Ted, meanwhile, having shed his hat and coat, was greeting Lady. He stroked her silken nose and murmured to her as he lifted the heavy saddle and bridle off the wall and put them on her back. Murmuring soft endearments, he led her into the yard and expertly ran his hands over her, checking her hooves to ensure she was properly shod for the ride to Carlisle where they would all board a train.
‘She seems in good condition, sir,’ he said to Ryder. ‘Nothing much wrong there.’
Suddenly Beth appeared at the door, a ragged coat over her dress, and nothing but a bundle in her hands.
‘Is this all you have, girl?’ Ryder demanded in astonishment.
‘Yes, sir,’ Beth said with a bob.
‘Get in there then.’ Ryder pointed to the carriage and, without a backward glance, Beth scuttled up the steps and collapsed on the seat trembling. Ted’s face appeared at the door and he grinned at her.
‘Take no notice of my things, Miss,’ he said, pointing to his fine new coat and hat, of which he was rather proud. Just make yourself comfortable.’
Beth went scarlet, and when Ted withdrew his head he looked pleased with himself.
By this time one or two more of the hands, interested in the commotion in the yard, had come back from the fields, and Ryder knew it was time to be off.
He saw Ted onto the back of Lady and gave a gentle slap to her rump as she was ridden out of the yard on to the road outside.
Then he turned towards the farmer, eyeing a butt that stood by the side of the stables to catch rainwater. With a sudden, dexterous move, he seized Frith simultaneously by the collar and the seat of his pants and tipped him head first into it. Then, dusting his hands together, as at a job well done, he strode towards the carriage while the farm hands, gaping at the master’s legs waving frantically in the air, burst into spontaneous laughter.
‘You’d better remove him from there,’ Ryder called, ‘else he’ll be dead.’
And then he jumped into the carriage, smiled at Beth cringing beside him, and commanded the driver to be off. ‘I want to be in Cockermouth before nightfall,’ he said.
As they drove out of the yard on to the road Ted preceded them on Lady, trotting gently, her mane tossing in the wind.
Behind them in the farmyard Farmer Frith’s men moved, somewhat reluctantly, towards the water butt to put him out of his misery.
Henrietta, Lady Woodville, looked round the bedroom where she had slept during all the years of her married life, where her four children had been born – two, sadly, to die in infancy – and where she had spent the unhappy years of her widowhood. Or rather, they had not been unhappy until Guy had married the woman from Holland and everything had changed.
Who would have thought that docile, rather plain Margaret would turn into a force to be reckoned with? Would be changed by the mere act of moving from one side of the Channel to the other? Would become a woman who wanted to be powerful as Henrietta had once been powerful; who wanted to rule not only her home and her husband, but her mother-in-law as well?
Finally Margaret had forced her to agree to the unsuitable alliance of her daughter with a man who traded as a builder! Eliza had been married in the sight of God to an ordinary, working-class man of the people whose hands were calloused and whose accent lacked the refined tones of a public school education.
By that time Henrietta had herself forgotten her own origins in trade because only by marrying a Woodville had she, in fact, become one.
Now she was to leave. Her boxes were packed, the drawers and closets emptied, the bed stripped. Most of the furniture was to go in due course to Bournemouth, to the house that Margaret had bought for her there. It was not too far away from her Martyn relations, and it was close to the sea. But it was a mere red-brick villa built only a few years before when Bournemouth began its expansion as a seaside resort to rival Brighton. It was not a mansion. It was not Pelham’s Oak, ancestral home of the Woodvilles.
She was to stay with her brother while the house was refurbished. She would have every comfort: a butler, a maid, a cook.
But it was not the life she wanted – and not the life she had envisaged when her son had married a woman for her money.
There was a movement behind her, and she turned with a distant expression on her face, expecting to see Margaret; but it was Guy. He crept in rather sheepishly, as he used to do when he had committed some misdeed as a small boy. The years seemed to slip away, and in her mind the image of the youthful Guy came vividly to life again. His mother, in a sudden rush of sentimentality, wanted to enfold him in her arms; but he was a husband now, a father, the head of the family. The years had put him out of reach.
