A Bridge in Time

by A Bridge in Time (retail) (epub)

  ‘What a pretty thing!’ he exclaimed, and dashingly used it to write his name on the stiffly starched linen tablecloth. If his wife had been present he would have been well and truly scolded for that alone. Then he repeated with a delightful grin, ‘What a pretty thing – thank you, my dear. I’ll always carry it and when anyone asks me where I got it, I’ll say it was given to me by a beautiful young lady.’

  He walked round the table to kiss her cheek and his pleasure in the gift was so obviously genuine that she kissed him back, pleased with her success. ‘It was difficult to find a gift for a man who owns so many lovely things,’ she told him.

  ‘You made an excellent choice,’ he assured her, then stood up and folded his napkin. ‘Drink your tea and I’ll take you to see something I’ve bought for you. I wanted you to start the year with it, and it came last night. It’s waiting for you now.’

  She gulped a cup of tea hastily and stood up. ‘Oh, let’s go now, Bap. I love presents. What is it?’

  ‘Wait and see,’ he said mysteriously as he ushered her to the door. The present was waiting in the stable, groomed and shining. It was a lovely bay mare.

  Bethya clasped her hands in delight at the sight of it. ‘What a lovely horse – but it’s very big, isn’t it? Do you think I’ll be able to manage it?’

  Her father-in-law looked at her in approval. ‘You’re a superb horsewoman and you know it, so don’t come that little girl act with me, young lady. I got you this horse because I could see that your grey’s too placid for you now. You need something with more spirit – an animal to put you on your mettle. I thought you could take her out hunting, because the man I bought her from said she’s the boldest jumper he’s ever ridden.’

  ‘What’s her name?’ asked Bethya, going up to the mare and stroking her face.

  ‘He called her Jess, but that’s an awful name. You can call her anything you want,’ the Colonel said.

  Bethya turned with her lovely face vibrant and said fervently, ‘You’re so kind to me, you really are. If it wasn’t for you, Bap, I’d have gone away from here long ago.’

  His shrewd little eyes were sad as he looked back at her. ‘I know that, my dear, and I also know you’ll go one day, but in the meantime I have the pleasure of your company. Why don’t you take your new mare out now? It’s a fine morning – I’ll come with you.’

  The groom who was holding the horse frowned. ‘If you go out, sir, don’t go up on the hill. I heard horns coming down from there a little while ago. There’s hounds running and this horse is keen: it might take off with Mrs Anstruther. Perhaps I should ride out with you?’

  But Bethya shook her head. ‘I’ll be all right,’ she said. ‘Come on, Bap. Let’s go and change and then we can be off.’

  The mention of hounds running on the Three Sisters excited her, for the thought of galloping over their vastness on a spirited horse was exactly what she needed to drive away her still-lingering melancholy.

  She and the old soldier cantered off down the drive in high spirits and of course, as soon as they were out of sight of the stable, she persuaded him to head for the hill. Bethya was dressed in her winter riding habit of dark green topped by a shiny silk top hat of the same colour and a broad-meshed eye veil. The Colonel eyed her appreciatively as they rode along. She was fearless on a horse but he felt he ought to warn her.

  ‘Take care, my dear,’ he cautioned. ‘She’s not like your other mare. Don’t do anything rash – keep her on a short rein. They are hunting up there and from the sounds of it, they’re running.’

  He might as well have saved his breath. The sound of the hunting horn made Bethya even more determined to gallop up the hill. ‘Come on, Bap, I’ll outrun you,’ she called, and set off at a gallop. The new mare was as eager as her rider to be out on the hill. For too long she had fretted in a loosebox with her only exercise being lunged round and round on a long rope by grooms who were afraid to ride her, for as soon as she sensed their fear she started bucking and kicking, and always succeeded in throwing them off. Bethya was not afraid, however, and the mare responded to her confident handling with good behaviour. They quickly struck up a rapport – a sort of communication and understanding between woman and horse. They had a lot in common: both of them were beautiful and wayward, but both also longed to be loved.

