by Simon Rumney
Remaining perfectly still he and Nanny held hands as they absorbed every element of this wonderful scene until the drama of the hunt passed completely out of sight. Distant hounds barked, the faint call of hunting horns sounded and the odd cry of “tally-ho!” found their way across the fields but eventually silence.
After standing in complete stillness for many minutes Miss Parks became aware of Robert’s shallow wheeze. Still holding his hand she closed the collar of his overcoat and lifted his scarf; then, after kissing the faint ribbon-shaped birthmark on his wrist, Nanny pulled his cuff towards the little glove she had so lovingly knitted for him. Miss Parks then turned and slowly led him towards the staircase leading to the warmth of the great house.
‘Will Mummy be back soon?’ asked the always fearful Robert of the woman who had become his surrogate mother.
Miss Parks felt the relief in his strong grip as she answered, “Yes she will be back before lunch my darling.”
Robert always had a strange insecurity about him. Nanny had noticed it from the very moment he expressed his first emotion. It was so peculiar that he should feel anything other than totally safe because the environment in which he lived was without doubt one of the happiest and secure she had ever encountered. Fear of starvation or poverty could also be ruled out because the Pishioburys were a very rich family. They had been accumulating assets and investments for hundreds of years and were now one of the wealthiest families in England, and as was important in English society, the Pishiobury name had been very well established over many generations.
Their fortune had been established over two hundred years before because the first Lord had been a very shrewd man who supported Oliver Cromwell during the English civil war. As luck would have it his decision to support the roundhead army against the royalists was the correct one and he had moved rapidly from the owner of a small estate to a privileged Lord within a few years of the war ending. It was ironic that his descendants were now extremely close to the Royal family which Cromwell’s Parliament first deposed and then restored to power.
The family had gone from strength to strength as a result of Cromwell’s victory and the accumulated wealth had been invested well. The father of the current Lord had been one of the first investors in the extremely lucrative slave trade. He had purchased many ships to ply the triangular route, as it was known, and his vessels now carried textiles from England to Africa, slaves from Africa to America and the West Indies, then rum, sugar and raw cotton back to England. Each route was extremely profitable in itself but linking them all together in a nonstop round trip made it a huge money earner. The present Lord, Robert’s father, had also invested a good deal of his substantial cash flow in sugar plantations in Jamaica which were now yielding incredible profits.
Robert’s problems could not be traced to issues of money because he was heir to a fortune. Nor could his mental frailty be attributed to lack of affection because he was surrounded by the unconditional love of everyone on the vast Pishiobury estate, but even with all of this he behaved with the unexplainable insecurity of a penniless orphan.
Spellbrook School
Robert had spent his first four years of life completely cocooned from the real world. He never left the grounds of Pishiobury Park for any length of time and had no interest in a world outside of his wonderful playground. Every day, from the time he was old enough to walk in the grounds by himself, Robert communed with nature. Summer and winter he ran to the spinney every day to look at the birds as they nested or fed their young in the trees and undergrowth.
Invariably two of his father’s favorite gun dogs Louis and Marie ran in huge circles around him. If they strayed too far a short whistle always brought them back panting and looking to him for the approval he was happy to give. The shining black Labradors were his best friends but he never became emotionally close to the dogs named in honor of the guillotined King and Queen of France because his instincts told him to beware of attachments to living things.
The river Stort passed through the estate and meandered in a sweeping loop behind the great house. Robert lay on its grass covered banks for endless hours watching big brown fish stalking insects which merely dented the surface above them. He empathized with these insignificant little creatures because an unknown assailant could come crashing through a flimsy membrane to end their lives at any moment and that was the only way he could describe how he felt about his own fragile existence.
In the heat of the summer Robert watched busy spiders weave their webs and a wide variety of insects glide innocently into them. Birds powered effortlessly through the warm air picking off tiny black dots while deer cared for their young on the woodlands below.
He knew the location of every rabbit burrow and badger set. Robert was as one with his natural world and while wandering aimlessly for endless periods of time his anxiety became tolerable. He simply felt safer while alone in this environment without the complexities of human interaction.
Robert had no reason to fear people even the staff expressed the love they felt for their benevolent master’s through him. No one had even so much as raised their voice to him but a real fear of people existed nonetheless. He was a child showered with positive emotions, his country home was without doubt one of the most loving and secure environments that any child could grow up in, yet Nanny Parks knew something was not as it should be. The wonderfully handsome and deeply intelligent boy had a fragile quality about him and for absolutely no discernible reason he seemed constantly afraid.
In keeping with her belief that Robert needed more time to develop his character Miss Parks recommended that he be enrolled at the village school near Pishiobury when he reached the age of five. This broke with tradition because Pishiobury children had been boarding at the same remote preparatory school for generations. Robert would still be leaving for the Leys school in Cambridge as soon as he was eight years old of course but, until then, Nanny wanted him to enjoy his protected childhood at home for as long as possible.
