Sandringham Rose

by Mary Mackie

  Emotion exploded inside me as our mouths met and commingled. I clung to him, my fingers driving into his hair, holding him down to me, feeling my body press itself against him, hampered by the crinoline. I wanted him so badly. Needed him. And I knew he shared my need. Yet somewhere in the still-sane part of me I knew also that to give in to it would only bring more shame.

  Weeping with despair, I pushed at his shoulders. ‘No. No!’

  He released me at once and as I turned away, my hands to my face, his arm came about my waist. ‘Let me take you home. Come.’

  Despairing of myself, I let him lead me back to his gig.

  The vehicle was narrow, cramming us together so that my crinoline billowed out like a mettlesome horse until I got it under control. Geoffrey had brought my cloak and I huddled it round me, wishing the vehicle had more room; his proximity in the darkness beneath the hood of his vehicle was unbearable, though he sat forward and I sat back, behind his shoulder as he held the reins. What must he think of me? If only my head would clear!

  He didn’t speak until we were past the guard at the Norwich gates and clopping slowly down the lane; then he said, ‘Did he… D-did he actually—’

  ‘No, he didn’t. When I fought him off he seemed suddenly to remember that I was unmarried. And then he pretended it was all a joke. He said I should find a husband. Presumably married women make less fuss about being debauched.’

  ‘I’m sorry.’

  ‘I feel sick just thinking of it. I feel unclean. Poor Princess Alix…’ The words choked off as I swallowed a sob.

  ‘She’s been ill a long time.’

  ‘Does that excuse him?’ I cried.

  After a moment, he said quietly, ‘No. No, it doesn’t.’

  Tears slid from my eyes, wetting my face. Making no attempt to stop them I huddled behind him in the darkness, aware only of my intense misery. What would become of me now?

  ‘I have not discussed you with the prince,’ he said eventually. ‘Not at all. I have never told anyone about—’

  ‘Not even Hal Wyatt?’ I cried.

  He twisted to look at me over his shoulder, saying fiercely, ‘Especially not Hal Wyatt!’

  ‘Then how did he know about us? Oh, you must have said something, Geoffrey, even if you didn’t mean to, you must have given him some hint – enough for him to guess. Oh…’ Impatient with my tears, I wiped at them with my hands, but more came behind them, flowing warm and free. I couldn’t seem to stop crying.

  Bringing the horse to a halt, Geoffrey secured the reins and turned to me, saying, ‘Don’t, love. Please don’t.’ And, as if it were the most natural thing in the world, he gathered me into his arms. I didn’t resist; I wept helplessly against him. I needed comfort and he gave it to me, holding me warm and safe with his cheek on my hair.

  It was so good to be with him again, there where no one else could see, where only he and I existed. Clinging to him, I nestled closer, breathing in the familiar scent of him, feeling his guardian arm tighten as he stroked my hair and my cheek. He bent his head closer, rubbing his face against mine, his breath warm on my neck.

  ‘I never told anyone about us,’ he said. ‘I swear I did not. I would not. It was our secret, Rose. Too precious to be shared.’

  ‘I know. I know.’

  He was silent for a long while, holding me close while the mood between us softened to a familiar intimacy. ‘I didn’t tell you how beautiful you looked tonight,’ he murmured. ‘I was so glad your uncle partnered you with me. I couldn’t have borne to watch another man have the pleasure of your company.’ His lips brushed the lobe of my ear. His moustache felt soft, adding to the sensual pleasure of touch.

  In some detached part of my brain I was aware that wine was making me behave as I would never have behaved had I been sober, but at that moment I knew only that I ached for him, that I had missed him, that I needed the comfort of his nearness. I burrowed my face into the curve of his throat, kissing the pulse that throbbed there. My lips tasted the angle of his jaw and his cheek, until I found his waiting mouth and gave myself up to the soaring joy that filled me.

  He loves me, I thought. He has loved me all this time. I was wrong to doubt him. I should have told him about the child. The child. Our daughter. He doesn’t even know that she exists. If I tell him—

  Then a pheasant cried alarm, its croak harsh in the night. Undergrowth rustled loudly. Geoffrey lifted his head. For long moments we were both still, listening.

  ‘Poacher?’ I breathed.

  ‘No, I don’t think so. A fox, maybe. Or a weasel.’

