A Dangerous Act of Kindness

by A Dangerous Act of Kindness (retail) (epub)

  ‘Good evening, Mrs Wilson,’ he said.

  ‘Good evening. Rough old night, isn’t it?’ she replied, giving him an arch look that he didn’t much like.

  ‘Nothing wrong, I hope,’ he said.

  She came across to him and leaned in.

  ‘Let’s pop inside,’ she said. ‘I’m afraid I’ve come with some rather bad news.’

  ‘Bad news?’ he said. ‘What about?’

  ‘Best go inside,’ she said.

  He ushered her into the house and called his mother who fluttered out of the kitchen, wiping her hands on her housecoat.

  ‘Goodness,’ she said, ‘I wasn’t expecting anyone. Look at the state of me.’ She untied her housecoat and dropped it onto the hall chair, quickly checking her hair in the mirror by the door. ‘Come on in, Mrs Wilson. I’ll make some tea.’

  ‘It’s well past teatime,’ Mrs Wilson said merrily. ‘Surely the sun’s over the yardarm, isn’t it?’

  ‘Yes. Of course. Come on through to the drawing room. Hugh, darling, would you do the honours?’

  Hugh sighed and turned to follow the women. The smell of stew was wafting into the hall from the kitchen and he was hungry as hell.

  As he fixed the drinks over by the sideboard, Mrs Wilson chattered on about the weather and the latest polio epidemic, pulling her gloves off and laying them carefully on the coffee table before settling back on the sofa, hugging her handbag against her as if she’d stowed the crown jewels in it.

  ‘I’ll leave you to it then,’ he said. His mother gave him a sharp and desperate look but Mrs Wilson said, ‘Oh, no, dear. I think you should stay.’ Something in her voice made him pour himself a measure of whiskey rather larger than usual before taking up a position beside his mother, who was hovering at the fender with a look of confused anxiety. He forced himself to rest his elbow on the chimney piece, affecting concentrated interest.

  Mrs Wilson surveyed the two of them and, clearly satisfied that she had their attention, she said, ‘I’ve been contacted by the Ministry of Health. They had some rather bad news, I’m afraid.’ She paused to take a sip of her sherry, leaving a scarlet crescent of lipstick on the rim. ‘Do you remember that young mother and boy who were evacuated to Millicent’s farm at the beginning of the war?’

  ‘Of course,’ his mother said. ‘The Russells – June and Danny.’

  ‘That’s right,’ Mrs Wilson said, leaning forward to put her sherry glass on the table before drawing a letter from her handbag. She studied the address for a moment and said, ‘I suppose they wrote to me because I organised the billets for the evacuees and they had to start somewhere.’ She gave a brittle laugh before clearing her throat and letting her face slip into an expression of deep seriousness. ‘I’m afraid something absolutely dreadful has happened. Poor Mrs Russell is dead.’

  ‘June? Dead?’ his mother said, leaving the fireplace and lowering herself into a chair. ‘How ghastly. Whatever happened? Was it one of those dreadful V2 rockets?’

  ‘No,’ Mrs Wilson said, raising a pencilled eyebrow. ‘Not a bomb at all. Apparently,’ – here she paused, straightened her back and leaned forward – ‘it was her husband.’

  ‘Oh, good God,’ Hugh said. He took a swig of whiskey and paced over to the French windows, staring out at the unkempt garden. The cherry trees jerked in the wind, scattering leaves across the lumpy lawn. He had the clearest image of June under the harsh lights of the kitchen, staring up at him with cowed eyes. Mrs Wilson continued behind him, ‘Evidently, the very first thing he did when he was demobbed was hunt her down. You would’ve thought he’d seen enough of that sort of thing when he was fighting.’

  Hugh spun round and stared at the back of the woman’s head, at her silly hat, with its preposterous feathers sticking out of it like some Red Indian squaw.

  ‘I knew it,’ he said. ‘We all knew it. We knew he was a violent man and we never did a thing to stop her going back. Christ almighty, we never did a thing, even after he attacked Millie.’

  ‘Wouldn’t have done any good,’ Mrs Wilson said, straining to turn her head to look at him. ‘That sort of woman always goes back. I had a cleaner once…’

  ‘Yes, yes,’ Hugh said impatiently, pacing back round and standing in front of her. ‘We all remember you once had a cleaner.’

