A Time Like No Other Page 15

  ‘Oh, no, Mrs Sinclair. This is our ’ome an’ as soon as ah’ve ’ad me a bit of a rest I’ll tekk meself back ter work. Mr Sinclair’s bin right good to us but ah can manage on me own now.’

  Susan Harper, like her husband had been and the Yorkshire family from which she came, was fiercely independent and had it not been for the baby in her womb would not have accepted Harry Sinclair’s help. But now she was delivered she would see to herself and her family. This lovely young woman who had appeared so magically to help her and Sam had been a blessing but Susan would strap her baby on her back, take young Sam’s hand and within a day or two be back at her loom.

  Lally, who argued with her for the best part of an hour, was forced to admit defeat for the time being but as she moved slowly out into the fitful sunshine she made up her mind that she would keep her eye on this little family and at the first sign of it faltering she would make it her business to make their lives better. After all, she had delivered young Jack!

  12

  Within weeks of their marriage Harry began the renovations to the Priory but though there was warmth, comfort, luxury even, apart from the new bathroom which was a miracle to the maidservants who had the task of cleaning it, somehow he managed not to change the nature of the beautiful old house. The original medieval great hall, stone-flagged, oak-ceilinged. The long gallery lined with an impressive array of Fraser ancestral portraits. An old wing with plasterwork and paintwork so obviously nearing the end of its life that it reminded Harry of the musky beauty of rose petals approaching decay. The carved oak staircase rising majestically from the hall, the dining room, the drawing room, all in sad need of repair and the ancient and dilapidated winter garden. All had a frail beauty, the baroque plaster moulding mellowed from the original white to delicate cream in places and all of which would need a master craftsman to put right. The chimneys which smoked would be cleaned and repaired and, in short, Harry Sinclair meant to make this his own magnificent establishment until he decided the time had come for him and his growing family to move on.

  Even outside where Harry liked to stroll with an after-dinner cigar was scarcely touched; the wych-elms, the sycamores, the gnarled and knotted oaks from generations ago seemed to please the new tenant and he spent many hours with Barty and Froglet discussing their care. He inspected the stables and outbuildings, assessing what needed to be done to restore their crumbling walls and leaking roofs, the coach house which had the small gig for Lally’s use and soon would have a new and splendid coach with its own coachman. There would be quarters above the stables and coach house for the outdoor servants and their families.

  Inside the house the hall was furnished with deep and comfortable armchairs grouped round the enormous fireplace in which a great leaping fire was kept burning night and day and at one side of the hall a big refectory table of heavy oak was installed on which estate maps were laid out along with newspapers and sporting magazines. The bedroom where he and Lally were to sleep, since he did not care to use the same bed she had once shared with Chris, was transformed into what looked like a bridal posy in peach silk and white lace with a dressing room knocked through to a somewhat more spartan bedroom where, should he be late back from a meeting or at the mill, Harry would spend the night. Their bedroom had an enormous bed, its curtains drawn up into a gleaming brass crown, the curtains at the windows of the finest, lightest silk, exquisitely draped and tied back with lace ribbon. There were crystal chandeliers with flickering candles in the main rooms downstairs, their floors covered in pale Chinese carpets in lovely shades of apple green and pink, their texture like velvet.

  The winter garden was given over to Barty who could scarcely believe the amount of brass he was allowed to spend. It was completely stripped of its wilting plants and re-stocked with a huge pot containing bird-of-paradise flower, tubs of bleeding heart vine, orchid cactus in hanging baskets plus a vividly colourful display of trailing ivy in all shades of green and geraniums of every hue from the palest pink to a startling red with white mock orange blossom to set it all off. There were water hyacinth in a small pool and even cages in which singing birds poured out their hearts. There were crimson climbing hibiscus and perfumed jasmine, a wax plant with flowers that perfumed the night and passion flowers with edible fruit, and here and there a magnificent palm tree. The floor was re-tiled in terracotta and in the centre stood a round table covered with a green, floor-length cloth topped with a lace throw. Four wicker chairs heaped with cushions surrounded it and, usually drowsing in a companionable heap, Ally and Fred and the kitchen cat found they liked its warmth. Even in the winter when the sun was absent it was warm with some hidden heating system Harry had had installed.

