An Orphan's Winter

by Sheila Jeffries

  ‘Course you can moor The Jenny Wren. Anytime,’ Ken said, his voice warm now, a smile creasing his old face. ‘That’s a spare ring there – you have that one. I’ll put yer name on it, lad.’

  ‘Thanks.’

  Ken waited, lighting his pipe, while Matt secured the boat and climbed onto the slipway. ‘ ’Tis good to have you back in S’nives.’ Ken looked him up and down and shook his hand with a warm dependable grasp. ‘You hungry?’ He didn’t wait for Matt to answer, but sat down on the wooden bench against the wall and unscrewed the top of a Thermos flask. ‘Hot, sweet tea,’ he said, pouring the steaming liquid into two tin mugs. Next, he took an enormous flat brown bun from a paper bag. ‘You have this. ’Tis a tea treat bun – my missus makes ’em for Sunday School.’

  ‘Don’t you want it?’ Matt asked, gratefully sipping the syrupy tea.

  ‘Nah – she feeds me too well already.’ Ken patted his substantial paunch with a grin. ‘You’ll be going up Hendravean to see your mum, will you?’

  Matt shrugged. Between bites of the tea treat bun, he told Ken about the orphanage and how they’d escaped. He didn’t mention his devastating visit to his mum in hospital. But Ken already knew. Matt sensed it, and sensed him deliberately keeping quiet to keep the peace – something Cornishmen were good at. Exactly what his dad had been good at. Tolerance. The shrug had said it all. Ken didn’t ask any more questions, but sat beside Matt in a contemplative friendliness.

  When Matt had finished the huge bun and the flock of turnstones were scurrying around after the crumbs, Ken said, ‘We miss your dad, Matt. Any time you want to think about training with the lifeboat crew, you’re welcome – always welcome here, lad. I don’t know where you’re living and I won’t ask – but S’nives is your home. Don’t you forget that – you’re one of us.’

  Matt nodded gratefully. He met Ken’s eyes for a brief moment of empathy before saying goodbye and walking away into St Ives, his haversack over one shoulder, packed with his sketch pads, pencils and the small black tin of Reeves watercolours. Turning his back on Hendravean, he headed for Downlong, curious to see what had happened to the terraced cottage where he, Tom and Lottie had once lived.

  Lottie had told him about the artist, John De Lumen, who’d turned out to be her father, and how he had bought the cottage to use as a studio. Even so, Matt was unprepared for what he saw. Expecting a wave of nostalgia, he stood in between the lines of washing strung across the narrow street. He was stunned to see the cottage painted white, the granite walls completely covered. A beautifully painted sign was nailed over the front door.

  THE DE LUMEN GALLERY.

  Smart, Matt thought. He longed to go inside and see what had been done with the cramped interior where he had grown up, but a smaller notice said, GALLERY CLOSED. Of course – John De Lumen was on the ship with Lottie.

  Matt peered through one of the windows, fascinated to see everything inside painted white, with lots of pictures hanging on the walls. Boring, he thought, compared to the ones in his sketch book.

  ‘The gallery is closed, young man.’

  The sharp voice was one Matt knew well – Maudie. She’d hounded him through his childhood, telling him off, shaming him at every opportunity, so he continued looking through the window, just to annoy her.

  Maudie was not someone to be ignored. She ruled the street, and several streets beyond, and thrived on ferreting out people’s darkest secrets. Matt could smell her coming close, a fusty, damp-dog sort of smell, and the particular way her shoes creaked and her maroon trench coat rustled.

  Go away, he thought, but Maudie stood there, and when he didn’t turn round, she started tapping the sleeve of his fisherman’s smock.

  ‘Can’t you read? The gallery’s closed. He’s gone to New York. And I’m keeping an eye on the place.’

  Ignoring her, Matt looked up at the roof. He knew how to climb in: up the drainpipe and over the roof to drop down into the backyard. He’d done it umpteen times. He braced his foot against the wall and tested the drainpipe to see if it would still take his weight.

  ‘Oy!’ Maudie poked him with her umbrella. ‘Don’t you try anything.’

  Matt swung round and looked her in the eye. Maudie bristled. Colour spread up her frog-like neck. ‘I know you!’ she scolded. ‘Matt Lanroska. What are you doing snooping round here? That’s not your place now, is it? Is it?’