  ‘The problem is,’ Mrs Wilson said, flashing an affronted look and fiddling with the brooch at her throat, ‘there’s the child.’

  ‘Goodness gracious,’ his mother said. ‘Of course, how ghastly. I suppose her husband will hang?’

  ‘I’m sure of it.’

  ‘And that poor little boy will be left without a soul in the world.’

  Mrs Wilson frowned. ‘No. Not at all. That’s what I’ve come to tell you. I was absolutely flabbergasted, as you can imagine, when I read the letter. The child is to be brought here.’

  ‘Here?’ his mother said. ‘But there must be family in London, surely? June lived at Enington Farm for less than a year, didn’t she?’

  ‘I suppose Danny grew rather fond of the place,’ Hugh said. ‘All the same, it does seem a bit odd, asking us to take him. How old will he be now? Eleven, I suppose. Twelve, maybe?’

  ‘Oh, no,’ Mrs Wilson said with a studied slowness, drawing the letter out of the envelope. ‘They haven’t written to me about the twelve-year old. I think he’s been placed in the foster care system. No, I’m talking about the toddler.’

  It was Hugh’s turn to sink down onto a chair.

  ‘She had another baby?’ he said.

  ‘Yes, dear. And, according to this…’ Mrs Wilson said pushing a piece of paper across the coffee table towards him, an unpleasant smile playing on her lips, ‘you’re the father.’

  Chapter Eighty Three

  Hugh shoved the uneaten plate of stew aside and stared at the knots in the kitchen table. ‘Just a bit of fun,’ that’s what they’d said. The night of the dance his blood had been up, but not for June. ‘Look at me,’ June kept saying, her chapped lips pressed to his mouth as he struggled with camis and suspenders on the rag-rug in front of the fire.

  He knew his mother was watching him. She’d even lit a cigarette, something he hadn’t seen her do since his father died. That blasted birth certificate lay on the table between them along with the letter that Mrs Wilson had, so bloody kindly, left with them so that they ‘could make their own arrangements’.

  ‘It’s a lie,’ he said. ‘It’s a bloody lie. Why would June do that? Christ almighty, we were kind enough to her, weren’t we?’

  ‘Were you?’ his mother said.

  He shoved his chair back, making the legs screech on the tiles, and pushed his hands through his hair, gripping the roots, screwing up his face. He felt such a rage building inside him. He heard the crackle of tobacco as his mother drew on the cigarette, the rattle of the saucer as she knocked the ash off on the edge.

  ‘What’s to stop her naming any man she wants?’ he said.

  His mother crammed the cigarette into the saucer and brushed the ash from her front before looking up and fixing Hugh with the most penetrating stare. He didn’t like it. He looked away and started picking at the hard skin on the palm of his hand.

  ‘I think it’s time you stopped fooling yourself, Hugh. You forget I knew that girl too, and I know she wouldn’t have made up a story like that if it wasn’t true. And I’ve a pretty good idea I know exactly when it happened. You were tight as a tick when you came back from that dance.’

  ‘When?’

  ‘Oh, come on, Hugh. You know perfectly well what I’m talking about. Do you think I didn’t hear you, ricocheting up the stairs in the small hours of the morning? I thought you’d been making whoopee with Millie. No such luck. Did you know you’d got her pregnant?’

  ‘No. Of course I didn’t know…’ His voice trailed off and he remembered how desperately she clung to him the night Danny broke his arm. What had she said? ‘You’ll take care of us, won’t you, Mr Adamson?’

  Is that what she meant? B
loody hell, that was what she meant.

  ‘Well, it should have crossed your mind,’ his mother was saying. ‘That poor girl changed after that night. She was listless, always crying off work. I thought something must have happened between you. If someone had told me she was chucking up, I’d probably have guessed but I thought she was simply pining for you.’

  ‘You never said a word,’ he muttered.

  ‘I’m ashamed to say I was hoping it wasn’t true but it was pretty clear she was potty about you. The night poor little Danny bust his arm, her eyes never left your face. I was relieved when she went back to London; I wanted the whole thing nipped in the bud. It never crossed my mind that she was pregnant.’

