by Clare Flynn
She bowed her head, unable to find any adequate words.
Merritt looked down at the sleeping baby. ‘As soon as I held my son, I knew I’d made a terrible mistake letting you keep this a secret – but there’s no reason to continue with that mistake when we have the power to redress it. We can’t reclaim the past months, but we can live the rest of our lives as a family. That is what’s right.’
Hephzibah looked at him in anguish. ‘Merritt, we can’t. I love you with my heart, my body and my soul. I too lie awake at night thinking of you, of us, of being in your arms, of feeling everything you make me feel when we’re together.’ She paced up and down the room. Merritt moved towards her his arms outstretched, but she held up her hands to block him.
‘You have to understand I couldn’t live with myself if I were to do what you ask of me,’ she said, her palms extended in front of her as a barrier. ‘Thomas Egdon rescued me from his father. I married him willingly. I thought I loved him and I was wrong about that, but it’s not his fault.’ She closed her eyes and took a deep breath, hoping that what she was saying didn’t sound rehearsed. She tried not to look at Merritt’s face. Get through this, Hephzibah. Don’t look at him. She raised her hands and covered her eyes. ‘Yes, he may be away from home more than I’d expected of a husband, and he may spend more money, but in every other respect he has behaved decently to me.’
Merritt took advantage of her covered eyes to move to her, but as soon as he touched her she stepped sideways. ‘Let me finish, Merritt. I do believe Thomas loves me in his way. I promised before God to be with him until death do us part.’
Merritt opened his mouth to speak, then appeared to think better of it. She allowed herself to look at him at last, studying his face. ‘You do understand don’t you, Merritt? God knows, I hate this as much as you do. I love you now and will always love you. Only you. I beg your forgiveness for unleashing this upon us both. If I’d had any inkling that I’d fall desperately in love with you, I would never have asked you to do what we did. At the time I wanted to save my marriage, save the husband I thought I loved. I was naïve, stupid even, blind certainly. I may not love Thomas but I can’t hurt him.’
‘But you’re hurting me!’ Merritt’s voice broke with anguish.
‘Don’t you think I don’t know that, my darling? I’m hurting you and I’m killing myself.’
The clock on the church tower began to chime the hour. Hephzibah looked at him, her mouth set in a straight line. ‘I have to go. Ottilie is expecting us back for tea. She is besotted with Edwin.’
She replaced the bonnet on the baby and was about to take him back into her arms, when Merritt reached for the child.
‘Let me hold him again. Just for a moment.’ He walked with the baby in his arms to the window which looked out onto a patch of lawn and a small orchard of fruit trees that screened this side of the house from the road. He bent his head and kissed his sleeping son again. Then he turned and handed the boy back to Hephzibah. Neither of them noticed the old woman with the black eye-patch standing among the apple trees.
Abigail Cake was angry. Her father had hit her again: bounced her off the kitchen walls and she’d caught her head on the corner of the cooking range. All because the baby wouldn’t stop crying.
Ned Cake hated the baby and had done ever since he’d noticed Abigail was pregnant and punched her in the gut – doubtless hoping to remedy that fact. The punch must have been in the wrong spot because it hadn’t worked. Little Rosy was a stayer. Tough, like her mother. She wasn’t going to be so easily disposed of.
Ned Cake had moaned about the cost of feeding another child, as if it were Abigail’s fault she had found herself in the family way. Ironic. After her being so careful all the time. She was fairly sure it wasn’t the squire who was responsible for knocking her up. She hadn’t taken any chances, preferring to take him in her mouth or getting him to pull out of her before it was too late. And she kept out of his way altogether at the dangerous times. She’d read an article in a medical magazine when she was cleaning Dr Desmond’s surgery for a spot of extra cash. It was all about which were the most fertile times of the month and ever since, she’d scribbled her dates on a piece of paper she kept inside an old biscuit tin under her bed. No, she didn’t think it was the squire who had got her into trouble. That hadn’t stopped her telling him the baby was his though. He’d been angry at first and accused her of sleeping with half the village, even though it wasn’t true. In the end he’d paid her three guineas and told her to keep out of his sight in future. Abigail wondered how long that would last. Dirty old bugger.
