Americans of course. You must show me your letters from Robert, LM. I’d like to read them. God, I wonder when we’ll see each other again.’
Robert and Maud spent Christmas Day with the Brewers:
‘You can’t be on your own in that house,’ John Brewer had said, after Jamie announced, flushed with distress, that he was to go to friends of Laurence’s.
‘I don’t actually know them very well,’ he said, ‘but Laurence seems to think it will be fun.’
Clearly he didn’t know them at all and it was unlikely to be fun: fun in any case was not a concept with which Laurence was over-familiar. But Robert smiled at him, told him he was sure he’d have a great day, although they would miss him, and spent the next hour trying to console Maud, who had been planning her Christmas with Jamie for weeks and had lovingly wrapped at least half a dozen presents for him already.
‘We’ll have a good day,’ John said, ‘Kyle’s here and Felicity’s sister and brother-in-law, and their two, and besides, we have to drink a toast to Felicity and her literary success. Your sister seems confident that several of her poems will be published. It’s so marvellous. I’m so very proud of her.’
Robert liked Felicity Brewer; she was a pretty woman, with a mass of golden-brown hair, large, rather pale blue eyes, and a gentle manner, which concealed the fact that she was steely and extremely determined. She was from a very old Boston family, her grandfather had been a general in the Civil War, her father was a most distinguished and successful lawyer, her mother was one of the queens of the New York charity circuit, and Felicity herself had grown up in a large house in East Hampton, been educated by a private governess, presented both at the Junior Assemblies and the Junior League Ball, the mark of a truly successful social season, and had been unarguably debutante of her year. Her family had not been exactly thrilled when she had fallen in love with the impoverished, if charming, John Brewer; but her father who had a shrewd eye for a good man and a promising investment, had given his permission and had never regretted it. Robert found interesting echoes in this of Oliver’s marriage to Celia.
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