Light & Dark

by Margaret Thomson-Davis

  And Lorianna would rest. Lying there listening to the monotonous click-click of Mrs Musgrove’s knitting needles, she would become almost hypnotised until eventually the back of the housekeeper’s head—the dark hair with the stark white line of its middle parting and the tight twisted knot at the nape of the neck—would become misty and fade. And then the rest of that day and the night and the next morning would have to be lived through before she could go to Robert again.

  The only other time when Lorianna’s emotions were stirred was when Clementina came down to the sitting-room. The child was becoming quite grown-up; she came by herself now—quiet, self-contained, a model of politeness. Her behaviour was so painstakingly correct in fact that Lorianna could not help feeling slightly uneasy. It hardly seemed quite natural for a child—after all, she still was only a child—to appear so anxious to be perfect. It was almost pathetic.

  ‘Darling, are you all right?’ she found herself asking one evening. ‘Is Miss Viners a good teacher? I mean, she’s not unkind to you or anything?’

  ‘No, mother,’ Clementina said politely.

  ‘You are quite well, then?’

  ‘Yes mother.’

  Lorianna eyed the silver sweet dish and then glanced over to see if Gavin was looking. His eyes were fixed on his book, although she had the strange feeling that his attention was on Clementina. She decided not to risk offering the child the dish as she usually did when Gavin was not there. Clementina, she noticed, was also eyeing her father somewhat nervously. Instead of proffering the dish therefore, Lorianna surreptitiously took a sweet from it and on the pretext of kissing Clementina good night she slipped the sweet into the pocket of the child’s pinafore.

  ‘Good night, dear.’

  ‘Good night, mother.’

  ‘Say good night to father and then on you go upstairs.’

  ‘Good night, father.’

  ‘Good night,’ Gavin called gruffly without raising his eyes.

  After Clementina had gone, Lorianna said to Gavin, ‘Are you sure that governess is all right?’

  ‘Of course,’ Gavin said. ‘An excellent woman! And deeply religious. Her credentials are of the very highest—she’s a clergyman’s daughter; her father was a respected minister in Fife.’

  ‘Clementina seems to be making good progress,’ Lorianna said, as if trying to convince herself.

  ‘There is not the slightest doubt about that.’

  Gavin’s attention settled back on his book and she was left to stitch absent-mindedly at her embroidery or wander through to the piano in the drawing-room and play sweet, sad tunes as the flame began to lick at her loins and burn up inside her, until she was nearly weeping with the ache of the hot emptiness that only Robert Kelso could fill.

  Tossing and turning alone in bed, she tried desperate masturbation to assuage her torment, but the lonely degradation of it released all her tears and she wildly sobbed herself to sleep with Robert’s name on her lips. And when she awoke each morning his name was still in her thoughts.

  ‘Robert, Robert!’

  ‘You’re like a madwoman,’ Mrs Musgrove said.

  And that was how she felt.

  24

  The letter came with the afternoon post. Lorianna saw it lying on the hall table, even picked it up and gazed at its odd childish printing. It was addressed to Gavin, so of course she did not open it. Later she was to wish she had done so—then she would have torn it to shreds and watched it burn on the sitting-room fire.

  They were having guests to dinner, Mr and Mrs Forbes-Struthers and Jean Dalgleish and her husband. Gavin was rather late in coming home and did not open the letter straight away, but went directly to his dressing-room to bathe and change. When he eventually appeared in the sitting-room his red hair was slicked close to his skull and darkened with water and his beard clung flatly to his face. He looked correct and formal in his very stiff high collar and highly-buttoned dark suit. Lorianna was looking especially beautiful in a shimmering gown of silver with a daringly low neckline and a long train attached to the bodice. At her neck were high rows of pearls fastened with a silver clasp and from her ears hung pearl drops, all dazzling with the dress against her dark glossy hair.

  Gavin brought the letter with him and sat down opposite her to read it. Right away she saw that there was something wrong. His face suffused with angry colour, his eyes glittered behind his pince-nez and his mouth trembled with emotion.

  ‘What is it?’ she asked.

