Hannah and Joel, Edwin and my father all had something of my grandfather about them: ‘black Barforths,’ with his hooked nose and uncompromising jaw, and even I, although my oval face and smaller features came from my mother, had the dark Barforth eyes, the heavy, chocolate-coloured Barforth hair. But Elinor was pink as a new rose and as fragrant, very much as my Aunt Hattie must have been as a girl; extraordinarily dainty, impossibly vain, with hair of a pale, silvery fairness and eyes a cloudy tint somewhere between blue and green, her slender figure, even at fifteen, elegant in her meagre finery.
My cousin Hannah had one good gown for summer, another for winter, and a sensible bonnet which she wore day in, day out, needing no other decoration than her grand Barforth self-esteem, but Elinor, by ingenuity and skill with her needle and a little unashamed begging from her richer relations, contrived always to appear fresh from the hands of some fashionable city dressmaker. New muslin flounces would appear on the hem of some old dress of mine; a satin bonnet I had long discarded would acquire an ostrich plume taken from a cap of my mother’s; a dashing straw hat, freshly crowned with spring flowers and the sauciest knots of ribbon, would be revealed, in whispers, as something for which Mrs Stevens had seen no further use. She would cut herself a wicked little spencer jacket from an evening cloak looted from my grandfather’s attic, a sash and matching reticule from the lining, while her pursuit of fans and gloves and costly little bits and pieces was so shameless, so very much like the terrier who gnaws and worries and refuses to let go, that she rarely came away empty-handed.
But today, although her pink muslin dress was worthy of comment, her appearance seemed momentarily to have slipped her mind, and even my enthusiasm for the roses in her chignon and on her sash and the little posy of rosebuds and ribbons dangling from her arm failed to distract her fully.
‘I had them from the minister’s garden,’ she said absently.
‘Had them? You mean you took them?’
‘Oh – yes, so I did. And why not? Hannah sent me to call – and I had no wish to go – and as I was coming away through the garden, there they were, the first of the season, just the thing for this gown. And I knew he’d never notice. Even if he had, I’d have picked them by then, and he’d hardly have expected me to put them back.’
‘But what did you say to Hannah?’
‘About the roses? That the minister is a Christian gentleman, which is true, surely? And that he gave them to me, which should be true if he’s really a Christian. And if I’d asked him, I daresay he wouldn’t have known how to refuse, so I’ve saved him the trouble, which you could almost say was very good of me.’
But even this example of her own cunning, her skill in playing the featherbrain to outwit her scrupulously honest sister, was not enough to lighten her mood, and as we picked our way up the stony little path to the Top House, she suddenly caught my hand and said urgently, ‘Verity, let’s hurry.’
‘But why? We’re not late.’
‘No – at least, I suppose not, since I never know what time it is. I leave it to Hannah to tell me. But, Verity, just the same, even if we’re not late, let’s hurry.’
And glancing nervously over her shoulder at the mill and the millhouse, black in the valley below us, she whispered, ‘There were men, you see, on the road as we came down to the mill, and I thought they meant to block our way, and Hannah thought so too although she kept saying, “Nonsense, Elinor, nonsense. Walk straight on.” And so I did, for I meant to keep close to Joel. And it was no nonsense either, because they shuffled around us quite horribly, and even Hannah looked scared, which of course she wasn’t, because she told me so. Anyway, Joel told them to move aside, and so they did, although some of them were quicker about it than others. But it was the muttering, Verity, and the scowling, and they were all so miserable – all of them, and all those others too, because I looked back, even though Joel told me not to – and they were all over the hillside, little groups of five or six everywhere, just staring down at the mill as if they hated it – staring like trees seem to stare sometimes, although Hannah said I was being fanciful, because trees have no eyes. But that’s just the point: they haven’t, and yet sometimes they still seem to see – and you’ll know, Verity, how baleful they can be. Yes, that’s what they put into my mind, fanciful or not – blind trees watching us. It must be the looms they hate, I suppose, and Joel said they were madmen to think they could stand in the way of progress. Although I don’t know much about progress – well – if it means they’re to lose their livelihood and their homes and live on the parish, then I daresay they don’t think too well of it. But I could see what he meant about them being mad. Oh, Verity, do ask your mother to send us home in the carriage, because she won’t think of it, and Hannah won’t beg – and do please ask her in good time before dark – Verity?’
