Eliza looked away, but the exchange and its nuances did not escape Prosper, who seemed anxious to change the subject.
‘Tell me, Julius,’ he said, ‘when are you going to move into your fine house?’
‘Never, I fear,’ Julius replied. ‘I was just speaking to Eliza about it. I am reluctant to live there. Now that I have built an Aladdin’s cave it no longer charms me. As you know, I am shortly to go to Hong Kong to establish our branch out there. I may settle there for some time, now that we are well staffed in London and Amsterdam, and put my house on the market.’
‘But it is a beautiful house.’
‘I know.’ Julius gave a regretful shrug. ‘And much thought went into it. But that’s the way it is.’
‘Are you open to offers?’ Prosper asked suddenly.
‘I might be.’ Julius gave him a shrewd, businesslike look. ‘Would you be interested?’
‘I might.’ Prosper looked at Lally. ‘What do you think, my dear?’
‘Live in the country?’ Lally shook her head in mock horror. ‘There is nothing I should dislike more in the whole world.’
Lally said: ‘I told you I didn’t wish to see it. Why waste time?’
‘But you must admit, my dear, it’s very beautiful.’
‘If I wished to live in the country – which I don’t – I should like to live in an old place like Pelham’s Oak. What’s the point of living in a modern house in the middle of Dorset? It has no charm or antiquity.’
‘But it has every conceivable comfort, in an area of natural beauty.’
Lally, looking very beautiful, very soignée, and completely out of place in the country, looked very obstinate and wilful too. She stared sulkily out of the window of what Julius had intended as the master bedroom on the first floor, with dressing room, bathroom and a balcony which was reached through French windows. There were heavy silk curtains draped at the windows and Wilton carpet on the floor, but there was no furniture, since Julius had never lived in the house he had built so lovingly.
Julius had given them the key, and they had been over the house from bottom to top and then right down to the bottom again. It was indeed a marvel of building and design, and he wanted a high price for it.
‘We could live here in the summer and in London in the winter,’ Prosper tried again, but Lally moved petulantly away.
‘I told you, I don’t wish to live here at all.’ She turned to her husband and gave him the smile that nearly always bewitched him. ‘Dearest, you know I am not a country woman. I love the city – put me anywhere in London, Paris, Vienna, Rome and I am happy. But the country ... urrh.’ She shuddered and pulled her cape around her shoulders, though it was in fact quite warm.
‘It is my native county, Lally,’ Prosper persevered. ‘I would like you to wish what I wish, for once,’ he added thoughtfully.
‘Well, I don’t,’ Lally snapped. ‘And by now you should have realised that, Prosper.’
Ignoring the splendours of the countryside around them, the outstanding views of woodland, vale and hill, she turned on her heel, and was about to leave the room when Prosper seized her abruptly by the arm.
‘That is not the way I wish to be addressed, Lally. Don’t forget what I rescued you from. I am the one you have to thank for being what you are today.’
‘Don’t you dare speak to me like that.’ Lally’s eyes flashed as she snatched her arm away. ‘Have I not given you years of faithful, loyal love? Have I not done everything you wished, gone with you everywhere, and entertained for you in a manner you yourself have admitted was good enough for the Queen? Now you dare to bring up the question of my humble origins. I am ashamed of you, Prosper. You knew about them, and now you fling them in my face.’
‘I am ashamed of myself,’ he said, suddenly chastened.
Crossing to the French windows, he threw open the doors and went out on to the balcony. Then he leaned over the white-painted wooden balustrade and sighed.
Slowly she followed him, aware of her capricious temper, the fact that maybe she had this time gone too far. She put a hand around his shoulder and leaned her head winsomely against his arm.
‘Don’t be angry with your Lally,’ she murmured in the voice of a small girl. ‘She knows how much she owes you; but she has repaid you.’
‘Oh, you have, my love,’ Prosper said, turning to enfold her in his arms. ‘And I am a wretch to speak as I have. But ...’
‘It is Roger, isn’t it?’ she murmured.
