Daughter of the River

by Daughter of the River (retail) (epub)

The object of Lew’s affections was the brown-eyed daughter of the wherry master who employed him each autumn and winter.

  Jack snorted. ‘They’m chapel. What you want to get involved with chapel folk for?’

  ‘Because they’m good, decent people,’ replied Lew, then added with a spark of mischief, ‘And because Mollie Chambers be the prettiest girl in the village.’

  ‘I suppose that’s a good enough reason for deserting your old father every night,’ Jack agreed.

  ‘’Tis only supper once a week,’ corrected Lew. ‘That’s all her mother’ll allow. Though when the nights start lightening I be hoping for better things.’

  ‘Then you’d best be off sharpish. You idn’t going to keep in her mother’s good books by letting the supper spoil,’ advised Jack… When the door closed behind Lew, he said, ‘He’m going to be the next to leave. If he’m got his knees under the table it must mean her folks approve.’ Then he gave a tremulous sigh. ‘It would’ve been different if the others had got wed and gone. You expects your young uns to leave home that way, ’tis only natural…’

  ‘If Lew marries Mollie they won’t be far away,’ said Maddy. ‘They’d always be calling here, and think of the grandchildren. You’d never be short of visitors.’

  ‘We’m a long way off that stage,’ Jack pointed out.

  Silence settled on the kitchen, broken only by the ticking of the clock and the crackling of the logs in the hearth. From time to time Jack shifted restlessly in his chair until finally Maddy put down her knitting.

  ‘Shall I read you more about Heathcliff?’ she asked. ‘You enjoyed it the last time I read to you.’

  ‘If you like.’ The response was lacklustre, but she fetched Wuthering Heights just the same. As she searched for the right page, Jack suddenly said, ‘Book-reading be all very well but it idn’t near as good as real company. What about that mountebank fellow you keeps company with? Why don’t he never come?’

  Maddy was so astonished she almost dropped the book. ‘You wouldn’t object?’ she asked.

  ‘If the Chambers can have Lew to supper up to their place I don’t seen why us can’t have that Patrick fellow yer sometime.’

  Patrick’s astonishment matched Maddy’s own when she told him. ‘You’re asking me to supper? At your home? Does your father know about this?’

  ‘Of course he does,’ Maddy laughed. ‘It was his idea.’ Then she grew serious. ‘He gets terribly lonely in the evenings now. He doesn’t seem to want to go out much any more and…’

  ‘And he considers my company is better than no company?’ completed Patrick.

  ‘Something like that,’ admitted Maddy, smiling. ‘Please say you’ll come.’

  ‘How could I refuse such a chance – any chance – to be with you?’

  ‘We’ll see you on Friday then.’ She nestled her head more comfortably against him, conscious of the impending difference in their relationship. So far their romance had been carried on against a background of disapproval from her family. Now, seemingly, that was to change.

  When Friday evening came, Maddy felt absurdly nervous, and her unease was not improved by her father’s restlessness.

  ‘Rabbit pie!’ he commented, looking at the fare she was providing. ‘And what be that to follow? Junket and cream? By harry, maid, ’tis only a potman from the Church House we’m expecting, not the Queen.’

  ‘The rabbits for the pie didn’t cost anything, because Lew caught them, and I decided we could afford to be a bit extravagant on the pudding,’ replied Maddy defensively. ‘I thought you liked junket and cream.’

  ‘I likes un well enough when I can get un,’ said Jack grumpily. ‘’Tis a sorry state, though, when I has to wait until a mountebank potman comes afore I gets the chance.’

  Her father’s mood did not bode well for the evening. Then Maddy began to worry about Patrick’s reactions. His encounters with her family had at times been violent. Had he really wanted to come this evening, or had he accepted merely to please her?

  The kitchen looked cosy and welcoming, with the firelight reflecting on the polished copper pans and the shining Delft. A freshly laundered white cloth covered the table, which was set with the best china and cutlery she could muster. She had even placed a jug of primroses in the middle, something which had caused Jack to snort derisively.

  ‘Here I am, pretty as a picture and fit for company,’ announced Lew, mincing down the stairs. ‘I’ve even washed behind my ears. Look.’ He bent towards her, pulling at his earlobe to give her a better view.

