A Child of Secrets

by Mary Mackie

  The door slammed behind her and her galoshes fell heavy on the thin runner along the passageway, the sound growing fainter until the door at the top of the back stairs closed. Jess let the silence gather round her, enjoying it. She, too, would indulge in some free time today, once the curtains were mended.

  Going down to the servants’ hall for lunch, she found the talk all about the evangelical crusade which was taking place in the area. Meetings had been held in barns and farmyards as well as chapels, bringing the Good News to the country folk. That afternoon, a gathering was planned on the shore at Martham. Several of the Hewinghall staff were going.

  ‘Why don’t you come with us, Jess?’ George the footman suggested.

  ‘I’ve got work to do,’ Jess said.

  One of the under-laundrymaids, a follower of Eliza, remarked to herself, ‘Thought she had a fancy for preachers.’

  ‘That’s enough!’ Mrs Roberts snapped. ‘I won’t have backhouse gossip repeated at my table.’

  ‘How about news from Syderford, then?’ Sal Gooden put in, coming to Jess’s aid. ‘The Haverleighs are back – and suckin’ sorrow by pailfuls, so it seem. She en’t speakin’ to him, and when she do, she do nothin’ but mob and minify.’

  While Jess appreciated the change of subject, the news only served to worry her. If the Haverleighs’ marriage was in trouble, would that Mr Ashton come sniffing round Miss Lily again?

  During the afternoon the weather cleared, clouds moving away to let the sun shine through. Jess went out on to the roof to savour it, leaning on the broad stone parapet and gazing out across the park as she wondered how the Martham evangelical meeting was going. Was Merrywest himself there that afternoon? Eliza had made sure that Jess heard about the posters and bills that were going up everywhere, announcing that the main preacher of the weekend was to be Nathanael Merrywest, of Lynn.

  Matty, too, on his recent return, had confirmed that Merrywest planned to bring spiritual enlightenment to this benighted corner of Norfolk. ‘It hen’t got nothin’ to do with you, though. Honest, Jess, he have forgiven you. He say that’s now up to you to seek forgiveness from the Lord. He’ll be glad to see you at one o’ his meetings, and if you feel the call he’ll welcome you.’

  ‘I’m sure he would,’ Jess had said, a taste like metal in her mouth.

  Merrywest was a master of tactics, always careful to keep his public face clean. He was praised as one of the best preachers on the Lynn circuit, whose words could make the most hardened sinner fall on his knees and repent. He walked miles to spread the message; he taught Bible classes and Sunday school; he was a good landlord to those who were his tenants, a good husband to his quiet, nondescript wife and two quiet, well-behaved children. A fine, God-fearing, upstanding man was Preacher Merrywest. Everyone said so.

  But little no-account Jess Henefer knew better. She knew the Sunday saint was a weekday devil, brutal, rapacious, unfeeling, with a conscience made of stretching leather. But how could she prove it – her word against his? Words were his weapons and his armour. She could never compete.

  The thoughts broke off as she saw someone coming at a run along the drive. It looked like Matty, and evidently his mission was urgent. There hadn’t been another accident, had there? Not Rudd…

  She waved and called, but Matty didn’t see her perched so high up on the roof. He went out of sight behind the west wing, making for the kitchen courtyard.

  Jess climbed back through the window and went to find out what was amiss. In Little Africa, she encountered Sal Gooden, who was coming to find her with half a tale about some mishap, Lily falling into a pond and needing a change of clothes. They’d taken her to Rudd’s cottage.

  Having dashed upstairs to pack a basket with fresh clothes from Lily’s room, Jess found that Matty had gone on, not waiting for her.

  Though the sun was now out, the woods were dripping, branches springing droplets as she brushed by, undergrowth crackling, birds stirring and starting. It took her a good half hour to get to Rudd’s cottage, by which time her boots and skirts were soaked. In the garden the broody hens were again sitting on pheasant eggs in their crates, safe behind wire enclosures.

  Jess had no time to take it all in. First Dash came charging down the path to greet her, then Matty was there, near beside himself with worry, wanting to know what had kept her.

  ‘I came as quick as I could!’ Jess exclaimed. ‘If you’d a waited, to tell me what this is all about—’

  ‘It’s Miss Lily!’ He dragged a hand through his hair, leaving it standing up in greater disarray than usual. ‘I had to get back to her. I was frit—’

  Jess was stepping into the kitchen, meeting Reuben Rudd’s steady gaze. It stopped her, telling her things that made her feel cold.

