An Orphan's Winter

by Sheila Jeffries

  Lottie hoped today would be the time to tell Matt about the baby. She wouldn’t tell him straight away. She’d wait for the right moment – and she’d tell him in the language of poetry. The miracle and the tiny heartbeat. She wanted Matt to feel good. She wanted him to love the little person who was curled up inside her womb.

  But when she reached The Jenny Wren, Matt wasn’t there. Usually he was standing on the boat, watching and waiting for her to arrive. She always loved the moment when he caught sight of her and gave her the curt Lanroska nod, and as she drew close she could see his eyes full of light.

  Where is he?

  Slightly deflated, Lottie sat on the sea-worn timber of the slipway, arranging her skirt nicely over her legs. She put the picnic basket down, glad that it had a lid strapped over the food as a few seagulls were eyeing it hopefully.

  Wharf Road was busy with women packing and selling fish, artists with their easels, Saturday shoppers with baskets, and local children playing. As she watched them, Lottie thought about Warren and wondered where he was. She’d enjoyed reading him stories, seeing his face light up, and teaching him to talk.

  At last she spotted Matt’s rangy figure weaving through the crowd at the far end of the quay. She waved, but he didn’t wave back, and Lottie immediately sensed something was wrong. Normally Matt walked in a leisurely, rather insolent way, his eyes challenging everyone he met. Now he walked in angry strides, his head down. Perhaps he hadn’t seen her. Something must have happened. Had he stolen something and got caught?

  He came pounding down the slipway, his face flushed, his eyes wild. ‘Get in the boat,’ he said roughly. He didn’t even look at her. Lottie froze. ‘Well, don’t just sit there in your posh frock. I’ve got to get out of here.’

  ‘What’s wrong?’ Lottie asked, upset at the way he was treating her.

  ‘Just get in.’ Matt pulled the boat in closer and vaulted in. He turned and held out his hand. ‘Are you coming or not?’

  ‘Matt!’ Lottie glared at him. ‘If you continue to speak to me like that, I shall take the picnic and go home.’

  Matt crumpled. ‘Please, Lottie, I don’t mean to upset you. I’d die if I lost you.’ He rubbed his shoulder and as he turned, Lottie noticed a dark bruise on the side of his face. It was bleeding a little into his hair, as if it had only just happened. ‘We have to talk about this.’ He touched the bruise gingerly, his hand shaking.

  ‘You’re hurt, Matt.’ Lottie swung herself into the boat. She tried to dab at the blood with her small hanky but Matt moved her arm away, gripping it firmly. ‘You’re trembling, Matt. What happened?’

  He looked down at her, his eyes full of pain. ‘I’ll tell you.’ He glanced anxiously at Wharf Road as if someone were chasing him. ‘But let’s get away, out on the water. You sit down – and hold tight, Lottie.’ He started the motor and steered the boat skilfully through the harbour, too fast, making Lottie gasp and cling on with both hands, the bow wave rocking the other boats, raising a few shouts of protest. But Matt didn’t seem to care.

  Lottie was terrified, not only for herself but for the tiny person growing within her. Could her baby hear the savage roar of the engine? Could it feel her anxiety at the way the boat was ripping through the calm water, rocking and bouncing? Matt had never done this before. He’d always been careful and considerate when she was with him. She shut her eyes and struggled to stay calm, images of the shipwreck haunting her. Then the storm on the way back from America, the way her father had held her so caringly.

  Out in the bay, The Jenny Wren came to a halt. Matt cut the engine and a tranquil circle of silence spread out around them in ripples of chalky blue and silver.

  ‘Are you okay?’ Matt sat down, his knees hunched, his body still, as if the burst of speed had dispersed his anger into the ocean.

  Lottie couldn’t reply. She looked down at her dress, which was now damp from the spray, and wished she hadn’t worn it. She reached out for a hug and they held each other. Lottie waited for Matt to start talking and when he did, she took both his hands in hers and looked into his troubled eyes.

  ‘I do love you, Lottie,’ he said in a low, husky voice, ‘and I don’t want to lose you. You’re truly the most precious thing in my life. But I need you to be honest with me.’

  ‘I always am.’