She looked in the bit of broken mirror she kept on the shelf over the range. Her right eye was puffy. She was going to have a right old shiner. But better that the old man take it out on her than on the baby. As it was, she had to make no end of effort to stop her father hearing the baby cry. Rosy had a hell of a pair of lungs on her so Abigail tried to be ready for when she woke during the night so she could clamp her to the breast before she cried. Often, if her father was around, she’d wrap herself and the baby up and go outside and sit in one of the pheasant sheds so he wouldn’t hear the crying.
The truth was plain. Her own father was her baby’s father. Ever since her mother had died he had used Abigail when he was unable to persuade one of the many destitute widows in the village to service his needs in exchange for a bit of cash for food. It happened every few months. He’d come home roaring drunk from the Egdon Arms or the Cat and Canary and climb into her bed on top of her, clamping his hand over her mouth so she couldn’t cry out and wake the other children. When it was over – which was usually mercifully quickly – she’d slip out from under his sleeping body and climb into bed beside her younger sisters. The first time he’d done it she had cried for days afterwards and refused to do the cooking and cleaning. Then he’d been full of remorse.
‘I dunno what came over me, Abby, love. It’s just you’re the living image of yer mother when I first courted her. I miss her and a man has needs as must be satisfied. It’s different for women. Just remember ya old da loves yer and means well. It won’t ’appen again.’
But it had happened again. Not often. But it only takes one time to make a baby. Ned Cake refused to entertain the possibility that he might be the father of his own granddaughter – yet his extreme aversion to the baby and her crying spoke clearly that her very presence was a reminder of his part in her conception.
Abigail looked at her sleeping child in the cradle. She struggled to feel much fondness for the baby herself. She was filled with a near constant anxiety that she would develop some terrible defect as a result of her perverted origin. Rosy didn’t live up to her name – she was a pale, scrawny child, prone to sickness and undersized – apart from her well-developed lungs. While Abigail failed to experience the expected maternal love, she still felt fiercely protective of the baby. It wasn’t the child’s fault that she was the product of incest. Although sometimes she did wonder whether it might be kinder to all concerned if she placed a pillow over the baby’s head and put Rosy out of the misery that Abigail was sure lay ahead of her.
She moved across to the stove and put a kettle on to boil. This was probably the only time she’d have time for a cup of tea – before her father came home and the kids came in from the fields. She had stolen a few pinches of tea from the kitchen up at the big house. Mrs Andrews usually watched her like a hawk on the days when she was up at the Hall to polish the silver, but yesterday the housekeeper had been distracted by the squire summoning her to his study.
A loud rap on the cottage door made her jump. She opened the door to find Mercy Loveless standing on the threshold, chewing on the stem of her clay pipe.
‘Is that a kettle you’ve got a-boilin’ there, Abby Cake? Let’s take the load off our feet and ’ave a cup of something, then I’ll tell thee what I found out this very day about a certain couple as is of interest to thee and the folk up there at the Hall.’ She shoved past Abigail and plonked herself
into a chair, putting her feet up on a low wooden stool.
Abigail stood with her back to the room, preparing the tea. She wasn’t about to reveal that she had some real China tea and have Mercy drinking her meagre supply, so she made them each a cup of nettle tea.
‘Afore I drink this and tell thee the tidings, I want to know what the reward is. Me old legs are getting bad and it’s a long walk out here from the village.’
Abigail tutted. ‘It’s five or ten minutes’ walk, Mercy, and you know it. And you spend half your day walking anyway. You’ll walk twenty mile if you think there’s something in it for you.’
‘What will you pay?’
‘That depends on what you’re selling. If it’s good enough I’ll give you the brace of pigeons I promised. Otherwise, it’ll be an egg.