  Freedom exhilarated them. The air was crisp, and as soon as the mare felt soft turf beneath her hooves, she gave three tremendous bucks and kicked out wildly. Instead of responding with panic, Bethya laughed and tightened her hold on the reins. ‘On you go, then. Let’s see what you can do,’ she said, leaning forward and urging the horse into a gallop. With the Colonel panting behind them, they tore up to the summit of the first hill and then paused while he caught up. The sparkling countryside spread all around them in a breathtaking panorama. In the far distance was a bluish-coloured line of snow-covered hills that marked the border between England and Scotland. Between them and the hill-top was a winter world of frost-whitened smaller hills, leafless woods, farmhouses with grey trails of smoke rising from their chimneys, glittering rivers, empty, neatly-ploughed fields that looked like squares of chocolate… a beautiful, open world inviting them to ride on and explore it. Bethya was smiling when her father-in-law drew rein at her side. ‘Isn’t this wonderful?’ she exulted.

  ‘Maybe, maybe, but I’m too old for it,’ he gasped. ‘I’ll have to go back.’

  ‘Oh Bap, not yet,’ she pleaded. ‘I’m only just getting a taste for it. You go back but I’ll ride on. I’ll be quite safe, I promise. I’ll return in an hour.’ She dimpled prettily at him and he gave in.

  ‘Oh, all right – but do take care. I can see you’ve got that mare under control, but stay away from those hounds.’

  In the distance they could hear the sound of a hunting horn, crisp in the frost-sharp silence. The mare heard it, too, and bent her neck to bite on the bit but Bethya held her still until the old man rode away down the hill again. Then she sat down firmly in her side-saddle, looked around and said out loud, ‘Which way, which way?’ As she gazed over the farthest slope she saw them, four tiny figures galloping behind a pack of hounds that raced along in a straight line with their noses to the ground. Far off in front of them, a red-brushed fox loped in the direction of a thick covert. It didn’t seem to be hurrying. Bethya laughed, drove a heel into her horse’s side and they slithered down the slope to join the hunters.

  The Duke of Allandale was leading the field on his chestnut horse Ajmeer. As he galloped along, he blew on a silver horn because today he was hunting the hounds himself. Two of his grooms were acting as whippers-in and his friend Sydney Godolphin was close beside him on the grey Knave of Hearts. They were all galloping flat out and the Duke knew that if he could raise the fox out of the covert for which it was heading, there was a chance that it would run for at least six or seven miles. ‘Whoo-oop!’ exalted Sydney at his side and glanced at his friend with an expression of pure delight. ‘He’s running, he’s running, let’s hope he goes on,’ he cried.

  They were aiming for a gate, intending to jump it, when the youngest whipper-in rode up beside them and called out, ‘Someone’s joined in, sir!’

  ‘Damned cheek! Go back and say this is private. It’s my pack and this is my hill. Tell whoever it is to go away. It must be some crazy farmer out for a bit of sport. These fellows just get in the way,’ called the Duke.

  The whipper-in’s face was concerned. ‘It’s not a farmer, sir, it’s a woman.’

  Both Sydney and the Duke stared at him in alarm. ‘A woman? My God, her horse must have bolted with her! Go back and stop it. She’ll probably break her neck if you don’t. Send her home. She shouldn’t be hacking on this hill anyway.’

  The man turned his horse and galloped back, but when the Duke and Sydney were checked at the covert gate listening to the hounds inside working the wood, he came back looking even more worried. ‘She won’t go home, sir. She’s asked if she can ride along with you. She says she won’t cause any trou
ble.’

  ‘But dammit doesn’t she know this is man’s sport? We don’t want women in on this. What if she falls off? Someone’d have to pick her up and catch her horse. Where is she? I’ll send her back myself,’ said the furious Duke.

  ‘She’s on the other side of the wood. She said she’d wait there to help watch in case the fox comes out on that side,’ was the groom’s reply.

  At that moment a shrill cry rent the air, ‘Gooone Awaaay!’ The second whipper-in was telling them that the fox had broken covert. The men turned their horses and rode round the edge of the wood to the other side, where the hounds were once more coming out and giving tongue. To the chagrin of Sydney and the Duke, at least a field’s length in front of them was the woman on the bay horse. The only consolation they could find was that they did not think she would be able to stand the pace or cope with the obstacles that stood in her way. ‘Let her alone. We’ll lose her quick enough and if she falls, don’t stop to pick her up,’ the Duke rapped out to his companions.

