by Val Wood
‘Indeed not,’ the woman agreed. ‘Well, I do know where she lives.’ She too pondered. ‘If I should write it down, then perhaps you could slip it into her letter box and then you could say you’d carried out ’errand. My word,’ she added, ‘you must be careful of ’people who give you such messages to deliver.’
‘She’s a poor servant girl who fell on hard times.’
‘And you’re helping her out? Well, that’s a very Christian thing to do. I hope she’s now found a better life?’
‘She has,’ Harriet said. ‘I’m very much obliged to you for coming up with such a splendid solution. Thank you.’
The shopkeeper appeared astonished at her unintended entanglement, but set about searching for a scrap of notepaper and scribbled down an address. ‘I haven’t put her name on it,’ she whispered. ‘So no one will ever know.’
Harriet nodded and said softly, ‘I’ll tear it into shreds once ’message is delivered. It won’t ever be needed again.’
She climbed into the trap and drove further up the street and turned a corner. Then, glancing at the address, she asked the first person she saw for directions.
The cottage was tucked into an obscure corner away from the main thoroughfare and seemed neat enough, with clean curtains at the window and a well-brushed doorstep, but when Harriet knocked she saw the curtains twitch. A moment later a woman of indeterminate age, but perhaps in her early fifties, with dyed reddish hair, bright lipstick, and rouge on her pale cheeks, came to open the door.
She gazed at Harriet and then at Daniel. ‘Yes?’
‘Mrs Stone?’
The woman put one hand on her hip. ‘Who wants her?’
‘I want to ask you a question about a child.’
Miriam Stone glanced at Daniel again and Harriet hastily said, ‘Not this child, he’s mine. I want to ask about his father, my husband.’
‘Your husband? I don’t tell tales.’
‘I’m not asking you to,’ Harriet said firmly. ‘And my husband is dead. But seemingly he was born here and I onny want to know about his mother – my husband’s mother.’
Miriam Stone heaved an impatient sigh and opened the door wider. ‘You’d better come in.’
The house was small but very colourful, with bright cushions on the sofa and chairs and a glass bowl of artificial fruit and flowers on the polished table. There was a strong smell of perfume.
‘Sit down,’ Harriet was told brusquely. ‘So what’s this about?’
Harriet sat down and unfastened Daniel’s shawl and bonnet. He gurgled up at Mrs Stone, who appeared immune to his charm.
‘As you will see, Mrs Stone, my child does not have an English skin. I’ve been told that my husband was born to a woman who worked here and I simply want to know so that—’
‘What was her name?’
‘I don’t know. My husband was named Noah, and his father …’ Harriet hesitated. Maybe Miriam Stone didn’t know the names of her customers, and Ellen Tuke would be furious if anyone else found out that Mr Tuke had visited a brothel.
‘Noah!’ Miriam Stone gave a whimsical smile. ‘Oh, yes, I remember Noah, and his mother. Rosie. Pretty little thing she was then. Gone very matronly since.’ She gave a derisory grunt. ‘Didn’t like working here, thought she was a cut above ’rest of us.’ She sat back in her chair and surveyed Harriet. ‘And you thought your bairn might tek after her? She was fair; fair-haired, fair skin. Noah wasn’t a handsome bairn, except for his dark eyes. Did his skin go darker?’
Harriet was pondering that she’d come to a full stop. Mr Tuke had dark hair once; she couldn’t recall what colour his eyes were but didn’t remember them as being remarkable. She glanced at Miriam Stone. ‘Noah’s skin?’ she said vaguely. ‘No, not especially. Didn’t you – didn’t you ever see him again?’
Mrs Stone shook her head. ‘Never. Well, I might have passed him in ’street but I wouldn’t have known him.’ Her lips curled. ‘He never came here. Not like Mr Tuke, his da.’ She laughed again, coarsely. ‘Oh aye, he was allus here. A regular, he was. His wife wouldn’t have him in her bed, so he said. Not at all after their first son was born, but he badly wanted another. He was determined to have one, an obsession it was, and he asked if any of my girls’d oblige.’
She wiped her eyes. ‘Oh aye, we had many a laugh about it, poor devil.’ She bent down and gazed at Daniel, who stared back at her from his beautiful eyes. ‘He’s a right bonny bairn,’ she admitted. ‘Not that I’ve much interest in ’em, not in my line o’ business. Did you say Noah was dead?’ she asked suddenly.
