Softly Grow the Poppies Page 23

  Lieutenant Tim Elliott thought he must have died on the long weary road he had tramped only to end up in his mother’s kitchen. There was Mrs Atkins who baked the most delicious almond biscuits in the world. He and James and Paul used to untie her apron strings and run screeching with laughter as she chased them with her wooden spoon. There was the old dresser and the shining black-leaded stove, the gleaming copper pans, the neat maids in their starched aprons and the ginger cat stretched out in front of the fire.

  He had tried, God how he had tried for work but nobody wanted an ex-officer with a first-class degree in history. What good could a man steeped in literature and history be in a country doing its best to recover from a devastating war? He was over-qualified to teach the children of a working-class man, he had been told kindly, so he had joined the multitude of ex-servicemen who were fighting each other now to get work, any work. He couldn’t remember when he had last eaten anything and he had threepence three farthings in his pocket, saved for a rainy day!

  Now, he realised that he was sitting, not in his family home but at a kitchen table with a horde of women round him urging him to eat up and eat up he did, much to their approval, positively bolting it. He could feel a little strength seep into him for the soup was the best he had ever tasted, better even than Mrs Atkins’s, cook at his old home, and she had been the best cook in Sussex. He wondered where she was now. Probably in her grave with his mother and father, and his two brothers who lay somewhere buried in Flanders fields.

  At that moment three more people burst into the kitchen, making it even more crowded. There was a very lovely woman, tall with a magnificent figure and short, curly copper and gold hair. Her eyes were the same gold, shot with copper. Despite his desperate weariness he could not help admire her for, after all, he was a man. The two men who came in with her looked like brothers.

  ‘Alice, for the love of God,’ one of the men said, not to the lovely woman but to someone who stood behind him, her hand on his shoulder, who, when he turned to look at her, took his breath away. The women were so different but really, he could hardly believe his eyes, they were both so beautiful. Where in hell was he? It must be heaven!

  ‘Sorry, old chap,’ the man said, turning to him, ‘it’s nothing personal but this bloody influenza has got everyone a bit paranoid. I believe it’s on the wane now but we tried to make sure it didn’t get into Beechworth or Summer Place and now Alice has brought you—’

  ‘It’s not influenza, Harry. I think this young man is ex-army and is looking for work. He’s starving, worn to the bone.’

  Tim Elliott stood up unsteadily. ‘Please, all of you, I apologise for intruding. I don’t know why I fell over but I’ll be on my way now. That soup has—’

  ‘You’re going nowhere, lad, so sit down an’ stop bein’ so daft.’

  Dolly had spoken and so Tim Elliott became one of them. The survivors!

  19

  Their new employee – which he insisted he was and was known to do more work than his frail health really allowed – was called Tim by everyone, even the servants. He was so obviously a gentleman, despite his shabbiness. Alice watched over him for signs of the dreaded influenza but as the days and weeks passed into a glorious spring then summer he began to look as tanned and fit as Harry and Charlie. Tim Elliott, by which name he had introduced himself, was once a lieutenant in the Royal Sussex Regiment. He felt no need to tell them he was titled. He was the younger son of Sir Albert Elliott, now deceased, as were his brothers, so he was entitled to be called Sir Timothy Elliott.

  He still wore his uniform jacket, the one with the lieutenant’s pips on the shoulder, and when Harry proposed that he borrowed a shirt or two, a couple of long-sleeved jerseys with polo necks and an old pair of riding breeches Tim was inordinately grateful.

  ‘I fought beside your lot at Ypres,’ Harry told him abruptly, as though to explain his generosity. ‘Bloody good chaps.’ And he felt the same about Tim.

  Tim was unassuming, eager to do any task asked of him, mucking out the stables, grooming Corey and Pixie at Summer Place. But the best and most appreciated was that Will transferred his attentions to Tim, claiming him for his best friend, dumping Alfie and John without compunction. He followed him everywhere and Tim didn’t seem to mind. Alice was of the opinion that the small boy took the place of his own brothers of whom he had been very fond but whom he had lost in the trenches. Certainly he had been the youngest but they had included him in all the games, the tricks, the hi-jinks boys get up to. Tim even began to teach Will, without the boy being aware of it, how to read, to write, to add up simple sums in the games they played. Harry had bought Will a small pony named Molly, and Tim and Will rode out nearly every day.