Robert always disliked traveling in his father’s coach because doing so stirred irrational feelings of drawing unwanted attention to himself. As bad luck would have it, Robert’s first coach trip to school coincided with four seemingly unrelated events that brought his latent anxiety cascading to the surface.
The first event was caused by an insignificant rut just deep enough to break the axle of the little cart which had reliably trundled into the village of Sawbridgeworth every morning at dawn for far too many years to remember. Stuck half way along its four-mile run, the little cart’s cargo of correspondence, newspapers and sundry goods was stranded and had to be rescued.
The second event was Robert’s coach stopping to see what had happened to the cart. The third when his driver offered to deliver the cargo. The fourth when a newspaper happened to be placed on the top of the little pile of cargo transferred from the cart to the seat across from Robert.
The front page of the London Times was devoted to a report of the recent French invasion of Venice. This news was shocking enough, but it was the portrait of the young French General Napoleon Bonaparte that sent Robert into spasms of inexplicable fear and panic just moments before the coach drew to a halt outside his new school.
Poor Nanny was horrified by the dreadful appearance of her young charge at the end of his first day at Spellbrook School. His demeanor had changed so completely within the six hours between sending him to school in the morning and welcoming him home in the afternoon. Nanny thought something significant must have happened during the day. Lord and Lady Pishiobury were also shocked but putting on a brave face they assured her that Robert was simply suffering from first day melancholy.
Like his parents, Nanny wanted to believe that it was just a new environment but she felt sure something far more serious was influencing her beloved boy, so the next morning Nanny Parks confronted the elderly Head Mistress of the small village school while Robert went to his class and was entirely dissatisfied with Miss Wagstaff’s expl
anation:
“He is a charming, bright young boy but he has no inner resilience.”
“What may I ask is inner resilience?” Miss Parks was not good at accepting criticism when it came to Robert and this sounded a lot like criticism.
“It is something I have observed during my many years as an educator,” replied Miss Wagstaff. “I have spent a good deal of my professional career working in the poorer areas of London and later in the workhouses of the industrial cities in the north of England. In my experience children who are born and brought up in hardship or are maltreated from an early age often suffer with this mental disorder.”
“Young Robert has been raised in the most nurturing of environments!” Miss Parks tone was one of complete indignation and disbelief. “Are you suggesting that he has been in some way abused or neglected?”
“I am suggesting no such thing,” replied Miss Wagstaff defensively. “I am responding to your question with complete frankness. I am not speculating upon the cause of the boy’s problem.”
“I do not believe that Lord and Lady Pishiobury will wish their son to remain in your school a moment longer. Please have Robert brought to my carriage. I will be taking him home immediately!”
This was a very delicate situation for Miss Wagstaff because the school existed simply because Lord Pishiobury provided funds. It was by no means the norm for children of estate workers and farm laborers to receive education and she did not want to place the future of her school in jeopardy, but she was compelled to tell the truth.
When Robert eventually arrived at the coach escorted by his teacher Mrs Putnham, he was in a shocking state. The thirty minutes he spent in the classroom had seen him fall into a terrible decline. His face was white as snow and covered in sweat. He felt hot to the touch but his body shivered as though freezing cold.
Without concern for his lack of status the coachman picked the boy up and placed him on one of the studded leather-bench seats within his carriage. He then climbed the step to his driving position to retrieve the tartan blanket he used to keep his legs warm on cold days. With the red and green cover under his arm he moved passed the overweight teacher with a look of disgust on his face. The coach driver had been at Pishiobury since before Robert’s birth. He had followed the boy’s progress with great interest and, like all of the staff, he had grown to love the sensitive lad while playing with him over the years and the anger he felt for these apparently evil women showed clearly on his face.
Miss Parks thanked him for the rug, covered the distraught little boy then turning back to face Miss Putnham with an accusing look in her eyes. With deep concern in her voice she asked, “What have you done?”
Interjecting to save her member of staff, Miss Wagstaff answered. “We have done nothing! Whatever Robert suffers from was within him well before he came to our school.”
Although Miss Wagstaff believed her words totally she was confused by the love being displayed by the driver and the boy’s Nanny. She had been convinced that the child’s behavior was as a consequence of maltreatment but the open affection being shown by his staff baffled her. Miss Wagstaff had seen many wealthy children display insecurities and in her experience they always came from families who treated both their children and staff disrespectfully. It was always obvious which families behaved in this way because the staff treated their master’s offspring in a vengeful manner but this young boy’s troubles were clearly born of a different source than his environment.
Turning her back Miss Parks climbed aboard. She wanted nothing more to do with the horrible women standing outside her evil little school. Banging on the ceiling of the carriage she called, “Take us home as fast as you can go!”
The two very shocked teachers watched the coach pass through the school gates. Both agreed that in all their years in the classroom they had never seen such a fragile child. The fact that he was clearly intelligent, appeared so perfectly formed and came from a secure environment had them completely baffled.
