The Woman From Heartbreak House

by Freda Lightfoot

  Timothy Tiffin, he of the fat wandering fingers, caught her nursing a sore head beneath the rose arbour. Bunty had been wishing that boredom and near suffocation hadn’t tempted her to accept a third glass of champagne when a pair of large, clammy hands had reached around her and firmly planted themselves upon her breasts. He always had been fascinated by her bosom.

  She’d screamed and there’d been a most unseemly tussle with ‘naughty Timmy’ trying to push his hands up her skirt and Bunty kicking his shins for all she was worth. He very nearly succeeded in having his wicked way with her as she’d been prostrate on the paving stones when, fortunately, she’d been saved by one of Aunt Cissie’s spaniels. Jess had heard her yells and come bounding out to join in the fun. She wasn’t the sort of dog to attack an intruder, unfortunately, being rather soppy with a very wet lick, but had certainly put Timothy off his stroke by jumping excitedly all over him.

  ‘Dratted animal,’ he’d grumbled, taking an unsteady kick at the poor dog. But the incident had allowed Bunty to extricate herself and he’d adjusted his tie and lurched off in search of more liquid comfort.

  It was all really rather shaming, and, to Bunty’s distorted sense of black humour, absolutely hilarious. She’d sat on the arbour wall and laughed till her sides ached, and had treated the dog to chocolates and extra biscuits ever since.

  Most suitors had not been quite so adventurous, nor so difficult to repel. Somehow or other, despite all Lucy’s conniving and machinations, Bunty had successfully managed to remain largely, if not entirely, untouched and unfettered, and certainly fended off all offers.

  It had been surprisingly easy. All she had to do was veer from sulky black moods to mute defiance, predictably they soon fled. The last thing they wanted to saddle themselves with was a difficult and petulant child bride.

  But then along had come Ralph Powney.

  He wasn’t like the others. Ralph Powney not only had more money, power and influence than all the rest put together, owning a large estate in Yorkshire as well as another in the Lakes, but also a persistence and strength of will which put even Lucy’s machinations in the shade.

  Which was why Bunty had this morning shut herself in her bedroom, making a desperate last stand, rather like a condemned prisoner refusing to eat his last meal.

  The hammering had reached an impossible pitch and Bunty could hear the two aunts remonstrating with her mother, demanding to know what on earth was going on

  Tears rolling down her cheeks, Bunty slid from the bed and made her way over to the window to stare out on a huddle of cottages. The whole of Heversham would be alerted if Lucy carried on in this fashion. What on earth could she do?

  If only she could get to Kendal, find Callum and talk to him one more time; explain how desperate her situation now was. Surely he wouldn’t turn his back again in her hour of greatest need. Couldn’t they at least be friends? The question was, how to get out of the house?

  Dashing the tears from her eyes, Bunty considered the drop from her bedroom window. An overhanging branch from a nearby beech tree looked temptingly close. Seconds later, she’d climbed out on to the sill and was making a perilous leap into the leafy arms of the old tree. A glorious sense of freedom soared through her veins as she clung to its knobbly trunk. It felt even more wonderful when her feet touched solid earth. Then she was off, running along the lane towards the main road where she hailed a lift on a milk cart. She’d beat her mother yet, see if she didn’t.

  The shop had been painted and fitted out as smartly as they could manage on their limited budget. It was not quite so large or grand as Ingram’s shoe department, but they would make up for that by offering a more personal level of service.

  Kate had visited several shoe manufacturers and stocked the shop with the very latest, up-to-the-minute styles that any flapper, or woman about town, would be only too delighted to wear. Children too had not been forgotten, and she’d bought a range of children’s wear in various sizes and fittings. Kate was most particular about the fittings. Not everyone’s foot was the same shape, particularly children’s.

  They were specialists and must behave as such.

  She instigated a system of stock control and trained Flora in how to use it so that slow-moving stock could be identified and marked down in an end-of-year sale, while popular lines could quickly be replaced.

  This was the way, Kate knew, to ensure maximum profit for minimum investment.