  ‘How many blackbirds have we seen this morning, lad?’ Tim would ask.

  ‘Six.’

  ‘And how many did we see yesterday? Do you remember the ones we heard singing in the meadow?’

  ‘Seven.’

  ‘Very good. Now think hard, how many is that altogether? Don’t forget the one that was perched on the branch of the oak tree.’

  Silence as Will added up the blackbirds then, triumphantly, ‘Thirteen.’

  ‘Good lad. Now take away the three we can see in that hedge there.’

  ‘Ten.’

  ‘By Gad, you’re a clever lad.’

  ‘By Gad, so are you, Tim. Now where are we going this morning? Shall we ride over to Ashtree Farm? They’ve got new puppies and if I’m a good boy and can tell Rose you said so d’you think she’ll let me have one? Tommy’s getting on a bit and—’

  ‘We’ll see, Will. Now then, d’you think you and Molly could jump that hedge?’

  ‘Course. Molly’s a good jumper.’

  ‘Righto, race you to it.’

  He let the boy win, of course, and Alice watched them from the rear bedroom window of Summer Place. Will was not the only one to take to Tim. Alice might as well have been a widow for all the notice her husband took of her. He had improved enough to have his own room now but he never attempted to claim his rights as a husband. He was extremely polite with her as he was with Rose. It made no difference to the way he behaved towards her and she began to fear he had lost not only a great part of his past but also his manhood. He had nothing to say on the addition to their household although he startled everyone by saying out of the blue, ‘I knew a chap once who was called Tim.’ This was early on when Tim had been with them for a week or so.

  Tim had turned to him immediately, knowing by now that there was something seriously wrong with the good-looking young man who was Alice’s husband and who always seemed to hang about on the edge of the company.

  ‘Did you, old chap?’ he asked gently, and though she did not realise it then, that was the moment Alice considered the astonishing idea that what she felt for him was not just the emotion of friend, of compassion for a fellow warrior, but something far stronger. All these years – five – she had loved Charlie. Or had she just idealised him, turned him into something he was not? Eighteen, she had been and Charlie so handsome, so dashing, such good company, and he had loved her. That had all gone and in her was a quiet place, empty and ready to be filled.

  ‘Yes,’ Charlie said now in a vague voice. ‘He was screaming, caught on the wire so I shot him.’

  ‘I know, Charlie. It was necessary, wasn’t it. You could not let your chum suffer.’

  ‘Did you know him, Tim?’ Charlie asked eagerly.

  ‘Oh yes. Tommy and Fred and Ginger and Sid and Wally.’

  Charlie smiled sadly. ‘They’re still here with me.’

  ‘I know, with me too. I say, why don’t you show me the places you go to here on this beautiful estate? Where you go to remember them as they were. We had a few laughs in the trenches, didn’t we, as well as the terrible suffering they knew. Did you have a particular pal with whom you would have liked to share these lovely moments you know now? Let’s ride over there.’

  ‘I’d like that, Tim.’ His face clouded. �
�But you see I have to stay with Harry. Harry and I are brothers,’ as though that was all that needed to be said.

  But Tim was a survivor, as Alice was and though the rest of them did not notice he and she often laughed and chatted to each other when Will was in bed. They walked through the woods, looking for mushrooms, they told Dolly, and as the summer ran into autumn, blackberries. He told her of his happy childhood with his family at home in the south.

  Though he knew he must tread lightly, he asked her about her past – and Charlie. ‘How old were you when you married Charlie?’ he questioned softly. ‘I believe it was at the beginning of the war?’