  ‘She’s all right,’ he said, though the look on his face belied the words. ‘There’s an old wives’ tale about that pond being bottomless, but it’s nobbut four feet deep, even at the middle. Obi found her in time.’

  ‘She just fell in!’ Matty said.

  Rudd afforded him a sympathetic look. ‘Happen she did, lad. Happen she did. Any road up, she was soaked right through, and she’s worn out, but she’s sleeping now. I reckon she’ll do. Thanks for coming, lass. She’ll be glad to see thee.’

  Jess stared at him, not wanting to understand. What was he implying – that Lily had tried to kill herself? ‘Where is she?’

  ‘I put her in my bed – it’s the only one that’s aired.’

  Twenty-Three

  Lily lay flat on her back, the covers pulled up to her chin and her hair swathed in a towel from which a few damp tendrils escaped to cluster round a face that was almost as white as the sheets. Hearing Jess’s footsteps she opened her eyes and tried a wan smile. ‘Jess.’

  ‘Now, what’s to do?’ Concerned for the pain written clear on the beautiful face, Jess sat on the edge of the bed. ‘You shouldn’t’ve been out walkin’ in this wet. No wonder you got soaked. Did you slip and fall?’

  Lily blinked, a tear dripping down her temple. ‘Is that what they told you? Oh, Jess… I thought I might as well walk into that bottomless pond and sink into oblivion. But it wasn’t deep enough!’ A bubble of painful laughter burst out of her. ‘I couldn’t even do that right.’

  ‘Thank the Lord!’ Jess said sternly. ‘You didn’t mean it.’

  ‘I did mean it,’ Lily wept. ‘I can’t bear it, Jess. Ash and Clemency are back. And she’s having a child. Cousin Oriana told me. It’s as if nothing had happened between him and me – as if I had never existed. Their life goes on, and mine…’

  ‘Yours go on, too! ’Course it do. Forget them. You’ve got other friends. Me, and Miss Bella. And Miss Peartree, and Dolly. And Mr Rudd, and Mrs Roberts. Why, everybody at Hewinghall think the world of you. And some love you, if on’y you’d pay them mind. Take our Matty now…’

  More tears swelled in Lily’s eyes, blurring their colours as she turned aside, croaking, ‘Oh, Jess!’ and bit on the sheet to stifle her desolate laughter.

  * * *

  Leaving Lily sleeping, Jess crept downstairs and found Matty toying with a plate of rabbit stew. The savoury aroma from a pot over the fire filled the room, making Jess feel hungry.

  ‘Where’s Rudd?’ she asked.

  ‘Gone off on his rounds. How’s Miss Lily?’

  ‘Sadly. What’re we goin’ to do, Matty? I shall have to get back, else there’ll be more talk, but I can’t leave Miss Lily alone here.’

  ‘Well, we’ll see what Mr Rudd say when he get back. He say you’re to eat, if you want. The stew’s good.’

  He was right about the stew. With a chunk of Mrs Obi’s crusty bread it went down a treat and made Jess feel better. She’d almost forgotten how peaceful it was in Rudd’s cottage, with the woods sighing beyond the door, the hens clucking as they brooded, the old clock tick-tocking steadily.

  She had lit the kitchen lamps by the time Rudd came back for his own supper. He sat at the table eating while Jess and Matty remained
either side of the fire.

  ‘Best thing you can do, lad,’ Rudd said to Matty, ‘is go explain to Mrs Roberts that Miss Lily’s had a fall and she’s staying here tonight. Jess can stay with her – no, it’s all right, I’ll not be here. I shall be out all night, keeping watch. You can come back here yourself, to save leaving the ladies alone. Better get off now. The sooner you’re back, the sooner I can be about my work.’

  Matty left, taking a lantern to light his way. Finding herself alone with Reuben Rudd for the first time in months, Jess stared at the fire, feeling self-conscious, wishing she had something to do with her hands.

  ‘Shall I make some more tea?’ she asked.

  ‘Aye, if you like.’ He was cutting an uneven wedge of bread to mop up the remains of his stew.

  Jess busied herself with the tea, trying to ignore Rudd, but his presence was a burning reality prickling all her nerves.

  After a while, he said quietly, ‘Like old times.’

  Jess stopped, poised over the singing kettle with the tea pot in her hand. ‘You reckon?’