‘T’wasn’t pigeons thee said, ’twas pheasants. And I think a dozen eggs too when thee hear the tale I’m goin’ to tell.’
Abigail groaned and told the old woman to get on with it, adding that pheasant was out of season.
The old lady snorted then said, ‘I was passing by the parsonage earlier when I sees the carriage from the Hall stopping and that Mrs Egdon, her from out the village, she gets down with that new baby of hers and goes inside the ’ouse. Now since I caught ’er and the vicar doing the dirty down in Dick Farthing’s old hut I was curious and so I puts off me trip to Saddlebottom where I goes to sell me baskets, and waited to see what’d ’appen.’
‘What did happen?’
Mercy Loveless raised her black piratical eye-patch and rubbed a fist over the hollow spot where her eye used to be, then repositioned the patch.
‘For nigh on an hour, bugger all. Couldn’t see inside the ’ouse from the road, even though I walks round the side, down that little gulley as leads to the canal, but I couldn’t see far enough inside the room. I could tell they was there but that was all.’
Abigail sighed and put down her cup. ‘You’ll have to do better than that, Mercy Loveless, or that cup of tea is all you’ll be getting from me.’
‘I’m coming to it. ’Old yer ’orses. Just as I was about to give up and go, the parson hisself comes up and stands in the window and ’e’s ’oldin ’er babby. ’Er from the Hall. ’Er what used to be governess and married the squire’s lad. Then ’e kisses the babby – the parson does. All over its little face.’
Abigail gasped. ‘I knew it.’
‘It weren’t a normal thing for a parson to do with someone else’s babby. Parsons pour water over a babby’s ’ead, but they don’t go round kissin’ ’em. Sure as those eggs thou’s going to give us is eggs, Parson Nightingale is the daddy of that Egdon woman’s child.’
Abigail went outside to one of the sheds and returned a few moments later, carrying two woodpigeons which she placed on the table in front of Mercy Loveless. Without a word she moved over to a shelf under the window and counted out a half dozen eggs from the basket there and put them in a cloth bag. ‘Here’s half a dozen. It’s as much as we can spare and more than you need.’
The half-blind woman peered inside the bag. ‘I ’opes they’s not cracked.’ She slipped the bag inside her wicker basket. ‘So what’s thee going’ to do on it? Goin’ to tell squire?’
‘Now that I’ve paid you for the information it’s my property and if I hear you’ve told anyone else about it I’ll take out your other eye. Understand?’ She yanked the old woman’s head back by the hair. ‘Understand?’
The woman squealed and then said, ‘Lemme go, Ab, I’ll not breathe a word. I swear.’
Abigail released her grip then returned to the pan she was watching on the stove. ‘You’ll do well to forget all about it, Mercy. And don’t be waiting and watching for what I’ll do. I’m a patient woman. I’ll be waiting for my moment – no matter how long it takes.’ She reached over and took the teacup from Loveless. ‘Now get on your way, old woman. And remember not a word if you value that eye.’
The woman scrambled to her feet and scuttled out of the door. Abigail took a cloth and wiped down the seat of the chair she had been sitting upon. ‘Filthy old witch,’ she said, under her breath.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
The means were worthy, and the end is won–
I would not do by thee as thou hast done!
(from Lines, on Hearing that Lady Byron was Ill, Lord Byron)
March 1908
Edwin was two and a half and running around. The older he got, the more he resembled Merritt Nightingale. Hephzibah took care to cover his head with a bonnet most of the time, but as he grew she knew it would become an increasing problem. The little boy’s hair was fair, much lighter than her own, almost blonde, but with a slight reddish tinge to it. She was certain she could detect the beginnings of freckles on his nose and was careful to keep him out of the sun.
Thomas was seemingly oblivious to his son’s lack of resemblance to himself. He was relieved that his adolescent mumps had not destroyed his manhood and confident that the birth of the boy had removed any possible objections by his father to him and, eventually, Edwin, inheriting the estate. Yet the new addition to the household did nothing to reduce the hostility between the squire and his son. Sir Richard appeared increasingly irritated and isolated.