  Extra servants were employed, two gardeners named Wilf and Evan, a groom, Ben, come from Mill House to care for Harry’s bay, Piper, Ebony, whom Chris had once ridden, Jeb, the moor pony, Blossom the cob who pulled the gig and the lawn mower, Lally’s mare, Merry, and the two ponies Harry was to acquire for Jamie and Alec when they were old enough to ride. There were two more housemaids, one for the kitchen named Dulcie and another called Tansy who was to help Jenny and Clara as a parlour-maid. Biddy was in charge of the kitchen and housekeeping but Harry confided to Lally that he was seriously considering employing someone to do all the cooking, for Mrs Stevens, as he called her, had enough to do with the general supervising of the house. A steward was hired, a man by the name of Cameron with a broad Scots accent, stern and dour with a wife and three silent children and they were housed in what had once been a tumbledown cottage at the back of the stables, but with money spent on it was transformed into a cosy home for the five of them.

  Lally often wondered what the Weavers of Foxwell Farm made of Cameron but as she grew bigger and more ponderous and it was realised that the new Mrs Sinclair was already pregnant with her third child, Mr Sinclair’s child, it was no longer considered circumspect to move about the estate and the tenants scarcely saw her. She sauntered about the increasingly well-kept gardens, her two sons tumbling about her skirts for Alec, now over a year old, was already floundering perilously on sturdy legs, constantly and good-humouredly falling over and picking himself up. The two dogs raced about and knocked the boys’ legs from under them and the garden was filled with laughter. Even the kitchen cat deigned to walk in a dignified manner at Lally’s back! It was winter now, and cold, with Christmas come and gone, but she wrapped them up warmly in their brand-new outfits and to Dora’s disapproval she took them out of the nursery and down the back stairs, out into the garden and across the meadow to the paddocks where Jamie as usual did his best to nip under the fence rails to get to the horses. There were six of them and Jamie wanted to ride them all!

  She lived in a luxury she had never before known. Harry had given her carte blanche to spend whatever she wanted for the children and the rooms they occupied at the top of the house and with the help of a builder and a decorator provided by Harry, who seemed always able to call on men to do his bidding, she had walls knocked through so that there was a night nursery, a day nursery, a bedroom for Dora and a room planned for a schoolroom. It was all painted in a delicate cream with scores of highly coloured pictures in bright rows where small people could most easily see them. There were toys, for with money to spend without thought she bought her sons trains and boats and stuffed animals, books and games all piled on to white painted shelves and Dora again tutted disapprovingly because her charges were in distinct danger of being ruined!

  When it was delivered she often took the gig over the moor – with Carly on the sturdy moor pony beside her since Harry would not hear of her going alone – to visit Susan Harper who, though she was glad to see her and thanked her politely for the huge basket of food she brought over, was not best pleased to the recipient of charity. But Lally knew, being a sensible and responsible mother, that Susan was deeply glad of the extra food, since it kept her Sam healthy and made it possible for her to nurse Jack with a plentiful supply of milk and though the three of them set off
each weekday to tramp to the mill, the exercise did them no harm. Her room was kept spotless and her fire was never allowed to go out for she could afford the extra coal. Susan knew, as did many of the nursing mothers who worked at High Clough Mill, that Mr Sinclair was a fair employer. He expected a decent day’s work from them all, men, women and children, but he was resented in many parts of the woollen trade for what was considered his laxity with those who worked at his spinning machines and power looms. It was well known that women who were forced to take their newborn babies to work with them were allowed time to stop and feed them and it was a bloody wonder to them how he managed to make a profit with his soft ways. There was a sort of a cre’ che where a woman was kept to tend to these infants and a schoolroom where, for an hour a day, the older children were taught their lessons. Those who scorned him did not realise that Harry Sinclair, instead of being ‘soft’ was in fact a shrewd businessman, for the women he employed were the most efficient in the industry. Susan Harper knew that, for wasn’t she one of them? He had even sent across one of his men to put sturdy locks on her door in the tenement building where she and her children lived and though she was not on intimate terms with Mrs Sinclair she was deeply grateful for the better life her friendship – if she could call it that – with the maister’s wife afforded her.