  I shifted myself upright and sat back, shivering, drawing the cloak about my shoulders. Reality was seeping back through the haze of alcohol. ‘It might be one of the keepers. Perhaps we should go.’

  ‘Perhaps we should.’

  Turning away, he took up the reins and slapped the horse into motion, faster than before. I had the impression that he was as anxious as I to end this impossible evening.

  Wood Lodge, where the McDowalls now lived, was all in darkness. As we turned the corner to go under the tunnel of trees, I said, ‘Set me down at the gate. My father will be waiting for me.’

  Geoffrey made no reply, but I knew he understood. He stopped the vehicle just beyond the gates, so that the new wall hid us from the house, and then he leapt down and came to help me alight. Neither of us knew a graceful way to accomplish our parting.

  If I were to tell him the truth, perhaps even now there was hope for us. He might go and find our child, bring her back, acknowledge her – and me. ‘Geoffrey…’

  He said, ‘Lucy and I are to be m-married in August.’

  I stopped as if he had driven a dagger into me. I wanted to scream, or fly at him like a Fury. I did nothing. I only stood there, staring at him, dying a little.

  ‘Rose…’ He took me by the shoulders, peering down into my face in the darkness. ‘Please understand. Whatever I may have done as a single man, I intend to be a faithful husband. I can’t let Lucy down. I’ve made promises to her. Whatever I feel for you—’

  ‘I know what you feel for me,’ I broke in, my voice thick with self-loathing. ‘And you’re right. I’m a fool.’

  ‘You’re warm and sweet and true,’ he said in a low voice, his fingers gripping, almost shaking me. ‘I know that. I envy the man who wins your heart. I pray you will be happy, Rose Hamilton.’

  Hot tears splintered my sight as agony pierced me. How could he keep up the pretence? I broke free and backed away, saying hoarsely, ‘You don’t care whether I’m happy or not. You never did. Don’t lie to me, Geoffrey. I know it’s all lies!’

  With tears running down my face, I fled.

  In the house, a few lights were burning. If Father saw me, he would probably kill me. Little I cared. I sat down on the step, careless of my lilac silk, and waited until the night air had cooled my swollen face. How was I to explain my dishevelled appearance?

  But for once in my life fortune was with me. I saw no one as I went up to my room – Father had fallen asleep at his vigil in the parlour; even Grace had grown tired of waiting and given herself to dreams. The only person I saw was Ellen Earley, who was dozing in a chair in my room. She jumped awake and came yawning to help me undress, but she didn’t seem to notice anything amiss; she was just eager to get the job done and find her own bed. I let her go as soon as she had loosened my stays.

  Left alone, I stood before the mirror staring at my reflection. My hair was like a bird’s nest, my face blotched, my eyes so bleak with hopelessness that I couldn’t face them. Then as I began to turn away I stopped and looked closer, seeing a long red scratch mark that stood out against the whiteness of my breast. My fingers discovered its raised shape, and its slight soreness. The Prince of Wales’s fingernail had caused it when he had lunged so clumsily at me.

  Sickened by the memory, I blew out the lamp, climbed into bed, and cried myself to sleep.

  Seven

  On the day following his ‘quiet’ dinner party,
the Prince of Wales returned to his official duties. Presumably my uncle Henry accompanied him. Later, newspapers reported that the Prince and Princess of Wales were to spend a few weeks in Wiesbaden, the German spa where, it was hoped, the princess would recover her health.

  Life went on, as though that shattering evening at Sandringham Hall had never happened. I told no one about it. In time, I half convinced myself it had been a bad dream.

  One consolation was the fact that Mama seemed better. Her marriage was more secure, her relationship with Narnie mended, and Grace was being earnestly courted by Turnbull; Mama was, if not exactly happy, at least more settled.

  On occasion I took her and Grace to visit Narnie, leaving them at Willow Cottage while I went on to the Grange to see the Wyatt girls. My life seemed meaningless. I was haunted by thoughts of my child, my little lost daughter, imagining how she must be growing, wondering if she was happy, if she was healthy. Thoroughly unsettled, ill-tempered with little provocation, I quarrelled with Grace, was impatient with Mama, and even had words with inoffensive Felicity when she chided me for wishing aloud that I had been born male.