  Christ, he thought, if he’d realised at the time, he could have sorted something out. Christaff was still around – he could have organised something, surely? Got rid of it.

  His heart gave a couple of suffocating beats.

  In his mind’s eye he saw Danny, that thin little boy running through the fields, whacking the heads off the nettles, riding the tractor, clinging to Hugh’s shoulder, his head swathed in scarves because he didn’t like the noise. And he thought of all those children, lined up and shot, herded and gassed – got rid of.

  He wanted to disappear and come back in another form so that he didn’t have to face the world, face Millie, face his mother. He looked up and absorbed his mother’s steady gaze. It filled him with fear and self-loathing, as if his body was packed with sweat and he knew there was only one salve.

  ‘You think we should take them both, don’t you?’ he said.

  Mrs Adamson nodded. ‘I think we should.’

  ‘What am I going to tell Millie?’

  ‘You must tell her the truth.’

  * * *

  Millie headed back across her yard. The autumn gales had blown themselves out over the last few days and the evening was still and fine. A low mist lay over the grass in the orchard and she could smell apples on the air. It’ll be Christmas before we know it, she thought and a strange tension stiffened her back. She needed to speak to Hugh. Her circumstances had changed. Finally the requisition order had been lifted and Enington Farm was hers.

  It shouldn’t make a lot of difference to Hugh but it made a vast difference to her. When she was widowed, the farm was in so much trouble that Jack’s final gift to her meant nothing. Now, as she let herself into the farmhouse, she was stepping into her own fiefdom, her sanctuary of warmth and comfort. She knew she couldn’t stay here once she became Mrs Hugh, but she could tenant it out and have an independent income, a bit of running away money, as Mrs Adamson liked to call it. Millie was never sure why her future mother-in-law imagined she would want to run away.

  She finished her supper and sat in the kitchen, reading a paper, every now and again looking out of the uncurtained window at the moon slowly rising above the Downs, the lights of Shawstoke winking in the distance.

  She often thought of Lukas, particularly as there were so many German prisoners in Britain now. She’d long since stopped hoping to see him in the crowd but occasionally she recognised a trait in the way a prisoner held himself, the shape of the back of a head or the line of a mouth that reminded her that once he’d been real.

  Gyp, who’d been sleeping in front of the range, raised his head, his tail slapping on the floor. Millie listened – yes, there was a car coming. She folded her newspaper and went to the door and there was Hugh, walking slowly across the yard, his head bent. When he stepped into the pool of light spilling from the doorway, he looked pale.

  ‘Hello,’ she said, offering her cheek up for a kiss, ‘I haven’t seen you for days.’

  ‘No. Well… I’ve been rather busy, what with this and that. I was wondering, could I come in for a minute?’ Millie stepped aside, a frown on her face.

  ‘Of course,’ she said, following him down to the kitchen. ‘Can I get you anything?’

  ‘No. Yes, perhaps. Have you got a glass of cider?’

  ‘I have.’ She went through to the pantry and fetched a couple of bottles from last year’s pressing. Back in the kitchen she found Hugh pacing up and down, squeezing his cap between his hands. He said nothing as she collected a couple of glasses, poured them and handed one to him. He gulped most of it down it down and dashed his hand across his mouth, his eyes moving restlessly around the room. She stood, her own glass poised, waiting for him to speak. Eventually she said, ‘I have some news.’

  He swung round and stared at her, his eyes blazing. ‘You do?’

  ‘I heard from the War Ag a couple of days ago.’

  ‘Oh, yes. Yes, I know. They’ve been in touch with me too. I should have come over. Thoroughly deserved. You’ve turned this dairy round,’ he said raising his glass to her. She noticed that his hand was trembling. ‘Mistress of Enington Farm,’ he said, then laughed nervously.

  ‘You don’t mind?’

  ‘Mind? Christ, of course I don’t mind,’ he said with such vehemence she stepped towards him and placed a hand on his arm.

  ‘Are you sure? You seem very agitated about something.’

  He pulled away from her and snatched at a chair, sitting down heavily, a few drops of cider leaping out of the glass as he banged it onto the table.

  ‘Hugh. Whatever’s the matter?’ She drew up a chair and took his hand. He turned to her, an awful expression on his face.