‘Well, since he came into our lives.’
‘You talk as though it were weeks ago,’ she pouted. ‘It is only a few days.’
‘It is simply that you never told me about him. Suddenly you produce a nephew out of the air and expect me to accept the fact that he is to live with us.’
‘Only for a time. I think you will like Roger, dearest, once he speaks well and conducts himself like a gentleman. You can see he has the instinct.’
‘Oh, I can see that.’ Prosper glanced at her slyly. ‘Quite remarkable, in fact, for one who has come from the back streets of Kentish Town. But why did you take pity on him now, my dear? Why now, and not before?’
‘I felt he was different from the rest – from his brothers and sisters, I mean. I was sorry for him and felt inspired to rescue him and give him a chance.’
‘Because he is really your son, is he not, Lally?’ Prosper said gently, but he put a distance between them just the same, and moved away.
‘The very idea!’ Lally cried, flouncing to the other side of the room. ‘Why will you not believe me when I say he is my sister’s son?’
‘It would be more believable if you had a sister, my dear.’ Prosper’s quiet, normally controlled voice had begun to rise. ‘But I don’t believe you have. You once told me that you were an orphan, without any relations. Perhaps you have forgotten that. What, therefore, am I to believe, Lally? Why have you lied to me, if that is not the case? Besides, he has your hair, your colouring, your eyes ... Did you expect me to be taken in by your story, my dear? If you had been honest with me we could perhaps have rescued the little lad before now. I would have taken him to my heart and brought him up as the son I have longed for. But now ...’
‘But now?’ Lally echoed fearfully.
‘Now, he is a boy who has formed opinions. I can see he is a boy also who has been bruised by life, wounded maybe by your rejection. He is brought into a strange environment, and already I can sense he dislikes me.’
‘He hardly knows you ...’
‘He hardly knows you, either, does he, Lally? As a mother you were not a very regular visitor, were you?’
Lally felt as if all the life, the spirit had gone out of her. She propped her arms on the wooden balustrade as though it could hardly sustain the weight of her heavy, pain-racked body. She sighed deeply and began, in the voice of one setting out to tell a tale:
‘It is true, Prosper, that Roger is my son, the fruit of a liaison with a gentleman many years ago. I had no money, and his father left me in distressing circumstances. The alternative to a foundlings’ home was to leave him with the sister of my maid, Abby, who was a good woman with children of her own.’
She went over to him and tentatively touched his arm, looking at him with her soft, limpid eyes. ‘When I met you I didn’t feel I could tell you about Roger. I’m sure you understand that. You are such a good man, and I thought it might spoil your love for me. I imagined, in any case, that we would have our own children; but, alas, I have failed you there.
‘It is true I have visited Roger occasionally, but not often enough. He calls me “aunt”, but he scarcely knows me at all. I think he resents both of us at the moment, and perhaps it would be kinder to take him back where he came from. And yet...’ her hand tightened on his arm ‘you have always longed for a son, dearest. He seems to me to be a bright lad and attractive. With an education, maybe he would be an asset to you. Did you think of that? Who knows, he may be as good in business as you yourself are. As it seems, alas,
that we cannot have a son of our own, would you not take Roger to your bosom, and love him as if he were your son?’
Prosper looked for a long time at the landscape he loved, towards the cottage where Ryder died. Like Ryder he too was a Dorset man, and this was his land, his country. The house seemed to him to embody everything that he had ever wished for: modernity, style, opulence.
He was a businessman and used to the ways of the marketplace, so putting his arm round Lally he hugged her closely before murmuring in her ear: ‘If you make a bargain with me I will adopt Roger and bring him up as my son, as a gentleman.’
‘And the bargain is?’ Lally began, but she had seen the look in his eyes and she already knew it. One day Roger would be living in close proximity to his natural father, and that was the eventuality that she dreaded. However ...
‘A bargain is a bargain,’ she said softly, giving him her hand and kissing him gently on the lips.