  ‘No.’ He sounded rueful, and when she looked at him he gave her a wry smile. ‘I’m making conversation, lass, that’s what it is.’

  ‘Then don’t trouble. I en’t here to be entertained.’ She turned her back on him again, watching the steaming kettle.

  Unexpectedly, he said, ‘I’ve missed thee, lass.’

  Jess stared at the fire, seeing the red heart of it shiver and go shapeless through tears as she cleared her throat. ‘Is our Matty now workin’ for you?’

  Rudd hesitated, then sighed as he accepted the rebuff. ‘Aye, when I need him. He’s not a bad worker. He’s willing to learn.’

  That was true, Jess thought wryly. Trouble was, Matty didn’t much care who he learned from: his mates down the ‘Admiral Nelson’, Jim Potts, or Reuben Rudd, it was all the same.

  ‘At least he was bright enough to see through Jim Potts,’ Rudd added.

  ‘And Eliza.’

  The silence seemed to stretch, then just as the kettle was coming to a full boil, bubbling and spitting, Jess heard him sigh, ‘Aye. And Eliza.’ Wondering if she dared believe her ears, she looked over her shoulder and encountered his sombre gaze. ‘I think I knew, any road,’ he said. ‘I tried to give her the benefit of the doubt, but after Matty told me… Are you making that tea, lass, or letting the water boil away?’

  Snatching up the pot-holder, Jess filled the teapot, rattled the lid into place and carried it to the table. ‘What did Matty tell you?’

  ‘About them using the rectory for hiding birds overnight. I knew they must have a place, but I didn’t think they’d have the gall to use the rectory – well, not until what happened to Gyp. That set me wondering. But I still didn’t believe Eliza had owt to do with it. I should have listened to you, lass. Happen I might have, if you’d said it more plainly.’

  ‘You din’t want to hear.’

  ‘I was trying to keep an open mind.’

  ‘Oh, hum? Is that why you walk her to chapel?’

  Rudd sat up. ‘Who says I do? That’s a downright lie! Eliza doesn’t go to chapel – you know that. Have you ever seen her there? You’ve been listening to idle gossip, Jess Henefer.’

  ‘It wan’t gossip when you squired her at the Christmas Ball!’

  ‘I was just keeping in with her, to find out what she knew. She has a soft spot for me—’

  ‘And you for her!’

  After a moment, he said slowly, ‘I’ll not deny I’ve an eye for a pretty woman – the same way I’ve an eye for a good dog, or a cock pheasant in his mating feathers, or a tree in new leaf, or a sunset. I appreciate beautiful things. That’s why I noticed thee, Jess.’

  ‘Squit!’ she flung at him.

  A suspicion of a twinkle started deep in his eyes. ‘You reckon?’ he teased her, using her own words.

  Jess felt as though hot water was being trickled all over her. ‘Yes, I do so reckon, Reuben Rudd. Oh… you’re a-tyin’ me up in knots just cos I en’t so clever as you. Do you now—’ The words broke off as a hysterical cry stabbed through the cottage: ‘Jess! Jess!’ Forgetting everything but the fact that Lily needed her, Jess ran for the stairs.

  Lily had woken out of bad dreams and, in the darkness, hadn’t known where she was. ‘I hate the dark. I hate it, Jess! Light the lamp for me.’

  By the time Jess had settled her down, brought her tea and then some stew – because she was ravenously hungry all of a sudden – Matty had returned and Rudd had gone to keep his night vigil for egg thieves.

  Sharing the double bed with Lily, Jess found it hard to sleep. She couldn’t forget whose bed she was lying in, and the warmth of Lily beside her made her wonder what it might be like to lie here with Rudd: the closeness, the comforting cosiness of lying together and talking about their day; then kissing, and… Her eyes snapped open as cold sweat broke from every pore. Even trying to imagine it made her brain explode with panic and her body curl up to repel invasion. She could never be a real woman, never a wife like Rudd deserved and needed.

  * * *

  No one at Hewinghall questioned Lily’s ‘accident’. They were, anyway, more interested in what had happened at the evangelical meeting at Martham Staithe: Merrywest had preached up a storm, warning so strongly of the consequences of sin that two women had seen visions and fainted; a child had been sick and so terrified himself that Merrywest had had to cast out the devil in him; the landlord of the ‘Admiral Nelson’ had thrown himself into the tide-flooded creek seeking instant baptism, and half a hundred souls had gone forward claiming to have ‘seen the light’.

