by Lynch, R J
‘Everyone must know.’
‘There is no shame. These people fear God only in the hearing of their betters. Few marry till a child is on the way at least. If a man does not know his woman can bear his children, how can he know there will be anyone to look after him when he is too old to work? One might say the young master has raised her value by proving she is fertile.’
‘I am not inclined to say that, Thomas.’
‘No, my lord. I only meant…’
‘You meant to excuse in one of noble birth what you would not forgive in a rustic. I will not have it. Did not your own Master say that, from those to whom much has been given, much will be demanded?’
The rector bowed his head. ‘As your lordship says.’
‘Something must be done. You will stay for refreshment, Thomas. We shall discuss the suitable young men of the parish. Blakiston, we need your advice. Some young man is about to receive advancement as a reward for taking on a child that is not his. Who shall it be?’
Thomas breathed a sigh of relief. For all his worries about the effect on himself, it was going to be all right.
Chapter 18
There was great agitation at New Hope Farm when the call arrived. Tom had no clothes fit for a visit to an overseer whom everyone in the parish believed to be gently born, but his mother sent him to wash under the pump while she brushed vigorously at his least torn, least stained breeches, shirt and waistcoat.
The walk across the fields to the castle took two hours. Approaching from the back, he went straight to the kitchen where his younger sister Hetty was in service as a scullery maid. Hetty was so awed by her brother being wanted by Lord Ravenshead’s overseer that she could not even bring herself to kiss him, but she started on its way the message that the young man was here.
Blakiston was not ready to see him, came the reply, but Tom was to be fed and given something to drink, after which he should wait on the overseer in the estate office.
Hetty sat Tom down at a table against the wall of the kitchen and set a mug of beer beside him. Then she took a sycamore trencher into the pantry and placed on it three thick slices of cold beef, some cold potato and cabbage, a wedge of heavy close-textured brown bread and a thick knob of golden butter.
Tom fell on the meal with a will. ‘D’you always eat like this?’ he asked his sister.
‘Aye, his lordship’s a good master,’ said the cook, who had been watching the proceedings with a smile. ‘As long as you’re not insolent with him.’
‘Insolent?’
‘Aye, man. Insolent. You’ll look a long way for a better master, as long as you remember that he’s the Lord and you’re…who you are. What do they want you for? You can’t be in trouble or they wouldn’t be feeding you.’
‘I’ve nee idea, man,’ said Tom, chewing energetically.
‘Well, his lordship needs something from you or you wouldn’t be here. And if I know his lordship, and it’s thirty years since I started here as a scullery maid, just like your Hetty there, so I do, he’ll not ask a favour without offering summat in return.’
‘That’s daft talk,’ Tom said to Hetty when the cook had gone. ‘How can Lord Ravenshead need a favour from me?’
‘I don’t know,’ said Hetty. ‘But if you’ve finished that you’d better get off to Mister Blakiston’s office. I’ll show you where it is.
Tom waited only a few minutes until Blakiston arrived together with Lord Ravenshead. Astonished by his Lordship’s presence, Tom stood in respectful silence, his head bowed. He was immediately aware that he was being appraised. After a prolonged scrutiny, the Baron nodded to Blakiston and left.
The overseer sat and motioned Tom to do likewise. ‘You are the second son of a farmer,’ he began without preamble.
‘Yes, sir.’
‘The tenancy will pass to your older brother on your father’s death.’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘Are you happy about that?’
‘Sir, I have always known it must be so.’
‘Yes. It must. Inheritance by the first born son is all that stands between us and ragged Ireland, with a people scarce able to feed themselves. You are familiar with Rector Claverley?’
‘I know him, sir.’
‘You will soon know him better, I fancy. The Reverend Claverley is a second son. His brother is a marquess, with an estate. The honourable Mister Claverley serves the church. That is the lot of second sons.’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘Still, it is hard. Your brother will be a farmer as he, and you, were raised to be. And you…you will be a labourer.’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘You live at the farm still. Your brother is not married. Your mother cooks for you and mends your breeches. But what will happen when your mother dies and your brother weds and his growing family needs more space? Or when you marry?’
‘I…I don’t know, sir.’
‘Of course you know. You will have to leave your comfortable farmhouse, and find some poor cottage. Will you not?’
‘I…I suppose so, sir.’
‘You will raise a family in two rooms.’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘It will not be easy, when you have grown up in a farmhouse.’
‘No, sir.’
Blakiston paused and looked again at Tom in silent evaluation. At length he said, ‘The tenancy of Chopwell Garth has come free.’
Tom stared at him. He could scarcely believe what he was hearing.
‘James Robinson is dead of an inflammation of the kidneys. His widow cannot manage the farm without him. She has only daughters.’
‘But, sir...Catherine Robinson is engaged to be married. Her man…’
‘…believes that by marrying her he will gain the farm. He is wrong. You know from your work at New Hope that we are at pains to improve the methods used on our farms. You must know this Matthew Higson. In fact, I know you do, for I saw you speak to him the day I asked whether you had seen Joseph Kelly. D’you think him capable of managing a farm as we require?’