  ‘I was eighteen when we met. Well, I say when we met but we grew up together, the Summers boys and me. Rode to hounds, or up into the foothills of the Pennines, taking a picnic. Funnily we were not acquainted with Rose then. You know what families such as ours are like. My father did not consider the Beechworths our sort since her family gained their wealth in trade and she was always busy with her estate. We met, she and I, as Charlie, full of fun and enthusiasm as they all were, set off for France. Charlie and I had been . . . lovers and when my father discovered I was with child, he threw me out with no more than a petticoat to my name.’ She laughed harshly and when Tim took her hand she let it lie trustingly in his.

  ‘I had met Rose briefly at the railway station when Charlie left and since I knew of no one else who would take me in, I went to Beechworth House. I loved her then and still do. She was my saviour. I was a romantic and when we heard that Charlie was missing I determined to search the battlefields to find him.’

  She shook her head and smiled sadly. She and Tim were sitting in a soft mossy hollow beneath the roots of an ancient oak tree and as their shoulders touched she leaned against him and seemed to accept what was happening. Their horses cropped the grass several feet away and the two dogs, Ginger and Spice, lay with their noses on their paws, their eyes swivelling lazily, their ears twitching at the loud, metallic chink chink of the chaffinch in the branches of the trees.

  They both sighed. They did not kiss. There was no need. There was no need for words. They knew what was happening to them.

  Rose’s love for Harry had never wavered though she often wondered what that episode in their lives during the war had meant to him. Not by a flicker of an eyelid did he show her even a fraction of affection other than that he showed Alice or Dolly or the boy.

  As she struggled on with her barren life helping the women in the kitchen or the men in the garden and meadows, trying to teach Will a few simple sums or a word or two, she often passed him as she moved from one house to another and he did the same and on one occasion he spoke her name carelessly.

  ‘Rose, now that Tim seems to have joined our household, I think Charlie and I, and Tim, of course, can stay permanently at Summer Place. We’ll take Will since he’s Charlie’s son. Alice may please herself. She and Charlie have not resumed their marital status and it seems they are never likely to, for I have come to believe Charlie will recover no further than he has so . . .’

  He shrugged carelessly and made his way towards Charlie and the newcomer who were laughing together over something in the stable yard.

  She felt as though he had deliberately slapped her in the face.

  Harry’s heart felt as though it were bleeding as he picked up Corey from the Beechworth stables with the intention of riding him across the field to Summer Place. Rose’s devastated face swam before his eyes so that had it not been for Corey’s instincts he might have ended up in Old Swan instead of his own stable yard.

  He wondered despairingly what had made him say and do what he had. He loved her, goddammit, more than life itself, and yet he seemed compelled to treat her as though they were no more than acquaintances. Once . . . once they had been different. Years ago now when he was on leave from the hell of war so why, why did he act as he had done? Why? He had loved her from the first time he had seen her on Lime Street station, the day Charlie had set off excitedly for France, the day Lady had refused to get on the train and Rose, later, had loved him. They had been lovers, for God’s sake, but since Harry came home a badly damaged soldier – not that that had anything to do with it – they had been cool with one another.

  So, what should he do next? he asked himself. He nodded at Ned as he ran forward to take the stallion who was jibbing with disapproval at the short ride, uncooperative as Ned led him into the stable and began to unsaddle him. Suddenly Harry turned and hurried back into the stable.

  ‘Leave him, Ned. He needs exercise and so do I. I’ll take him to . . . to . . . well, leave him saddled and . . .’

  Ned was startled but handed the reins to Sir Harry and stepped back respectfully. He watched as his master thundered out of the yard and headed for the stand of trees and then beyond to the moorland where he urged the animal up and up to the start of the lower Pennine Chain. On he rode, his face almost on the stallion’s neck, pursued by the expression on Rose’s face. He had for a moment or two been transported back to those magical days when he and Rose had been lovers. She had clung to him as eagerly as he had clung to her but there had been so much confusion. All those who relied on him turning towards him for orders. God, oh Jesus God, what was he to do? What was he to do with this love he bore her? Did she feel nothing for him? If not, then why had she been so glad to be in his arms?