  ‘I have news too. Terrible news.’ God, she thought, his mother’s dying. ‘June’s dead.’ For a moment she couldn’t think who he was talking about. ‘June Russell,’ he said, his tone angry as if she was purposely misunderstanding him.

  ‘Oh, my God,’ she said, releasing his arm and sitting back in her chair. ‘How? When?’

  ‘A few months ago. Silly cow.’

  ‘Hugh!’

  ‘Well, she is. If she’d gone to the police every single time he beat her up…’ he said thumping the table with his fist to emphasise each word, ‘he’d never have come here, never have attacked you, never have hunted her down and…’

  ‘Killed her? Her husband killed her?’

  Hugh nodded mutely.

  ‘What about Danny?’ she said.

  ‘He’s fine,’ he said and flung himself back in his chair. ‘He’s absolutely fine.’

  ‘He can’t be,’ she said, struggling to understand his attitude. ‘How can that poor little boy be fine?’

  Hugh leapt to his feet and started pacing up and down. He came to a halt facing the range and grasped hold of the railing along the front, dropping his head to his chest, his shoulders heaving. The energy of his distress filled the room and Millie went over to him, laid her hand on his back.

  At her touch he turned, clasped her to him. A single, shuddering sob broke into her hair. Gently she pressed him away and looked into his face. He was red now, his eyes swimming and she was gripped by the same alarm she felt when Jack dropped into his pit of despair.

  ‘Darling,’ she said gently, ‘come and sit down.’ She took his hand and led him back to the table. ‘This is dreadful news but this… this reaction. It’s not like you.’

  ‘You don’t know me,’ he said.

  ‘Of course I know you.’

  He started to shake his head, slowly at first, still looking at her but then more violently as if he was trying to tear his eyes away. Eventually he drew himself up, a hard look came into his eyes and he said, ‘I have a son.’

  Millie frowned.

  ‘You have a…?’

  ‘A son.’ His shoulders relaxed now he’d made the first admission. ‘I slept with June on the night of the dance.’

  She didn’t take her hand away. He did. She stayed quite still, looking at him.

  She hoped he imagined she was battling with abrupt and brutal feelings of jealousy but she wasn’t. She felt nothing except an overwhelming relief. Even as it washed through her, like a warming gulp of poteen, she knew it was the wrong emotion. Her affection for him hadn’t changed but he was no longer on a higher moral plane, and her anxie
ty was all for his suffering.

  ‘My God,’ she said. ‘Had you said Ruby, well…’

  ‘I know. God, Millie, I know. I am so, so sorry. I was drunk, terribly drunk and it was a moment of madness. She meant nothing to…’

  She raised a hand to stop him. She would let him imagine her distress but she wouldn’t let him lie.

  ‘It means something now,’ she said.

  He looked as shocked as if she’d struck him.

  ‘You mean you and me, don’t you?’

  ‘No. I mean Danny and… Does your son have a name?’

  ‘God, Millie. You’re being so good about this.’ He snatched up his glass, took another swig and said with a hollow laugh, ‘She called him Hugh.’

  ‘When did all this come out?’

  ‘A few days ago.’ He was talking now, as easily as if they were discussing which crop to plant in Topfield. He was ranting about Mrs Wilson, explaining his plans for Danny as well as his little brother, his determination that, having made such a monumental blunder, he intended to fulfil his obligations, stand by his responsibilities – everything she would have expected from Hugh.

  She poured more cider and listened to his confession, as unmoved as a parish priest. She wondered briefly if her detachment was the numbness of grief for a loss of trust between them but deep down she knew it wasn’t. His transgression released her from the guilt of knowing she’d never been in love with him, and as she listened to his recriminations she wondered if, after everything that had happened, it really mattered. Her affection for Hugh ran deep. Perhaps that was enough.

  ‘You’re a saint, Millie. Do you know that? Where do you find your compassion?’ He was massaging her hand in his.

  ‘You’ve found compassion – for Danny.’

  ‘Perhaps compassion isn’t the right word.’ She could see him struggling, weighing up what he was about to say. ‘I think I mean forgiveness. You do forgive me, don’t you?’ Before she could reply he hurried on, ‘That’s why you’re a saint, a goddess.’