  ‘I knew he was a bad influence all along,’ Gavin said. ‘An impertinent, ungodly, intemperate man like that!’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘Kelso.’

  She had to grasp the arms of the chair to steady herself. ‘What about him? Is there something in that letter?’

  Gavin flung it across to her and it landed on the floor at her feet. Trying not to reveal that her hand was shaking, she picked it up and read:

  ‘You think you’re a great Christian and family man and all. But under your very nose someone in your own house is acting the dirty bitch with Robert Kelso. He’s got her eating out of his hands. Does what he likes with her. Has his own way any time. No decent girl would want to work in a place where there’s such dirty, evil goings-on.’

  Gavin said, ‘How dare he corrupt one of our maids. How dare he come into my house and taint it with his evil ways!’

  Lorianna hovered hysterically between laughter and fearful sobs. ‘Anonymous letters should surely be burned and ignored, Gavin,’ she managed finally. ‘They are the product of a sick mind.’

  ‘I could believe it of him. Had it been Jacobs or anyone else, I could perhaps have ignored it as you say, my dear. But not Kelso! This is exactly the kind of thing he is capable of.’

  She could see that Gavin was trembling and she thought, how strange! How ironic! Here he was, the most evil person she had ever known—someone who had spent years sadistically hurting women—getting so outraged and indignant at the imagined seduction of a servant by his grieve. His dislike of Robert must be greater than she had thought. It amounted to positive hatred, she saw now, and suddenly she felt afraid for Robert more than herself.

  ‘Try to be fair, Gavin. You have no reason to say that about him. He has been a good conscientious worker for years; you have said as much yourself. The farm’s only a hobby with you; it is Kelso who runs it, keeps us supplied with all our food and—’

  ‘I have never denied that he could run the farm efficiently. But I have never liked him as a man. Never! I have had cause to warn him several times about his behaviour and his attitude. That man has never known his place and has always thought he could get away with anything he chose. But this time he has gone too far. I shall put him in his place all right—in the gutter, that’s where he belongs! Once I am finished with him, there will not be a gentleman in Scotland who will give him employment.’

  Lorianna thought he was never going to stop talking about it. All through dinner he ranted and raved, mightily encouraged by Mrs Forbes-Struthers who thought all servants were a disgrace.

  ‘You will dismiss him, of course?’ she said.

  ‘After I have told the scoundrel what I think of him,’ Gavin replied.

  ‘I wonder who the maid is?’ Jean asked. ‘Have you any idea?’

  ‘No, but tomorrow I shall question the staff most thoroughly,’ Gavin assured her.

  ‘And dismiss her too, I hope,’ said Mrs Forbes-Struthers.

  ‘Of course! When I think,’ Gavin sighed and shook his head, ‘of the sinfulness being perpetrated under my very roof!’

  Lorianna felt sick at his sanctimonious self-righteousness, but dared not say a word. She felt herself on a dangerous slippery slope, leading to heaven knew where. Knowing her husband as she did, she could see that he was going to enjoy questioning both Robert and the women servants about the secrets of their sex life, and that nauseated her too. Gavin was feverishly angry, but underneath the anger was an intense enjoyment, a mental rubbing of the hands, a fiendi
sh glee. He was sexually excited.

  This suspicion was later proved correct when he tried to come into her bed. In horror she endeavoured to fight him off, managing in the violent struggle to reach the bell-pull and give the three tugs signalling that she wished Mrs Musgrove to come upstairs rather than any of the other servants. Within moments there was a sharp rap at the door and Gavin had barely time to scramble from the bed and into his robe before Mrs Musgrove entered the room carrying a candle. She was dressed in a dark maroon-coloured robe and her hair hung in a plait over the front of one shoulder, but she looked none the less formidable.

  Gavin was almost speechless with fury. ‘How dare you come barging in here like this!’

  ‘Madam is not well, sir and it is my duty to look after her both day and night.’

  ‘She is perfectly all right at the moment, so you can return downstairs where you belong.’