‘Yes,’ Harriet murmured. ‘Last Christmas. Noah and Mr Tuke both drowned in ’estuary. They’ve not yet been found.’
‘Ah! I think I did hear summat about it a father and son drowning. Well,’ she sighed. ‘I suppose it don’t matter too much now, cos although you might find it surprising, I never talked about ’men who used to come here. Their wives might have heard about it and stopped ’em coming!’
Mrs Tuke knew, Harriet thought, or did she guess? She also suggested that Noah came too, but seemingly he didn’t, and I’m pleased about that.
‘But you’re barking up ’wrong tree, I’m afraid,’ Mrs Stone went on and again she laughed, a harsh grating sound which wasn’t at all humorous or pleasant. ‘Like I say, Tuke came regular in the hope of begetting a son. What you must understand is that my girls were not in ’way of mekkin’ babbies if they could help it, but sometimes they got caught out and we had to mek, shall we say, arrangements. But Rosie left it too late and said she wanted to have ’bairn; then, after she’d had him, she realized that she wouldn’t be able to look after him and that she couldn’t stop here if she kept him. So we told Tuke it was his.’ She shook her head and put her hand to her mouth to hide a grin. ‘Poor Tuke. Poor feller. He was thrilled to bits. But ’bairn wasn’t his. He couldn’t even raise a smile, never mind owt else!’
Before she left the house, though her thoughts were whirling in confusion, Harriet managed to persuade Mrs Stone to say where Rosie was living now; at first she insisted that she didn’t know, but Harriet had remembered she had said that Rosie was now very matronly and asked if she was still living in Brough.
‘Don’t tell her it was me that told you,’ Miriam Stone urged. ‘She’s a married woman and won’t want her husband to know what she did to earn a shilling when she was young. Not that there’s owt wrong with it,’ she maintained with a touch of pride. ‘It’s an age-old profession and fills a need.’
Harriet drove to the Haven and ate her bread and cheese as she sat by the lapping water and meditated on the news she had been given. She felt an overwhelming sense of joy and release flooding through her. Noah and Fletcher are not brothers; they don’t share either a mother or a father. But I must be sure, and I can only be certain by speaking to Rosie.
The thought of what this information could mean made her feel hot and cold, excited and apprehensive at once. What if Rosie won’t admit the truth? And if she does, what will Fletcher make of it when I tell him? Will he believe it? And more to the point, will his mother believe it?
And, she thought worriedly, how could they prove it, if for instance Fletcher wanted her to marry him when her mourning was over? And what if he didn’t really want that? Doubts and uncertainties crowded her mind. He was a man, after all. What if he was only saying these things because he knew that it was impossible? What then? Would she still have to leave Marsh Farm? Without a shadow of a doubt she knew that she would, because her position in the household would be unacceptable. She would be a stranger in the house, unrelated to anybody.
Daniel began to yell with hunger and she unfastened her blouse and started to feed him. She looked down at him and smiled; how could anyone give away a child? Poor Rosie, she thought. She must have been desperate.
When she knocked on the door of the address she’d been given a maid answered it. Harriet asked for Rosie, for she hadn’t been given a surname.
The maid looked at her blankly. �
��There’s no Rosie here,’ she said. ‘This is Mrs John Gilbank’s house.’
‘I’m sorry. I must have ’wrong address,’ Harriet began, and then hesitated as she heard a woman’s voice call out, ‘Who is it, Edie?’
‘Would your mistress know?’ Harriet asked. ‘Perhaps it was a previous householder.’
‘Don’t think so,’ she said. ‘Mistress has been here for years; but just a minute and I’ll ask.’
She retreated to the end of a small hall and stood in a doorway and Harriet heard the murmur of voices. Then the maid turned and went through another door as a woman dressed very plainly in a dark gown – and, as Mrs Stone had said, rather matronly – came down the hall towards her.
‘Yes?’ she said. ‘Who is it you’re looking for?’
It had to be her, Harriet thought. She was fair, though now her hair was lightly streaked with grey, and despite the roundness she had small hands and feet denoting a once slimmer young woman. Her anxious-looking blue eyes were taking in Harriet and, more searchingly, Daniel, who was sitting up in Harriet’s arms and gazing cautiously at her.
‘I’m looking for someone who used to be called Rosie,’ Harriet said softly. ‘I don’t know her surname. I was told that she lived here. I’m not here to cause her trouble, but I need to ask her a question. One that’s very important to my son, and to me,’ she added pleadingly, her voice catching slightly as she considered with some emotion that this might be Daniel’s grandmother.