  The ground beyond the wood was rough and needed watching, but the woman in front maintained her lead and her pursuers began to wonder if her mount was in fact bolting, for it charged along with its head down and its legs covering huge lengths of ground at each stride. Yet she sat up in the saddle and appeared to be enjoying herself. There was no sign of panic or hauling on the reins as she surely would have done if the horse really was running away with her.

  When the hounds reached the rising slope of the second hill they began nosing in and out of whinbushes making a great din but the Duke drove his horse down a bank of slippery shale to bring them together and set them on the right line again. Once more they were off, streaming along behind the dark-red blur that was the fox. It, too, was travelling faster now and the pace became furious. The Duke and Sydney, who were riding stirrup to stirrup, caught up with the woman but ignored her and spurred their horses on, setting them at the most dangerous places without trying to find safe routes. From time to time they noted with surprise that the woman was still with them, taking the same frightening jumps with total aplomb. In the end they covered six miles, ending up at a hill-top cairn where the fox went to ground in a hole that it knew well. It just managed to slip into its sanctuary a few feet in front of the slavering jaws of the leading hound, an old veteran called Bellman who’d lost many a fox there before. Bellman looked up at the Duke with puzzled and sorrowful yellow eyes when he rode up. ‘Yes, he’s done it again, he’s got away,’ agreed the hound’s master, slithering out of the saddle and standing on the heap of stones beside the panting dogs.

  Sydney rode up, too, and rested with both hands on his knees and his head down while he fought to get breath back in his lungs. ‘What a run he gave us. He deserves to get away,’ he gasped.

  Then the woman came clattering up, mud-spattered and pink-cheeked with her hat on the back of her head. ‘That was wonderful,’ she cried. ‘I hope you didn’t kill it!’

  Sydney turned and looked at her in astonishment at the same moment as she recognised him. Her expression froze. ‘It’s you! What are you doing here?’ she exclaimed.

  He assumed a mock Irish accent. ‘Sure amn’t I doing a bit of whipping-in for his Grace the Duke here.’ His friend looked at him in astonishment but Sydney silenced him with a significant look and said in a more normal voice, ‘This is Mrs Anstruther. Her father-in-law the Colonel is one of the directors of the railway company, Your Grace.’

  He knew the Duke was still against the railway. He had never softened his opposition, for there was no reason to drop his prejudices and objections, but courtesy had been bred in him and he doffed his hat to Bethya, saying, ‘You ride very well, Mrs Anstruther, but I feel I must point out that this is private land and today I’m hunting my hounds purely for my own amusement.’

  She flushed even pinker. ‘Oh, I’m sorry. My mare was so excited I couldn’t stop her…’

  Sydney butted in, ‘That’s not how it looked. As far as I could see you were urging her on.’

  ‘I got interested,’ Bethya snapped back, giving her most haughty stare and thinking, ‘What right has a navvy to question my word?’ Every time she came up against this man he caused her trouble.

  The Duke tried to defuse the situation. ‘All right, let’s go back now. The horses and the hounds are tired. Follow us, Mrs Anstruther. We’ll show you the way.’

  When Colonel Anstruther built his house, he told the architect that all the reception-room windows and those of the main bedrooms must look up to the mysterious trio of hills. The Three Sisters fascinated him, and they were the reason he had chosen to build a house on that site. After he returned from his ride he stationed himself in the morning-room bay window with a spyglass to his eye, watching for his daughter-in-law to come riding down the slope. He’d known she would go towards the hounds. By telling her not to, it dawned on him later, he was as good as issuing a challenge. Though she did not know it, he’d turned around halfway down the hill and watched her cantering through the thick gorse-bushes, sitting up easily in the saddle with her top hat shining in the winter sun. ‘She’s no fool. She’ll be all right,’ he had told himself in reassurance, but now he was watching to see her come safely home.

  Gus was lounging in a chair with a newspaper up before his face. ‘What are you looking for, Pa?’ he asked.

