Sea Mistress

by Iris Gower

  ‘There are no buts,’ Calvin’s voice was hard, ‘either you love me enough to give up the paper or the relationship is ended.’

  ‘Don’t give me ultimatums.’ Arian drew herself away from him. ‘I can’t be forced into a mould, it’s far too late in my life for that. I’ve been used enough, now I am a woman in my own right, a successful woman. I love working on the paper, I raised it up from nothing but rusting machinery and a dilapidated building, I’ve made The Times one of the most popular papers in Swansea, I can’t give it up.’

  ‘We both know that the paper could function very well without you,’ Calvin said. ‘Mac is talented, he’s more than capable of managing the affairs of the business alone so don’t make me excuses, Arian.’

  Arian sat on one of the elegant chairs and drew on her boots, lacing them up with short angry stabs of her fingers. ‘I’m a person, not an object to obey your commands, how dare you talk to me like that?’

  ‘You bent to Simples’ will but you won’t bend to mine, is that it?’

  Arian looked up at him. ‘That’s not fair and you know it, Gerald was always unstable, he used coercion and force, I had expected more of you.’

  He was kneeling beside her then, trying to take her hands in his, ‘I’m sorry, I didn’t mean all that, I was angry, forgive me, my love.’

  She let him hold her but she was unresponsive, tense in his arms. When he released her she looked into his face, his dear face so close to her own.

  ‘But you won’t let me be your wife and the proprietor of The Times, is that correct?’

  Her tone angered him and he rose to his feet, thrusting his hands into his pockets, moving away from her. ‘You’ve summed up the situation with your usual swiftness of mind.’ He was being sarcastic and they both knew it.

  ‘Then there’s nothing more to be said.’ She moved out into the hall and by the way the maid appeared swiftly from the shadows and helped Arian with her coat, it was clear she had been listening. Tomorrow, the word would be all over Swansea, that now, even though she was a widow, Calvin Temple was not going to make an honest woman of Arian Smale.

  Well to hell with them and to hell with Calvin, she had managed alone before, she would do so again. She began to walk towards the town where the lights were flickering from the streets and where the sea, silver in the moonlight, washed into the shore.

  She had half expected Calvin to come after her, she listened for the sound of a horse and the wheels of the carriage but the silence fell thickly around her. The street lamps were nearer now but they shimmered as the tears filled her eyes. What had she done? She had alienated Calvin perhaps for ever. And yet she knew that if she had to make the choice between marriage and the newspaper all over again, she would have come to the same decision.

  Well, she was on her own now, a widow but a rich and successful one. She held her head high as she entered the Strand and as the sign above the door of the newspaper office came into sight, ghostly in the lamplight, she felt her spirits lift a little, she was coming home.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  Ellie had retired early, worn out after a day of helping in the grinding house. Martha had been horrified. ‘You’ll spoil your hands, they’ll be calloused and stained, not the sort of hands a vicar’s wife should have.’

  ‘It has to be done,’ Ellie had protested, ‘we’re two men short; with Smithers gone and Harry taken to his sick bed, there’s nothing for it but to get on as best we can.’

  ‘Let Rosie do it, then,’ Martha replied. ‘She’s a robust girl, more fitted to the work than you are.’

  ‘I’d rather Rosie carry on with the housework, the washing, the cooking, that sort of thing, she does it well, much better than I ever did.’

  Martha had not been appeased and now, lying in her bed, Ellie felt that Martha had a point. Ellie’s bones ached, her head ached, she felt as though she had been kicked from one side of the yard to the other. She was getting soft.

  She needed to take on more hands; Harry, Luke and Boyo were good workers but they couldn’t be made responsible for the entire running of the tannery. The currying, unhairing and fleshing, the soaking of skins in a solution of oak bark, these were time-consuming operations. As well as hard physical effort, skill was involved if good leather was to be produced and the high standards of the Glyn Hir tannery were to be maintained.

  Boyo had been working like a Trojan in the grinding house, doing the work of two men. He had been carrying in the plates of oak bark, feeding the greedy wheels of the hopper as well as carrying the bark chippings out to the yard. He couldn’t keep that sort of pace going, however willing he was and today Ellie had taken pity on him. She unearthed her old skirt and top and had gone into the grinding house to help him. Now she was overtired, she couldn’t sleep.