Perce Adams stood in front of Eliza, his cap in his hand, yet his attitude was one of defiance rather than humility. Years ago it would not have been like this, and Eliza knew with certainty that times were changing. Men like Perce were no longer content to be subservient. Even though his manner was polite and respectful, his words were strong.
‘The fact is, Mrs Yetman, that the Yetman name is doing nothing. I have spent the years since the death of your husband, ma’am, carrying out my trade best as I could. Now Mr Heering has offered to set me up in my own business.’
‘Then let him set you up, Perce,’ Eliza cried, yet already she knew she was losing ground. ‘Use your own name. It is an honourable name.’
‘But Yetman’s has a name for quality, ma’am. Besides –’ he looked nervously around him, ‘there’s your son, ma’am, your Laurence. He told me a long time ago he would like to be in the same business as his father ...’
‘My son doesn’t come into this, Perce,’ Eliza said tersely. ‘He is a schoolboy ...’
‘Nevertheless he be always hanging round where we be working, ma’am. He is a ready lad with his hands, skilful too. How would it be if he followed in the tradition of his father and grandfather and headed a fine business again, built up what his uncles have tried to destroy? They take no interest in it at all, being content to run it down.’
Eliza rose and began to pace the room.
‘I’ll have to think about it, Perce. I’ll have to take advice. I don’t want charity from Mr Heering ...’
‘But charity isn’t what he’s offering, ma’am. ‘Tis capital, a business proposition. That’s a different matter altogether. I tell you, I like Mr Heering, ma’am. He may be forrin’, but he is a good and honest man. He has sold his house to his business partner and already he has put work in my way. I have taken over where Mr Yetman left off to finish that house so that Mr Martyn and his lady can move into it. Think of the opportunity, ma’am ... Think of turning it all away ...’
Perce opened his arms so wide that they seemed to embrace the whole county of Dorset, and more besides.
When Perce had gone Eliza sat for a long time brooding at the desk where she regularly did her accounts. It was indeed a struggle to make ends meet; every day there was less and less, and it was true that higher education for Laurence, even had he wished it, would have been almost out of the question.
Riversmead was in need of repair; the house – neglected by Ryder while he did other things – was falling about her ears, and yet why was it that Miss Fairchild’s offer of Connie’s house failed to attract her?
Why was it that she wished to remain in a place where she had known such happiness, but also such sorrow?
After Perce’s visit she waited for her sons to come home from school. This was the local grammar school, very different from Eton where their cousin George was and where Carson was to go. Eliza could not afford the expense of boarding school fees, and she had felt, anyway, that it was not what Ryder would have wished for his children. They had agreed on that before his death.
It was the spring following Emily’s death, and she stood by the river, her eyes on the road in the distance where she would see Laurence and Hugh trudging home from school.
Dora still went to Miss Bishop’s Academy, but she would leave in the summer. Her future had not yet been decided.
Dora had missed her father so much that, for months after his death, she had wandered round the house looking for him, refusing to believe he had gone. Since his death she had become much quieter and more thoughtful. The death of her cousin Emily had depressed her even further, and there was a melancholy strain in her daughter that worried Eliza.
Just then she caught sight of the boys through the trees and she hailed them, going swiftly to the gates to welcome them.
Hugh, always loving, ran to kiss her, but Laurence avoided kisses. He was undemonstrative.
‘Tea’s ready,’ she told them, ‘and afterwards I want to talk to you, Laurence.’
‘I’d like to finish something for the woodwork class tomorrow, Mother.’
‘Nevertheless I wish to speak to you first.’
Hugh talked about school and the day’s happenings, but Laurence was silent, seeming preoccupied as he munched his tea. He did, however, ask where his sister was.
‘She’s gone to tea with one of her friends. What’s the matter, Laurence? Bad day?’
‘Usual,’ Laurence said with a frown, then, ‘when can we begin our talk, Mother? My work will take me quite a long time to complete.’
‘Let’s talk there then,’ Eliza said, rising. She bent towards Hugh. ‘Will you finish your tea, darling? Be sure to do your homework before going out to play.’