  ‘You can’t mean it, Rose,’ she said. ‘That’s your aunt Agnes speaking, not you. God made you as you are, for his own reasons.’

  ‘What reasons?’ I demanded. ‘Why is his purpose always so obscure? While he was creating me female, why didn’t he also create me compliant like you and your sisters? You may be content to moulder away without purpose to your life, but I hate it.’

  Felicity looked as if I had slapped her. ‘I don’t choose to moulder as an old maid. If Victor hadn’t been taken…’

  I was sorry to have hurt her. To Felicity faith was an anchor, to cling to without question. To me it was a string of mysteries whose enigmatic nature was an irritant to my restless, questing soul. That summer, everything irritated me. When Johnny came home, he too tried my limited patience. At fifteen, already as tall as I and still growing, he had reached a difficult time between boyhood and manhood. And he was bored. Most days he simply went off somewhere, and all too frequently the backus boy went with him. We heard about their escapades later, from villagers whose children had been frightened, or whose windows had been broken, or from farmers whose hens had been scattered. It all made an extra annoyance.

  Father’s health continued to concern me. He had started to add, ‘God willing’, to every sentence concerning the future, and he came more often to church, as if seeking answers that had so far eluded him. In that, he and I had much in common.

  Between haying and harvest, Father went to Norwich on business for a few days, leaving McDowall in charge. In his absence, I decided to take a good look over the farm while exercising Dandy. August had begun, bringing the date of Geoffrey’s wedding ever closer.

  The day was hot, the flies swarming and biting, and the crops were in a sad state, wheat and barley broken down, green tops chewed, legumes drooping and dying – all because of the hares. What they didn’t nibble they battered down. We had tried everything: tarring the runs, stuffing gorse into holes in hedges, erecting more sacking barriers… Nothing stopped the furry predators.

  Arriving home in a fret of concern for the farm, I discovered that Johnny had been up to yet more mischief. He had come in filthy, refused to say where he had been, then sworn at Mama, leaving her in tears and Grace outraged. I didn’t wait to hear the details; I hurried upstairs and burst into his room.

  Angry remonstrances died in my throat as I saw my young brother standing stripped to the waist, twisting towards the mirror in an effort to see his back – which was covered in livid blue and red weals. Someone had beaten him.

  ‘Johnny!’

  Startled, he whirled to face me, clasping his shirt to cover his chest. His face was streaked with dirt and tears. ‘Don’t tell Father! Don’t tell Father!’

  ‘Who did it?’ I strode across to him and grasped his shoulder, making him wince with pain as I turned him so that I could see the marks more clearly.

  ‘It was Sir Arthur.’

  ‘Sir Arthur Devlin?!’

  ‘He took his riding crop to me.’

  For a moment I couldn’t think coherently through my anger, then: ‘For what?’ Again I took hold of him, making him look at me. ‘What did you do to annoy him, Johnny?’

  ‘I was only walking on his land. Only walking. Truly, Rose! You won’t tell Father, will you? You won’t tell—’

  I heard no more; just as I was, in my working clothes, darned and dusty, with my hair caught in a snood beneath a broad-brimmed straw hat, I swirled out and ran down the stairs.

  * * *

  Ambleford Hall was a gracious old house of mellow red brick, its earliest parts dating from Elizabethan times. It was approached by a long drive flanked by towering oaks that met overhead, hiding the view until one came round a bend and out of the trees, into open parkland where sheep grazed. The park spread right up to rose-red walls with pointed archways, buttresses and leaded windows, the whole topped by tall twisting chimneys reminiscent of our old farmhouse.

  I galloped Dandy up the drive and threw myself to the ground, tossing the reins around a hook by a mounting block hollowed by the feet of centuries. Tugging on the brightly-polished brass bell-pull, I waited, tapping my foot, bitter thoughts fuelling my temper. A part of me hoped that Geoffrey would be there, so that he could witness the confrontation. How dared his fine family treat Hamiltons like serfs to be whipped and scourged!

  A butler appeared. I demanded to see Sir Arthur. Inviting me to wait in the small entry hall, where a dark Jacobean cupboard had pride of place, the man disappeared along a gloomy hallway, reappearing after only a few minutes to inform me that his master was ‘not at home’.

  ‘Then I want to see Lady Devlin,’ I said. ‘And don’t tell me she’s not at home either, for I’m not leaving until I’ve seen one or the other of them.’