  ‘You’re not going to like this, Lottie, but you have to know. This morning I was here early and I went up to the gallery to give John some more of my drawings. I was feeling good. But when I walked past Morwenna’s place, her mother was standing outside her door smoking and talking to her friend. She came across the road and started screaming at me – she was right in my face. She kept on and on saying she hated bastards like me because of what I’ve done to you. So I laughed at her. I said, “Get off me, you mad woman,” and I told her I hadn’t done anything to you and I didn’t know what she was on about – and she yelled, “Ask Lottie – go on – ask her.” ’

  Lottie listened, horrified. Why had she trusted Cora? ‘Did she actually say what you were supposed to have done?’

  ‘No. She wouldn’t shut up and people were coming out of their doors to see what was going on – like they always do around here. I laughed at her and called her Crazy Daisy and she went mad. She went into her house and grabbed a frying pan and threw it at me. It really hurt. I thought she’d broken my jaw.’

  ‘How dreadful! What did you do then?’ Lottie asked.

  ‘I kept telling her I didn’t know what she was accusing me of. I felt like throttling her with my bare hands, Lottie, but I managed to walk away without touching her. She threw all sorts of things after me – shoes, saucepans. It was hard, but I just walked away. I thought of Dad and how that’s what he would have done. And that Maudie woman was there as well, gloating. But Cora Bartle really got to me, Lottie. I hate those women. What gives them the right to attack me like that in my own home town?’

  ‘Oh, Matt.’ Lottie slipped her arm around his shoulders.

  ‘I mean – I haven’t done anything, have I? What exactly is she blaming me for? And why did she keep saying, “Ask Lottie”? Do you know why?’

  Lottie shut her eyes. There was no avoiding it now. Matt must be told. The language of poetry wasn’t going to work. He was looking at her so intently, with darkly wounded eyes. He needed the plain truth – no frills. She let go of his hands and placed hers over her tummy.

  Help me, she thought. Little one, little star – help me.

  ‘Lottie? What did Cora mean? Tell me.’

  ‘Cora shouldn’t have blamed you, Matt. It wasn’t something you did on your own. We did it together. We made love and it was beautiful. Our love has made a baby.’

  Matt frowned and drew his lips back into a horrified snarl.

  She waited, but he didn’t speak so she said, ‘Our baby – yes, our baby – is a miracle. It has a tiny heartbeat, a sweet little face, perfect fingers and toes. It wants to live and it wants us to be its parents.’

  Matt went pale, the bruise already darkening to a florid purple over his cheek. ‘A . . . baby?’ he spluttered. ‘But . . . we’re young lovers, Lottie – we’re too young to have a baby.’

  Lottie tried to speak gently and quietly, infusing her voice with a sense of magic, the way Nan did when she was telling a legend. ‘I’m a woman, Matt, not a girl. I have monthly periods like every woman does. Don’t you know that?’

  Matt shook his head. He spoke in a hoarse whisper. ‘No – no, I didn’t. I might have heard about it, but I didn’t know what they were, and nobody’s told me. Dad would have explained it, but he’s gone and he’ll never come back. I don’t talk to Mum and I couldn’t possibly ask her anything like that – she’d go mad, like Cora Bartle.’ A single tear rolled down his bruised cheek. ‘I’ve lived like this, on my own, since we escaped from the orphanage. It’s been hard, Lottie – yeah, I know I chose to do it, but no one knows how hard it is. And I’ve got no one to talk to. Ken, maybe, but not about things like that – or your dad, John.
I really like him but I’ve only just met him. Who else is there? I could have talked to Grandad Vic but he just went off, didn’t he? He lives in Newlyn.’ He gazed out at the sea. ‘He always liked me. He stuck up for me and gave me advice. I miss him, Lottie.’ Another tear caught a glint of sun as it rolled down his cheek. ‘When we lost Dad, we lost everything, didn’t we?’

  Lottie nodded, still holding his hands, rubbing the rough texture of his skin with her small thumb.

  ‘We lost . . . everything,’ Matt repeated. ‘Our dad, our grandad, our home. And when we were dragged off to the orphanage, I even lost you, Lottie, and it made me understand how much I loved you. Everything I’ve tried to do – finding The Jenny Wren and restoring her, doing the drawings to make some money – has been for us, Lottie, and when you told me you loved me too, it was suddenly like my whole life had changed and I had a reason to go on living.’ He stopped talking and let his eyes gaze at her steadily.