  It was March when Roly Sinclair came home from his travels!

  She was dressed in a warm and luxurious bottle-green cloak, its hood and hem edged with pale grey fur and on her hands she wore pale grey kid gloves. She was in the garden in deep conversation with Barty who, with no children or grandchildren of his own, and with the extra help had a bit of time to spare, asked her hesitantly whether she might fancy a tree house for the lads, as he called them. There was a grand old oak with branches that would lend themselves to such a thing, not far from the house and with a ladder, which he, of course, would build with the help of Froglet and the handyman. Master Jamie and Master Alec, when they were a bit older, would be made up with it, in his opinion. It would be safe and sturdy, he would see to that, and Lally was made to realise that he and Froglet, who hung about at his side, were quite excited at the idea. They kept their eyes averted from the burgeoning bulge of her pregnancy as Barty walked her down the grassy slope towards the tree he had in mind, his arm at the ready should Mrs Sinclair need it in her cumbersome state. They were all surprised by the speed at which she and the new master had started a bairn and at the size of her already but they were simple folk and accepted her condition without question.

  Not so Biddy! She had watched her mistress almost from the first days of her marriage, for the speed with which it had happened had startled her. Of course with Mr Sinclair about she and Miss Lally had not been as close as once they had been. She could no longer wander in and out of her little mistress’s bedroom as she had been wont to do and when she did, after the master had left for the mill, Miss Lally was often still in bed. But one day, a few weeks after the wedding, she had taken up a pile of freshly laundered underwear and with barely a tap on the door had entered the bedroom to find Miss Lally about to shrug herself into her shift. For a moment the girl had stood with her arms above her head, the shift in her hands, and the swelling of her belly, the growing fullness of her breasts were fully revealed.

  Biddy hissed unbelievingly then the clothing dropped from her suddenly nerveless hands.

  ‘So that’s why . . .’ Her mouth dropped open and her face lost its colour and for a moment she thought she would faint and it was only the small distressed sound that came from the back of Lally’s throat that kept her upright.

  ‘Biddy . . . Biddy, please . . . What else could I do?’ she pleaded, knowing that Biddy would understand exactly what she meant.

  Biddy sank on to the unmade bed and Lally knelt at her feet, taking her hands in her own and so they remained for several long moments until Biddy regained her senses.

  ‘Whose?’

  ‘Roly.’

  ‘Does Mr Harry know?’

  ‘Oh, yes. I told him and at once he offered—’

  ‘Marriage.’ The word was harsh but at the same time Biddy knew a vast relief, for who cared who the father was as long as her lamb was safe.

  ‘Yes.’

  All Biddy said was, ‘Thank God,’ and from that moment Biddy Stevens was Harry Sinclair’s ‘man’ and would have died for him. She could not do enough for him, in an unobtrusive way, of course, and would have no word spoken against him. Not that any of the servants would do so and in every way she could, should anything have been whispered, she kept up the pretence that Miss Lally and her new husband had, perhaps, anticipated their wedding night and the servants, forgetting the way Mr Roly had haunted the place before the wedding, accepted it.

  ‘Now tha’ see’t way them branches mekk a sorter platform, Miss Lally,’ Barty was saying, pointing with his hoe into the crown of the oak while Froglet nodded his head enthusiastically. ‘Well, that’s steady as a rock up there an’ when us’ve—’

  He was interrupted by the sound of horse’s hooves on the now smoothly raked gravel of the drive. The children and the dogs began a surge towards the horseman and the three adults, if you could call Froglet such, turned to look up the drive in the direction of the approaching animal and the man on his back.

  It was Roly Sinclair!