Hugh, who was clever but lazy, rolled his large eyes heavenwards but nodded, and Laurence rose, still eating a piece of cake, and preceded his mother to his workroom, which had once been part of the stables.
Eliza no longer kept a carriage, but used a pony and trap for going around the country. Lady’s daughter, Beauty, and her foal, Magellan, were the only horses left in the field. Ted mostly did work around the house, and eked out a further income cutting wood when he could. Eliza still employed a cook and two maids: labour was very cheap, and people would rather be in domestic service than go to the poorhouse.
Eliza seldom went into Laurence’s workroom, but when she did she was always impressed by its neatness. Everything was tidy and in its place: all his tools, his instruments gleaming in brackets on the walls.
It was quite certain that he had inherited his father’s gift. On his bench there was a model of a schooner in full sail which she had not seen before, and as she went towards it she cried out: ‘It’s beautiful.’ She fingered the delicate sails and intricate rigging. ‘How long has it taken you, Laurence?’
‘Three months.’ Laurence blushed a little.
‘And you did everything – the hull, the rigging, the sails ...’
‘Everything,’ Laurence replied then, a little anxiously. ‘Careful, Mother. Those sails are very fragile. It is for my final-year project. I hope I shall be given first-class marks.’
‘I’m sure you will. It’s very beautiful, and you didn’t say a word to me.’
She stood back as he crouched in front of his model and began delicately to paste part of the sail that had not yet adhered to the mast.
She watched him in fascination realising, as sometimes a mother does, how little she knew him. The boy is outstripped by the man who becomes a stranger, and acquaintance has to begin with him all over again.
‘Laurence,’ she said drawing a chair up to his bench, ‘Perce Adams was here today.’
‘Oh yes?’ Laurence squinted in concentration as if he scarcely heeded her.
‘I think you know what he wanted?’ Eliza went on.
‘Why should I know?’ He didn’t look at her, his mind intent on his task.
‘He said you told him a long time ago that you’d like to work with your hands, continue your father’s business.’
‘But you knew that already, Mother.’ Lau
rence interrupted his work to look at her.
‘Is it still true?’
‘More true than ever. Besides –’ he stopped working and hoisted himself up on the bench, swinging his legs ‘– you know that we can’t afford to send me to university like George.’
‘Yes, but if you would like to go I’m sure I could find the money. I don’t like to think of your cousins receiving a better education than you.’
‘But where would you find the money?’
‘I’d borrow it from Guy, or Mr Heering would lend it to me.’
‘Oh, Mr Heering is a nice man He would gladly lend you the money.’
‘Do you see much of him at your Uncle Guy’s?’
‘Quite a lot since he sold Uncle Prosper his house.’ Laurence paused and turned to look at her. ‘He asks quite a lot about you, Mother. I do know that. He likes you very much. You should think about marrying him.’
‘Laurence!’ Eliza felt herself reeling with shock. ‘That’s a very impertinent thing to say.’
‘I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to be impertinent. But if he likes you, and you like him ...’
‘I hardly know him.’ Eliza sounded doubtful.
‘Mother, you’ve known him for as long as you’ve known Aunt Margaret. He often talks about you. I like him.’ Laurence had returned to an intricate piece of work which was evidently to his satisfaction, because he stood back and admired it. ‘We all like him, very much. If he does ask you, Mother,’ Laurence looked at her frankly, ‘you should accept him. He will look after you and give you a better life.’
‘I don’t want to be looked after,’ Eliza said.
‘Nevertheless,’ Laurence seemed quite adamant, ‘I think you two would get on well together. But it’s just as you like. We don’t need his money. I have had a very fine education. Wenham Grammar School is one of the best in the county. I tell you, Mother, I would like to be apprenticed to Perce. I would like to run the business as Father ran it, and –’ he went over to her, putting his arms round her neck in an uncharacteristic display of affection ‘– I would like, most of all, to see you happy and comfortable in your life, and free at last from worry.’
The People of This Parish (Part One of The People of this Parish Saga) Page 46