  She thought of Daniel, wondering if he was awake in his college room in Lampeter, looking out at the stars. The same stars she could see through her own bedroom window. She felt a stab of disquiet, had he got over his disapproval of her involvement in the opium business? She had done her best in a bad situation but her best did not measure up to Daniel’s moral scruples.

  She turned her face away from the moonlit window and firmly closed her eyes but sleep would not come. Her thoughts were racing around her head like the slivers of bark inside the hopper. Was what she had done to protect herself so wrong, she wondered? Perhaps it had been selfish of her to wish for a way out of Matthew’s blackmailing scheme, perhaps she should have gone to the authorities straight away and told them about the contraband just as Daniel had wished. But what was the use of thinking of what might have been?

  Ellie sat up and lit the lamp. She plumped up her pillows against the hard brass bedhead and looked around her at the shadow-filled room. She wished Daniel was here with her now so she could tell him how much she loved him. He was a man of strong principles and she admired him for it but he was young, untried, he didn’t yet know the pitfalls the world could hold in store.

  Ellie lifted her head, suddenly alert, she had heard a sound out in the yard, she sat up straighter, listening intently but there was only silence. She sighed and doused the lamp and then slipped from her bed and pushed aside the curtains, opening the window wide. A bright moon was shining, she could see in the distance the shape of the wall around the tannery. The shadow of the buildings were in stark contrast to the splashes of moonlight, it was a fine, crisp spring night.

  She was just about to close the window and return to bed when she scented the hint of smoke in the air. She raised the window higher and leaned out and the sharp tang of burning wood was unmistakable. She saw it then, a flame rising from the roof of the currying house and even as she watched, it sprung higher, shooting sparks into the night sky.

  The oak bark was dry, it hadn’t rained for several days, it would burn fiercely. It was out in the middle of the yard and though it should not have posed a threat to any of the buildings, the fire was spreading. The beam house was alight too now and Ellie was suddenly galvanized into action.

  She pulled on a robe and hurried into Boyo’s room. ‘Wake up, Boyo, the tannery is on fire!’

  He was awake at once, as though he had not long been asleep. He sat up, wide-eyed and saw the flames outlined against the closed curtains of his room.

  ‘I’ll get help.’ He slid from his bed and drew on his trews and neither Ellie nor he had time to be embarrassed by his state of undress.

  ‘I’ll call Martha, I doubt if the fire would spread this far but it’s best to be on the safe side.’

  Martha, in contrast to Boyo was slow to wake, she sat up and rubbed her eyes and Ellie had to repeat herself several times before the older woman rose reluctantly from her bed. ‘Don’t know what the world is coming to,’ she grumbled, ‘never had fires in the middle of the night in my young days.’

  Ellie met Rosie on the landing, the girl was rubbing her eyes, her hair hanging loose to her shoulders. Ellie ushered her downstairs, ‘Come on, Rosie, wake up and make sure Martha
doesn’t go back to sleep. I’m going to investigate, I won’t be long.’

  Ellie hurried outside and was struck at once by the acrid smell of burning leather. As she neared the tannery, she could see that most of the buildings were well alight.

  As if by an unseen signal, Harry arrived at the tannery, he looked unshaven and bleary-eyed, he should not really be out of bed, Ellie thought with a stab of concern. Close on his heels was Luke, he stood, hands on hips staring at the flames with disbelief. ‘Duw, there’s not a lot anyone can do here,’ he said mournfully. ‘The whole place is going up like a tinder box.’

  ‘Aye,’ Harry wiped his brow as a piece of smoking bark touched his hair. ‘Someone’s done a good job here, Ellie.’

  ‘Do you think it was deliberate then?’ Ellie asked and Harry nodded sagely. ‘Oh, aye, no accident this, nothing here to ignite the timber, see? This is deliberate, no question.’

  Ellie heard a bell ringing, it echoed faintly against the roar of the burning buildings.

  ‘Fire brigade is on its way,’ Luke said. ‘Bit late, if you ask me.’

  ‘Boyo went for them as soon as we saw the fire,’ Ellie said, ‘I suppose we should have realized it was useless, the wooden buildings were bound to go up in minutes.’ She felt suddenly weary. ‘I might as well go back to the house. Tell the leading fireman to come up to see me when he’s finished here.’