  ‘You mazed fool! Poor Mollie Chambers, she doesn’t know what she’s taking on.’ Laughing, Maddy tried to push him out of her way, but he insisted upon thrusting his ear towards her. In the heat of their mock conflict, Maddy almost did not hear the knock on the door.

  ‘I was afraid I’d come on the wrong night,’ said Patrick, when she let him in.

  ‘I don’t know about the wrong night, you must have thought you’d come to the madhouse with all this noise,’ Maddy said. ‘It was Lew acting the fool.’

  ‘When it comes to being a fool our Lew don’t need to act,’ said Jack, holding out his hand. ‘Come on in, boy.’

  Stepping over the threshold Patrick grasped his outstretched hand, and Maddy heaved a silent sigh of relief. The brief moment of horseplay had caused her father to suspend his misgivings about their visitor. Her spirits rose more when, after having shaken hands with Lew, Patrick took a bottle from his pocket.

  ‘A small contribution towards what I know is going to be an enjoyable evening,’ he said.

  ‘Honey wine,’ said Jack appreciatively. ‘Well, there idn’t naught wrong with your taste, boy. I habn’t had honey wine since I don’t knows when. Come and sit by the fire and us’ll take the top off un while Maddy gets supper on the table.’

  Maddy glanced at Patrick and he smiled at her, a reassuring smile that said ‘Everything’s going to be all right.’

  And everything was all right. At first there was little conversation, the excellence of the supper saw to that. No one could ever accuse Patrick of being poor company and, after the dishes were removed and the honey wine set out, he soon had the others in fits of laughter. Maddy was delighted to hear her father chuckling, she had not seen him look so animated for a long time. She enjoyed, too, the firm grasp of Patrick’s fingers as he held her hand beneath the table. This was an evening she had never expected to happen, to have Patrick sitting by their fireside, with her father’s approval.

  ‘I really must go.’ Patrick gave her hand one last surreptitious squeeze, then rose to his feet. ‘I’m afraid I’ve sadly outstayed my welcome.’

  Jack looked up at the clock. ‘It can’t be that late!’ he exclaimed incredulously. ‘Why, it don’t seem two minutes since you got here, boy. You’m given us a merry time and no mistake.’

  ‘No, the giving was on your part,’ contradicted Patrick. ‘I can’t remember when I last spent so enjoyable an evening. Being something of a wanderer, with no longer any folks to call my own, it’s a rare treat for me to sit beside a proper fireside and be treated as one of the family.’

  He could not have said anything that would have appealed more to Jack, who was still missing his lost sons sorely.

  ‘Family be a great thing, boy.’ Jack put his hand on Patrick’s shoulder. ‘Sadly us don’t always appreciate it till ’tis too late. If you’m a mind, you must come again.’

  ‘I will, you can be sure of it. And my thanks for your hospitality and your kindness.’

  Patrick said his goodbyes and Maddy saw him to the door. There were no lovers’ farewells, just an exchange of smiles that were brief and tender. Maddy did not mind. The evening had gone better than she could ever have anticipated. True, her father had never once referred to Patrick by name, only as ‘boy’, but she sensed a last residual reserve in this rather than disapproval.

  ‘That fellow of youm, he’m rare amusing, there idn’t no getting away from the fact,’ yawned Jack, reaching up to wind the c
lock, as he always did before bed. ‘Once you gets to know him he seems a brave enough fellow. Don’t be too long afore you invites him again.’

  ‘I won’t, and thank you, Father.’ Maddy was delighted. She became aware, though, that Lew had said little. ‘Don’t you like Patrick?’ she asked bluntly.

  ‘I agrees with Father. He’m some amusing, and that be a fact.’

  ‘But do you like him?’ she insisted.

  ‘Tidn’t no use asking me summat like that,’ Lew said. ‘’Tis if you likes un, that be the important thing.’

  Maddy was not fooled. Beneath his diplomatic response she sensed he did not like Patrick. She felt a momentary distress, but it swiftly disappeared. He would soon come round. Once he really got to know Patrick, how could he help himself?

  * * *

  ‘Your Lew’s in well with the Chambers these days, I hears,’ remarked Annie one day. ‘Us’ll be hearing wedding bells soon I shouldn’t wonder.’

  ‘Perhaps, in time,’ replied Maddy. She knew that her brother had good reasons for not rushing things.