‘The carriage is ready, Mother,’ Guy said quietly. ‘But take your time. I know how you feel.’
Henrietta, dressed in her hat and furs, sat down suddenly on one of the upholstered brocade chairs, staring in front of her.
‘Do you, Guy? Do you really know how I feel?’ Wearily she passed her hand across her brow and gazed at him reproachfully.
‘I think so, Mother,’ he said contritely, as though he carried the blame for Margaret’s behaviour. ‘I’m sorry it came to this.’
‘Had you not married her ...’ Henrietta began scornfully.
‘We would not be here, Mother, if I had not married Margaret. It is only her money that has allowed us to continue not only to live, but to live well.’
‘You could have found some other woman, an English woman who understood.’
Guy shook his head. ‘An English woman from a good family would have had an English father who would have sent me packing. It was only a foreigner in search of an English title whom we were able to impress. Willem Heering is a great man in many ways; but he is venal. Thank God for that.’
He held out his hand, but Henrietta seemed disinclined to rise.
‘You will come back, Mother. There will be holidays. It is not as though you were going for ever.’
‘I shall never come back to this room,’ she said with a shudder. ‘There are too many ghosts.’
‘As you wish, Mother.’ Guy hung his head. ‘But try and forgive.’
‘Forgive?’ Henrietta’s head came up sharply. ‘I am thrown out of my own house by trickery. I am blackmailed for acting in the best interests of my own daughter. You think I should be the one to forgive? Do you know that Margaret actually attended Eliza’s wedding?’
Guy nodded, but said nothing.
‘She went back to the house afterwards for the reception.
It’s a wonder she didn’t force you to go too.’
‘She tried,’ Guy said cravenly. ‘But I knew how you felt.
And I’m very glad you did, Guy.’ There was a triumphant glint in his mother’s eyes.
‘I didn’t want to upset you, Mother, but, eventually, I would like to see Eliza again.’
‘I hope it will be over my dead body, Guy.’ Henrietta fixed a stern eye on him. ‘I hope you will never receive your sister as long as I am alive. Please don’t forget what she did. She dishonoured you, she dishonoured me, she dishonoured your father – but, most of all, she dishonoured the ancient family pride: the pride of the Woodvilles.
Springing from her chair, Henrietta advanced upon Guy, shaking her finger, and, suddenly, he realised how very afraid of his mother he still was. At the same time, he understood that he’d married a woman rather like her: someone who would always keep, or try to keep, him under control.
Henrietta saw the fear on his face and took advantage of it.
‘You are a weak man, Guy – you know it and I know it. Never give in to that weakness and allow your sister to enter this house again. If you do, you will never forgive yourself and I shall never forgive you.’
PART TWO
The Master Thatcher
11
Lally lay in the large double bed in the house in the Vale of Health, the tiny baby in her arms. She looked so pretty, so vulnerable, that Guy decided his love for her hadn’t really changed despite the
shock she had given him.
To Guy, Lally was an object of love, a beautiful thing for his delectation: someone who could remove, by her caresses, the cares of the world with her kisses, the frustrations and anxieties of everyday life.
The last thing he had wanted from his goddess had been a child.
He had been so angry when she had told him the unwelcome news that, for many weeks, he didn’t go near her. Wisely she made no attempt to contact him, and her silence eventually worried him. He realised how much she meant to him, and how bereft he would be if anything happened to her.
Very soon he was back with her again, but not quite on the same footing. There was a wariness now.
Six years had now passed since Guy had married Margaret Heering at the church in Wenham. He was the father of three children: his first-born – George, a daughter Emily – and now a third child, a love child, a boy yet to be named. He was a pretty baby, tiny, almost like a girl, because he had been premature. Lally had been so determined to maintain her figure throughout pregnancy – as much to keep the curious neighbours away as anything else – that she had laced her corsets too tight. The miracle was that the baby had lived at all.
