‘Now this,’ she said, handing the newspaper to Nathaniel, ‘is exactly what we need for Felix.’
He read the article briefly and laughed at her. ‘Is it indeed?’
‘It is indeed,’ Jane told him seriously. ‘’Tis just what I’ve been waiting for. A grand occasion with plenty of guests and lots of food and drink. Summat lively. He’ll not have time to sit and brood if he’s rattling along on a train or sitting next to our Milly at a banquet. ’Tis just the very thing.’
Nathaniel grinned at her. ‘I’m sure Mr Hudson had your Felix in mind when he planned it.’
‘I don’t really care what Mr Hudson had in mind,’ Jane said. ‘’Twill suit our purposes to perfection and that’s what counts.’
‘Then I suppose I must contrive to get him an invitation.’
‘Of course,’ Jane said. ‘We can’t have him drooping about not saying anything the way he did at Christmas. He’ll never marry Milly if we let him go on like that. He needs a push.’
‘Which you intend to give him,’ Nathaniel said, laughing at her.
As the date of the official opening grew nearer, York fell into a fever of excitement. New outfits were ordered, carriages and horses were spruced up ready for the parade, the gossip was endless. Milly begged leave of absence from her two pupils for four whole days, Jane bought a new bonnet, Nathaniel treated himself to a grey top hat, and after a long three weeks while everybody in Shelton House held their breath and hoped, Felix wrote to say that he had written to Mr Hudson accepting his kind invitation and would be driving his carriage over for the great occasion and was very much looking forward to it.
‘Now all we want is the weather,’ Mary Jerdon said to her son-in-law.
‘Which Jane will have ordered up for us,’ he said.
She laughed at that. ‘Even my Janey can’t change the weather,’ she said.
‘When she’s in one of her determined moods,’ Nathaniel told her, ‘I believe she could turn the tides.’
And sure enough the weather was superb. As the 400 guests arrived at the Guildhall for the inaugural breakfast, the sun shone on their fine feathers and made their polished carriages gleam like new. And Jane was delighted to see that Felix handed Milly out of his own carriage in the most loving and gentlemanly way and walked into the Guildhall arm in arm with her.
‘So far, so good,’ she said as she and Nathaniel followed them.
It was a champagne breakfast, as everybody there expected, and as they emerged into the sunshine afterwards, replete and not a little tipsy, they found the carriages lined up and waiting for them, so the procession got off to a smooth start and looked and sounded extremely grand. Jane said it made her feel as if she were the queen. But the best moment was when she saw Mary and Nat waiting on the bridge, just as she’d arranged, with their grandmother and Audrey holding their hands and their eyes wide with the wonder of it all.
The great George Hudson was driving at the head of the procession, waving to right and left and smiling at the crowds, with his wife sitting stoutly beside him, and he was in his element. He knew he was royalty and of a real and laudable kind, for weren’t folk calling him the Railway King? He heard it everywhere he went and the newspapers were beginning to use the title as if it were his name. And why not? He was every bit as rich as a king now and had quite as much power.
‘A grand occasion,’ he said to Lizzie with immense satisfaction. ‘And nowt but what I’ve earned.’
But the best and proudest moment was when they turned into Thief Lane and he saw the train all ready and waiting for them, eighteen coaches long, no less, five first class and ten second class for all his guests, and three third class for the navvies who’d worked on the line, with one of Mr Stephenson’s splendid locomotives at each end, one for the outward journey to South Milford, and the other to bring them all home again. It was a triumph.
It took a very long time and a great deal of excitement to get everybody aboard but it was eventually done and the engine shrieked and they were off, heading south into the open countryside at an unbelievable speed with white smoke puffing out behind them and parasols fluttering in the breeze they were causing.
‘Wouldn’t our littl’uns enjoy this,’ Jane said to Nathaniel as they were swayed from side to side by the onrush of their journey. ‘We must take them for a ride as soon as we can. ’Twould be such an adventure for them.’
Felix said it would be an adventure for anybody and wondered how far they were going on this particular trip and what they would do when they got there. ‘Feller at breakfast was telling me Mr Hudson means to build a line from York to London.’