  ‘Your wife. I gave her a new horse today and she’s ridden out on it. She’s going up the hill.’

  Gus lowered his paper to reveal a debauched face as he said in surprise, ‘You gave her a horse? But she’s got one already, hasn’t she?’

  ‘I gave her a better horse,’ said his father, who was still standing staring out of the window with an anxious look on his face. ‘I hope I didn’t make a bad choice. It’s very highly bred.’

  Gus laughed nastily. ‘Well, well, no wonder you’re worried. With any luck your little pet’ll break her neck.’

  The Colonel turned and looked at him with scorn. ‘I don’t know how I managed to father you,’ he said as he stomped from the room.

  He need not have worried about Bethya. At that moment she was riding along behind Sydney and the Duke who were trying to show her how unwelcome she was in their hunting party by pointedly talking together and comparing their runs. Piqued by their neglect but still thrilling with the excitement of the headlong chase, she rode behind. She knew she’d acquitted herself well. Leaning forward, she patted the mare’s sweat-stained neck and told her, ‘Well done, well done. I’m going to call you Boadicea.’

  When they were on the last slope, and Bella Vista could be seen lying among its gardens and lawns beneath them, two grooms came cantering up in their direction. The leader was her own head groom, who called out in relief at the sight of her: ‘Oh, thank goodness you’re safe, ma’am. You’ve been away for so long we thought there’d been an accident. The Colonel’s in a terrible lather.’

  Bethya said coolly, ‘I’m perfectly all right, and so’s my mare. I’ve been hunting.’

  At this point Sydney spoke to the groom. ‘I think you’d better tell the lady’s husband that he ought to take greater care of her and not let her out on these hills alone in future.’

  She was furious and spat at him like an angry cat. ‘I’m perfectly capable of riding alone. I can outride you any day!’ Then she cantered away, stiff-backed.

  The Duke looked across at his friend and grinned. ‘Well, she told you off good and proper, didn’t she, my lad? That’s some lady, Godders.’

  Sydney was smiling too as he watched her go. ‘I wouldn’t call her a lady, Dicky – she’s an altogether different kind of creature. And she’s dangerous, if you ask me. Any woman who takes her fences like that must be half-mad.’

  Chapter Seventeen

  Emma Jane was back at Tibbie’s for ten days before the thaw set in, but on every morning of inaction she walked to the bridge and stood beside the piers, laying her hand on the stone and wondering when the frost would be sweated out of them. At last it was and work rec
ommenced.

  During the lay-off, the navvy camp had looked bleak and empty, but when the frost began to lift, life returned to it. It was never again to be as crowded as it was before the cholera epidemic, for not only had death cut down the population but many frightened families had moved away. As the year 1855 got under way, however, word spread around via the navvying grapevine that there was work at Camptounfoot, and men came back. Once again women gossiped at the water burn; children played and fought in the cleared area where Benjy’s had stood; dogs yapped and ran about as skinny and undisciplined as ever. Sydney still slept in the hut that had been Major Bob’s, but now it was looked after by the wife of one of the new occupants – a lanky lad from Derry called Lucky Jim for no reason that he or anyone else could explain. He’d been given the name on the first job he got after leaving Ireland, and had used it ever since. Mrs Jim was a good plain cook, better than Major Bob, and she was sober too, so living conditions in the place improved, but Sydney remembered the old days with a strange nostalgia as if it had been a golden age. He realised that his time as a navvy was coming to an end, and hoped Miss Wylie would finish the bridge before he could stand the life no longer.

  Jimmy-The-New-Man was living again in the camp in the hut that used to be kept by Squint Mary, another cholera victim. Its new châtelaine was even more degenerate-looking and drunken than Mary had been, but was just as terrified of Bullhead, the boss of the hut. Jimmy was seldom seen without the big man by his side and so inseparable were they, that tongues began to wag. Bullhead saved his own reputation by having a succession of women living with him, though Jimmy never seemed to be with anyone in particular and anyway he was nearly always staggering drunk. His behaviour still perturbed Sydney, who tried from time to time to speak to him privately, but never with any success, for Bullhead always seemed to pop up and stand between them.