  Ellie rested her hand on Harry’s shoulder. There was nothing she could do and standing in the yard shivering was not helping anyone. As she turned away from the flames, she realized she was still in her nightclothes.

  ‘Aye, go on you, Ellie, we’ll see what we can salvage from this little lot.’

  Up at the house, Martha was fully awake and dressed, she looked up questioningly as Ellie entered the kitchen. Rosie was peering into the fire, carefully shovelling coal onto the fading embers.

  ‘Is it bad?’ Martha was white-faced but her greying hair had been brushed carefully into place. She would meet her maker looking impeccably tidy, Ellie thought as Martha continued to speak. ‘I can smell the burning leather from here.’

  ‘I think the lot is ruined.’ Ellie sank into a chair and drew her robe closer, she was suddenly very cold. ‘Jubilee would be so distressed if he could see the tannery now, hardly a building left undamaged.’

  ‘Will it be a great loss, financially, I mean?’ Martha sounded anxious and Ellie shook back her long hair. ‘I’ll have no money problems, Jubilee left me very well provided for, it’s just sad to see all he worked for going up in smoke.’

  ‘How do you think it started?’ Martha leaned across the table, ‘It’s not likely it was an accident, is it?’

  ‘I bet it was that Matthew Hewson,’ Rosie looked up, her face was smudged with dust, ‘no-one else wicked enough to deliberately set light to the tannery is there?’

  Ellie privately agreed with Rosie, Matthew was more than capable of carrying out an act of arson. ‘We don’t know who is to blame,’ she said firmly. ‘The firemen will soon have the blaze under control and perhaps they can tell us exactly what has happened.’

  Rosie brightened, ‘The firemen will be coming up to the house? Oh, I think they’re so brave, they rescue people an’ all, don’t mind putting themselves in danger.’

  ‘I think you’d best get some clothes on.’ Martha’s tone was acid.

  ‘Duw, there’s nothing to see, me and Ellie are both wrapped up like babies in a shawl,’ Rosie protested. ‘In any case, it looks as if it’s too late, if I’m not mistaken there’s the sound of voices in the garden, the men are here all ready and gasping for a cuppa, I bet.’

  Ellie sighed in resignation as there was a knock on the door and Harry entered the kitchen. ‘I’ve got the boys from the brigade here,’ he said, ‘can they come in for a minute?’

  ‘Of course, Rosie, you’d better put the kettle on.’ Ellie drew her robe more tightly around her. ‘Come in, find a seat, boys, tell me the worst.’

  The leading fireman took off his helmet and pushed back a tuft of hair that was dark with sweat. ‘Not much left, missus,’ he said. ‘Definitely a case of arson because we found traces of oil-soaked rags next to the currying house.’ He smelled of burning wood and his face ran with rivulets of sweat. ‘The seat of the fire was at the pile of oak bark you had stacked in the yard, easy enough to set light to those, dry as tinder they were.’

  Ellie sighed, it could only be Matthew who had set the fire, no-one else would have been so wicked and irresponsible. Harry and Luke stood in the doorway, faces blackened with smoke and Ellie felt a dart of pity for them. From today, there would be no work at Glyn Hir.

  ‘Will you rebuild the place?’ Harry asked as though reading her mind. Ellie rubbed at her eyes. ‘I don’t know, Harry, I really don’t know what I’ll do.’ She looked around. ‘I must talk to Boyo, anyone seen him?’

  ‘He was in the yard, looking for clues, so he said.’ Harry looked grim, ‘Like the rest of us, he has a fair idea who started the fire.’

  Ellie frowned worriedly, ‘Do you think you’d better go and look for him, Harry? I don’t want any harm to come to him.’

  Harry nodded and left the room and Ellie sank into a chair, staring round her in bewilderment, not able to believe what was happening.

  Rosie was in her element, she made pot after pot of tea, supplying the firemen with as much as they could drink. Watching her, envying Rosie’s energy and enthusiasm, Ellie felt tired and depressed, nothing seemed to be going right in her life any more. It was frightening to think that she had made such a bad enemy of Matthew Hewson that he would set light to the tannery and burn it to the ground.

