A tide of red washed up his neck and flooded into his face as he squirmed in shame. Day after day he’d gone on, he couldn’t remember half of it. And then had followed the need to talk. He’d told her things about the years before he joined up that could send him down the line if she opened her mouth – not that she would, he knew that. And then he’d started on about the war, about Fred and Walt, the slaughter that had gone on, the constant deafening blast of artillery and the screams and groans of the dying and injured. The way men had turned into dumb killing machines, with vacant eyes and loose mouths. And the mud. Oh yes, most of all the mud . . .
She must think him a weak-kneed nowt. His head jerked as though he was attempting to toss the thought aside. And she was right, he was. For years he’d played the big fellow – it had been the way he’d survived – but he was the big fellow no more, certainly not in Nessie’s eyes.
Rising abruptly to his feet he left the sitting room and walked through to his bedroom where he had left his pipe. After lighting it he poured himself a large glass of brandy and then walked back into the sitting room.
Deep down, Nessie must think him an excuse for a man but because she was kind she didn’t condemn him as many would have. But she pitied him, which was worse. He’d seen a look on her face sometimes when she glanced at him. Damn it. He stared into the fire again. But he owed it to Pearl to stay and help with the shop, labour being scarce, at least until James and Patrick came home. And then he bit his lip. Who was he kidding? If Pearl had girls queueing at the door for a job, he’d still stay – because Nessie had become as necessary to him as breathing. It was as simple as that.
Chapter 23
As the carriage wheels bumped over yet another deep rut in the lane they were travelling along, Clarissa Armstrong glared at her husband. ‘I’m going to be black and blue at the end of this. You should have summoned Christopher to the house as I told you to.’
‘You know as well as I do that he wouldn’t come. I tried, damn it.’
‘You should have made him come.’
‘For crying out loud, woman, talk sense! If three visits by Parker wouldn’t persuade him, what would? You tell me that. Do you think I want to travel to the back of beyond?’ He almost added, ‘With you,’ but he was too weary of her perpetual harping to provoke a scene. He’d cursed Christopher every inch of this hellish journey himself, but silently. He hadn’t felt at all well for the last few months and the pains in his body were getting worse, not better, in spite of the pills and potions the doctor had prescribed. Damn quack, he was. Tension and worry, he’d said, and put in a bill for two pounds ten shillings.
Oswald snorted to himself. Was it any wonder he was worried? He didn’t know if he was on foot or horseback half the time these days. The war had played havoc with his business dealings but his home life had been worse hit. The damn Government, insisting that servants needed to be given their marching orders so as to release them for what was called ‘more useful purposes’! This had decimated his staff. He hadn’t long bought a motor car and employed a chauffeur, but the latter had skedaddled and joined up. With Clarissa bleating in his ear that all their friends travelled by car he’d tried driving the thing himself and crashed it into a tree. After that, they’d reverted to the carriage and horses, and his wife hadn’t stopped complaining ever since.
They had only halved their staff, which was nothing compared to others he could name. The Steffords were left with only their housekeeper, cook and one maid, and had shut up part of their home for the war effort, but when he’d suggested doing the same, Clarissa had bitten his head off. Kate Stefford had thrown herself into this and that, organising food and clothing parcels for the troops and heading umpteen committees, but to his knowledge Clarissa hadn’t lifted a finger.
But it was the death of Nathaniel that had hit him the hardest. He hadn’t expected to miss him so much, hadn’t realised how much he’d relied on him. He’d been proud of him in his officer’s uniform, of course, proud that his son had been willing to fight for his country and hadn’t waited until he’d been conscripted like many he could mention, but when they’d received the telegram . . . Now they were going to see this one who wasn’t worthy to lick his brother’s boots. It was true what they said: the devil looked after his own.
Clarissa was holding a handkerchief scented with cologne to her nostrils as though they were travelling through a Newcastle slum area rather than the fresh countryside. It was one of many of her ‘genteel’ habits which drove him to drink. ‘You didn’t have to come,’ he said irritably. ‘I told you I could handle this on my own.’