  They inserted a large advertisement in the Manchester Guardian for the first day of October, the date they planned to open in good time for Christmas. They put up posters in neighbouring shops; handed leaflets out to shoppers in the street. Yet still there seemed to be a great deal left to be done. The specially printed paper bags hadn’t yet arrived, nor had much of the stock for that matter, and Kate and Flora were on pins every day watching for deliveries.

  Kate had sent invitations for the opening party to a few friends and neighbours, to Millie and her family, Callum of course, new business acquaintances, fellow shopkeepers, plus a sprinkling of local reporters who she hoped would write a little piece about the shop in their newspaper.

  She’d received acceptances from all of them, except her own son.

  It had been agreed that Toby would arrive a couple of days before the event in order to help with final preparations and assist on their first day of trading. She hoped he would bring Callum with him but that was still a week or two away. In the meantime, Kate had decided it was long past time she went up to Kendal and spoke to him herself.

  ‘I need to talk to the daft eejit about whatever problem is driving him to the demon drink. Will you stay with Millie while I go?’ she asked Flora.

  Flora hugged her mother. ‘Go and tell him we need him here, working with us.’ And so it was agreed.

  Bunty discovered almost at once that she had made a futile, empty gesture. Long before the rickety milk cart had travelled the six or seven miles to Kendal, Ralph Powney had been informed of her escape, had easily waylaid the slow-moving vehicle and driven her home again in his fast Ford motor car.

  Where would she have gone in any case? Callum would have refused to see her, as he had once before when she’d called. Why had she fooled herself into thinking otherwise?

  The last time she’d knocked on the battered old door, that scruffy friend of his had told her that Callum had moved and he’d no idea where to. Bunty hadn’t believed him, but since she had very little freedom to scour the streets of Kendal, what else could she do but cling to the hope that she might run across him by chance one day? Unfortunately, she never had, and never dared risk another letter.

  Callum seemed to have meant it when he’d said he wanted no more contact between them.

  Even so, in her heart she knew that he still loved her, for all he’d set his mind against her - and for such a silly reason. All because he believed she’d willingly agreed to the abortion.

  As a consequence Bunty was left to deal with Ralph Powney on her own.

  From the first moment he’d set eyes on her, he’d resolved to have her. It had been at a Christmas function where everyone was in fancy dress. Bunty had been dressed as Fairy Crystal, her mother’s idea and quite inappropriate since the handkerchief hemline of the short skirt revealed far too much of what Bunty considered to be her worst asset, her rather chunky ankles.

  Ralph Powney, however, thought otherwise. He was clearly enchanted and, unlike Evan Whatshisname - fat suitor number one, or naughty whiskery Timmy, he made no attempt to force himself upon her. Nor, as many others before him had done, did he run a mile when Bunty resorted to her usual trick of rudeness by telling him that the Prince of Darkness would have been a more suitable disguise for him, rather than Good King Wenceslas.

  Ralph had been amused, had congratulated her on her wit, and thereafter he was present at every party she attended, quietly observing her, giving the lop-sided leer that was the closest he ever came to a smile.

  He seemed to take great pleasure in provok
ing her into ever more outrageous remarks. When once he asked her to dance, Bunty said she’d rather cut off all her hair and enter a nunnery. Powney said it could be arranged but then he’d have to become a monk so that he could still see her.

  Another day when he invited her to accompany him to a recital, Bunty remarked that she hated music.

  ‘So do I. Clearly we are a perfect match.’

  ‘I think you’re ugly,’ she bluntly responded when he complimented her on her appearance.

  ‘Splendid! Beauty and the Beast. What a pair we’ll make.’

  Now it seemed that they were indeed to be a pair. Without her even realising his intentions, Ralph Powney had approached Lucy and asked for her consent. When her mother had told Bunty of this, for one wild moment she’d hoped he meant to marry Lucy herself, as they were much more of an age, but her mother’s sharp rejoinder to this suggestion brought her quickly to her senses.

  ‘I know that you will come to love me, my sweet, once we are man and wife, even if you don’t quite yet,’ Powney informed Bunty now with calm assurance as he handed her over to her mother’s far from tender care. ‘So do please stop fighting me.’