  ‘Very well, miss. If you’ll be so kind as to wait here…’

  But this time I went after him, covertly, planning to disconcert the Devlins if, as I fully expected, they should refuse to see me.

  The dark-panelled hall, narrow and full of shadows, led past a stairwell and a gun-room whose open door allowed me to see the weapons ranged in their cases. There was a tang of expensive tobacco in the air: Sir Arthur might not be ‘at home’ – not to me – but he wasn’t far away. Ahead of me, the butler opened a door which let more light into the dark hall. I heard him speaking with someone, heard a woman’s voice answer, and with that I was pushing past him, saying, ‘Lady Devlin, I must insist that—’

  Lady Devlin wasn’t there. The only person in the room was a girl who jumped up in alarm, oversetting her tapestry frame. It clattered to the floor with a thud that made her wince visibly, a hand flying to her mouth.

  ‘Miss Hamilton!’ the butler exclaimed in outrage.

  ‘I’m sorry.’ The apology was for the startled girl, who looked as if she might faint. I hurried to pick up the frame for her and set it back on its stand. ‘Forgive me.’

  ‘I shall summon Her Ladyship at once,’ the butler warned, and went away.

  The room was long and narrow, bright with sunlight pouring through tall windows. Two marble pillars helped to support an ornate plaster ceiling. There was no fashionable clutter here; no ornaments and photographs, no antimacassars, bobbled velvet, or draperies to hide the ‘limbs’ of chairs, tables or piano. To my eyes the room with its exquisite Georgian furnishings looked half empty, but in that first moment I hardly saw it: all I saw was the frightened girl.

  I took her for a companion, maybe an impoverished relative being cared for by the Devlins. She looked to be about sixteen, a small, slender person with grey eyes set wide apart in a pallid face. She wore her mouse-brown hair drawn back into a netted chignon spangled with jet, matching the necklace that hung down the front of an afternoon gown in grey trimmed with black. The tapestry sampler she had been working on was equally colourless, worked in shades of brown, grey and black, with a few s
titches of dark blue.

  ‘I didn’t mean to startle you,’ I said. ‘But it’s important that I see Lady Devlin.’

  She stared at me with worried eyes, her hand still cupped as if to protect her mouth. ‘Do I know you?’

  ‘My name is Rose Hamilton. I’m a neighbour, from Orchards Farm.’

  ‘Oh. Yes.’ She glanced down at my clothes, reminding me that I was still dressed as I had been when I came in from the fields.

  ‘I came out in rather a hurry,’ I said with chagrin. ‘You’re right, it’s hardly the proper way to come calling, but I was so angry that—’

  ‘Miss Hamilton!’ The imperious voice made me stop and take a deep breath as I turned to face Lady Ophelia. She stood erect and severe, her face, though thin, still striking, set off by greying fair hair, with a frothy jabot at the throat of a black gown. ‘How dare you burst into my home in this way! Leave at once. You’re unwelcome here.’

  ‘Lady Devlin…’

  ‘I told you to leave.’

  My courage faltered. She was a formidable woman, with a way of looking down her thin nose that made me feel like a beetle she was about to squash. But I remembered Johnny’s back, marred by blue and red weals. ‘I shan’t leave until I’ve said what I came to say. This feud between Sir Arthur and my father has gone far enough. Today your husband beat my younger brother – viciously used his riding crop on the boy – merely for walking on Ambleford property.’

  The girl behind me made a small sound like a choked-off moan. She looked sick, her hand still hiding her mouth.

  ‘Crimmond!’ Lady Devlin snapped.

  The butler, who had been waiting behind her, advanced on me.

  ‘If he lays hands on me,’ I said, ‘I shall take pleasure in charging him with assault.’

  The butler stopped, looking uncertainly at his mistress.

  Breathing angrily through her nose, she looked me up and down with disdain. ‘I’ve heard about you, Rose Hamilton. You’re a disgrace to your sex. How dare you come to my house looking like a field-worker, forcing your way into my drawing-room, upsetting Miss de Crecy? If you don’t leave of your own free will I shall have you ejected from this property. And if you dare to lay a complaint then I shall be glad to see you in court and have you explain this to a jury. I know with whom they will sympathise.’