‘I don’t think so.’ Clarissa’s voice was cutting. ‘You have an unfortunate penchant of alienating even the most reasonable of men, and Christopher is not reasonable. You will lose your temper if I’m not there to check you, and then we’ll be worse off than we are already.’
‘I don’t know why the hell we’re going to him cap in hand anyway. It should be him grovelling to us.’
‘No one is “grovelling”, Oswald, but this attitude is just the sort of thing I was talking about. You’re bent on confrontation and you should have learned by now that Christopher does not respond to your bully-boy methods. You could employ them with Nathaniel – he was a different kettle of fish.’
How she could talk so calmly and coldly about her own child he didn’t know. Oswald rubbed his perspiring face with his hand. The April day was unseasonably warm. She was an unnatural woman. He had found her lack of emotion chilling even before they married, but since they had heard about Nathaniel this flaw in Clarissa’s nature had got worse. Or perhaps he was just noticing it more? Whatever, he would have given the world once or twice for her to feel as he was feeling about their son. It would have been bad enough if Nathaniel had died quickly, blown to smithereens in a moment like so many were, but to know he had died slowly of blood poisoning from the wounds he’d received made his stomach heave if he thought about it. His voice harsh, he said, ‘Leave Nathaniel out of this.’
‘Don’t be so stupid. The only reason we’re making this journey is because Nathaniel has gone.You know it, I know it – and Christopher knows it.’
‘I didn’t want to make it, if you remember.’
‘Oh, I remember, Oswald. I remember very clearly what you said to me. But, unlike you, I want the estate to pass to our own flesh and blood, perverse though Christopher is.’
Oswald ground his teeth together. ‘Don’t make me lose my temper, Clarissa. You know I want that too but like I said, Christopher won’t look a gift horse in the mouth. He might be a fool where the women are concerned, but he’ll fall in line. No one turns their back on an inheritance like he’ll come into when we’re gone.’
‘Really? If that is so, why, pray, didn’t he come when you sent Parker, not once but three times? You underestimate him, Oswald. You have always underestimated him.’
‘Is that so? Whereas you’ve always handled him perfectly?’
‘Don’t raise your voice to me. I’m not one of your employees or a common wench you’ve set up in a house for your pleasure.’
Oswald shot a glance at her. Did she know about Peggy? No, it wasn’t possible – was it? Surely she would have said something before this. No, she’d been talking generally, of course she had. Nevertheless he moderated his voice when he said, ‘You were with me on the gypsy chit, you know you were.’
‘Of course I was, we’re not disputing that. But one of your weaknesses is that you always suppose people come down to your level, Oswald. I’m sure it would come as a surprise to learn that not everyone is motivated by greed or power or . . . lust. I consider Christopher unworthy in every respect, but I understand him enough to know that he has a peculiar code all of his own. He associates with the riff-raff of society as naturally as his own class, he has no sense of decorum in that respect. He may be an embarrassment and a disgrace but he is the only son we have now, and I won’t have you jeopardising his return to his rightful place in society.’
The way she had said lust, she did know about Peggy. Oswald stared at his wife but Clarissa was looking out of the window, the handkerchief in place once more. Not that she could take him to task on the matter. Once Christopher had been born, Clarissa had informed him that her duty had been fulfilled. He was free to have ‘diversions’ as long as he was discreet. Her bedroom door had been firmly closed after that, and the once he had dared to try to resume intimate relations, she had frozen him out of the bedroom. And he had been discreet. He still was discreet, but Peggy was the first woman he had actually set up in her own place. It had either been that or lose her, as Peggy herself had made very plain, and he’d discovered he needed her. He might be getting old but Peggy suited him and he’d found he didn’t want the bother of seeing to his needs elsewhere. Peggy was earthy and bawdy and she enjoyed a bit of rough stuff on occasion, but she could be kind too. She’d held him when he’d cried about Nathaniel and she hadn’t thought any the less of him afterwards. Or if she had, she hadn’t shown it, which was all he asked.