‘Aye,’ Nathaniel said. ‘He does. The plans are already under way.’
‘Amazing,’ Felix said. ‘He is truly an extraordinary man. Quite extraordinary. To have built all this is amazing enough but to build a railway all the way to London … It takes one’s breath away, it truly does.’
It took their impressive train just over half an hour to reach the little wooden platform at South Milford and then half a dozen men in their new railway uniforms appeared along the platform to help the ladies to dismount and to inform the party that they had half an hour to explore the countryside and to reassure them that the train would whistle when it was time for them to return.
‘He has every little detail planned,’ Felix said admiringly.
‘It’s the nature of the man,’ Nathaniel said as they walked down the little flight of steps. There were footpaths leading east and west, running alongside yet another set of gleaming railway lines, and they took the westward one, which seemed the natural choice to Nathaniel as it led them towards Leeds. He and Felix walked at a sturdy pace, talking of railways and their recent champagne breakfast while he watched until Jane and Milly had fallen so far behind that they were lost among the strolling crowd. It was time to give this young man the push he needed.
‘You had something particular to say to me, I believe,’ he said and smiled.
Felix blushed so much that he was rosy to the roots of his fair hair. ‘Well, sir,’ he said, ‘as to that, I mean to say, there was something, actually there is something, only the truth of it is it’s a deal more complicated than I would wish, so perhaps …’
‘There’s nowt so complicated but can’t be cured by a little consideration,’ Nathaniel said, quoting the old saying. ‘If I’ve learnt nothing else from working on the railways I’ve learnt that.’ And then as Felix blushed and said nothing, he prodded for a second time. ‘It concerns my stepdaughter, I believe.’
The hedges around them were a twitter of nestlings calling to be fed, the corn was green and promised a good harvest, and in the old lush fields beside the new straight lines of their amazing railway, white lambs snuggled against their mothers’ mud-flecked sides and watched them curiously.
‘Which is all in the nature of things,’ Nathaniel prompted.
‘The truth of it is, sir,’ Felix ventured at last, ‘the truth of it is, I would like to – um – ask your permission to – um – marry your Milly. However … however, the fact of the matter is … I would have liked to have been able to tell you that I could provide for her, I mean to say, provide for her well, that one day she would become Lady Fitzwilliam and live in Foster Manor and that she would never want for anything, but I fear that is uncertain.’
‘On account of your father, I don’t doubt.’
Felix swallowed painfully. ‘He has made up his mind that I’m to marry a girl he approves of,’ he admitted, ‘which means a girl he’s chosen for me.’
‘And if you do not?’
‘Then I fear he may disinherit me.’
‘I can see that that is a problem for you,’ Nathaniel said gravely, ‘and a very considerable one, however it need not concern us unduly, for the matter between is whether or not I would give my permission to your marriage. Even if you were to be disinherited you would not go penniless, that is true, is it not?’
‘I could earn a living, sir. I am a barriste
r now that I’ve completed my pupillage. I take cases. Not very many at the moment, I must be truthful, but I’m building a reputation. Quite a good one, actually. I am patient and thorough and I persevere. My clients are pleased with what I do for them. Sir Godfrey speaks well of me and that’s quite a feather in my cap, for he is a man who speaks his mind.’ He was talking with some pride now, as Nathaniel was pleased to notice, and a great deal more easily. ‘In short, sir, I am confident that my career will grow. I will earn more eventually, possibly a great deal more. I don’t earn a great deal at present, I have to admit, but what I do earn is enough to keep us.’
Nathaniel smiled at him. ‘Then you have my permission,’ he said.
Felix was blushing again. ‘Thank you, sir,’ he said, holding out his hand, which Nathaniel shook. ‘Thank you very kindly.’ Then he couldn’t think what else to say so perhaps it was just as well that the train gave out a long shriek to recall them to their carriages and that allowed him to run back along the path to find his beloved. And Nathaniel, walking more sedately behind him, was able to send an eye signal to Jane as she walked towards him that the deed had been done and all was well.