  ‘Listen, Matt – don’t speak, just listen, please.’ She looked at him with a bright, compelling gaze. ‘Yes, we lost everything, but now we’ve been given a miracle of life, a tiny, perfect baby, a secret star that came through our beautiful lovemaking. It came through you and into me, and it wants to live, it wants us to be its parents. It will bring laughter and happiness into our world. I am carrying it, keeping it safe and warm.’ She patted her tummy. ‘And Dr Tregullow could hear its fast little heartbeat in there.’

  ‘But . . .’

  ‘No – listen, Matt,’ Lottie spoke with all the intensity she could muster. ‘Both of us, you and me, have had broken childhoods, and this little person will be our family. I don’t know why but I feel it’s a girl, and she will look a bit like me and a bit like you, and even a bit like your dad. He always wanted a little girl.’

  ‘But, Lottie, this is a baby, not an angel with wings. And babies are horrible. They scream day and night. I remember when Tom was born. He was awful. Mum was worn out – and babies smell; the whole house stinks for years.’

  ‘You sound like Cora Bartle!’ Lottie felt annoyed. Her plan had failed.

  ‘I do not!’

  ‘Cora’s attitude upset me. She painted a sordid, miserable picture of motherhood. She even said the family would throw me out.’

  ‘So you did tell Cora Bartle – why tell her, of all people, Lottie?’

  ‘I needed some down-to-earth advice, and like you I felt . . .’

  Matt interrupted her, angry now. ‘So what was her down-to-earth advice? Attack me in the street and shout it all over St Ives? You might have told me first.’

  ‘I did try to tell you that day on the boat, but you wouldn’t listen.’

  ‘Well, how was I to know it was something so . . . so devastating?’ Matt snatched his hand away from hers and clenched it into a fist. ‘You betrayed me, like all women do.’

  ‘I did not!’

  ‘Yes, you did – and don’t glare at me, Lottie. It hurts. How did you think I’d feel, having her yelling at me? Eh?’

  ‘I didn’t know she was going to.’

  ‘So what else did Cora Wonderful Bartle advise?’ Matt snarled.

  ‘She said I should keep it a secret and she offered to help me get rid of it.’ Lottie’s voice became a whine of pain.

  ‘Get rid of it? What the heck does that mean?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘Oh – you don’t know!’

  ‘Don’t be horrible to me, Matt,’ Lottie spoke quietly, but her eyes blazed. ‘I don’t know because I don’t want to know. I wouldn’t dream of killing our child – our child, Matt. I intend to let it live, let it be born into a loving, caring family, and that includes you. You’ll be its father, Matt. Think about it. But if I have to, I’ll do it on my own.’

  Matt clenched his hands into his hair. He hunched his back and rocked forward. ‘I can’t take this,’ he growled. ‘Just leave me alone to sort my head out.’

  ‘Oh, Matt,’ Lottie tried to give him a hug.

  ‘Get off me.’ He pushed her away. ‘Leave me alone. Give me a chance to think, will you?’

  Lottie went cold. She looked at the distant shore. ‘Okay, then will you please take me back to the harbour? It’s too far to swim.’

  Matt continued to rock and growl. She remembered how he’d been as a child. Angry. He’d sit hunched on the stairs, chucking a ball at the front door, endlessly.

  Sadness clawed at her heart. His attitude, his rough disregard of her feelings – was this the same Matt who made love with her so tenderly? Was it really love? Or was it something he could switch off when she needed support?

  The brilliance of the day burned at the edges, the shimmering sunlight and the calm sea reduced to a distant blob of light. Surely the love of her life wasn’t going to abandon her?

  He started the boat’s engine. ‘Hold tight,’ he said, grimfaced. Without looking at her again he headed for the harbour. The tide was ebbing so he pulled the boat in at the bottom of the stone steps leading up to Smeaton’s Pier. ‘Well, there you are. You can go,’ he growled.

  A sense of finality swept over Lottie. Shocked at his ruthless, uncaring behaviour, she sat frozen. ‘Matt – Matt, please – don’t be so cruel.’

  ‘I did what you wanted – brought you ashore. So just go.’

  ‘But, Matt . . .’

  ‘Go!’

  Numbly, she climbed out of the boat onto the granite steps. He revved the engine and left in a curve of flying spray. Lottie felt hollow inside.

  Cora’s words rattled in her mind: When you tell him, he’ll run a mile.

  Matt had gone. Without saying goodbye, without looking back. Lottie stumbled up the steps with only one thought hammering away in her mind: her life was over.