‘Well, of course I’ll ask her,’ I promised easily, by no means alarmed, since Elinor would say almost anything to beg a ride in a carriage and her fears were usually no more than a means of making herself noticed. ‘And if the horses have gone off somewhere or if she doesn’t want them to go out again, then you can stay the night with me.’
But to spend the night at Lawcroft Fold, when she had seen it under siege, menaced by that dark human ring of trees, was not at all to her liking, and, as she caught my arm, her eager little hand touched its fear into my skin, sharpening my tongue.
‘Oh, Elinor, such a fuss. And what a goose you always are. Trees, indeed. Weavers, that’s all, having a grumble about the looms, and what more can they do but that? There’s Edwin and Joel, and the soldiers down at the mill, and there’s my grandfather. Do you think my grandfather – of all people – would let anyone harm us?’
He was waiting in the garden of the Top House, a gnarled old tree himself, sitting on a bench from which he could see the whole vast, stone-clad outer garment of his enterprises; his mill, his chimney stack, his school, his chapel, the grey tentacles of Cullingford that were creeping ever nearer, the millhouse he had built for his wife, the Top House, built for himself and his final indulgences, the grey smoke of prosperity, rising from the town, blowing eastward today, so that above his head there was even a patch of blue sky, a hopefully glimmering sun.
‘So you’ve come to see me, Verity Barforth, have you?’ he said. ‘Good. And where’s your mother?’
And looking behind him, I saw that my father’s eyes were asking me the same question.
Edwin was there already, and my cousin Joel; and although they were superficially much alike, I judged my brother to be the pleasanter, easier man and knew somehow that Joel, for all his show of friendship, did not really like Edwin at all, considered him, in fact, to be a pompous fool and intended to get as much out of him as he could when they became brothers-in-law.
Joel Barforth was twenty-eight that year, somewhat leaner and considerably darker than Edwin, a man who had been wild in his youth – much addicted to cards and bare-knuckle prizefighting, to fancy wines and spirits instead of plain, honest ale – and although, on his father’s death; he had shouldered his responsibilities in true Barforth fashion, Law Valley men still treated him with suspicion. In an area where a man’s worth could often be measured by the engine grease and dirt ingrained beneath his fingernails, my cousin Joel’s hands were always scrupulously manicured; and if, as a child, he had been notoriously threadbare, having been obliged, like his mother, to pay for his father’s extravagance, his garments now were always well chosen, well pressed, his boots highly polished, his cravat so elaborately arranged that the Law Valley often wondered how he could find the time. He was, I suspected, shrewd, hard, keen, cunning, one of the truest Barforths of them all – more like my grandfather, even, than Edwin – but my grandfather did not like him, had refused assistance at the height of Joel’s troubles which he could easily have afforded to give, and even now when Joel had proved his ability to survive, was inclined to treat him scornfully, giving him no opportunity – when Edwin was there – to shine.
<
br /> Certainly no one could accuse my brother of wasting time on dress, for it was very clear that even on his betrothal day, with a dozen coats to choose from, he had taken the first one that came to hand: peacock blue, as it turned out, with a yellow waistcoat and checked game keeper’s cravat, a poor showing indeed beside Joel’s plumcoloured coat and dove-grey trousers, his white, artfully tucked and pleated shirt, the snowfall of his cravat that proclaimed the sartorial gulf between them. And although I could like him no better for it, I understood well enough why Joel so disliked my brother.
Edwin, with no effort whatsoever on his part, would inherit Lawcroft Fold, while Joel, at considerable personal sacrifice, would be lucky to hold on to his few leaking, broken-down sheds at Low Cross. Edwin had only to express the desire and instantly his grandfather had ordered power looms, soldiers to guard them, a new mill to put them in, leaving Joel to endure his scorching, unsatisfied ambitions. Edwin, at twenty-four, was to many the girl of his choice, while Joel, four years older, could see no end to his courtship of a certain Miss Rosamund Boulton, who had agreed to wait but could not be expected to wait forever.
