Bear No Malice

by Clarissa Harwood

  Tom was confused. “I thought his name was Sam.”

  “You know nothing, I see. For God’s sake, Tom, just go.”

  Tom walked to the doorway, then stopped, bracing his hand against the doorframe. He knew he was pushing Simon to the limit of his patience, but he was so consumed with worry for Miranda that he couldn’t help asking one last question.

  “If this Richard is a violent man, can’t he be arrested? Can’t Miranda be protected from him somehow without having to hide?”

  “He’s not physically violent. His power over her is more complicated than that. But I have no doubt that she’ll be safer if you leave her alone. Will you promise to stay away from her?”

  “I can’t make such a promise. Not unless she makes that request of me herself.”

  Simon turned away, and Tom left.

  21

  Wandering between two worlds, one dead,

  The other powerless to be born,

  With nowhere yet to rest my head,

  Like these, on earth I wait forlorn.

  —Matthew Arnold, “Stanzas from the Grande Chartreuse”

  WETHERBY, WEST YORKSHIRE: JULY 1908

  Be off wi’ thee, lad! I nivver saw the likes o’ thee fer a browl.”

  The voice came from the street below Tom’s window, startling him out of a reverie. He was sitting at the writing desk in his stiflingly hot room at the Higby Inn, his shirt sticking to his back. He’d moved the writing desk directly in front of the open window, but the cooling breeze he’d hoped for hadn’t materialized. It had been an unseasonably hot summer in London, but he hadn’t expected the same in Yorkshire.

  A scuffling sound rose from the street, then someone—the offending boy, it seemed—ran off. The man who had been yelling exclaimed unintelligibly, then walked away, too.

  When he’d first arrived a month ago, Tom had been surprised how alien the dialect sounded, despite its having been his own for the first seventeen years of his life. Perhaps by trying to erase his past, he had also erased the language he associated with it. The sounds coming out of these northerners’ mouths sounded harsh and grating to his ears. But after a few weeks, he was able to follow the conversation of even the excitable and garrulous Mr. Higby, the innkeeper, and it no longer sounded so foreign.

  A knock came at his door, and Tom called out, “Come in.”

  “Here’s the paper tha’ asked fer, Mr. Hirst, and thy letters,” said Mr. Higby. “Would tha’ like summat to eat?” He was a spry, bright-eyed septuagenarian with the energy of a thirty-year-old.

  “No, thank you. I’d like a pot of tea, though, if you please.”

  “Aye. Did I tell thee owt of Dick Rudd? I canna remember.”

  “I don’t think so.”

  “He’s lived in Wetherby fifty years. He knows everybody. I told him about thee, and he remembers a Hirst girl who married a Wilson. Even if that Hirst isn’t a relation of thine, mebbe the family will know summat.”

  “Thank you, Mr. Higby. I’ll certainly talk to these people.”

  Mr. Higby gave Tom the address and left, and Tom tossed the papers on the desk without looking at them. He was grateful for the new opportunity to talk to someone who might know his mother or sister, but he had been following similar tidbits of information since his arrival, and so far they’d led nowhere. His family seemed to have disappeared as completely as he had seventeen years earlier.

  He had reluctantly reverted to the name Hirst for his time in Yorkshire. Whenever he introduced himself to people, he hoped to see a light of recognition in their eyes, or perhaps they would say, “Hirst? I know a Hirst in Wetherby. Are you a relation?” Of course, there was also the danger that someone would know his father—and his father’s crimes—and Tom would be tarred with the same brush.

  Before going to Yorkshire, Tom had stopped in Liverpool, where the Adriatic, the ship his father was scheduled to be on, was starting to board. His inquiries turned up nothing conclusive. His father’s name was on the passenger list, but Tom didn’t actually see him, and there was no proof that he had in fact boarded the ship. He could have sold his ticket to some desperate person for double the price Harris had paid, then gone straight to the pub to celebrate his cleverness. Tom had done all he could, and so decided to let it be.