  Ignoring him, Mrs Musgrove strode across the room, put down the candle on the bedside table and said, ‘Madam is extremely distressed.’

  Lorianna clutched at the maroon gown and began to weep. ‘Don’t leave me, Mrs Musgrove! I … I feel so faint and ill. I need your help.’

  ‘And you shall have it, madam. I’m sure Mr Blackwood will see it as his Christian duty to ensure that you receive nothing but the best care and attention.’

  Mrs Musgrove stayed with her until morning and then tugged the bell for Lizzie to come and take over. Lizzie had been instructed to give her mistress breakfast in bed and Lorianna was glad that she was spared seeing Gavin at breakfast, where apart from anything else she feared he might have broken the normal breakfast silence by talking to Gilbert about the letter. Gilbert had been out the previous evening and so did not yet know about it.

  But after she heard Gavin and Gilbert ride away to Bathgate to the factory she was in an agitation to get up and fly to the farmhouse in order to warn Robert. Then it occurred to her that he would not be there. He was never at home in the mornings, but rose very early and rode around the estate attending to his various duties. He could be anywhere on the estate’s many acres of rolling fields and hills and woodland. She could have wept with her frustration and growing alarm.

  As if nothing unusual had occurred the night before, Mrs Musgrove arrived as usual for their morning discussion of menus and other domestic matters.

  Lorianna shaded her eyes with one hand. ‘For pity’s sake, Mrs Musgrove, I cannot concentrate on all this today.’

  ‘It would help if you could try, madam.’

  ‘You don’t know all that I have on my mind just now.’

  ‘Baxter, the parlour-maid, has been talking about a letter Mr Blackwood received. Apparently he was discussing it while she was serving at table.’

  ‘My God!’ Lorianna groaned.

  ‘Don’t worry, madam. Nothing will ever go further than the four walls of this house. They would not dare—they all know that it would be as much as their job is worth.’

  ‘You have told them so, I suppose?’

  ‘Certainly, madam. I don’t hold with servants gossiping.’

  ‘My God, what am I going to do?’

  ‘You should keep calm and do nothing, madam.’

  ‘But I must go and—’

  ‘No madam, you must stay and allow other people to look to themselves. They are more able than you.’

  Lorianna’s lips trembled. ‘What will happen?’

  ‘I would think that Mr Blackwood will return early after lunch, send for Kelso to question him here and then perhaps dismiss him.’

  ‘Perhaps? You think there might be hope that—’

  ‘Mr Blackwood has threatened to dismiss Kelso before, madam, and in the end has not done so.’

  Lorianna began to feel slightly calmer. ‘Yes, I remember now. Yes, that’s true.’

  ‘Kelso is always very calm, very sure of himself. And he’s a man. He can take very good care of himself, madam. Now, I believe you have a luncheon appointment today and that you and Mr Blackwood are going out for dinner this evening. So we shall not require either a luncheon or a dinner menu for today. But I thought for tomorrow …’

  Lorianna made a conscious effort to concentrate. She was grateful to Mrs Musgrove for being so reassuring and also for reminding her of her luncheon appointment with Mrs Anderson. In her anxiety and distress she had completely forgotten about it. She resolved to see Robert at her usual time this afternoon, when they would discuss everything that had happened.

  And yet, all the time, behind her polite concentration, behind the welcome reassurance, anxiety still lurked.

  25

  Clementina had grown to fear every adult in her life. Even her mother was not to be trusted, because she was ruled by her father. Her whole existence now became a test of how to avoid getting smacks or reprimands or worse from one adult or another. Whatever she did was sure to be wrong in the eyes of at least one of the grown-ups. The best she could do was to try her very hardest not to annoy her father, because she feared him most of all.