Guy sat down on the bed next to Lally and tentatively put out his index finger, which was grasped by the tiny hand. The baby smiled winsomely at him and tried to put his finger in his mouth. His eyes seemed to plead for his father’s love, but Guy didn’t love him at all. As far as Guy was concerned, the baby was unwanted and unloved.
‘Aren’t you glad we had him?’ Lally asked anxiously, seeing Guy’s expression.
Guy said nothing but, his finger still held tight in the tiny fist, he stooped and kissed Lally. For a moment, she clung to him desperately, also wanting reassurance of his love.
‘I wish we could be married, Guy,’ she said, voicing a thought that was constantly on her mind.
‘One day,’ Guy murmured unconvincingly. ‘Maybe. I am not yet financially independent of Margaret. Unfortunately the new Act of Parliament gives her some control over her money.’
‘But I thought you were working so hard?’
She pouted prettily, but the reference to work irritated him and he rose from the bed. Moodily he jangled the coins in his pocket and, walking over to the window, gazed out on to the Heath. It was autumn and the leaves were beginning to fall. In the distance some children, well wrapped up against the keen north wind, trampled through them under the watchful eye of their mother. It was a happy, domestic scene and, momentarily, Guy was envious. How nice it would have been to be part of such a carefree picture, instead of a man weighed down by anxieties, and fear for his future: a mistress he couldn’t afford, an unwanted child and a domineering wife who was beginning to question everything he did.
The truth was that all had not gone well for Guy. In six years he had progressed from the mean little room in Lower Thames Street to one as small, but not as mean, in Threadneedle Street. He wore a frock coat to work with a top hat, and a gold watch and chain across his waistcoat. He was considered rather a dandy, his hat at a jaunty angle, and carried a cane. He usually smoked a cigar in the cab taking him to work. He was, after all, Sir Guy Woodville, baronet, though the company seemed still to regard him as little more than a clerk. He had few responsibilities, and although he had made no losses for the firm he had made no profits either. He was a little more punctilious than before, but still undeniably bad at his job. He had no understanding of the complexities of the business world, of the fluctuations of the market, the movement of stocks and shares.
If Guy Woodville’s life at the age of thirty had to be summed up in one word, that word would be boredom. He was a bored young man who felt he had lost his way; he envied others who always found things to do. Even though he never saw him, he envied his brother-in-law, Ryder Yetman. In five years, Ryder had turned a failing business into a profitable one. Under him Yetman Builders had boomed. He could imagine Ryder out walking with his family like the family up on the Heath now. Did Ryder have a mistress, Guy wondered; a woman of the lower orders tucked away in a little cottage in some hidden vale of Dorset? Did he, perhaps, have more progeny who, like Lally and the baby, were kept well hidden?
He doubted it. It was many years since he had seen Ryder, but from what he had heard he was the epitome of the contented man: loved, loving, and now wealthy. Some fellows had luck they surely didn’t deserve.
‘What are you thinking about, dearest?’ Lally asked from the depths of the bed. She looked so delightfully languorous that, were it not for the unwelcome, tiny pink form in her arms, he would gladly have jumped in beside her.
‘Oh, this and that,’ Guy said, strolling back to the bed. ‘I was thinking how I wished we could be together.’
‘Would you divorce Margaret if you could?’ She gazed at him keenly, taking careful note of his reaction to her question.
‘Of course I would,’ he said with conviction and, sitting by her side, again took her hand. ‘But whether she would let me go is another thing. She is very happy at Pelham’s Oak. Now that my mother has gone she rules the roost there like a fine lady. She gives dinners and parties, even a ball is planned for next week. She is an expert manager and looks after the finances, the accounts. The servants seem to like her and work well for her.’
‘Then she will never let you go.’ Lally’s voice was desolate.
‘Oh, darling!’ Guy knelt on the floor by her side and, taking her hand in his, brought it up to his lips. ‘Take heart. We must never despair. Never. Anything can happen.’