  Lucy, fearful that her carefully laid plans could fall apart at the last moment, thanked him profusely. ‘I have been out of my mind with worry, every since the silly girl ran away,’ as if it had been a day rather than an hour that Bunty had been missing. ‘She is little more than a child, after all, so I do hope that you’ll make allowances for her foolishness?’

  ‘Indeed, but now is the time for her to grow up. Very soon she will have the responsibilities of being my wife and helpmate. And lover,’ he said, deliberately allowing his gaze to rove over Bunty’s firm young flesh.

  ‘Quite so. Quite so,’ Lucy agreed. ‘You can safely leave her in my hands. I shall make sure that she understands how fortunate she is.’

  ‘This silly performance,’ Lucy forcibly informed her recalcitrant daughter the moment they were alone, ‘very nearly cost us everything. Fortunately, since Ralph is so captivated by your charms, he wants no further delay. You are to be wed within the month. Please try to remember how very privileged you are to have received such an offer, considering our situation and your shameful, past history, secret though it must remain. He is an excellent catch, so do not even consider being as difficult as this ever again. Do I make myself clear?’

  ‘He didn’t even bother to ask me himself,’ Bunty said, struggling to retain her composure. ‘I’m twenty-one years of age. Don’t I have any say?’

  Lucy sighed heavily. ‘We’ve been through all of this a million times and my patience is quite exhausted. How you have managed to hold them all off so long I cannot imagine, but there will be no further delays. Ralph Powney has offered a marriage settlement which will see us all in comfort for the rest of our lives, so the deed will be done. The aunts and I are depending upon you. You will marry him before the month is out, whether you like it or not.’

  Bunty once again sat in her bedroom and wept with fury and despair, swamped in a black suffocating blanket of depression. No matter how nasty she’d been to him, Ralph Powney had resisted all her schemes. He was not in the least put off by her rudeness, her sulks, or even her defiance. What could she possibly do or say to make him withdraw his offer?

  She chewed on her nails and thought for quite some time. More than ever she sympathised with Kate’s efforts to fight off Lucy’s machinations in the past. No wonder the pair had been at daggers drawn half the time. How could one loathe one’s own mother so much? It was obscene, and yet she did. Bunty hated her because Lucy was utterly out of control, obsessed with her own needs, with money and boring security. She crushed dreams, destroyed hopes and desires, took a person’s life and twisted it to suit herself.

  She’d done it to Kate, apparently, and to Callum too. Strong as they both were, they’d been unable to confound her, so what could Bunty hope to do, a mere girl?

  And then it came to her. The perfect solution, or the last desperate throw of the dice, depending on how you viewed it. It would most certainly be a lie, and a risky one at that, but desperate straits called for desperate measures. Bunty realised, in that moment, that she must take the chance. What alternative did she have?

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  Flora opted not to accompany Kate to Kendal but to stay on in Manchester and carry on getting the shop ready to open, which was a relief in a way. It would give Kate the opportunity to talk to Callum alone. The instant she set eyes on him, the first time she had seen him in months, Kate saw at once how her son had changed.

  He looked gaunt, his face sickly and pale, jaw set tight upon some suppressed anger. His once laughing blue-grey eyes were hooded and unfocused, never quite meeting her gaze.

  ‘Aw, what is it, m’cushla, what is eating you up inside? Don’t ye look dreadful, poor boy? Haven’t I been worrying meself sick over you? Toby tells me that your boss is threatening to sack you because you keep turning up late for work, or not at all. This won’t do, Callum, it won’t do at all.’

  ‘Don’t fuss, Mother. And don’t pretend you give a monkey’s what’s wrong with me. You’re fine and dandy in Manchester, so why should you care?’

  ‘Of course I care. Aren’t you my fine boy? Don’t I love the bones of ye? Did you not get my invitation to the opening? I hope you’ll be coming to see what yer mammy and sister have been up to ... mebbe join us in the business. Now wouldn’t that be grand?’

  ‘I know what you’ve been up to. Flora’s told me all about your fancy man.’

