All the dear faces Page 41

  “The bloody bastard's fornicating with another woman," he roared. "No wonder he's not got my Esmé in the family way. Playing a game away from home, the talk of the bloody parish, she says ... " brandishing the letter as though he would dearly like to smash the fist which heldit into Reed Macauley's face ". . . some damned farm woman he's taken up with and he's round there from morning till night . . . an' through the night an' all, I'll be bound. Well, we'll see about that. There's no sod going to play fast and loose with my Esmé's affections, I can tell you that, woman . . " just as though the whole thing was the fault of the open-mouthed, white-faced trembling figure who sat at the foot of his table. His Esmé, not hers, as she had always been. The two maid-servants, now that they realised that the savage anger of their master was aimed, not at them, but at Miss Esmé's husband, or so it seemed, relaxed their hold on one another and exchanged a glance for this promised to bring a frisson of excitement into the long tedium of their hard-working day. Wait until they got back to the kitchen, the exchanged glance seemed to say. Wouldn't they have something to tell the others? They simultaneously edged a little closer so that they would not miss anything.

  Suddenly aware of them, for even in the midst of the direst emergency Edmund Hamilton-Brown was careful of his mouth, he turned on them so that they again reared back.

  “And you two can clear off. I'll ring the bell when I need you.”

  There was nothing for it but to leave the breakfast room but they had the meat of it, hadn't they, and the rest would soon be revealed, one way or the other. Scandal always was.

  “What are you . . . to do, Edmund?" his wife quavered. Edmund leaped to his feet, his wrath too much to contain sitting down. He strode to the window, flinging aside the heavy velvet curtains which were fashionable but which kept out most of the daylight. The fringed bobbled tiebacks bounced with his ferocity and his wife winced. He turned again, his wildness flaring about him, his blue eyes withering her, his mouth twitching, the saliva almost running down his chin.

  “I'll tell you what I'm going to do. I'll tell you what I'm going to do, woman. I'm going up to bloody Cumberland and I'm going to sort this lot out. No one, no one's going to make a fool of my Esmé. No one's going to make my girl cry, or if he does he'll live to regret it. I'm not without some influence and in my years of doing business I've come across some gentlemen who owe me a favour or two. They'll make Reed bloody Macauley toe the line I can tell you. I should have known. The high-faluting, ladidah boyo with his fancy duds and fancy ways," his voice became vicious, "but he'll rue the day he made my Esmé shed tears, that he will. Now then, set them girls to packing my bags and send that stable lad to the station to find out the time of the next train to Carlisle or Penrith, or wherever the nearest railway station is to bloody Long Beck. I've a bit of business to attend to at the mill but I'll be back in an hour. Is the carriage at the door? Good, then jump to it, woman. I've not got all bloody day.”

  *

  Reed had kept his promise. He had not been over to Browhead but each day he made enquiries of Maggie Singleton, who had, questioning her closely on Miss Abbott's health and state of mind. Was she eating, sleeping, working on the farm, or up on the fell? Maggie was to collect the eggs, and the butter and cheese that maidservant of Miss Abbott's made and see that they got to market. How? How did he know? There was a pony and trap in the stables. Could she drive one? She could. Good, and if she hadn't the time, or Miss Abbott needed her, surely there must be some farmwife with whom Maggie was acquainted who could take them, and of course, she would be paid for her efforts. She was to keep him informed. Take any profits made down to Miss Abbott's farm, talk to Natty Varty and Jake could go with her and any help Natty needed at Browhead, Jake was to supply it. Now was there anything else, he asked the astonished young wife of Jake Singleton? Anything Maggie herself could think of to make Miss Abbott's grief less . . . well . . . easier to bear? He was putting Miss Abbott's welfare in her hands since, as yet, Maggie had no children, she and Jake having been wed no more than six months. Jake was Reed Macauley's yardman and Maggie worked in the dairy but they were to consider themselves, for the moment, as working for Miss Abbott, was that clear? Just until Miss Abbott recovered from the dreadful death of her child.

  Maggie Singleton came from Sharrow Bay on the far side of Lake Ullswater and Annie Abbott's reputation was unknown over there. She had heard tales, since she had come to live at Long Beck, of her strangeness and the odd way she dressed, but she had never seen her, and her true 'wickedness', the gossip and speculation about her relationship with Mr Macauley, were none of Maggie's concern. She was unbiased and unprejudiced and Reed could not have chosen a more kindly, tolerant young woman to keep an eye on the woman he loved. She saw Miss Abbott twice a week. Once when she slipped into the Browhead kitchen to collect the stuff for market from Phoebe, and again when she took her the money they had earned. She did not speak to Miss Abbott. The silently staring, white-faced, dead-eyed woman who sat all in black on the sconce aroused a fierce compassion in her but they were strangers to one another and she could not intrude into the grief-wracked world in which Miss Abbott dwelled.