  Tom hadn’t done anything during his time in Yorkshire but search for his family and think. He had spent more time alone in the past month, it seemed, than in his whole life so far. He hadn’t realized how little used to solitude he was. He did most of his thinking during long walks, mostly at night when the air was cooler and the curious eyes of Wetherby residents were not on him. He thought about whether he could continue to work as a clergyman, much less a canon at the cathedral, and if he couldn’t, how he would make a living. He toyed with the idea of staying in Yorkshire and doing some sort of manual labor—even working as a blacksmith as his father had. He had learned some of the trade as a child. But to choose that line of work smacked too much of penance, and he didn’t think it was necessary to go that far. He still wanted to work with people, but he no longer wanted a public role. He was afraid of falling into the same trap, being tempted by the admiration of others to think himself invincible.

  Tom’s thoughts were interrupted by the arrival of Mr. Higby’s wife with Tom’s tea. When she had left, Tom picked up the three letters and sat down at the desk again. Two of the letters were business-related: one was from the chairman of the Prison Reform Committee, asking for information about some of the inmates Tom had been working with; the other from the bishop, asking when Tom intended to return to London. Reading between the lines, Tom knew the bishop wanted particulars of his spiritual and emotional state to determine if he was fit to return to work.

  The third letter was from Julia. He’d had no contact with her in months, and he couldn’t imagine anything good coming in a letter from her. He opened it with a feeling of foreboding.

  Dear Tom,

  You’ll be surprised to hear from me, I know, but I’m writing on behalf of another. I hope it’s cooler in Yorkshire: God knows we could all use a refreshing change from the suffocating heat of London. We’re staying in London for the Season, of course, but I look forward to moving to our country house next month. You’ll be interested to know that your little friend Miranda Thorne has been staying with us and will accompany us to Rudleigh.

  Tom caught his breath, his thoughts whirling. Why was Miranda staying with the Carringtons? Was she the one who had asked Julia to write to him? He hadn’t heard a word from or about her since he’d left London.

  By the way, if you’re deliberately staying away to avoid the various scandals with your name attached to them, you needn’t. Fortunately for you, the Tyne and Bow affair has caused a far greater public stir, and your troubles have been largely forgotten. You, of course, could never be forgotten, and I’m certain you wouldn’t wish to be. The general public opinion about you (at least in the circles I move in) is that you are just bad enough to be interesting. That ought to please you!

  To get to business, though, Charles has asked me to invite you to stay with us at Rudleigh for a week in August. It’s the usual party to mark the beginning of grouse season, and we need a few nonsporting men to entertain the ladies. It will, no doubt, feel strange to both of us after everything that has passed between us, but I think it will seem stranger if you refuse to come, especially if you’ve returned to London by then. You have an ally in Charles (like it or not), who has defended you to your critics at more than one social function.

  If you’re still not persuaded, perhaps knowing Miranda will be there will help. (She and I use each other’s Christian names now, having become great friends.) I am arranging a small exhibition of her paintings at our house while the guests are there. You likely know how she hates putting herself forward, but I’ve convinced her it will be a small party and that she may play the role of the mysterious artist who is above the rules of social life we mere mortals must observe. I doubt she’ll be displeased
to see you.

  Let me know as soon as you can. I can’t say I’d be displeased to see you, either, after all this time!

  Julia

  Tom frowned. It was an unusually friendly letter, considering the last conversation he had had with Julia. To think of her audacity in inviting him to stay at her country house! Even if she was telling the truth and Charles had prompted the invitation, she could have found some excuse not to offer it. And the irony of Charles being Tom’s ally was too uncomfortable to ponder. Tom needed all the friends he could find, but for Charles to be the last man standing by his side was to heap burning coals on Tom’s head.