‘I…I wouldn’t like to say, sir.’
‘Quite right. No more you should. But I can say it. And I do. Word has already been given to him. We shall see whether he still wishes to marry the wench. So. We need a tenant for Chopwell Garth. Would you like it to be you?’
Tom’s heart beat violently. The bluntness of the offer took his breath away. Would he like to be the new tenant at Chopwell Garth? To be the farmer he had been raised to be, instead of a labourer? To be, at least so far as a man of his class could be, his own master, and not always living at the whim of others?
‘Yes, sir. I should like that very much. Please,’ he added, suddenly recollecting the manners his mother had drummed into him.
‘Then let us hope we can arrange it.’
‘What must I do?’
‘You have no wife. A farmer must have a wife.’
‘I…but, sir. I…there is no-one…’
‘So the Reverend Claverley has informed us. We wish to make you a proposal, Thomas Laws. Accept the wife his lordship wishes you to marry, raise the child she is to bear as dearly as you would your own, and he will give you twenty pounds in cash and make you tenant of Chopwell Garth.’
There was silence in the room.
Florrie went with Lizzie when the call to the Rectory came. She had known what would happen from the moment Lizzie told her she had spilled everything to Lady Isabella. Blood would call to blood. The rector would not much care that a girl of no social consequence had been outraged by the scion of a noble family. Young girls’ petticoats were made to be thrown up, and young men to do the throwing. But he would object strongly to the child of an aristocratic father being raised to be a labourer or a kitchen maid. And so would Lord Ravenshead. Whatev
er they wished to propose, Lizzie would need her support.
Thomas had agonised over where the interview should take place. The Greeners’ cottage would have been the obvious place, but how could one broach such a matter in front of a teeming horde of the children of the low? The inn had private rooms, but that idea was rejected instantly. If the innkeeper himself did not eavesdrop, his wife and servants certainly would and the whole parish would know the story by cock crow. No, the Rectory it would have to be.
Once settled on that, there was the question of which room. Not the kitchen, with Rosina and the scullery maid in and out. Not the dining room, for the same reason. Not the cosy parlour with its fine wood panelling, for that was the preserve of his wife and the ladies she chose to entertain. No Greener could expect to set foot there, except to clean or scrub.
‘The answer is clear, Thomas,’ declared Isabella. ‘Why do you make difficulties where none exist? You must see the girl in your study.’
The rector shuddered, but saw no alternative. It was, then, to his study that Florrie and Lizzie were shown on their arrival. He considered his message a simple one, and simply he delivered it. Lizzie’s reaction was equally straightforward.
‘I would rather be dead.’
The rector was stunned by the girl’s response. He had expected relief, even gratitude; he had presented the proposal as something being done for the girl’s benefit, which was indeed how he saw it; it had not crossed his mind that she might refuse.
‘That is not your decision to make,’ he snapped.
‘I would kill myself before I agreed to any such marriage.’
Thomas spoke through lips white with fury. ‘That would be a terrible sin. You could never be forgiven. You would spend the whole of eternity in the blackest regions of hell. Not only for the terrible sin of despair. For ending the life of an innocent child as yet unborn. Think of Our Lord’s words. Take heed that ye despise not one of these little ones; for I say unto you, that in heaven their angels do always behold the face of my Father which is in heaven. It were better for such a man that a millstone were hanged about his neck and he were drowned in the depth of the sea, yea it were better for such an one never to have been born.’
‘What about me?’ the girl cried, her voice rising in her anguish. ‘What about what that man did to me?’
‘Child,’ said the rector, ‘We must deal with what is, not with what should be. He did what he did. You should not be with child, but with child you are.’
‘But he did wrong,’ sobbed Lizzie. ‘Do you admit he did wrong?’
‘He is an Earl. It is not for me to say…’
Lizzie was on her feet. ‘What does his father say?’
There was a sharp rap on the door and Isabella entered. ‘Tell her,’ she demanded. ‘Tell the child what the father of her defiler has to say.’
The rector stared wildly around the room.
‘Then I will,’ said his wife. She took Lizzie by the shoulders. ‘Lord Ravenshead has told his son that his behaviour was wicked. His lordship knows that no magistrate would arraign the boy and no judge condemn him. But he has left him in no doubt that, if he should ever do such a thing again, he will be disinherited and sent to the colonies beyond the seas to fend for himself, without hope of return.’ She turned to her husband. ‘Leave us.’
‘But I…’
‘Leave us,’ repeated his wife furiously.
Thomas pointed a shaking finger at Lizzie. ‘What passes between baron and earl is no concern of anyone else. Not me, and certainly not you. I command you on pain of excommunication. You will repeat what my wife has just said to no-one.’
When the rector had gone, Isabella pressed Lizzie back into her chair, and seated herself. ‘Men,’ she murmured. ‘We imagine we have plumbed their worst stupidities, and find we have not. My dear. Let me say to you the things my foolish husband should have said but did not.’
‘I will not have this man.’
‘I understand you. But, please. Hear what I have to say.’