  She did not say this to Mr Macauley, poor man. He was not himself at all these days, almost as bad as Miss Abbott, she would have said, moving about the farmhouse without his usual crackling vigour, his fierce, dauntless energy which defied any man to keep up with him. From six in the morning, she had heard, up on the fells, or rummaging about the farm making sure every man who worked for him was doing it, ten to the dozen. Off on his wild black mare to Keswick or Penrith or Carlisle and even, Jake told her, travelling down to London on the railway train. Tireless, bloody-minded, but ready to dirty his hands, not like some, a real man and would you look at him now, drifting about the place as though he had no idea how to fill his day, only brightening when she herself approached him.

  “How is she? Did you see her?" he would ask, no matter who was with him, even Mrs Macauley, who had gone as white as the driven snow at his words. She had run into the house, she had, her skirts in her hands, and Maggie had felt sorry for her, as well as him.

  “She's calm, sir," was all Maggie could say, for what else was there to say? She's off her head with grief ? She's in another world? She never speaks and only eats when Phoebe makes her open her mouth and sticks food inside?

  “Calm? What the bloody hell does that mean?"

  “She's grieving, sir, and still not herself, but from what I hear she's a strong woman and will recover."

  “Aye . . ." he said, ready to turn away. He swung back violently at her next words:

  “And she's young, sir. She's plenty of time to have another child."

  “Another child! What are you blathering on about, woman? She's not even married." His face had lost its usual healthy colour during the past few traumatic weeks and now it became even more drained. His eyes were haunted but the menace in them was lethal. Nevertheless Maggie stood her ground. She had been asked to keep an eye on Annie Abbott and report back to Mr Macauley. Give her opinion on her condition and that was what she was doing.

  “That could be remedied, sir."

  “Remedied! What the hell does that mean?" he said for the second time.

  “She's a beautiful woman, sir, with a farm which is beginning to prosper ... "

  “Prosper, prosper! A beautiful woman. Jesus Christ. She's just lost her child and here you are with her waltzing up the aisle on the arm of some fortune hunter and ready to give birth within the year. Are you mad . . . ?”

  But it was not Maggie Singleton who was mad. She realised she had gone too far. She had been trying to comfort, to give him hope, though really, need she have bothered? He wanted to hear that Miss Abbott wasrecovering, but at the mention of the possibility that she could return to what Maggie thought of as a normal life for a woman, a house, a husband, children, he had been ready to turn on her and knock her to the ground. It was a strange job she had been given and one she did not relish. She felt a great
and overwhelming pity for Miss Abbott. Though she herself had no child as yet, she was a woman, and already within her grew the seed her husband had implanted in her three months ago so she could guess, to a small degree because of it, what Miss Abbott was suffering. But what she did not care for was the way in which the other servants, knowing where she went, questioned her about Miss Abbott's home, her demeanour, just as though the poor woman was a . . . well, a loose woman and was available to every man who had a bob in his pocket. Poor woman. Gripped fast in the inflexible blackness of her mourning and them in the kitchen at Long Beck were only interested in the colour of her petticoats and the width of her bed. Prying and poking into what did not concern them. Lily and Nell, the two women who had laated' with Maggie before the child was buried, were more sympathetic. They had seen Annie Abbott's grief, her devastation. They had done their pitying best to contain it, but the others were `nowt a pound' as far as Maggie was concerned.

  There was a carriage, a hired hack, coming up the track towards the front of the house and Reed Macauley turned away from the troubled figure of Maggie Singleton to stare without much interest at its progress. Its wheels bounced crazily between the ruts, it was going with such speed, and when it came to an abrupt stop, the door to it was flung open with such force it hit the window of the carriage with a crash which lifted a flock of crows from the nearby trees. A man sprang to the gravelled driveway. Not a young man but expensively turned out in an impeccably cut black broadcloth frock-coat with waistcoat and trousers of the same material, the latter not quite as tight-fitting as was thought fashionable, for the man was portly. He carried a long, double-breasted chesterfield overcoat and on his head was a tall, silk top hat.

  For a moment Reed was astounded. What the devil was Esmé's father doing here? In the years since he and Esmé had become engaged to be married, and since their marriage, Edmund Hamilton-Brown had been to Long Beck only once and that was on the occasion of the party to celebrate their engagement. It had been Edmund Hamilton-Brown's suggestion that it be held at Long Beck and at the time Reed had been well aware that it had been no more than an excuse for the man to inspect the house and the surroundings where his daughter would live, the servants who would wait on her, and Reed's friends and acquaintances with whom she would socialise. He had made it his business to poke here and there in every room that was available to him, noting the contents and their value, checking the service she would receive since it must be efficient, and looking over Reed's guests to ensure they were fit to sit in his daughter's drawing room. Had he found any deficiency in either the house, the service, or the people with whom she would come into contact he would, no doubt, have rectified it. Since then the only visiting done had been on Esmé's part when she returned to Bradford, and by Reed himself as business called him to that part of the world where he sold his wool.