  ‘Us’ll wait a while until the talk about Davie dies down,’ he had said. ‘Not that I be ashamed of him, nor do it make no difference to Mollie. But her ma be still not too happy about her girl marrying into a family as has a hanging in its history. Only natural, I suppose, so I think ’tis only right to let things settle down a bit.’

  Maddy hoped sincerely that things would ‘settle down a bit’ for the pair of them, for although he said little, she knew Lew was desperately fond of his Mollie.

  ‘And what about you, then?’ Annie’s voice broke into her thoughts. ‘I hope you’m getting your bottom drawer together too, for you’m going to need un afore long, if I be any judge.’

  ‘Get along with you!’ said Maddy scornfully.

  ‘Don’t you scoff at me, my girl!’ Annie pretended to be indignant. ‘My eyes idn’t playing tricks. That Patrick of youm be down here of a Friday night for his supper regular. If that idn’t a sign of a wedding to come I don’t know what be.’

  ‘If you’re looking for a chance to buy a new bonnet soon then I’m afraid you’re going to be disappointed,’ Maddy laughed.

  She did not admit that, of late, she had begun to be of the same opinion. No longer was it a question of deserting the family if she wed. If she married Patrick they could live with Jack, for there was plenty of room. She was sure her father would not object. Already he was beginning to say in a jovial tone, ‘Any day now I be going to have a serious talk with that fellow of youm. I wants to know his intentions.’

  And what were Patrick’s intentions? He had never actually mentioned marriage, but his remarks always referred to the wonderful future that they would share one day. Recalling the things he said, and the way he was always so tender and loving towards her, it was no wonder that her thoughts were beginning to turn happily towards wedding rings and church bells.

  It was one wash-day when Maddy thought she caught a glimpse of Lew going past the door as she was prodding clothes into the copper in the lean-to beside the cottage. Through the clouds of steam she could have sworn she saw him, but when he neither came in nor called out to her she decided she must have been mistaken. Hadn’t he said he was going down mill to settle up with the Totnes agent for the salmon? He would never have come home so promptly, not when he had a chance to call in on Mollie. But as she was carrying the basket of wet laundry into the garden, she definitely heard his voice.

  It was coming from Annie’s house. She paused, puzzled as to what he was doing there. At that moment he emerged from next door with Annie. Seeing her, their serious expressions grew even more grave.

  Maddy put her washing down. ‘What’s the matter?’ she demanded. ‘What’s happened? Something’s happened to Father!’

  ‘No, Father be fine,’ said Lew, helping Annie over the rough path. ‘Just wait for us indoors. We’m coming as fast as us can.’ He looked unusually agitated.

  It seemed an age before the pair of them finally entered the kitchen. When they did they looked at each other with seeming helplessness, as if each willing the other to speak.

  ‘You tell her,’ Lew urged Annie. ‘I habn’t got the heart.’

  ‘For pity’s sake, one of you tell me what’s been going on!’ cried Maddy.

  ‘You’m best sit yourself down, my lover, for us’ve got a bit of bad news,’ said Annie gently. She took a deep breath as if steeling herself for what was to come. ‘Maddy, my maidie, there idn’t no easy way to say this so I’ll come straight out with it. That sweetheart of yourn, Patrick, have run off.’

  ‘Run off?’ Maddy sank onto the nearest chair.

  ‘That idn’t the worst, neither. Oh, Maddy, I wishes I wadn’t the one to tell you this but… he’m eloped with that haughty Fitzherbert wench!’

  Patrick gone? Eloped with Victoria Fitzherbert? It was unthinkable! Ludicrous! Maddy could not, would not, believe it.

  ‘What sort of stupid joke is this…?’ She looked from Annie to Lew. Their eyes showed distress and love and pity. ‘It’s a joke,’ she said. ‘It’s got to be… Please say it’s a joke.’

  But no one admitted to joking. The only response was silence.

  Then she knew it was true.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Maddy sat very still. Patrick had eloped with Victoria Fitzherbert. Patrick, who just the night before had held her in his arms and told her that she and no other was his beloved Rustic Damozel. He must have gone straight from her to— No, she could not bear to think of it. He had betrayed her in the cruellest way – with kisses and sweet words. All the time he had been pleasuring her with soft caresses and loving whispers he had been planning to run off with Victoria. She was too numb with shock to feel any pain yet, bewilderment was her sole emotion. Her head knew the story was true – Annie and Lew would never have come to her with such a tale if they had not been certain – but her heart refused to accept it.