He had no greeting for me beyond a slight, formal nod, for I had no part in his schemes for the future. It was very much in his interests, I knew, to marry his sister Hannah to my brother, and his sister Elinor to any man with a few hundred a year who would have her, thus relieving himself of expense and responsibility and bringing him a step nearer to marrying his own handsome Miss Boulton. But I could be of no use to him in that, and, giving Elinor a look which clearly told her to behave herself, he turned, back to his conversation with my grandfather. And I was aware that behind his deference he was as bitter and seething as a bad November, acknowledging my grandfather’s malice and returning like for like.
Sitting gracefully on its shelf of landscaped greenery cut from the otherwise bare hillside, fragrant among its beds of lavender and carnations and feathery foreign greenery, the Top House was not a place I greatly cared for. No one could fault its elegance or its comfort, or feel anything less than admiration for its airy, high-ceilinged rooms, moulded in blue and white and gold, and furnished in a lightweight, light-coloured style Mrs Stevens believed to be French and which I had always thought too insubstantial for my grandfather. But Mrs Stevens, who knew all the arts of pleasing men and practised them lovingly, had scant regard for the opinions of women and none at all for those of young girls; and although my brother – and even my father – often came here to be cosseted and flattered and to sample her excellent mulled wine, she had a way of making me feel unnecessary so that I was never sorry to leave.
But Hannah, the chosen bride, who would be mistress of Lawcroft, when her time came, in a far more positive way than my mother, was not to be neglected – certainly not by Mrs Stevens, who knew my grandfather was not immortal and that she would have her living to earn when he was gone – and it was no surprise to me to see her and Hannah whispering together, Hannah straight and tall and just a little ill at ease, Mrs Stevens a soft breeze fluttering around her, murmuring of stolen kisses and wedding bells and the recipe for her special syllabub, a secret she would entrust to no one else.
She was a slender, boneless woman, Mrs Stevens, moving in a constant aura of rose water and gentle, obliging laughter, a superb housekeeper whose larder shelves were a temptation of savoury pies and pickles, custards and cheesecakes, her kitchen ceiling festooned with glazed, exotically flavoured hams, garlanded with spicy sausages, and, in season, festering with illegal game from Lawcroft Moor. Her seed cakes and spice cakes were famous, her apple jellies miraculous, her bowls of potpourri quite unique, her smile extremely caressing, yet I did not like her, my mother did not like her, and I was relieved to see my cousin Hannah draw back a little, as if she found the older woman’s perfume too cloying, her manner altogether too winsome for her age and her station.
But Mrs Stevens was too experienced a campaigner to be unduly dismayed and, quite certain that Hannah would need an ally in time when she came to share a home with my mother, she gave my cousin’s arm a final, loving squeeze and came floating towards me with an air of such deliberate secrecy that everybody turned to listen.
‘Verity, dear,’ she whispered, knowing how well whispers carry, ‘it is well past three o’clock. Does your mamma mean to honour us, or has it slipped her mind?’
‘I was just wondering the same myself,’ Edwin muttered, heavy with his great news. ‘She’ll be in the garden, I shouldn’t wonder, talking to the flowers or watching the grass grow. Well, I’ve got something to say and I’ve a mind to say it now—’
‘You’ll wait,’ my father told him, ‘until your mother comes.’
But Edwin looked through my father to my grandfather, and seeing the pain in my father’s face, I said quickly, ‘She’ll be here presently. She told me so.’
‘Aye, she told you so and promptly forgot all about it, or else she never meant to come at all, which is more likely. She knows well what I have to say, and why she can’t bring herself to like it I’ll never know. No – and she’ll never explain herself either. She’ll smile and say, “How very nice,” and I tell you, there are times when it’s too much – when it won’t serve—’
‘Edwin,’ my father said dangerously, I told you to wait and you’ll have the manners to do it, and keep a civil tongue in your head while you’re about it.
‘Oh, dear,’ Hannah murmured, moving swiftly between them, angry in her turn with my mother for keeping Edwin waiting, angry with my father for taking his wife’s part against his son, yet intending her role to be that of peacemaker. But her intervention was not needed, for at the same moment, my grandfather rose lumberingly yet quite majestically to his feet.