  Corey was beginning to flag so he reined him in, leaping from his back with the smooth movement of the splendid horseman he was. He left the animal to graze on the wide shelf of grass, flinging himself down and turning on to his back to stare at the blue bowl of the sky. His eyes closed and, relaxing at last, he fell asleep.

  She found him there, the strong invisible bond that both had denied drawing her on Foxy’s back to this peaceful plateau. Quietly she dismounted as Foxy whickered a greeting to Corey. She knelt at Harry’s side and looked down at his beloved face which was gaunt, thin, the clefts chiselled beside his mouth deeper, more pronounced, his eyelashes, so long and dark any woman might have envied them. His mouth was stern, even as he slept and she noticed that the hair above his ears had white streaks in it which had not been there before the war. He must be thirty-two or thirty-three, she mused. She was twenty-nine and time was racing by at an impossible speed, a frightening speed.

  He sighed and without thinking she laid her lips on his. He actually smiled in his sleep. She felt it beneath her own then his arms lifted and drew her down to him. He opened his eyes, unfocused as he woke, then he groaned.

  ‘Tell me I’m not dreaming,’ he murmured, his lips opening against hers. ‘I couldn’t bear it if I was.’

  ‘No, Harry, you’re not dreaming. I don’t know how it came about. I didn’t follow you up here. I just needed to get away from things.’

  ‘I did the same. Is it meant to be, d’you think? You know I love you.’

  ‘No, I didn’t. I only know I love you.’

  ‘Then why the hell have we been—’

  Her lips stopped the words and, now that his arms were around her, she really didn’t care how it had come about. She was here where she had longed to be for months, years, and it seemed words were no longer needed. He propped himself on one elbow, his eyes drinking in the luminous, incredulous glow in hers.

  ‘Did you say you loved me?’

  ‘Yes, and did you say—’

  ‘I did and I do, dearest heart.’

  Despite his astonishment at this moment he began to kiss her face with a somewhat feverish desperation as though he were afraid this might somehow be an illusion and he needs must make the most of it. His lips slid under her jaw and down her throat to the buttons of the usual white shirt she wore.

  ‘Dear God, I love you . . . want you. I need to take you before you change your mind or fate changes it for us.’

  ‘Please . . . oh please, let this be real. I wouldn’t want to live if you . . . if we . . .’

  ‘Be quiet, woman . . . my woman . . .’

  ‘Harry . . . Harry . .
.’

  Their lips clung together while their hands were busy with buttons, belts, until her breasts were revealed, sweet . . . sweet in his hands and lips, her nipples hard and peaked at his touch. He sucked and bit them as her body arched to his and the horses turned in bewilderment, amazed at the sound of their lovemaking. At last it came, an explosion that, because of their long wait, was rapidly over. They were both almost naked. Then it began again, slowly this time as he moved inside her, tenderly then more insistently as the love they shared and which had been denied for so long carried them to the highest peaks of climax, then gradually on to the shores of peace, acceptance, tranquillity. He rested his face on her white, rosy peaked breast, his hand stroking her belly and the glory of the auburn triangle that guarded her womanhood. It was as it should be. They loved one another. Harry and Rose. Rose and Harry.

  Tim had proved to be an honest, obliging hard worker, with Charlie at his side, thankful to have found a settled place at last and Harry and Rose thanked the gods who had sent Tim Elliott to them. He and Charlie were scarcely ever apart though Tim, with an anxious apology, asked humbly if he might have a bedroom of his own. He was sensitive to Charlie’s needs but he needed privacy, he explained to Harry who understood.

  No one noticed the growing attachment between Alice and Tim, for they were all agog with the unexpected but wonderful preparations for Sir Harry’s wedding to Rose Beechworth. Where once Will had clung to Harry, he now would not be parted from Tim who resignedly put up with Charlie and his son. It became a familiar sight for the two men and the small boy to be seen trudging about Beechworth and Summer Place and they all – Harry more than the others – thanked whatever being they believed in, that Will had transferred his attention from him to Tim and Charlie. Another occurrence, or two actually, that escaped the household’s attention was the disappearance at odd times – at the same time – of Tim Elliott and Alice Summers.