To Catch a Dream

by Mary Wood

  ‘Agatha!’

  ‘I’m sorry, Mother. I didn’t mean to upset you, but my pompous brother here doesn’t seem able to put a foot wrong. Everyone’s bad news is his good news.’

  Andrew gave her a withering look, but decided to treat what she had said with the contempt it deserved. ‘Please stay with Mother and help her, Agatha. We have guests – the officers who brought the terrible news about Jeremy. They are staying to lunch, but I need to ask them some delicate questions in private.’

  He found out as much detail as he could about Jeremy’s death: it was as he had thought, Jeremy had led his platoon from the front and had been shot by a sniper. He ascertained that Jeremy’s body would not be brought home; due to the heat, they’d had to bury the dead very quickly. He rejoined the gathering in the withdrawing room to find that Dvina had arrived. She sat on a chair by the fireplace – filling it to capacity, he noted – holding his mother’s hand. Floods of tears rolled down her cheeks. But then it wasn’t that long since her father’s death, and now she had to face losing her uncle and cousin.

  Pity for her softened the hardness of his heart. Their relationship had been very strained since Agatha’s outburst a couple of months ago, but now was not the time to perpetuate that. He went to her side and placed his arm around her shoulder. ‘My dear, I am very sorry. It has all come as a shock to you, I know. You had such faith your uncle would recover, and that Jeremy would come home. And all so soon after your own father’s passing.’

  She remained with her head bent, but took the handkerchief he offered her. Did he feel a slight squeeze of his hand as she did so? God, he hoped so. These last months had been agony.

  Issy used her pinny to rub the flour off her hands. It seemed she’d only just settled into her job in Tarrington House, sorted her ma and got used to the likes and dislikes of Mrs Beale, the housekeeper, when it was all set to change again!

  A few days after Mr Eastland’s funeral they had learned that, due to his death and that of his son, Mr Harvey had inherited Hensal Grange. He and Miss Dvina were going to move into it, and Mr Harvey’s mother would be moving back to this house.

  ‘What a carry-on, and all in the space of a few weeks. I don’t know . . .’ Mrs Beale grumbled for the umpteenth time. ‘And poor Mrs Harvey. She’s now six months with this one, and they say as he hardly speaks to her.’

  ‘Well, I wouldn’t listen to such gossip if I was you. There’s none of us knows what goes on for sure upstairs, and them as works up there only thinks they do. So I wouldn’t spread anything you hear. Now, if you don’t mind, I am up to me elbows in baking.’

  ‘Well! You never have learned your place, Isabella. If it wasn’t for the fact of Mrs Harvey bringing you here herself, you’d have been up the road by now.’

  Issy ignored this. Mrs Beale had a bitter tongue, and arguing with her only made things worse. Besides, she had no time to do so. Mr Harvey’s mother was coming to dinner, and so were several guests of the legal persuasion, with their wives, and she had been asked to make it all very special. ‘I want Mrs Eastwood to see I am more than capable of being hostess of the grand Hensal Grange, Isabella,’ Miss Dvina had said. She often spoke directly with her, on the rare occasions she and Mr Harvey entertained, but then they went a long way back together. Issy had started in Hartington House when Miss Dvina had been just a lass and, always hungry, Miss Dvina had often visited the kitchen. They’d all had a laugh with her, and they’d all loved her. It hurt to hear from Jane that things weren’t as good for her as they had been.

  When they met as they went about their duties, she and Jane tried to speculate about why this was. It all seemed at odds with how things had started out. Oh, they knew Mr Harvey wouldn’t visit her chamber as often now Miss Dvina was pregnant, but the pregnancy should have kept them close. Surely it wasn’t all about what happened in the bedroom, was it? A pang of irritation with herself entered her at this thought, because she now knew how important that part of a marriage must be. Her face, already red from the heat, blushed even redder as thoughts she tried to suppress came into her. Eeh, Issy, give over. Just be thankful nothing came of it, and stop getting these longings for it to happen again! You’re no better than a whore!

  Not that she ever wanted it to happen again as it had done, of course, but finding someone of her own would complete her world.