  *

  ‘I’ve had a lovely day,’ Jenny said, her face glowing with happiness as John returned from his outdoor painting time, his easel tucked under his arm. ‘I sold three paintings, John! Two of yours and one of Matt’s.’

  ‘Oh, well done, that is good news.’ John stood gazing at her. ‘It must be your pretty face.’

  Jenny flushed. ‘And I met interesting people, mostly from up-country. Some of them do speak funny, but I rather enjoy listening to a different accent. I’ve put the money in the drawer, where you showed me – and I put Matt’s money in an envelope. He and Lottie must have had a wonderful day out on the boat. What about you, John? How did the sketching go?’

  ‘Pretty well. I walked inland up to Trencrom and did some drawings of the quoit.’

  ‘Come on – show me,’ Jenny said, wanting to encourage him.

  John opened his sketch pad and showed her his pencil drawings of the giant granite dolmen said to be a burial chamber.

  ‘I’ve been up there a few times,’ Jenny said. ‘It’s quite a climb, isn’t it? I couldn’t do it now.’

  ‘Have you mastered the electric kettle yet?’ John asked.

  Jenny grinned. ‘Is that your way of asking me to make coffee?’

  ‘Yes, please.’ John shut the gallery door and put the CLOSED sign up. ‘I won’t lock it in case Lottie comes by on her way home. She often does.’

  For a moment they both stared at Discovering Charlotte, the painting John had done of nine-year-old Lottie playing on the beach with Morwenna. It had pride of place in the gallery. He’d never sell it, John promised. It would be an heirloom to be handed down through the family.

  ‘She was such a beautiful child,’ he mused. ‘It’s good to have the memory. She’s growing up so fast.’

  ‘She went out this morning in the posh frock you bought her in New York. She looked stunning in it. Maybe it’s time to do another painting of her, John, don’t you think?’

  John’s dark blue eyes shone. ‘Well, actually Jenny, it’s you I’d like to paint.’

  ‘Me? Whatever for?’

  ‘Because you’re beautiful, Jenny. Beautiful and strong, and you have a radiance about you today.’

  ‘Have I?’

  ‘But exactly how to
paint such radiance is something I haven’t worked out yet. Perhaps I should just enjoy it instead.’ He reached out and touched her face, his eyes holding hers in a stare loaded with intention. Jenny held her breath, her lips parted. His fingers moved over her cheekbone and softly down to trace the shape of her mouth, lingering for a moment to stroke the centre of her top lip.

  Jenny felt herself melting. She knew he wouldn’t want her to be stiff and resistant and thinking of Arnie. John would want her soft and pliable and passionate. He wanted her to want him. And she did.

  ‘You’re lovely,’ he breathed, his feet shuffling closer, pulling her gently in until she felt the full length of him against her. She reached up to touch his face, watching the light in his eyes, the loneliness and the longing, the letting go as he finally kissed her.

  Jenny’s spirits soared. She felt weightless and free. ‘Shall we go upstairs?’ he murmured.

  ‘Lock the door,’ she whispered. It wouldn’t do to have Lottie walking in on their lovemaking.

  *

  On that still, warm day, thundery showers were building over the sea, peppering the tranquil water with fat drops of rain. Alone at Hendravean, Nan fetched Mufty in from the paddock. Donkeys hated getting wet so she wanted him inside with a haynet stuffed with sweet meadow hay and a luxurious bed of crisp golden straw. It took Nan an hour to settle him in, heaving barrowloads of straw across the yard and then shaking it out with a pitchfork. She struggled up the ladder into the hayloft, filled Mufty’s net and rolled it down. The hay dust made her wheeze and cough. She dragged herself back to the house and brewed a mug of hot black tea, the steam from it easing her breathing.

  Nan fell asleep in her chair and awoke at noon feeling rested, enjoying her time alone. The struggle to look after Mufty made her reflect with gratitude on the work Tom and Lottie did on a daily basis. They were willing and quick, looking after Mufty and the chickens, bringing in wood and coal for the range. It was good to have them around. Her decision to take them in had been hard, but it had brought blessings into her life.

  Sharing the harvest meant a lot to Nan, and she’d enjoyed every minute. Instead of facing winter on her own, she was looking forward to cosy evenings by the fire, helping Lottie with her studying, telling stories and legends in the flickering firelight.