  Harry returned. ‘No sign of him,’ he said, ‘boy’s gone off somewhere on business of his own, I reckon.’

  ‘You sure he’s not lying hurt somewhere?’ Ellie asked anxiously. ‘I haven’t seen him for ages.’

  ‘He’s all right, that lad can take care of himself,’ Harry said. ‘He was standing with us as bold as brass when the fire was put out so he’s quite safe; he’s got his own reasons for going off the way he has, don’t you worry.’

  At last, the firemen piled out of the small kitchen leaving it suddenly empty. Ellie rubbed her eyes with her hands, afraid she was going to cry. Martha banged the empty teapot on the table and sank into a chair. ‘I thought they’d never go and leave us in peace. They must all be awash with tea,’ Martha sniffed looking pointedly at Rosie.

  ‘Don’t be ungrateful,’ Rosie replied. ‘Them boys are brave, mind, you wouldn’t like to put yourself in danger every day like they do, would you?’

  ‘Come on, you two,’ Ellie said quietly. ‘It’s still only early morning, let’s try to get some rest.’

  ‘I won’t go back to sleep, not now,’ Martha said. ‘Go on up, you, I’ll occupy myself with a bit of sewing.’

  Ellie climbed the stairs wearily and sat on the bed, still wearing her robe. She knew she wouldn’t sleep but she needed to be alone, needed to quieten her thoughts. There were big decisions to be made and in her present frame of mind she was very worried that she might make the wrong ones.

  Once the firemen had finished their job, something had caught Boyo’s eyes, a small movement, a glimmer of light, he wasn’t sure what but obeying his instincts, he’d quietly made his way out of the yard.

  The moon had obligingly reappeared from behind a cloud and Boyo had seen the tall figure of Matthew Hewson striding along the lane leading to the road as if he was out on a daylight stroll.

  Boyo had traced him to the boarding house where he was staying, saw him entering the door using his own key and knew that Matthew had made a cosy home for himself. Boyo took note of the address, it might come in useful. He rubbed his chin, he still smarted from the way Matthew had hit him, casually, as if he was nothing but a punch bag. Well he would show Matthew Hewson that he had brains, a much more useful asset than brawn alone could ever be. One day, Matthew Hewson would have his just deserts and when that day came, Boyo would be there, w
atching.

  Daniel was coming to see her. Ellie was luxuriating in hot water in the large zinc bath, the warmth of the kitchen fire casting a rosy glow on her breasts and arms. She wondered what Daniel would say when he came home, with luck he would have put the business of the opium smuggling out of his mind.

  Later, in her room, she combed her hair; long, curling hair, lit with golden lights, she wanted to be as perfect as possible for the man she loved.

  Downstairs, Rosie was washing up the dishes in an enamel bowl, she looked up in approval when she saw Ellie. ‘Excited are you?’ Rosie’s eyes were alight, ‘it must be lovely to be promised to such a good man.’ She sighed.

  ‘Rosie, I don’t want any gossip about me and Daniel getting married, not outside these four walls, anyway.’

  There was a knock on the door and Ellie rose to her feet, her heart beat swiftly in anticipation. ‘Go answer it, Rosie, tell him I won’t be long.’

  She took a last look at herself in the mirror over the fireplace and then, slowly, not to appear too eager, she went towards the doorway. In the hall, Rosie was giggling like a little girl and Ellie felt disappointment fill her as she realized that the caller was not Daniel but Caradoc Jones. She forced herself to smile, she had completely forgotten this was his night to do the books.

  ‘Sorry to hear of the fire, Ellie.’ Caradoc seemed to have difficulty tearing his eyes away from Rosie’s smiling lips. ‘Dreadful thing to happen, dreadful.’

  Ellie led the way into the parlour. ‘Come on in, Caradoc, there’s a nice fire burning in the grate.’

  Caradoc was looking back over his shoulder. ‘Lovely little lady, Rosemary, so sweet and innocent.’ Caradoc’s eyes were alight in his plump face. As was his habit, he stood back to the fire and lifted his coat to feel the full benefit of the warmth. ‘Yes, such innocence is rare these days,’ Caradoc repeated.

  Ellie hid a smile, innocent wasn’t the way she would describe Rosie. Caradoc looked at her properly for the first time. ‘You are very smart, Ellie, expecting company are you?’