  But the invitation was tempting for other reasons. Tom could see Jack again and find out if he was safe from the scheming of his sister, or mother, or whatever Ann was to him. He could assess the damage to his reputation based on the attitude of the Carringtons’ guests. And most tempting of all, he could finally see Miranda. If she and Julia had indeed become “great friends,” as Julia (slyly, he thought) proclaimed in her letter, Miranda must have no objection to his presence. And Julia had written, I doubt she’ll be displeased to see you, so even with the double negatives, he had reason to hope. On the other hand, Julia knew too much, had too much power to influence Miranda against Tom, and she could have issued the invitation merely to torture him.

  His feelings for Miranda were becoming clearer every day he was away from her. He had written a cautious but friendly letter to her when he first arrived in Yorkshire, hoping to gauge whether her feelings for him had changed, but to his disappointment, she hadn’t responded. This had worried him, though he had told himself that perhaps she simply needed time to think. He wrote other letters too, longer and more intimate ones, but these he didn’t send. He could no longer treat her merely as a friend, and what he needed to say must be said in person.

  There were so many obstacles. Even if she could look past the damage to his reputation and didn’t believe Ann’s lies, it would be unfair to ask her to marry him when he was so uncertain about his vocation. And there was also the mystery surrounding the vicar named Richard, and Sam, whoever he was. Simon had told Tom long ago that marriage was impossible for Miranda: was Richard or Sam the reason for this? Was she already married to someone else? Was it some conviction of hers based on her bad experience with Richard, or perhaps on some insecurity about her own fitness for marriage? Such a conviction could be overcome, and Tom intended to do his best to overcome it once he had the chance to talk to her.

  He set Julia’s letter aside and picked up the Times. It was his only link to London now. The first week after arriving in Yorkshire, he had read it with trepidation, worried that his name would be mentioned. One night he had even dreamed that the paper had been full of stories about him, stories that denounced him as a hypocrite and blackguard and presented lengthy lists of his sins. In reality, the Times had thus far paid no attention to him at all.

  The latest issue was no exception. The front page was dominated by stories about militant suffragettes destroying property and the Tyne and Bow affair. Tyne, a well-known and respected Conservative MP, had been exposed for accepting a bribe from a man named Bow. Tom silently thanked the dishonorable men and the suffragettes for being more newsworthy than he was.

  The only other news item that caught Tom’s interest was a brief mention of a Royal Academy exhibition: “An unexpected success by a newcomer gathered a great deal of attention: a painting entitled Wistful by E.A. was commended by several critics for its unusual and arresting composition. We expect to see more of the mysterious E.A.’s paintings, if not the artist herself, at the Royal Academy. All we know is that she is a woman who prefers to remain anonymous.”

  Tom knew it had to be Miranda, and he was happy for her success. It made him want to see her all the more. He needed to distract himself before the longing became unbearable. He left his room, deciding to make a visit to the Wilson family that Mr. Higby had mentioned.

  It was late afternoon by the time he found the house, about six miles from Wetherby. Tom chose to walk there, but before long his shirt was damp with sweat again and he regretted not hiring a vehicle. He’d also made a wrong turn, which slowed his progress. Finally, he found the Wilson house on an isolated stretch of road, a small yellow brick structure that could have been satisfactory when it was first built, but many decades of wear and poor upkeep had left it with a dilapidated appearance. The roof sagged dangerously in the middle.

  As Tom knocked at the door, he tried to beat down the same spark of hope, mixed with anxiety, that arose in him every time he was about to meet someone who might know his family. He had repeated this pattern so often that the hope ought to have been easier to extinguish.

  The door was opened by a grimy-faced, wide-eyed boy of about eight.

  “Who is it, Freddie?” a harried-sounding woman’s voice called from within.

  “A gennelman,” said Freddie.

  “Well, let ’im in! Can’t you see I’ve got my ’ands full?”

  Freddie opened the door wider, but only his head showed from behind it, his big eyes staring at Tom as if he were afraid of being eaten.

  “Thank you, lad,” Tom said, stepping into a tiny vestibule. At the end of a passageway was the kitchen, from which the sounds of cooking and the babble of young voices could be heard.