  It had been three months now, and the gypsy hadn’t been back around these parts. She’d never told anyone. She couldn’t. They’d have painted her with a tarred brush, and would have put some of the blame onto her, saying she must have egged him on. And then the threats he’d made . . . She shuddered even now at the thought of them.

  Not for the first time she wondered what had happened to the gypsy to make him change. He’d never given any trouble when he used to visit each autumn a few years ago: he never stole, he worked hard and he was generally welcomed. His visits were even looked forward to. But since his raping of her, she’d heard tell of a few tales as to his ways, especially amongst the Irish. Helping her ma deliver babbies up in that quarter had made her privy to some of the things folk said about him, and it all horrified her. It seemed he loaned them money and then punished them if they couldn’t pay back. One had even said he’d taken little children as payment, and they had disappeared for good. She couldn’t take this in, or believe it as a truth. Everyone knew the Irish lot could tell a tale and make it grow ears, but she had to admit they did all seem very afraid of him. They had begged her not to say anything, for fear of him. Well, she knew what that felt like, for hadn’t she kept everything to herself, not even telling her ma? And she’d never stopped thanking God it hadn’t resulted in a pregnancy.

  Putting her mind to attacking the dough on the board in front of her, Issy determined to banish it from her mind. She wanted to lock it away for good, but she knew she couldn’t do that. Not in the small hours of the night, she couldn’t, for then the feelings he’d given her visited her and she shamed herself by giving them a release.

  The door to Andrew’s office opened without anyone knocking, and he looked up from his desk in surprise. This was replaced by discomfort when he saw Dvina standing there. His concern made him stutter, ‘What . . . are you all right, my dear?’

  ‘Yes. I’m tired, but I wanted to talk.’

  ‘Oh, not about anything serious, I hope. I have such a lot of stuff to read. I have to make sure I know the exact questions that I need answers to tonight, and the implications of everything.’

  ‘I won’t be fobbed off again, Andrew. We have to clear the air.’ She closed the door behind her. ‘You will have to forgive me for intruding, but this is the only place where we are not likely to be disturbed by the servants wandering around. I swear some of them have ears that can bend around corners.’

  He laughed at this. She always amused him. Even over these tiresome months when relations between them had been strained, she’d often found some way of lightening the really awkward moments. But still, in many ways, she was to blame for it all. She had said in the beginning that as long as he was discreet she’d understand if he had the odd liaison, so how come – when she found that he had done so – she played up in such a dramatic way? She’d banned him from her bed, and only talked to him when necessary. It had been hell, pure bloody hell! So much so that, despite a melting of hostilities since the day Edgar had died, he still felt inclined to make her do the running. ‘So, you have my attention. What are you proposing we do about our situation?’

  ‘I want you to stop – well . . . extramarital activities.’

  ‘What?’ Bloody woman! She knew no boundaries of propriety at times. How dare she speak to him – her husband – in that way? His only defence seemed to be a counter-attack. ‘Well, there aren’t any marital activities, as you call them, so how can I indulge in extra ones?’

  ‘Trying to be clever won’t help matters, Andrew, nor will it ease your guilt – which you seem to have wrapped up and put onto me.’

  God, she had a way
with words. It seemed like she could see inside him, and it gave her an advantage. He’d very nicely blamed her for a long time now and did not want to go back to shouldering it all himself. It was at odds with him to do so. ‘So, knowing all of what Agatha said that day, and both of us having made a plan together to deal with it, meant nothing to you?’

  ‘I . . . I did know, but having it spelled out, and you not denying it, hurt me so much. It meant me realizing how aware of it everyone was.’

  ‘But you knew that, too. We’d spoken about it. We had made plans to put it right. I honoured my part of that bargain, Dvina. I honoured it because of my love for you. But from that day, when that bitch of a sister of mine took great pleasure in spouting it all out for you to hear, you chose to ignore that fact.’

  Dvina’s face paled. Andrew watched her grope for a chair, her bulk too much for her to carry in a standing position for very long. He felt disgust as he looked at her bloated body and rounded face, with its chins hanging in folds, almost hiding her neck. Yet inside her body she carried something so precious to him, and he didn’t want anything to happen to it. He moved towards her. As she looked up into his face he saw in her eyes the beautiful woman still encased inside her, and his love of that woman touched a fragment of his heart. ‘My dear, you must take care. You mustn’t overdo it. You have done so well to carry our child this far.’