  ‘Tell me the details,’ she said bleakly. ‘I want to know.’

  Annie looked up at Lew. ‘Twas the boy yer as heard un, and he came hastening to me.’

  ‘I heard about un down mill,’ Lew said. ‘The place were buzzing with un, and I were afeared you’d find out by chance. That’s why I come to Annie. I reckoned her’d know the best words.’

  ‘There idn’t no best words, not for news like this,’ said Annie grimly.

  ‘Tell me, anyway,’ insisted Maddy, her voice expressionless. ‘I must know.’

  ‘According to the tale down mill, when Mary, the Fitzherbert wench’s maid, went to wake her, the bed was empty. Just a note on the pillow saying as her’d gone off with the man she loved. At first no one knowd which man her meant, her never seemed to fancy no one special. Then Mr Fitzherbert questioned Mary, real fierce about it he were, and the upshot were her admitted her mistress had been seeing that Patrick on the quiet.’

  ‘Then it’s just Mary’s word that Victoria’s eloped with Patrick!’ Relief roused Maddy from her stupor. ‘The maid must have been mistaken or else she’s lying.’

  Annie shook her head sadly. ‘Patrick’s things have gone from the Church House, and no one have seen him since late last night.’

  ‘That doesn’t mean anything.’

  ‘He took his fiddle, and Lucy Ford’s pony and trap has disappeared.’

  ‘A coincidence,’ Maddy cried contemptuously. ‘Who would think of eloping in a pony and trap? They’d be overtaken in no time.’

  ‘It’d get them to Newton or maybe Torquay, some busy place like that, where they could get the train,’ Lew pointed out. ‘Anyway, Mr Fitzherbert have gone after the pair of them, swearing like nobody’s business and lashing about with his whip.’

  ‘Then he’s gone on a fool’s errand,’ declared Maddy. ‘As like as not that wretched female’s not eloped at all. You know what she’s like for making mischief. She certainly won’t be found with Patrick.’

  Again Annie and Lew exchanged concerned glances.

  ‘There
’s more’n Mary’s word,’ said Lew. ‘They was seen together a few times. Folk thought it were chance, with that Victoria always riding about the place, but now—’

  ‘Lies!’ cried Maddy. ‘All lies!’ Then she put her head in her hands and wept, because try as she might to disbelieve what she was hearing, she kept remembering Victoria’s odd behaviour last time they met. She feared she knew the reason now for that gloating self-satisfied expression. No wonder Victoria had been triumphant, she had got her revenge for past conflicts with a vengeance, by inflicting the greatest hurt she could upon Maddy. She had stolen her lover.

  The door flew open with a crash, and there stood Jack.

  ‘Be it true?’ he demanded. ‘What I be hearing about that mountebank and the Fitzherbert wench?’

  ‘It be true, right enough,’ said Lew.

  Jack strode over to his weeping daughter and, ignoring his working dirt, enfolded her in his arms. ‘He’ll pay, my maidie,’ he swore. ‘No wretch causes my girl this sorrow and gets off scot-free. He’m played fast and loose once too often and, by harry, idn’t he going to rue the day.’

  ‘What are you going to do?’ cried Maddy through her tears, as Jack released her and made for the stairs.

  ‘I be going after the pair of un,’ he replied.

  ‘But Mr Fitzherbert’s gone already,’ said Lew.

  ‘Fitzherbert? He idn’t naught!’ Jack was disparaging. ‘Plenty of noise and little else. He won’t find un.’ And he stamped up the stairs.

  He was back in a few minutes dressed in his Sunday suit, an old haversack over his shoulder. Helping himself to some bread and cold bacon and to a few coins from the Delft jug he said, ‘I’ll likely be home late. Don’t wait up.’

  Lew leapt to his feet. ‘Hang on a minute,’ he cried, ‘I’ll come too.’ But Jack shook his head.

  ‘This be my work, boy. You bide yer, and have charge of the boat. I suppose Fitzherbert have took his horsewhip? Horsewhip!’ He snarled in disgust. ‘That be too good for the villain. He’ll feel my fist, aye, and my boots, too, when I catches up with un. They’ll teach un a harsher lesson than any horsewhip.’