  A woman emerged from the kitchen, balancing a baby on her hip while wiping her hands on her apron. She strode towards Tom with the quick movement of a young woman, but when she came nearer, he saw that her face was lined and sallow. Her graying hair was pulled back tightly, but a few strands had escaped, sticking out at odd angles. She didn’t meet his eyes, being occupied with the baby, who was twisting in her arms and beginning to fuss.

  “I’m sorry to trouble you, ma’am,” Tom said, “but I’m looking for a Mr. or Mrs. Wilson, and I’d be obliged if you can help me.”

  “Aye, I’m Mrs. Wilson,” she said. “What d’ye want?”

  “I’m looking for some family members named Hirst, and I was told you might know . . .” Tom’s voice trailed off, for she was now looking up at him, and in her eyes was a look of shocked recognition.

  “Oh God,” she said in a strangled voice.

  He didn’t know her. She was too young to be his mother, and too old to be his sister. Or was she? Her eyes were very dark, almost black, like his own. And if he imagined her hair without the gray . . . could it be?

  “Kate?”

  If he thought she would rush into his arms in a paroxysm of joy, rather like Jack and Ann had done with each other, he was mistaken. Once the initial shock of recognition had passed, a hard look came into her eyes and she said gruffly, “You’d better come in.”

  She half guided, half pushed the boy in front of her as she strode back down the passageway, and Tom followed her with a myriad of thoughts and misgivings whirling in his head. Kate had been only fifteen when he left, two years younger than he was, and certainly she would have changed a great deal in so many years, but it was hard to believe that this exhausted-looking, sour-faced woman was in her early thirties. As a young girl, his sister had had a beautiful laugh—it had bubbled out of her effortlessly when they played together. This woman didn’t look as though she was capable of laughter. A creeping heaviness weighed Tom down as he followed her into the kitchen.

  His first impression was that he’d been transported into the duchess’s kitchen in Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. An older woman was stirring a large pot that was bubbling vigorously on the stove, and there were three young children sitting on the floor, too close to the stove, throwing dishes at one another. When his sister—for he was certain now the woman must be Kate—entered the kitchen with the baby and Freddie, the kitchen was crowded indeed. Tom stood uncertainly in the doorway, wanting to rescue the saucers from the children and the children from the stove, but knowing it wasn’t his place to do so.

  “Katie! Joe! Susan! Stop that this minute. Mam, didn’t you see what they’re doing? There won’
t be any dishes left!” Kate stooped to remove the dishes from the children’s grasp, nearly dropping the baby at the same time. “We ’ave a visitor,” she added.

  Tom stood as if turned to stone as his mother turned from the pot of stew to look at him. He knew her immediately. Her dark eyes were sharp, and she was still small and wiry, stronger looking than her daughter, despite being in her sixties.

  His mother’s reaction to seeing Tom was very different from Kate’s. She burst into tears and started towards him, nearly tripping over the three children on the floor in her haste to get to him. Tom moved forward, too, as close as he could without knocking over children or furniture, and his mother sprang into his arms, sobbing uncontrollably.

  This reunion had happened so suddenly, despite his long search, that he was too stunned to know what he was feeling. He held her tightly, as if to make up for all the years he was out of reach. In the background, he heard Kate order the children outside to play.

  When his mother’s sobs had subsided, she took his arm and led him to a nearby chair. He sat down, but when she pulled up a low stool to sit close to him, he protested.

  “No, you take the chair, Mam,” he said.

  “Hush. The stool is fine for me.” She sat and leaned on his arm. She looked up into his face, smiling through her tears, and said, “My only son. My Tom. I knew you’d come back. I told you, Kate. Didn’t I say he’d come back?”

  “Aye,” said Kate.

  Tom glanced at his sister, who had taken over stirring the pot, still balancing the baby on her hip. She wasn’t looking at him. The kitchen had become quieter now that the other children had left and the baby had stopped fussing. The only sounds were the bubbling of the broth and Kate’s spoon banging against the pot as she stirred.

  “You’ve become a gentleman, just like you always wanted,” said his mother. “And so handsome. Don’t you think so, Kate?”