One afternoon the squire came upon Hephzibah reading in the library. Edwin was taking his afternoon nap and Ottilie was riding. Sir Richard pulled an upright chair across the room and placed it in front of Hephzibah, and sat down.
‘Thomas is not getting another penny from me,’ he said without preamble. ‘I’m going to alter the terms of my will in favour of Edwin. I’ll create a trust so that if I die before the boy reaches majority – and you won’t get good odds against that happening – I’ll make you the trustee. I expect you to ensure that your wretch of a husband doesn’t get his hands on the cash or try to raise a mortgage against the estate.’
‘You can’t expect me to do that. I have no influence over Thomas.’
‘I do expect you to do it. For the sake of Edwin. I can tell that since the baby was born you’ve started to see through the charms of my son. I’ve seen how you look at him and it isn’t the way you looked at him when you were first married. All marriages are like that – the passion never lasts. But you’re different. It’s more than the fact that you’re no longer in the first flush of passion. You sometimes look at him as if you can’t stand the sight of him.’
Hephzibah sat upright. ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about.’
‘The scales have come off your eyes. You know now that he’s a good for nothing wastrel that cares for nobody but himself. You’d be well shot of him. And it hasn’t escaped my notice that if he was barely here before, now he hardly ever darkens the door.’
Hephzibah felt the blood drain away from her face. She didn’t want to have this conversation.
The squire went on. ‘You have to think of the boy now.’
She shut her book and slammed it on the table. ‘I don’t want to talk about this. You can’t expect me to act as policeman or banker to my own husband.’
He studied her for a moment, then leaned back in his chair, adjusting his bad leg with his hands. ‘Perhaps you’re right. So here’s what I’ll do. I will pay a small allowance directly to you and the boy. Thomas can have a lump sum of five hundred guineas to settle his debts, then I want no more to do with him. I won’t be bled dry any more. He will no longer be welcome in this house. You and the boy will remain. I will make Nightingale the trustee of the boy’s trust fund. He seems fond of Edwin and is a decent fellow. He’ll look after the child’s best interests.’
Hephzibah felt her face redden. ‘That doesn’t seem right. Thomas will never agree.’
‘It’s not up to him to agree.’
‘But this is his home.’
‘Then he should not have treated it with contempt and absented himself so much.’
‘I don’t think you should do this, Sir Richard. Thomas will be angry. I dread to think what he will do.’
&n
bsp; ‘He can’t do anything.’
‘But Ingleton Hall is his birthright.’
‘Then tell him to sue me. But as soon as any judge sees that he’s worked his way through over twenty thousand pounds in just a few years, has no interest whatsoever in this estate or its affairs, and rarely so much as crosses the threshold, he’ll laugh him out of court.’
‘He’s your son. Talk to him. Make him see reason.’ She paused. ‘I’ll talk to him. I’ll try and persuade him to spend more time here. Maybe he can help you and Mr Cake in the management of the estate. Perhaps if you gave him some specific responsibility?’
The squire lit a cigar and drew on it, watching the smoke spiral up in front of him. ‘I tried that before. I offered him Middledown Farm. He was never there. He waited too long to get the spring barley in and the crop was ruined. He almost lost me the barn when he left a lamp burning in the stable block. If it hadn’t been for Cake seeing the smoke and acting quickly we’d have lost a season’s hay, two plough horses and a three-hundred-year-old barn. All he cares about are his damned racehorses. He’s never stopped asking me to turn this place into a stud farm and a training centre for racehorses.’
‘Is that so terrible?’
‘He knows as well as I do that the ground isn’t right to create practice gallops. Too waterlogged, too uneven. And as for breeding – it takes knowledge and experience and more money than sense. I don’t have to remind you about Bess – she lasted all of six months before pegging it. Ingleton has always been arable land with sheep and a few head of cattle. I’m not turning centuries of tradition on its head for the sake of his half-baked fancies.’ He puffed on his cigar, creating rings from the smoke as he exhaled.