The woman licked her lips, but Harriet could see that her eyes were moist as they strayed to Daniel once more, and as if this might have been a pre-arranged visit she opened the door wider.
‘Please come in,’ she said. ‘I’m Rosie.’
CHAPTER FORTY-SIX
Mrs Gilbank took Harriet through to her parlour and asked her to take a seat, then called for her maid and asked her to make tea. When it arrived she told the girl she might go and that she’d see her the following morning.
‘She doesn’t live in,’ she explained. ‘I prefer my own company.’ She paused for a moment and sipped her tea from a fine china teacup.
If this is Rosie, Harriet thought as she drank her tea, then she’s done very well for herself, considering her previous employment. The room was cosy, with a glowing fire, gleaming brass candlesticks and a wooden clock on the mantelpiece; the chairs were comfortable and a small round chenille-covered table stood in the window with ornaments and flowers set neatly and precisely upon it.
Mrs Gilbank asked how Harriet had found her: was it through Miriam Stone? When Harriet reluctantly admitted that it was, but that Mrs Stone had only given her Rosie’s name and address because of Daniel, she sighed.
‘I guessed this would happen eventually,’ she remarked. ‘Truth will out. In fact I’ve expected a visit from someone for years. But had anyone come previously,’ she hesitated briefly, ‘when my husband was still alive, then they might not have been totally welcome.’
‘I don’t understand,’ Harriet said. ‘How do you know who I am?’
Mrs Gilbank gazed at her. ‘I don’t know who you are, but I know who the child is. He’s Noah’s son, no doubt about it.’ She gave a wistful smile. ‘You don’t see many dark eyes like that around here.’
Harriet hadn’t realized that she had been holding her breath until she breathed out. ‘Then – then you are Noah’s mother?’
Rosie nodded. ‘I am – was – Noah’s mother.’ A fleeting shadow crossed her face. ‘But I heard that he’d died. Bad news travels fast, and when I learned that a father and son had drowned in ’estuary I somehow knew that it was Nathaniel Tuke and Noah.’ She gave a little shrug. ‘I don’t know how I knew, but I did, and when I made enquiries I discovered that they’d lived further up ’river, and that ’younger man had a wife and newborn child.’
‘Did you ever see him?’ Harriet thought it incredible that finding Noah’s mother had been so easy. Here she had been, merely a few miles away from him, all along.
‘Onny once,’ she murmured. ‘I saw Nathaniel with a young lad in Brough, and I guessed it was Noah. I followed them up ’street for a while to be sure.’
She took another sip from her cup. ‘Nathaniel didn’t recognize me. He used to come to Mrs Stone’s after he’d tekken ’child, but never to me; I couldn’t face him knowing that we’d lied to him. Mrs Stone will have told you that Noah wasn’t his? Poor man,’ she said softly. ‘He was sad, I think. No love given to him in his life, and I imagine he didn’t give it either.’
‘No,’ Harriet murmured. ‘He didn’t. He was allus angry. Do you think he knew?’
Mrs Gilbank shook her head. ‘I don’t know. It’s possible.’
They sat in silence for a while, the only sound the crackling of the fire and the ticking of the clock, then Harriet shifted in her seat.
‘So – who was Noah’s father?’ she asked, and thought how impertinent it must have sounded to this modest woman.
‘His name was Marco,’ Mrs Gilbank said softly. ‘I think he was Italian, or from a hot country, anyway. His ship had docked in Hull and some local men had brought him to Brough to stay with them for a day or two, and they came to visit Mrs Stone’s. I was given him to – entertain. He was young, mebbe eighteen or nineteen, not much older than me, and he didn’t speak English.’ She smiled at the remembrance. ‘He was lovely,’ she whispered. ‘Innocent. He came back on his own a few days later and asked for me.’
She bent her head. ‘When he left, he said – I think somebody had taught him ’words – he said, “I come back.” But of course he didn’t. But that’s why I wanted to keep ’child. I knew it was his. We were taught to be careful.’ A smile flickered about her lips. ‘But that time I wasn’t.’
Again they were silent as Harriet digested the information. But then Mrs Gilbank turned to her and asked abruptly, ‘So what do you want from me?’