  She had often pondered on how it would be when they met again, the unthinkable moment when they would come face to face but now that it had actually arrived it was not at all as she had imagined it to be. How had she imagined it to be? He would know, naturally, that she had married his brother and that she was pregnant but he would not be aware that the child she carried was his. When the baby was born he might speculate, as many would on its early arrival, but she was a respectably married woman with a wealthy and influential husband and nothing could change that. But somehow the circumstances did not unduly worry her. She was heavy not only in her body but in the senses, her emotions lulled, half dormant, pulse beat and heartbeat sluggish, submerged in her role of breeding female, too placid and patient to arouse any kind of anxiety.

  Nevertheless she turned away, ready to go as fast as she could towards the house and the safety of Biddy who was the only one who knew the truth. Biddy would see to him. Biddy would get rid of him. Biddy would explain that Mrs Sinclair was not up to visitors, but it was too late as Roly covered the last couple of yards to where they stood, skilfully avoiding the boisterous group of children and animals. He leaped gracefully from the saddle and handed the reins to the open-mouthed Froglet and took Lally’s limp hand in his. His eyes swept the bulging line of her stomach as he bent to kiss her hand.

  ‘Lally, my dear, how well you look. Positively thriving, I must say, and it all seems to have happened so quickly. I had no idea you and Harry were . . . well, never mind, you are now my sister-in-law and I must say I couldn’t be more pleased. I said so to Harry when I arrived this morning but he had something tricky on the loom and he was in a temper so I left him to ride over here to congratulate you.’

  Without turning he indicated to Barty and Froglet that they were to leave and take his gelding with them, then, putting Lally’s lifeless hand through his arm, he began to lead her towards the house. ‘Come, are you not going to offer me a drink?’

  ‘Of course,’ she answered, falling automatically into the role of welcoming hostess which had been bred in her. They walked side by side up the slope, Lally still in the state of startled shock which the sight of him had produced. Suddenly realising she had, in her bewilderment, totally forgotten her children, she wrenched her hand from his arm and turned back but Barty and Froglet had them securely in hand, informing them sternly that if they did not do as they were told, which was follow their mam, Barty would not build them the promised tree house. They had been enjoying the freedom their mama allowed them, for everyone knew her to be an indulgent mother, away from the stricter rules of Dora, and they did not want to return to the nursery but they did want a tree house even if the b
aby Alec was not at all sure what it was.

  It was the gentleman who persuaded them.

  ‘Come along now,’ ordered in a way they were both aware he meant. Not in five minutes or even five seconds but now. Recognising the voice of authority they plodded up the slope after their mama and the gentleman.

  ‘It’s as well you have married Harry,’ Roly remarked pleasantly, taking Lally’s arm again. ‘They need a man behind them, I’m thinking, and Harry will stand no nonsense. Where is their nursemaid hiding, would you say? I do believe in children being restrained in the nursery, don’t you?’

  Again she pulled her arm away from his hand. ‘No, I do not,’ she snapped and perhaps for the first time she realised that of the two brothers she had married the right one. Harry was inclined to be sharp with the boys at times, but he did it in a way that let them know he meant what he said. At the same time he was always fair, and already her sons, though still so young, understood that he was a tolerant, kind-hearted man. She herself had come to recognise that kindness could easily be confused with weakness but this was not the case with Harry. He was a man of many layers, unpredictable, deep, keeping the private part of himself, which he allowed no one to see, well concealed, but as the weeks passed and she grew accustomed to his presence she had felt herself drawn to his masculine virility. He had at first taken her every night in their bed but as she grew bigger and more clumsy he had taken to sleeping in the bedroom on the far side of the dressing room and, strangely, she had missed him. She would forever be grateful to him for what he had done, for her, for Chris’s boys, for Susan Harper even, and soon, for his brother’s child who was doing a fandango in her belly at this very moment.

  Biddy’s face was a picture as Lally and Roly entered the hallway. She was directing Tansy, the new housemaid, in mixing furniture polish, following a new recipe she had found in a magazine and was eager to try, which included linseed-oil, turpentine, vinegar and spirits of wine. She supposed Mr Sinclair’s housekeeper must already have taught the girl the rudiments of being a parlour-maid but Biddy liked her own ways and was busy teaching the lass what they were.