  ‘But it would all be so futile if I was to lose you.’ A tear rolled down her cheek. ‘I . . . I came in to say I’m sorry. You are right. We had discussed it, in a way, but without actually naming things. We had understood each other, and you had promised to change things. And I know you did stop . . . stop going to town in the evenings; and I know that, because of my condition, we couldn’t put the other part – the entertaining and socializing – into practice straight away. I just don’t know why I couldn’t cope with it all when I actually heard it said, in no uncertain terms. Can you forgive me, Andrew? Can you love me again like you once did?’

  At this moment he couldn’t be sure whether he could. He hadn’t stopped loving her in a way, but some of the edge had gone from it. There had been no intimacy, and he had resumed his visits to Lilly without guilt. What she gave him had become his satisfaction, and though he had tried, he couldn’t really recall the depth of feeling he’d had when he coupled with Dvina. As he looked at her now, he wondered if it had all been a figment of his imagination, or even how she could have aroused in him any passion at all, let alone the deep passion he thought he remembered.

  When he didn’t answer, she said, ‘If you cannot, then I want us to separate. I will move back to Hartington House, as it has not yet sold. You are very wealthy now, so I would expect you to support me and our child.’

  ‘No! No, not that, Dvina. I won’t allow that to happen.’ The shock this gave him tugged him out of the world he’d drifted into since that awful day when she’d heard the truth of everything. My God, how had he allowed things to slip to this depth? ‘Dvina, I couldn’t live without you. I know that now.’

  He watched as more tears tumbled down her cheeks. She tried to rise, but couldn’t. His heart twisted with the thought of having done this to her.

  ‘Oh, my dear . . .’

  ‘Don’t, Andrew. It’s not your fault. It’s mine. And now . . . look at me, I have buried myself in food again. I know I do it, so why do I do it? Oh, God!’

  He knew then that she had seen the disgust in his face. ‘If we were happy again, would you try to control how much you eat? Oh, I don’t mean that would be a condition – I just want us to be happy, no matter what – but would it help? I am so fearful for your health and for our child, my dear.’

  ‘I seem to have made things so much worse. I have wallowed in my hurt, and used it as an excuse to give in to my greed. But yes, Andrew, if I thought I had regained your love, I could cope again. I could find a way. Mrs Harman is always advising me on what I should be eating and says she has some potion or other.’

  ‘Well, take her advice, but not her potions. We don’t know what is in them.’

  ‘She says they are all made of herbs, and she has a deep knowledge of what they purport to do. Some may help with the variation of my body temperature – how I feel cold a lot of the time – but the one she wants me to have cleanses the body of impurities. She says once that is accomplished, I won’t crave food like I do. She says I am eating all the wrong things, that I have a sweet tooth; she has a potion – well, a tea – that will diminish those cravings.’

  ‘It is true that she does have a good knowledge and has come up with cures for ailments. Even diseases that spread like wildfire have been stopped by her intervention, but I am afraid. Supposing they harm the baby?’

  ‘Well, I will talk to her again, but I cannot see as herbs could do any harm. The important thing is that you still want me as your wife and in your home. That has lifted my spirits so much. I feel better already.’

  Kneeling down, he took her chubby hand. He knew he could not make her any promises, but he also knew he couldn’t bear her taking the drastic step of leaving him. Somehow they had to resolve their problems. ‘Dvina, I can only say that when you said you would leave, it was so far from what I wanted, it shook me to my core. We will need time to get ourselves back to—’

  ‘I know, and I am willing to give you time, but will you come and lie with me again? I don’t mean to . . . well, just to hold me, to let me know you want me, and I promise I will do my best to recover. So that when our child is born we can – well, you know . . .’ She smiled a tired, weak, unsure smile. He lifted himself off his haunches to reach her cheek. He kissed it, and then as she turned her head towards him he found her lips and his kiss deepened. The softness of her skin and the cushioning effect of her plump face stirred memories in him, and he knew it would be possible to get those feelings back. It would just take time. By his reckoning, it would be another three months before their child arrived, and then, as he understood it, another six or so weeks after that before he could even think about resuming their love-making. He would use that time to recover and to wean himself off his need of Lilly.