Lizzie and Florrie walked homewards. ‘These people treat us like animals,’ Lizzie said.
‘Yes.’
Florrie said nothing more, and the walk continued in silence. As they reached the cottage gate, Lizzie stopped. She turned to her mother. ‘Do you want to marry Isaac Henderson?’
‘If I don’t I’ll end in the Woodside Poor House.’
‘But do you want to marry him?’
‘Oh, Lizzie. Want. What does want matter? Isaac is a good man.’
‘Mam. Are you…you’re crying. Why are you crying?’
It was true. Tears streamed down Florrie’s cheeks and her shoulders heaved.
‘Lady Isabella. Did you see her face? Her hands?’
‘She’s a lady, our Mam.’
‘She’s the same age as me!’ Florrie put her hand over her mouth as she realized she had been close to screaming. ‘Do you think anyone would look at us and know that? They’d think I was her mother!’
‘Oh, our Mam.’ Lizzie put out her arms and clasped to her this suddenly frail woman who had always seemed so strong.
Slowly Florrie detached herself. She wiped at her eyes with her frayed sleeve. Quietly she said, ‘Let’s go in. They’ll be wanting their supper. Such as it is.’
Later that evening, Lizzie went outside and sat on a flat stone on top of the wall. She loved to sit here, out of the turmoil of too many people in too little space, looking down into the valley as night fell. She loved it especially in summer when the swallows that nested under the eaves swooped through the air, feasting on insects. There were no swallows in March, and she had in any case more to think about than birds.
She was sixteen, no longer a child, a child of her own growing inexorably inside her. Her father would soon be dead. She scarcely remembered her mother. Florrie, who had filled that gap so well, seemed suddenly aged. Life had been a happy thing, if poor. As common land had been enclosed elsewhere, and the harvests had failed in poor summers, and war had taken men from the fields, the cost of food had risen. Meat that had been threepence a pound was now ninepence. The price of corn was horrendous. Without the pig they fattened each year on the common, the eggs from the chickens and the potatoes and cabbages from their garden they would have gone very hungry. Sometimes, indeed, they had been without food for a day or two, but the adults in her life had always made it come right. That was what adults did.
She was too young to marry. She could imagine the conversation between Tom Laws and the Baron. “Take this bastard off our hands, there’s twenty shillings in it for you.” The man could probably not believe his good fortune. He and his cronies would be drunk for a month on that sort of money, and then what? The rector’s wife said he was a good man, but what did that mean? That he would only beat her when he was too drunk to know what he did? The son had come into her life without leave and left her with his child. Was the father now to tell her who she must marry, and where she must live?
“Do you want to marry Isaac Henderson?” she had asked her mother, and the only answer was that it was him or the Poor House. Poor Florrie. She could have stayed in service fed, clothed, housed and free of worry, as her friend Rosina had chosen to do. Instead she had come into their lives, taken on three children and born two more without complaint.
And now, whether she wanted to or not, she would have to take a new man who would use her in the same way. She would raise children until she was utterly worn out. She would patch clothes and cook meals from ingredients that were always inadequate. And as if that were not enough she would pick potatoes, glean after harvest and scrub the houses of the rich for a pittance whenever the opportunity presented.
Or she could forget about Isaac and more children and cleaning other people’s floors and move with her family into a comfortable farmhouse.
&nb
sp; Lizzie returned to the crowded cottage and took up the neck cloth Lady Isabella had given her.
‘Where are you going?’ asked Florrie.
‘To the rectory. I may as well meet this Tom Laws, don’t you think? Before I refuse him?’
Florrie stared at her. ‘You can’t go out on your own at this time of night. I’ll come with you.’
‘You sit down and rest.’ She laid a hand on the shoulder of her oldest brother still at home. ‘You’ll keep us company, won’t you, Ned?’
The meeting took place the next morning. Tom was intensely nervous at the thought that the two things he wanted most—the hand of Lizzie Greener and to be a farmer—were within his grasp.
‘I do not wish to marry you, Tom Laws,’ was the first thing Lizzie said. ‘But you, I am told, wish to marry me. Why?’
Tom stared into the calm grey eyes in stunned silence. This was not the opening he had expected. At length, he said, ‘To get the tenancy of Chopwell Garth.’
Lizzie clapped her hand to her mouth and emitted a laugh that had no humour in it. ‘The rector’s wife told me you were a good man. She did not say you were also an honest one. Do you know why Lord Ravenshead wants to find me a husband?’
‘You are carrying his grandchild.’
‘And do you know how that came to be?’
‘I know it was no fault of yours.’
‘How old are you, Tom Laws?’
‘I was twenty-two last Michaelmas.’
‘And I am sixteen. You do not think you are too old to marry me?’
‘I would be kind to you, Lizzie. I have always admired you. When I came that morning to your house...’
‘I do not wish to marry you,’ Lizzie interrupted. ‘I have told you that. I am filled with anger at what that man did to me. I know you want to do the same and I am angry with you for it. I would hate being tied to you. I would not make your life easy.’