  ‘You can’t tell me what to do.’

  ‘Oh, yes I can.’ Maudie flew at him like an enraged bantam, words bursting out from ruffled feathers. ‘Just ’cause you’ve grown into such a big fellow doesn’t mean I can’t tell you – someone’s got to. You’re a bad ’un, Matt Lanroska. Always were, always will be. And don’t think you’re so clever, grinning at me like that. You should be ashamed – running off and living on some grubby old boat, causing your mother so much worry. As if she hasn’t got enough to think about.’

  Matt wasn’t good at arguments. Nothing he could say would silence Maudie anyway. He walked away with his dad’s wisdom ringing in his heart.

  Walk away, lad. Just let her get on with it.

  But it was disappointing. He’d wanted to linger close to his old home and think. Instead, he’d collected yet another set of salt-in-the-wound rejections and unfair accusations from Maudie. Matt couldn’t help it. He took everything to heart, despite his cultivated bravado. The Jenny Wren wasn’t ‘some grubby old boat’. He wanted to drag Maudie down to the harbour and make her look at the gleaming new paintwork and the homely little cabin with its well-polished windows. He wanted to tell her how he loved his solitary life out on the water under the sky. He had peace – which was more than she had. Maudie was like a storm in a barrel; she didn’t know peace.

  What gave her the right to attack him like that? Next she’d go boasting to her friends – ‘I said to him, I said . . .’. Maudie lived in a never-ending stream of malicious gossip.

  One day I’ll tell her, Matt vowed.

  Pulling his hat down over his eyes, he walked on, dodging and ducking under the washing, following a familiar route through Downlong to Porthmeor Beach and along the cliff path to Clodgy, his spirits lifting as he drew near to the rock stack. He planned to spend the day sketching the great weathered rocks with the startling glimpses of the deep turquoise glittering ocean and the domes of sea pinks against the light. His pictures of the place he loved would be vivid and strong.

  It had been Matt’s intention to stroll up The Stennack in the afternoon and meet Tom on his way home from school. But time slipped away as he became engrossed in his artwork. He sold one of the sea pink pictures to an elderly couple who were out walking. The five crisp pound notes would buy him fuel for The Jenny Wren and a week’s meals, a bottle of cider and a thin sable-hair paintbrush for painting the curved whiskers of seals and the wiry stems of sea pink. Perfect.

  Back on the deck of The Jenny Wren, Matt ate his supper watching an electrical storm out at sea. Lightning crackled, blindingly bright in a sky so lustrously dark that the distant seagulls twinkled like white stars against the cloud. Big peardrops of rain peppered the harbour water and pinged on the roof of the cabin. Matt moved inside and sat on his makeshift bed, enjoying the sound of rain on the roof. He found himself looking again at Hendravean and thinking about his stuff that would be stored there. Most of it was useless to him now, but there was something he passionately wanted: his dad’s old cork lifejacket. Matt didn’t have one, which meant he was in constant danger out at sea on the boat.

  Would he dare to turn up at Nan’s place and ask for it? Definitely not. He didn’t need yet another storm of recriminations. No. The only way to get the lifejacket would be to act like a burglar, watch for his chance, and break in. Nan’s door was never locked and rarely shut. In summer, she left it open for the swallows who nested in the rafters over the porch, and a pair of robins who had built a home in the bookshelves.

  Where would the lifejacket be? In their old home, it had hung on a hook behind the scullery door, kept
there so that Arnie could grab it on his way out. After he’d died, Jenny had left it there, and Matt had seen her touching it, resting her cheek against it and quietly crying. The memory sent emotions tumbling through him. Surely he had a right to claim his dad’s lifejacket? He couldn’t leave St Ives until he had it.

  Tomorrow. He’d do it tomorrow.

  The decision gathered his thoughts together under an umbrella of peace. In the thundery twilight, it felt good to fall asleep on his own bed, safe on The Jenny Wren, and to dream of Lottie far away on the same bright ocean, the great ship steaming on, bringing her closer – blessedly closer – to home.

  Chapter 5

  Intruders

  Lottie’s dreams of finding her birth mother had been with her constantly. She had wanted the reunion to be special and meaningful. She wanted her mother to see her as a sophisticated young woman, not the wilful child she had been. She imagined them being in perfect harmony, talking and laughing together, sharing secrets, more like sisters than mother and child.