  Sitting in the very well-sprung carriage on his way to Leeds the next morning, Andrew felt a sense of well-being settle over him. Today everything would be finalized as regards his new fortune.

  He relaxed back and enjoyed the gentle rolling motion, a much pleasanter one than the jolting of his old carriage, whilst he went over in his mind some of the things he needed to make sure of during his visit to his bank.

  Just over an hour later, as his driver drove him to his club, he reflected on how well the visit to the bank had gone. Armed with the knowledge he had from his solicitors after the very agreeable dinner of the evening before, he was able to sign all of the necessary papers. The extent of his wealth hit him in all its glory: he had over one million pounds in capital assets, property and land, and a further million in business holdings. Not to mention foreign assets, which he did not yet have a figure for, but he understood some of it to be in gold-bullion holdings in a Swiss bank.

  So much had happened since the day his mother had told him of her marriage, and his worries at the time seemed paltry now. He entered the gentlemen’s club of which he’d been a member for a number of years and found a quiet corner. He remembered sitting there with Jeremy once. A lot of the patrons then present had wanted to give Jeremy all their attention, and to bag some of Andrew’s just to get in Jeremy’s favour. Jeremy had been the richest member at the time. What the fawning bastards hadn’t stopped to consider was what a nice man Jeremy was, rich or not.

  Sipping the hot toddy the bartender had brought over to him, Andrew thought of how that part of Jeremy’s character had shown itself in the last letter he’d received from him, when he’d told him not to feel guilt if – as had seemed imminent – he lost his life. That helped a lot, because without that assurance Andrew, the ultimate guilt-plagued man, would have felt terrible about the inheritance. Poor Jeremy! How very sad that he had met his
death so soon after he’d written the letter, and doubly so because already there were rumblings of reaching agreement to bring about peace in Africa by early 1881, such a short time away; if only he’d remained safe until then.

  The hot spirit warmed his stomach, taking some of the chill of the wintry weather out of him. He moved his chair to face the roaring fire. He had so much on his mind that he wondered if he’d cope with it all. For one thing he intended – very soon – to reinstate the stables at Hensal Grange, and for that he would need an excellent groom. He knew Henry Fairweather looked after the shire horses that remained, and he knew him to have far more skills than were called upon to do this work. But Andrew’s dream was to have hunters and racehorses, as well as some good carriage horses and mounts, and Henry wouldn’t manage all that. They would have to advertise for another skilled man to help him. But then, of all the inconveniences, he’d only just let the cottage that was usually reserved for a groom and his family! He’d have to find a way around it. Maybe if he got a single man, he could lodge him with one of the widows he hadn’t yet moved out of the Miners’ Row. Mrs Harman and Isabella – the very ones! Yes, that would do nicely. After all, two women would be a chaperone for each other to cover the impropriety of having a man living with them, and they could share and give the upstairs room to the groom. Besides, it wouldn’t be for long, because Hadler could move into the first of the completed new cottages with his family, and then the groom would take possession of his rightful property. Well, that all seemed simple enough. He’d run it by Dvina and see what she thought, and then put an advert out.

  Thinking of Dvina brought to mind their conversation in his study. He’d known something must happen soon, and was glad she’d broached the subject and got them talking about it all. Although she had charmed and entertained everyone at the dinner party with her social graces and her wit, he had felt a moment of embarrassment when she’d first entered. Jane had tried hard to fashion a gown to soften her outline. The silk material in the palest of lilacs had draped well from a band under her enormous bosom, but hadn’t disguised her size; and the layers of fat had hidden any beauty he had once seen in her face. He didn’t want to feel like this about her. He wanted to have the depth of feeling that could overcome everything, but he supposed he must have it, for it had devastated him when she’d suggested moving out. He tried again to remember how it had been in the beginning; how the pleasures of her had made it possible for him to fall in love with her and to contemplate giving up Lilly. He had given her up, in fact, for three whole months. He closed his eyes and imagined the softness of Dvina, how he loved to snuggle into her and sink himself deep into her . . . God! I’m getting an erection! He sat up straight; his reaction shocked him. There were things in his memory that he wanted to revisit with her – very much so – but in the meantime he would have to go and see Lilly.