They rode back to York in great pomp and the happiest state, although since there were other guests in the carriage with them they couldn’t talk about this great change to their fortunes, but Felix and Milly sat happily hand in hand, and Jane smiled so much, first at her daughter and then at her husband, that by the time they chuffed back into Thief Lane, her jaws were aching.
A civic banquet seemed entirely appropriate after that.
George Hudson stood at the centre of the high table in the banqueting hall, with the great George Stephenson beside him, smiling at his 400 guests. Success on such a stunning and public scale was lifting his spirits to ecstasy. It was entirely deserved, of course, which was all the more reason to enjoy it. He’d tackled things that nobody else could have tackled or even dreamed of – he, George Hudson, who’d once been mocked as a mere farmer’s son and a one-time linen draper, and he’d done it all on his own, often with far too much opposition. And this was just the beginning, as he would soon be telling his guests.
The master of ceremonies was clearing his throat and calling the assembly to order. ‘My lords, ladies and gentlemen, pray silence for your host, Mr George Hudson, Lord Mayor of York.’ And they were applauding and turning expectant faces towards him. It was a perfect moment.
He began his speech with a graceful tribute to George Stephenson. ‘If ever there is a man who deserved to be held up to the public approbation of the whole world,’ he said, beaming at his famous colleague, ‘that man is Mr Stephenson.’ His audience applauded with enthusiasm and, from that moment on, he had them agog for every word he uttered. He was cheered to the echo every time he paused to take breath and wine, and was given prolonged applause when he predicted that within a year there would be trains running from Edinburgh to York and from York to London by way of Derby and Rugby. ‘They will take no more than ten hours to complete the entire distance,’ he told his happy listeners, ‘and they will travel at a speed of over twenty miles an hour, just as you did this morning.’
When he finally sat down they didn’t just cheer, they beat the table with their fists until he was rosy with success.
The next speaker to be called upon was Mr James Meek and he seemed to be in an uncharacteristically sanguine mood. ‘London,’ he predicted, ‘will be the head of our railway, Edinburgh the feet and York the heart.’ The diners were delighted by such sentiments and waited to see what he would say next. He turned so that he was facing George Hudson and gave him a sly smile. ‘I hope,’ he said, ‘that the head will never be afflicted with apoplexy, nor the feet with gout, and that York will continue sound at heart.’
Most of his listeners thought that this was just a pretty conceit and applauded it roundly but George was peeved. There was no need to go on about gout – that was just spiteful when the man knew how badly he suffered with it – nor to make snide remarks about the soundness of York’s heart. There’s nowt wrong wi’ my heart, he thought, and I can stand on my own two feet no matter how much gout I’ve got.
‘The man’s jealous,’ he said to Lizzie under cover of the applause. ‘This is all on account of me being Lord Mayor two years running. Won’t do him a happorth of good. I’ve got his measure, don’t you worry. Nasty sly-faced bit o’ goods.’
The speeches continued, ten opulent courses were served and devoured, wine glasses were constantly refilled and by the time the great crowd rose from the table for their short stroll to the ballroom, many of them were almost too drunk to stand and the opening reel was a riot of trodden toes and cheerfully inebriated men who’d forgotten which way they were supposed to turn. Jane and Nathaniel retreated from the chaos after the first five minutes and sat peaceably at their table to watch the proceedings.
‘They’re so happy,’ Jane said, as Milly and Felix skipped by, gazing into each other’s eyes. ‘If he don’t propose to her now I’ll eat my hat.’ It was a torture to her to have to sit here and wait when her dear, dear daughter was so close to the question she wanted to hear and the answer she wanted to give. ‘Oh, he must propose to her now, surely to goodness. Yes, look, they’re going out into the grounds.’
It was dark and rather chill out in the gardens after the crush and heat of the ballroom but blissfully private. Milly and Felix strolled towards the river arm in arm still singing the tune of the reel. They were dizzy with love and wine and good food and impervious to the cold. Above their heads the stars were white pinpricks in a velvet sky, the music of the next dance drifted out towards them over the lawns and below their feet the river was a moving blackness made visible by the reflected lights from the Guildhall.