‘Want?’ Harriet faltered. It hadn’t occurred to her that Noah’s mother would question her reason for arriving on her doorstep, but of course she’d think there was an ulterior motive. ‘I don’t want anything,’ she stammered. ‘I was onny seeking out ’truth. For my son’s sake.’
‘How did you know?’ Mrs Gilbank asked keenly. ‘Who told you that Noah wasn’t Mrs Tuke’s son? Nathaniel paid Miriam Stone for keeping quiet and not telling anybody; he said it was ’onny way that Mrs Tuke would accept ’bairn.’
‘It was Mrs Tuke who told me,’ Harriet admitted. ‘But she never accepted Noah as her own, and she onny told me because I asked her if she was pleased about ’forthcoming grandchild. She said she wasn’t, cos it wouldn’t be her grandchild because Noah wasn’t her son. He was Mr Tuke’s. And,’ Harriet was close to tears, ‘she’s wanted nowt to do wi’ Daniel since ’day he was born.’
Mrs Gilbank shook her head in disbelief, and then said, ‘Can I hold him?’
Harriet smiled weakly and handed Daniel to her. He grabbed the jet beads at Mrs Gilbank’s neck and attempted to eat them.
‘Oh.’ Mrs Gilbank’s eyes were awash with tears. ‘Never did I think …’ She swallowed. ‘Never did I think that I’d hold Noah’s own bairn in my arms.’ She started to weep. ‘He was my precious child, and not a day went by but I thought of him and wondered what kind of man he’d become. We, my husband and me, we didn’t have any bairns of our own. If we had, mebbe ’pain would have lessened.’
She looked at Harriet. ‘He died in January, not long after Noah was lost. He was a good man,’ she said, wiping her eyes. ‘He never knew about my past, which you might think surprising as this is such a small town. But ’customers never spoke about Mrs Stone’s establishment, and I left not long after I gave Noah away and eventually nobody recognized me. I hated that place and was desperately upset about losing my child, and I took what other work I could find until by chance I met Mr Gilbank. He was a Hull man. He’d come to live in Brough after his first wife died. He was nearly twenty years older than me and I knew I’d have security wi’ him. But I never told him about my fo
rmer life or about Noah, for I wasn’t sure how he would have felt about it.’ Her gaze travelled round the room, touching on her furniture, her ornaments, all her treasured possessions. ‘I kept house for him to begin with, and we became fond of each other. And I was content wi’ that. Security means a lot when you’ve been at rock bottom, as I’d been for most of my life.’
Harriet nodded. It did. She knew that, for wasn’t that why she had agreed to marry Noah?
‘What was he like?’ Mrs Gilbank asked, gently rocking Daniel on her knee. ‘Noah. What kind of man did he become?’
Harriet hesitated for only a second. She wanted to say that he would have been a better one if Mrs Gilbank had brought him up. He would have had love in his life, which he hadn’t had from Mrs Tuke, and so he had grown up feeling unwanted. But she didn’t say any of it. Why would she disappoint this woman who had nurtured him in her heart for all these years?
She reached for Mrs Gilbank’s hand and gently squeezed it. ‘He was a fine man,’ she said. ‘A son to be proud of.’
As Harriet drove back to Marsh Farm her feelings were in turmoil. Mrs Gilbank – Rosie – had told her that Mr Gilbank always referred to her as Rosamund and that was the name she preferred. ‘Rosie disappeared a long time ago,’ she’d said.
What she also said, or at least asked, was whether Harriet would call again, for she would like to see more of Daniel. Harriet felt sad at the thought that here was a woman who had been deprived of her own child when she had had love to give, but happy that she had accepted Daniel as her grandson without question. But there was a proviso; Mrs Gilbank would not admit to anyone else that Noah was her son. ‘I’m known as a respectable widow,’ she told Harriet. ‘I don’t want to lose that esteem. I hope you understand that?’
Harriet did understand and told her that she would visit again, and also said that if she wished she could write to her care of Mrs Christopher Hart at Hart Holme Manor; but what was on her mind most of all was that although she now knew for certain that Noah and Fletcher were not related by blood, she had no proof. Rosamund Gilbank did not want anyone to know that she had given birth to an illegitimate child, and Mrs Tuke would not admit to anyone that Noah had been born in a house of ill repute. Noah and I were married legitimately in the eyes of ’church and ’law, but more to ’point, in the eyes of the world Fletcher and Noah were brothers and a woman cannot marry her husband’s brother. Even Fletcher had said that they would have to live in sin.