  For example, Miss Viners would send her down to the kitchen to fetch more milk for nursery tea. But the moment she put her head round the kitchen door a red-faced harassed Cook over at the stove, madly whisking some sauce or cream with a tiny sheaf of bleached birch twigs would shout at her to go away. At her busy times, Cook couldn’t stand any distractions from anybody. It was then, as Henny used to say, that Cook was at her most volatile. But Clementina daren’t think of Henny, in case the floodgates of her grief would burst open again. So, jug in hand, she would wander up and down the long, stone-floored passageway trying to decide what to do. She considered stealing some milk from the pantry but if one of the maids or—horror of horrors—Mrs Musgrove caught her she would either have her ears boxed, be given a punching or be marched upstairs to the sitting-room and reported to her father. If she dared go back to the kitchen, Cook would get really angry and perhaps throw something at her. If she went back upstairs to the nursery without any milk, Miss Viners would he furious and would punish her.

  So she would just stand in the darkening passageway clutching the empty milk jug, paralysed with fear, not knowing what to do.

  Her dream of escaping to Edinburgh became more and more desirable and urgent, until she felt she could not bear to wait until she had saved up any more money—she had to go now.

  A perfect opportunity presented itself when Miss Viners said she would be going off early to attend someone’s funeral. Mother was always out in the afternoon and father would be at the factory. Miss Viners had also told her, ‘You’ve not to go and visit your parents today, because your father and mother will be busy getting ready to go out to dinner.’

  So it would be perfectly safe for her to set off early for Edinburgh. Nobody would know. She wondered what she should take with her and decided on a rag doll made from one of Alice’s old stockings, a clean handkerchief and of course her pennies. The rag doll Alice had made had been christened Black Mammy because the stockings were black and Alice had sewn on brown crosses for eyes and a red cross for a mouth from scraps of darning wool. Clementina loved the doll very much.

  There was a signpost on the Drumcross Road that pointed to the left towards Edinburgh and that was the direction Clementina took, clutching Black Mammy under her arm and with her pennies safely tucked away in the pocket of her pinafore. After a while she came, rather confusingly, to another signpost which pointed down to the right for Edinburgh; eventually she reached a big main road where yet another sign pointed to the left.

  Already she was getting tired and trailing Black Mammy by the arm alongside her. There was quite a lot of traffic on this road and she guessed it must be coming from Bathgate. Men on horseback cantered past. Open victorias—in which ladies sat, holding parasols high swept along. Closed carriages rumbled noisily, whips cracking over horses with heads and tails held proudly. Carts and wagons of all shapes and sizes clattered behind heavy Clydesdales. Then suddenly the shadow of a victoria stopped beside her and she looked
up to see the grim-faced figure of her father.

  She stood perfectly still, clutching her doll, her mind completely blank. Then somehow she found herself in the carriage beside her father and he was turning the horses round and going back towards the house.

  She realised that he too had been going to Edinburgh and the fact that she had diverted him from his journey and caused him the inconvenience of turning back would make her crime all the more serious… . And therefore her punishment. Her heart was thumping so much she was sure it was making the whole carriage throb.

  Into the drive they turned and still in terrifying silence. By the time they reached the house she was too weak to even try to climb down and had to be lifted. Up the stairs and into the reception hall. How quiet the house was! Into the study. Now nothing needed to be said. Tidily she laid down her doll. Then, bunching up her dress and pinafore, she unbuttoned her knickers and took them off.

  The rough hands began rubbing and probing and she closed her eyes and bit her lip and tried to remember to be brave. But she could hear her father making strange noises now and they frightened her more than anything. She dared not open her eyes. The hands were quickening and soon their violence knocked her down and, as she lay on her back they spread-eagled her legs, making her terrifyingly vulnerable. Even her clenched teeth could not stop her moans and high-pitched squeals when she felt her father’s weight come on top of her and something hard began bumping ferociously against her, She began to shriek with pain, forgetting about everything else, concentrating only on her agony.

  Outside in the hall, Mrs Musgrove had come to stand at the top of the stairs as usual to greet Lorianna.

  ‘Good afternoon, madam.’

  ‘Good afternoon, Mrs Musgrove… . What on earth is that noise?’

  ‘I saw Mr Blackwood return earlier with Miss Clementina, madam. I believe he is in the study with her now.’

  Lorianna screwed up her face. ‘Poor little thing, I wonder what she’s done now? She must be getting punished more severely than usual—she never cries out as a rule.’