‘Say your piece, lad,’ he ordered bluntly, as if my father were not there at all. ‘It’s past three o’clock and there’s meat on Mrs Stevens’s table too good to spoil. Let’s hear you.’
I saw, like fragments of stained glass, my father’s jealous hurt, my brother’s satisfaction at getting his way and his certainty of getting it again, their mutual hostility, and the cold, sardonic gleam in my cousin Joel’s eyes as he watched the Barforth ranks so sadly split asunder.
‘Well, it’s no secret, I reckon,’ Edwin said, his strong brown fingers reaching out for Hannah and claiming her with an enthusiasm that touched us all and may have given her actual pain. ‘It’s time I was wed – high time – and there’s no other lass I’d want for a wife but Hannah. They told me to choose a sound woman, one who’d look me in the eye and see things my way, and there’s no woman anywhere more straightforward. She’d never keep me waiting and keep me guessing – no, I know where I am with Hannah. And that’s what I have to say. We’ve known a long time how things were likely to turn out between us, and today I told her it was time we got it settled, and so we did. She’s to be my wife as soon as she likes – the sooner, the better – and if anybody don’t care for it, then it’s all the same to me.’
‘Oh, Edwin,’ Mrs Stevens sighed, ‘how beautiful. Oh, Edwin – and Hannah, too – how very moving. We all of us wish you well – all of us, I’m sure.’
As if at her signal, there was a surge of congratulations, of back slapping and kissing, Edwin preening himself like a gigantic, slightly embarrassed peacock, Hannah mindful of her dignity yet conveying to him with every glance, every movement of her square, capable hands that she would be everything he wished, hard-working mistress of his house, enduring companion of his bed, mother of his dozen sturdy sons, with nothing elusive about her, nothing to intrigue him, nothing to plague him or to remind him in any way of his mother. And when the kissing was done we went into Mrs Stevens’s high-vaulted, deep-windowed dining parlour to gorge ourselves on her chicken pie, her hot new-baked bread, her almond creams, and my grandfather’s wine.
My grandfather sat heavily at the head of his festive board, eating little, gazing with a certain sentimental satisfaction at Mrs Stevens as she performed her intricate little domestic ballet arou
nd the table, coaxing the men to partake of this and that, to try just a little more of the other, leaving the women to fend for themselves, not really caring whether they were served or not. The engaged couple remained side by side, stiff with self-conscious happiness, Hannah’s smile deliberately cool, her eyes excited and hot, her hand, I thought, still in Edwin’s, concealed by a fold of Mrs Stevens’s lace cloth. But my father, after some brief discussion with Joel, hovered restlessly a moment or two before retreating to the window seat to stare moodily out of the window which would give him the best view of the path my mother would be bound to take; and when Mrs Stevens offered him a wedge of her chicken pie and a murmur of sympathy I missed neither his irritable gesture of dismissal nor my grandfather’s frown.
‘We’ll drink to the future,’ my grandfather said very loud, his glance flickering over my father, leaving him and settling on Edwin. ‘Yes – Edwin and Hannah – the future. Let’s have the champagne, Mrs Stevens, and while we’re about it I’ll give you something else to drink to. Now that we’re all assembled – all of us, that is, who choose to assemble – I have this to tell you. The new looms will be in production by the end of next month, with more of them on the way and more on order, and it’s only fitting that there should be a new mill to house them. Yes, Edwin, I saw my builders yesterday and when it’s done, lad, when it’s six storeys high, we’ll pack it full of every newfangled device those engineers can offer us, so long as there’s a profit to be made. That’s it, lad, eh? Power and profit, progress, if that’s what you like to call it. And it’s all to be yours, lad, one day, yours and Hannah’s.’
‘By God,’ Edwin said, his eyes on fire, his knuckles showing white as his fingers crushed themselves around Hannah’s wrist, heedless of the pain he must be causing her and which she, gritting her teeth behind her smile, bore like some unflinching shield-maiden of old.
The Clouded Hills Page 3