‘Is this the place?’ Clarissa’s voice was one of horror as she peered more closely out of the window. Oswald leaned across to see. Parker had told them they had to follow the rough stone road which Mr Christopher had had laid a couple of years back for the last part of the journey, and it would bring them to the farm. ‘It can’t be, can it? It’s . . .’ Words failed her.
Oswald wasn’t so surprised. He had asked his butler what Mr Christopher’s farm was like, and Parker had been frank. The nearer they got to the farm the more he agreed with his butler. ‘Not a patch on the estate farm, sir.’ Mind, at least you could get to the place without travelling across fields and rough ground. Apparently, according to Parker, that hadn’t been the case when Christopher had taken the place on. And the fields filled with grazing cattle and sheep and lambs he could see now through the carriage window had been practically bare of livestock.
The carriage trundled down the bumpy road and into the farmyard itself eventually. The coachman jumped down and helped them alight, his face impassive when Oswald ordered him to resume his seat and wait. The servant grapevine had been active, and what Parker had related in confidence to the housekeeper had winged its way down to what was left of the rest of the servants. Personally he thought the place was a whole lot better than Mr Parker had described.
Clarissa stared at the hen run and hen crees. When her gaze moved to the pigsties she visibly shuddered. ‘Do – do you think Christopher is at home to visitors?’ she asked Oswald faintly, for all the world as though they were making an afternoon call on one of their circle of acquaintances.
Oswald was taking a perverse pleasure in his wife’s distress. Taking Clarissa’s arm none too gently, he virtually hauled her across the muck-strewn farmyard. He’d noticed a front door to the house as the carriage had approached the building, but the yard led to what was clearly a back door. It was on this he hammered, thinking grimly that Clarissa needed her handkerchief for once. The stink from the pigsties was ripe in the warm air.
When it became clear that no one was going to answer, he tried the door which opened into a stone-flagged scullery. A pile of dirty dishes were in the sink and stacked on a table, and stuff was strewn everywhere. When they walked through to the kitchen-cum-sitting room it was equally messy and devoid of comfort. The remains of a meal were still on the kitchen table, and the fire in the range had all but gone out.
They were standing looking at each other when they heard footsteps and then a man appeared in the doorway to the scullery. It took them a moment to realise it was Christopher, he was so changed. He was clad in a workingman’s clothes for one thing, and he had a full beard which was threaded with grey, as was his shock of thick hair.
‘Mother. Father.’ He nodded at them but made no effort to come towards them. ‘I was in the upper field and saw the carriage, but it takes a few minutes to reach the house.’
Clarissa had her hand to her throat and uttered not a word. She didn’t have to. Her horror was written on her face.
After dragging his eyes from his son and glancing at his wife, Oswald cleared his throat. ‘Hello, Christopher. We’ve come to have a word with you, as you can see. Parker said you couldn’t spare the time to leave here.’
‘Lambing,’ said Christopher briefly.
‘Quite.’ For once in his life Oswald had had the wind taken out of his sails. Clarissa had insisted she was going to do all the talking but she was simply staring at her son and he could understand why. He felt at a loss himself to deal with the weatherbeaten individual in front of him.
Clearing his throat again, he said, ‘I understand Parker told you about Nathaniel.’
‘Yes, he did. I’m very sorry.’ Christopher came into the room now, waving his hand towards the old sofa. ‘Won’t you sit down?’
Clarissa glanced at the sofa which had seen better days and which at the moment had a large ginger cat curled up on it. Pulling one of the hardbacked chairs away from the kitchen table she placed it in the middle of the floor and wiped the seat with her handkerchief before sitting down. Oswald remained standing. ‘Do you understand what Nathaniel’s going means to you?’ she asked coolly, her composure restored.
‘It means I have lost a brother of whom I was fond.’
‘Fond?’ Oswald turned his head sharply. ‘You had a funny way of showing your affection, that’s all I can say.’