  First impressions mattered. Their first meeting should be filled with mutual respect. Lottie considered herself grown up now, in charge of her life, not to be pushed around. There would be some honest talking between them. She wanted her mother to understand the far-reaching effect her act of abandonment had caused. Olivia must be made to listen – to everything. And in return, Lottie planned to do her share of listening, if only her mother would talk candidly about her life.

  In the moment of reunion, something magical would happen, like a severed nerve being reconnected. The bonding would be instant, wordless and strong. When Olivia hadn’t turned up, the dream drifted away as if it were abandoning her.

  She’d seen it. She’d wanted it. And it had gone.

  So when Lottie awoke, her face hot and tear-stained, her hair messy, her heart full of sadness, it was a shock to realise that Olivia had crept into her cabin and was sitting on the bed. One glimpse was enough. Sensing the presence and smelling perfume, Lottie opened her eyes wide. She stared at her mother as her dreams of the perfect reunion vanished over the horizon.

  The red coat was gone and Olivia wore a silver-grey cashmere dress with a low-cut neckline and a triple set of pearls against her throat. Her mother looked small and delicate with bony-white wrists, hollow cheeks and devious eyes. She smiled and reached for Lottie’s hand. ‘Hello, Charlotte.’

  Lottie snatched it away. ‘Don’t touch me,’ she hissed, ‘and don’t call me Charlotte.’ She shut her eyes again.

  ‘Aw, honey-child,’ crooned Olivia. ‘C’mon – don’t be angry. John’s been telling me how good you are.’

  ‘Not anymore.’ Lottie held her head with both hands, completely overwhelmed and desperate to escape. It was too soon. She needed time to heal and try to restore her sense of reason.

  ‘But, honey-child, I only . . .’

  Lottie clamped her hands over her ears, making her eardrums ache. ‘I’m not going to listen. Go away and don’t come near me.’

  ‘We have to talk, Lottie . . .’

  The demons seemed to be magnifying every word that came out of her mother’s mouth and using them to beat the relationship into a mound of crushed glass with thousands of winking lights, each one mocking her. Lottie felt that trust was destroyed and could never be rebuilt. Not with her mother sitting there so calmly.

  Maybe Lottie Lanroska was an illusion, she thought, regressed in an instant to being a four-year-old trusting little girl in a velvet dress. When her mother had abandoned her, the sense of betrayal had fallen into her mind like an unexploded bomb. The explosion had waited all those years, years of nodding and smiling and managing. It had waited for Olivia, and her smooth, detonating words.

  Lottie sat up and pushed a hank of tangled blonde hair away from her brow. She faced Olivia with hostility in her eyes. ‘Will you go away, please – leave me alone. This is my cabin.’ She moved her face closer and closer to Olivia. ‘Will you just go – if you don’t, I will have to – to . . .’ She saw herself running wildly along the corridors and staircases of the ship, up and up until she could breathe the briny air of the Atlantic, and hold on tightly to the deck rail. ‘If you don’t go – I might . . . might find a way of disappearing. Forever.’

  Olivia raised her eyebrows. ‘My goodness, Charlotte, you are a drama queen.’

  Lottie jumped to her feet, grabbed the knitted donkey from her pillow and fled from the cabin. But when she reached the final staircase leading to the deck, a rope was stretched across it, and a steward stood there guarding it. ‘Sorry, madam, you can’t go on deck at the moment. We are sailing into a storm.’

  *

  That evening, Lottie went to the dining room and spoke to the Italian waiter who, she knew, had a soft spot for her. She smiled up at him, straight-backed and confident, her hair swept back from her face and tied with a cerise satin ribbon.

  ‘Would you please find me a table for one?’ she asked. ‘I wish to sit on my own for the rest of the journey.’

  He gave a little bow. ‘Of course, madam.’ His inquisitive eyes studied her with interest. He led her to a small table tucked into a corner. ‘I bring you cutlery,’ he said, and swiftly organised a place setting for her, adding a beautifully folded napkin.

  The dining room was nearly empty and people were only just beginning to arrive for dinner. Lottie studied the menu and ordered lemon sole with mashed potato, carrots and peas. She waited tensely for the moment her father would walk in with Olivia.