‘I feel as if I’m dreaming,’ Felix said, as they stood side by side leaning against the parapet. ‘I shall wake up presently and none of this will be true.’
She leant amorously against his side, looked up into his face and pinched his cheek.
‘Ow!’ he said, jumping back from her. ‘What did you do that for?’
She laughed at him. ‘If you’d been asleep you wouldn’t have felt it,’ she said. ‘Now tell me what Mr Cartwright said.’
‘You know what he said,’ he protested. ‘I’ve been telling you all afternoon.’
‘So why don’t ’ee propose to me?’ she teased. ‘You’re mighty slow about it.’
‘I couldn’t very well go down on one knee in the ballroom,’ he said.
‘No,’ she agreed, ‘possibly not. But you can do it now.’
‘Is that what you want me to do?’
‘Naturally. I couldn’t say yes to ’ee if you were standing on your feet. Or on mine as the case may be, what you were doing in that reel, summat chronic.’
He was appalled to be told such a thing. ‘I wasn’t,’ he said and then asked anxiously. ‘Was I?’
‘You were,’ she said, laughing at him again, ‘but I’ll not scold ’ee for it. Not if you propose nicely.’
‘Now?’
‘Now.’
He lowered himself rather gingerly to one knee. He really was very squiffy. He reached for her hand and took it, more to steady himself than because it was the thing to do. ‘Miss Smith,’ he said, gazing up at her. ‘It cannot have escaped your notice that I am very much – um – enamoured of you. Is that the right word, Millikens?’
‘Aye,’ she said, delighted by him but pretending to be severe. ‘It is. But do get on with it, for mercy’s sake. I never knew anyone so long-winded.’
‘Where was I?’
‘May I have the honour,’ she prompted.
‘Ah yes,’ he said and took a deep breath. ‘My dearest Dumma-dumma, may I have the honour of your hand in matrimony?’
‘Yes, yes, yes,’ she said, stooping to kiss him full on the lips.
At that he had a fit of the giggles. He simply couldn’t help it, the relief was so ovewhelming. ‘I can’t believe it, I tell ’ee,’ he said, between
gasps of laughter. ‘I simply can’t believe it.’
Now and a little late in the occasion, she realized that he was kneeling in mud. ‘You’re getting mud all over your breeches,’ she said. ‘What will people think?’
‘I don’t care,’ he said. ‘Let ’em think, say I. Let the whole world think.’
There were people approaching them along the path. Rather grand-looking people.
‘Get up, my darling,’ Milly said. ‘They’re looking at us.’
He got up but he was too excited for caution. ‘My dearest, darling Dumma-dumma,’ he said and kissed her long and passionately.
When he lifted his head he discovered that he was being scrutinized by one of his old college friends. ‘I say, Felix!’ that gentleman said. ‘I never thought you had it in you. You do go it!’
Felix recovered sufficiently to make introductions. ‘Miss Smith, allow me to present an old friend of mine. Rufus de Seward. His pater’s a lord, don’t ye know.’
Milly had recovered her balance more quickly than her lover. ‘Your servant, sir,’ she said and dropped him a pretty curtsey.
‘Rufus,’ Felix said with splendid aplomb, ‘allow me to present my darling Miss Millicent Smith who has just done me the honour of agreeing to be my wife.’
‘My stars!’ Rufus said. ‘You do go it!’
They walked back into the ballroom together, giggling and laughing, and Milly and Felix ran straight to her mother’s table as soon as they got in through the door because they couldn’t wait to tell her they were engaged. Rufus watched them rather enviously for a few seconds, and then strolled off to find his friends and tell them the amazing news but, unfortunately for Felix, the first person he actually found was his father and his father had seen their cheerful entry and quizzed him about it straightaway.
‘Was that not Sir Mortimer’s son I saw coming in with you?’ he said.
‘It was indeed, Pater,’ Rufus told him. ‘Bit of a surprise, what?’
‘And who was that person hanging on to his arm?’
Off the Rails Page 23