  “Edmund, this is a surprise, " he called out as he moved from the side garden where he had been talking to Maggie Singleton, his hand outstretched, for despite his own misery, the civilities must be carried out, particularly to one's father-in-law.

  At that moment, before Reed could reach him, the door to the house flew open, Edmund turned in its direction, dropped his overcoat to the ground and with an incoherent cry, opened his arms wide to receive his weeping daughter.

  “Papa . . . oh, Papa . . . thank heavens you have come, " she cried into his broad shoulder. He held her close and patted her back whilst he shushed her comfortingly, and all the while he turned an expression on Reed Macauley which would have badly alarmed a lesser man. His face was broad and fleshy, highly coloured, for though. his doctor advised against it, he drank a great deal of port and brandy and was rarely without an expensive cigar clamped between his teeth.

  It was his grandfather who had begun it, the business which had made Edmund wealthy. He had been a merchant who had gone with his string of packhorses wherever there was decent wool to be had, bringing it back to independent men to be spun and woven. But as the industrial revolution, as it was to be called, had intensified he had, from the profit he made, built his own mill in which weavers and spinners, as their trade declined, worked for him. One mill, then two, as his son grew to manhood. A carding and combing mill, then another as Edmund Hamilton-Brown himself took over and though he had never known want, since he and his father before him had called themselves rich, he was, as Yorkshire men had the reputation of being, a careful man except where his daughter and himself were concerned. The best of everything for Esmé and Edmund Hamilton-Brown, and his appearance testified to it.

  “To what do we owe the honour of this visit, Edmund?" Reed managed to say, doing his best to be polite though did he give a hang why the old man was here? he asked himself wearily. He had been badly shaken by Maggie Singleton's careless inference to the probability of marriage for Annie Abbott and to her bearing another child. He had wanted to hit her and tell her to shut her vile mouth. Annie belonged to him. Not bodily, not yet, but surely when she had recovered somewhat from this mortal blow which had been struck her, she would agree to let him look after her, to settle her and Phoebe in some luxurious place away from all these bad memories, to give her the soft and special things she deserved so that she could live a life of ease and never again worry her head about money. He would do that for her. He would love her, care for her, protect her from all hurt and if there was any child to be given, he would be the one to give it to her.

  “Never mind that, Macauley," his father-in-law was saying, jolting him out of the pleasant dream of the future which was the only thing that mattered to him now. He cared nought for his farm, for his businesses, his investments in copper, in iron, in the railways and many other concerns, those which had made him a wealthy man. He would do again, of course, when he and Annie were together and Annie was tucked up safe and snug, but all he could think of just now was the slow worry which invaded him night and day, and the impatience he must curb until it was all over. His wife's tears concerned him not in the least. She was always weeping over something these days, moping about the house, refusing to go out or entertain, which he was glad about since the idea of engaging in small-talk at the dinner table was abhorrent to him. But it would all die down, the gossip and speculation, when Annie moved out of the district. He was a man. The men who did business with him would think him a lucky dog and wish him well of his liaison with the Browhead woman, and the women would do as they were told. As his would when he had found out what her father wanted and sent him on his way. Reed Macauley might be low, not quite himself lately, but he was master of his own home, and his own life.

  “Let's get inside, my lass," Edmund said gently, his arms still about the heaving shoulders of Reed Macauley's wife. "See, you go and wash your face and have a rest. You and I'll have a nice chat later. I've things to say to your . . . husband but it'll not take long."

  “Won't you have some coffee, Papa, or a . . ."

  “Nay lass, off you go. I'll have something when you come down.”

  He kissed her fondly then watched her as she drifted up the stairs, a tired little girl whose world, which had been so safe and happy, which he had made safe and happy, was tumbling about her innocent head.

  “Right then, lad," he snarled at Reed when she had disappeared, "you and me have something to talk about, I think. Tell that chappie who brought me from Penrith hecan get off now and have one of your servants fetch my coat in. I dropped it by the coach. And I'll have a brandy and some sandwiches. I'm taking the three thirty train back to Lancaster and I reckon you can find someone to take me to the railway station."

  “Certainly." Reed's voice had become chilled. He was not used to being given orders, nor to being spoken to as though he was a schoolboy who had misbehaved. He was beginning to get an inkling of the reason for his father-in-law's visit and though he was not overly concerned he did not greatly care for the idea of being given a talk on discretion by his wife's father. Still, best get it over and send the silly old fool on his way. He had guided Edmu
nd Hamilton-Brown into his study, indicating brusquely that he should seat himself by the cheerful fire which burned in the grate. He pulled the bell rope and when the butler came, gave the necessary orders, then lighting a cigar he went to stand by the window, looking out across the vista of his garden and beyond to the slopes of his inland fields. They were white with his ewes which were waiting to lamb, a constantly drifting scatter, forming and re-forming into tiny groups which cropped peacefully on the lush green grass the snows of the winter had nourished.