  Among those half hundred had been Eliza Potts.

  ‘That came over me all at once,’ she declared to anyone who would listen. ‘All I hear was this voice, cryin’ out, “Repent! Repent!” and that struck me to the heart. I fell on my knees. Seemed as how the clouds all rolled away and there was this brightness. Then I seen the preacher, and he lay his hand on me and a whole weight of sin fell off of me. You ought to be saved, too.’

  It was hard to decide which was the least attractive – the old, malicious Eliza or this new saintly exhorter. Knowing she’d been Saved, she pitied and derided those less fortunate. She also became a regular at chapel – which made Jess wonder if the conversion was yet another attempt to impress Reuben Rudd.

  In the week after Easter, the Fynchams returned from Kent. Jess was delighted to have young Bella back and Lily too seemed glad to resume the routine of lessons. Bella hadn’t enjoyed the rough and tumble of her four cousins; she preferred her own quiet nursery, where she felt at ease with Lily and Jess, and where Ching was always willing to be petted.

  The cat won his immortality when he came to be included in a portrait of Bella which Sir Richard commissioned. The artist, Mr Anstruther, felt inspired to portray the child with the cat on her lap and Ching, seeming aware of the honour, indulged his human friends by posing sedately – for an hour, or two minutes, as the mood took him.

  On an afternoon when a few thin streaks of rain spotted the window, Lily sipped tea and watched the clock. Time seemed to move particularly slowly when she and Bella were in the private drawing room. Those times were trying for Bella, too; she desperately wanted to please her mother, but every day she managed to do something wrong.

  That day, when the child stumbled for a tenth time over a passage of reading, Lady Maud snatched the book from her. ‘She’s not improving!’

  ‘She’s nervous,’ Lily said.

  ‘Nervous?’ Lady Maud’s eyes glittered dangerously.

  ‘I think,’ Sir Richard intervened, strolling across the room from his stance by the window, ‘that Bella is tired. After all, she spent two hours this morning posing for Mr Anstruther. We know she can read much better than that. Can’t you, my love?’

  ‘I was trying very hard, Papa,’ Bella said plaintively.

  ‘Yes, of course you were. And you were doing very well.’

  Her ladyship was still glaring at Lily,
who felt sure that another tirade on her shortcomings as a teacher was about to ensue. Fortunately a maid interrupted with news that Lady Maud’s favourite mare was about to foal. Lady Maud was on her feet and on her way to the door before the girl had finished speaking.

  ‘I shall go and change. I must be there. Well, Bella – there’s to be a new foal. Tomorrow I shall take you to see it. Perhaps I shall allow you to give it a name.’ Not giving Bella time to reply, she swept out.

  Bella was looking sickly: she was terrified of horses and hated visiting the stables, a fact which infuriated her mother.

  ‘We shall all go,’ Sir Richard said, touching her hair for comfort. ‘Now, why don’t you run back to the nursery? I wish to have a word with Miss Clare.’ At this, Lily looked up, starting out of her seat, but his smile reassured her. ‘Be still, Miss Clare. This will only take a moment.’

  Having bestowed her usual kiss on his cheek, Bella hurried away. Her father lowered his long body to a settee opposite Lily’s, watching her with steady grey eyes.

  Unable to bear that clear, perceptive regard, Lily stared at her hands, twisting them in her lap, seeing the badly bitten nails and the snags of skin caught up by embroidery needles – needlework had never been a favourite occupation. Maybe she should try making lace, or pegs, or tying bunches of lucky heather…

  ‘I’m sorry her ladyship is not pleased with Bella’s progress,’ she said into the silence. ‘She does work very hard. It’s just…’

  ‘Just that my daughter is not the stuff of which great intellects are made,’ Sir Richard completed the thought. ‘Harry was the same.’

  Surprised, Lily glanced under her lashes and saw him gazing at the portrait above the mantel – a picture of a copper-haired boy wearing a sailor suit, standing under trees with a dog beside him. He looked to be about the same age as Bella was now. When her portrait was finished it would make a pair with this one of her lost brother.

  ‘But he was an active boy,’ the squire added softly. ‘He loved animals. Dogs, and horses – not cats.’ He shared a glance with Lily that said much. Lady Maud had adored her son because he shared her interests. She wanted to love her daughter, but she did not find Bella lovable, or compatible.