Surviving
Lady Pishiobury sat at a table on the front lawn with her head cook planning menus for the coming season. Both were lost in total concentration because many dignitaries even royalty attended dinners and balls at Pishiobury and the menus had to be absolutely perfect.
Reveling in the interaction with her employer, and the warm sun on her back, Cook’s thoughts of quail, pheasant, roast swan, fresh Scottish salmon and venison were distracted by the sound of carriage wheels moving rapidly along the gravel driveway. Looking up, Cook wondering why her husband wasn’t returning his beloved vehicle to the stables at the back of the house as he usually did after a run to town.
“About the dinner party for fifty guests during the week before the Cambridge end of term balls?” said Lady Pishiobury bringing Cook’s attention back to the menus.
Cook was about to say that she would not let her Ladyship down when the carriage pulled to a halt in front of the grand stairway and her employer’s attention was completely lost. Climbing out of the carriage was a distraught Nanny with an even more distraught Robert in her arms.
Lady Pishiobury stood with a look of deep concern on her face and the pain of losing her sister returned to her thoughts.
“Whatever has happened?” There was deep pain in her voice.
Robert ran to the source of the loving words and buried his sobbing head in his mother’s huge petticoats.
“Whatever has happened?” she asked looking up at Nanny Parks.
“I have decided to bring Robert home in light of what happened at that terrible school, my Lady.” Nanny’s tone was indignant. “That horrible woman said he has been maltreated! Can you imagine? Our little Robert? Poorly treated? I have never been more outraged in my life!”
“Poorly treated? What could she possibly mean? Robert has never so much as been shouted at let alone maltreated?”
Lady Pishiobury attempted to lower herself to hold the distraught boy and kiss the top of his head in his favorite way but he clung to her as though his life depended on it. She could feel the circulation in her legs being stifled as she said reassuringly: “You are safe now my darling, please loosen your grip.”
Robert could not be convinced with words alone so Nanny tried gently prying his fingers from one another but he simply applied even more pressure. Cook had to help because the little white knuckles reconnected as fast as they could be separated. When his powerful little arms were eventually parted Lady Pishiobury dropped to her knees to hug him as she asked in a soothing voice, “What has frightened you so my darling?” Her beautiful, lemon-yellow dress absorbed brown and green moisture from the dew-covered lawn like blotting paper. The discoloration which worked its way between the silk fibers of the exquisite garment would have horrified her just seconds before but, at this moment, polite behavior meant absolutely nothing; she could think only of the pain that had taken possession of her beloved offspring as she asked her coach driver to carry Robert to his room.
When Lord Pishiobury arrived home with his shooting party he was completely unaware of the change that had so suddenly befallen his household. The first indication of any problem was the unusual concern in Pinker’s voice as he walked out to meet him. Maintaining the dignity befitting his status, the butler hid his anxiety behind small talk, “Good afternoon my Lord, I trust that you had a good day with the muskets.”
“Yes, thank you Pinker, marvelous shoot, we have all bagged enough game for a feast.” Pausing for a moment he noticed the change in his Butler and said, “May I ask if there is something wrong Pinker?”
“May I have a private word with you my Lord, it is a matter of some delicacy.”
Pinker felt very conscious of the fact that he was being melodramatic but Lady Pishiobury had insisted that her husband be told at the very moment of his return because he loved Robert as much as anyone.
The other guests were all men of power and status who understood matters of importance. Respecting Lord Pishiobury’s need for privacy they all walked to
the food-laden tables standing on the perfectly groomed lawn at the side of the house. The footmen who surrounded the white cloth covered trestles poured cold drinks from the silver decanters for the parched hunting party who were all ready for a libation after a full morning spent bagging hundreds of pheasants.
“What is it Pinker? Has something happened to Lady Pishiobury?”
“Gladly, no my Lord.”
‘Then what is it? Be a good fellow and spit it out.’
His Lordship’s relief was felt by Pinker who genuinely regretted causing his master to fret but by not fully considering his next words made things even worse. “It is your son Robert, my Lord.”
Before Pinker was able to say any more Lord Pishiobury was running towards the house. Sprinting up the marble stairs and through the open doors he gave the cleaning staff a terrible start. Without looking at his bewildered maids he took the stairs to the first floor two at a time. After very nearly colliding with another young housemaid in the long corridor, Lord Pishiobury found the bedroom of the son who meant everything to him. Pausing outside the doorway before entering, he prepared himself for the worst.
The first thing Lord Pishiobury saw as he entered the room was his wife sitting on his son’s bed dressed in a striking yellow dress covered in mud and holding him motionless in her arms. His heart seemed to stop for one brief moment as he spoke. “What has happened?” The words emerged in an uncontrolled sob.
Both Lady Pishiobury and Miss Parks turned to look at him with total surprise on their faces. His wife understood immediately what the sound of his voice meant. “Did Pinker not explain darling?”
“What has happened?”
“Robert has had a terrible experience at school.”
“What kind of experience? Is our son hurt in any way?”
“No, he is just upset.”
“Upset! Upset?” He concern was beginning to shift towards anger.