  Alienating herself wasn’t making Lottie happy. She felt worse. Self-conscious. Angry. There was a fine line between feeling proud and feeling ridiculous. Trying to prove she was independent and grown up. But actually it was an open act of hate towards her mother. Such a lonely thing to do.

  She expected a confrontation, but there wasn’t one. As he walked in with Olivia, her father acknowledged Lottie with a courteous nod and padded past without stopping. Out of the corner of her eye, she watched him pull out Olivia’s chair for her, and Olivia gave her a tiny, apologetic wave. Like most of the women in the posh dining room, her mother sparkled with jewellery, a silver bangle and earrings that looked like diamonds. She’d added lipstick and rouge. John looked oddly subservient and subdued.

  It didn’t feel right. Lottie ate her meal without tasting it, trying hard to divert her thoughts to the beautiful time with Matt. Her first time as a woman. Lottie looked down at her young breasts under the crimson dress Jenny had lent her for the trip. It had subtle ruffles of pleated taffeta around the bodice and sleeves and the kind of swirly skirt that Jenny loved. Lottie felt good in it. She tried to imagine Matt sitting opposite her in an evening suit with a collar and tie. It didn’t work. She could only visualise Matt in his worn blue clothes, balanced on The Jenny Wren, tall and lean against the sea, turning to look at her in that heart-stopping way, Matt leading her into the cabin, gentle, purposeful . . .

  Her dream was interrupted by Olivia’s ringing laugh. Lottie overheard the conversation she was having with the Italian waiter. ‘Do excuse my daughter, Charlotte. She’s only sixteen.’

  The waiter raised his hands in the air. ‘Ah! I too have a daughter who is sixteen – such a difficult age. We in Italy call it the silly age.’

  They whispered something, glancing over at Lottie, and Olivia laughed again, her earrings swinging, her red mouth wide open, eyes flashing at John who was watching her attentively. Too attentively.

  The laughter was caustic, a strong abrasive chemical burning into Lottie’s dreams. She stopped eating, her throat aching with loneliness. Even her father was steadfastly ignoring her, and it hurt. She couldn’t swallow another mouthful. Pushing her plate away, she sashayed out of the dining room and downstairs to her cabin where she locked the door.

  How could she stand two whole weeks of this? She longed for her father to come to her cabin and talk to her kindly. What if he abandoned her now when she needed him most?

  The ship ploughed on into the storm, dipping and rolling. S
omewhere in the corridor outside her cabin, an empty bottle was rolling, pausing, then hitting the wall and rolling the other way. A door left open was slamming rhythmically, and all over the ship smaller objects were rattling, clinking or crashing. The hiss of the sea echoed down from the storm-washed deck as if rehearsing how it would rush and surge through the innards of the ship. Underlying the cacophony was a low-pitched, moaning sound, sinister like the buzz of a hornet in a bedroom.

  Lottie had been told this ship was very safe. It couldn’t sink. It had weathered countless storms. Unsinkable.

  Like Titanic!

  On her own in the cabin, Lottie began to feel scared, especially when she watched the porthole, which was underwater one minute and full of sky the next.

  It was an unwelcome dollop of fear to add to her already overloaded mind. She felt far away from everyone she loved, and the person she most wanted was Jenny. Jenny was brave, bright and sensible.

  Why did I do this? Lottie thought. Why put myself through all this torment when the people who really love me are right there in St Ives?

  She was pleased to hear a tap at her door and John’s voice, ‘Lottie? I’m on my own. I want to reassure you.’

  She let him in and once more they sat together on the cabin bed. John took her hand and sandwiched it firmly between his peaceful hands. ‘You must be terrified,’ he said, ‘after being shipwrecked yourself.’

  Lottie took some deep breaths. She looked into his steady eyes and began to feel better. John didn’t push her to talk, but held on to her firmly. ‘It will be all right,’ he kept saying. ‘The storm will pass. You just hold on to me. I’ll be your anchor.’

  *

  Back in St. Ives, Nan hauled herself up into the hayloft. She knew she wasn’t supposed to go up ladders, but she was determined to catch the wild boy who’d continued to steal eggs, turnips and anything else he could grab.

  He’d even been coming in the dark. On the previous night, Bartholomew had sat on the windowsill of Nan’s bedroom, like a sentry, the twitch of his whiskers silhouetted against the moonlit sky, his fur bushed out. He was growling like a dog, his neck moving as he watched what was going on in the yard.