  Kate jerked as if she’d been struck. ‘Fancy man? What are you talking about?’

  ‘Flora’s told me how you have a new man in your life, how he’s been wining and dining you. No wonder you’ve never been near Kendal in months.’

  Kate was appalled that he should think such a thing. ‘’Tisn’t so! That’s not the way of it at all. I’ve been out with Theo Ingram a few times but there’s nothing in it. Anyway, just recently, with us being so busy getting the new shop ready for opening an’ all, didn’t I tell him to stay away? That’s what’s kept me tied up in Manchester, the new shop, not Ingram. Though I must say that if I should wish to go out with a fella again, I don’t believe I need to ask your permission first.’

  ‘Then don’t come pretending to care about me, or start poking your nose into my life. I’ll do as I please.’

  ‘What is it? What’s upset you so badly? Is it that Bunty you once fancied? Has she given you the push?’

  He turned on her then, eyes alight with fire and fury. ‘Don’t speak of her in that way.’

  ‘I - I’m sorry. I didn’t mean ...’

  ‘Aye, you did. You want to say that you told me so, that you knew it wouldn’t last, that she was only playing games with me. Well, I hope you’re satisfied because you were obviously right. She’s getting married. How about that? She got over me pretty damned quick, didn’t she?’

  ‘But I thought it was Lucy getting married?’ Kate tried to put her arms about her son but he thrust her away, the distress in his face breaking her heart. ‘Aw, don’t I know how you must be hurting, but drowning yer sorrows in drink isn’t the answer. Won’t it only ruin yer health, and yer life?’

  ‘What do you bloody care?’ he shouted. ‘You have your fine new business and yer fancy man, so can afford to leave me high and dry. Leave me alone, I tell you. Leave me alone!’

  Upon which note he strode away, leaving Kate filled with confusion and shame. She’d tried to make things better for her son and only succeeded in making matters worse.

  It was true what she’d told Callum, that for the last several weeks Kate had managed to avoid going out with Theo Ingram, yet he always seemed to be around. Sometimes she would laugh at his audacity. ‘Not you again,’ she would say. ‘Don’t you ever give up?’

  ‘I want to see you, Kate. I mean to win you over.’

  ‘Wear me down, more like. Will ye behave, ye daft eejit?’ She had to hand it to him for persiste
nce. Nevertheless Kate refused to accept any more of his invitations, claiming she was far too busy getting ready for her opening. But then he caught her unawares again.

  She came home from the shop one night to find him talking to Flora in the street. He was leaning close to hear what she had to say and they were both laughing, as if sharing a joke. Kate rushed up, annoyed that Theo should speak to her daughter without her permission, although really she couldn’t have said why it should matter. Hadn’t she made it plain to Callum that she was perfectly entitled to have a man friend, if she’d a mind? Yet what was it they were talking about with such earnestness?

  ‘Why are you here?’ she bluntly demanded. ‘I told you I was too busy to go out with you at present.’

  His dark eyebrows rose in mild surprise at Kate’s tone, then he gave Flora’s shoulder a little squeeze. ‘We were just getting acquainted, were we not? Admittedly I was asking her where you were, and if I could waylay you and carry you off on my white charger, but your charming daughter said you had no head for heights.’ Again they both laughed in unison and Kate felt suddenly rather foolish. She smiled, in a vague attempt to prove that she really did have a sense of humour, even if she was too tired at the moment to exercise it.

  She felt obliged, in the circumstances, to invite him in for a cup of tea although managed to keep the visit short and to send Theo on his way with vague promises for the future. Whether she would keep them, or wished to spend time with him, if she did have any to spare, Kate couldn’t quite decide.

  ‘Usually women are queuing up for me to take them out. You, dear Kate, are proving to be a particular challenge.’

  ‘I’m pleased to hear it. Never let it be said that I’m easy.’

  Theo leaned close, brushing his lips against her ear. ‘Nevertheless, you’ll succumb to my charms in the end, just like all the rest.’

  ‘He’s nice,’ Flora said, after he’d gone. ‘He has a lively sense of humour, and he doesn’t look too bad either. You could do worse, Mammy.’