Tenderly Guy stroked her hair away from her hot, damp forehead. She looked so enchanting, yet he had never seen her face so unhappy. If she had wanted this child, which he doubted, so far he had brought her little joy.
‘But dearest,’ he said, continuing to stroke her hair as though she were a sleek animal, ‘you know that I have two children of my own. I cannot at the moment acknowledge this baby. What is more, beloved, your own name and reputation will be compromised.’
‘It is compromised already,’ Lally said in a sulky voice. ‘Don’t think people don’t know you visit me here.’
‘A woman with a child, living alone, will be ostracised by everybody.’ Guy went on. ‘Now you have some friends, and you speak to the neighbours whatever they may think. You will see.’ He rose and, hands in his pockets, began restlessly pacing round the room. ‘No one will speak to you. I know what happened to my sister. She is scarcely accepted in the town, and she has been legally married for five years and has three legitimate children.’
‘Well, you weren’t much help to her were you, Guy? Not much support?’ Lally said waspishly. ‘You never spoke to her either. Still don’t, I believe.’
Guy halted and, shrugging his shoulders, turned towards her.
‘Sometimes I feel I would love to see my sister and speak to her, believe me. But I doubt now that she would receive me. It is true that my mother and I were greatly offended by her elopement with a man who had no class, and no money then either, though I hear he is now making a fortune...’
‘Maybe that will influence your attitude?’ Lally looked at him archly, gratified to see that his face had changed colour.
‘There’s no need for sarcasm, my dear,’ he replied with dignity. ‘Eliza’s behaviour was disgraceful. The amount of suffering she brought upon my mother was enormous. That I cannot forgive, no matter what has happened since. Well –’ Guy crossed the room and, taking his hat, ran his fingers uneasily round the curved brim – I think we have no more to say to each other at the moment, Lally. But ponder over what I have said, my dear.’
Then, without kissing her or looking at his son again, Guy left the room.
Half an hour later when her maid entered Lally was still weeping. Abby was a good-hearted servant girl who had been with Lally ever since she first came to Hampstead. She was the same age as her young mistress, and she knew almost everything about her, what went on in her mind and in her life. She reached tenderly for the little bundle
beside Lally and hugged him.
‘What is it, ma’am?’ she asked, rocking the baby back and forth in her arms. ‘Is he not pleased?’
‘He is not interested in the b-b-a-a-by,’ Lally sobbed into her pillow.
‘You didn’t expect it, Miss, surely, did you?’ Abby asked, peeking into the baby’s blue eyes.
‘I know Guy didn’t want him, but I hoped that when he saw him he’d love him. He won’t even give him a n-n-a-a-me. He has no h-h-heart. He says I will lose people’s respect and no one will speak to me. Oh, Abby ...’ Lally sat up and ran her hands through her thick golden hair. ‘I’m sure I will lose Guy. He has been too much of a gentleman to reject me, but now ...’
‘No loss if you ask me, Miss ...’
‘Mind your tongue!’ Lally said sharply, but her voice lacked conviction. She knew quite well the contempt in which Guy was held by her maid. Maybe Abby felt the same about her too.
‘He loves only himself, not you, and certainly not the baby,’ Abby insisted.
‘But what shall I do? Oh, Abby ...’ Fresh tears poured down Lally’s cheeks, leaving ugly streaks on her beautiful face; her large eyes were like limpid pools. Abby, who knew nothing about the theatre, always thought that her mistress would make a fine actress. One minute she presented this face to the world, the next another. Smiling one moment, tearful and melancholy the next. Abby loved her mistress, but she found her vexing. Now she looked sadly into the eyes of the most beautiful baby she had ever seen. Beautiful, but unwanted and unloved, even by his mother.
‘Abby, I don’t want to lose Sir Guy. What’s more, I would like to resume my career in the theatre. I can’t have a baby as well, can I, Abby?’
The People of This Parish (Part One of The People of this Parish Saga) Page 24