‘Oswald.’ Clarissa’s beautiful face was calm but her voice carried a warning.
‘We were fond of each other, as it happens. The last time Nat came here—’
‘Your brother came here?’ Christopher’s words had startled Clarissa, and Oswald was looking thunderstruck.
‘Several times. The last occasion was shortly before he left for France again after his last leave.’
‘He didn’t mention this to us.’
‘He didn’t think you would approve,’ Christopher said simply.
‘He was damn right.’ Oswald looked as though he was going to explode.
This time Clarissa’s voice was sharper when she said, ‘Please, Oswald.’
‘He stands there with a smirk on his face and tells us Nathaniel came to see him before he got himself shredded with shrapnel, and you expect me to say nothing?’
Christopher’s face was white but his voice was low when he said, ‘The smirk is in your imagination, Father.’
‘And you hiding here while your brother fights for King and country is in my imagination too, I suppose?’
‘As it happens I tried twice to enlist but the injury to my arm and chest means I’m classed as unfit. Satisfied?’
‘Unfit? And you work on a farm?’
‘Take your argument to the doctors, Father. Not me.’
‘I don’t believe a word of it. You never attempted to enlist.’
‘Oswald!’ For the first time any of them could remember, Clarissa had shouted. She hadn’t merely raised her voice, she had shouted. It shocked Oswald into silence and it was into that silence Clarissa said, ‘I am sure you would have gone to war if you could, Christopher, but I am glad you did not. Losing one son is quite enough.’
Christopher could have reminded his mother at this point that according to her she’d only had one son to lose, but he did not. He knew why they had come to see him. Funnily enough, Nathaniel himself had predicted it as they were saying goodbye that last time. They’d shaken hands but then Nathaniel had hugged him hard, slapping him on the back as he’d let him go. ‘Look after yourself, little brother. I’m glad we’re back as we were in the old days.’
Christopher had been able to say in all honesty, ‘So am I.’ Something he was glad about now.
‘If anything happens to me, you know the pair of them will be hotfoot here to lay the royal robe of inheritance over your manly shoulders, all forgiven?’
‘Nothing is going to happen to you.’
‘Perhaps not, but be warned just in case.’
‘Nat, I don’t want a penn
y of their money, never have. I’ve got all I want here. I’m gradually getting it round and in a year or two I’ll start on the house. Get running water piped in from the stream and do the building work I told you about.’
‘I never thought you’d stick it, you know.’ Nathaniel swung himself up on to his horse. ‘I thought the winters would do for you, and the loneliness.’ He’d clicked at his horse and as it had trotted off, called over his shoulder, ‘See you when the swallows come home, little brother.’
Only he hadn’t.
Christopher brought his mind back to what his mother was saying. ‘. . . And so your father and I think it’s high time we all let bygones be bygones. None of us wants a family feud, do we? So many people have lost loved ones and it’s made us all realise what is important, I’m sure. Isn’t that right, Christopher?’
The hypocrisy was too much. He had told himself that if they came, he would be polite but firm. He wouldn’t be drawn into an argument and he would be civil. Nothing was gained by further animosity and when all was said and done, they had just lost Nathaniel on whom all their hopes of a good marriage and grandchildren to carry on the family name had been pinned. But for his mother to sit there so cool and calm and lie through her back teeth made his blood boil. He preferred his father’s hostility.
‘And what, exactly, do you think is important, Mother?’ he asked grimly.
‘Well, it’s obvious, isn’t it?’
‘Your mother and I are prepared to put the past behind us.’ Oswald felt he’d been silent long enough. ‘If you knuckle down, I see no reason why you can’t do as well as Nathaniel, given time. It might take a while for you to pick up the strings but you’re not unintelligent.’ When Christopher continued to stare at him without speaking, Oswald said, ‘Do you understand what I’m saying, boy?’
‘Perfectly. You want me to step into Nathaniel’s shoes.’
‘Well aye, in a manner of speaking.’
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