‘Oh, I think you said it well enough on Christmas Eve. It’s we who’ve got to thank you. Look’—she put down the tray—‘I’ll make another cup of coffee. You’d like a cup of coffee?’
‘Yes, please. Yes, I would like a cup of coffee,’ he said, nodding at her, and she nodded back and said, ‘Well, your wish is my command,’ and disappeared into the kitchen again on a laugh; and he looked at the older woman and smiled. The atmosphere in this house, or room, was relaxing. That was the only way he could put a name to his feeling at this moment.
‘Was it a bad do, I mean, your foot?’
‘Well, it took longer than I thought before I was able to walk.’
‘Yes; your man told us about it.’ And her voice dropping, she said, ‘He’s your butler, isn’t he?’
‘Well, that’s the name he goes under, but he’s a bit of everything. He runs the house and he’s a very good fellow altogether.’
‘Yes, he seems a nice man. Thinks a lot of you.’ Her head was bobbing at him. She turned as her daughter was entering the room and said, ‘The butler man, he thinks a lot of his master, doesn’t he, by what he said to us?’
Liz handed Joseph the cup of coffee and said, ‘My mother has a great respect for family retainers,’ stressing the last two words.
He smiled up into her face, saying, ‘And you haven’t?’ And she answered him, ‘Not much. But she’—she thumbed towards her mother—‘was brought up on an estate. Her father, my grandfather, was groom to a…Scottish Laird’—she again stressed the last two words—‘but then an awful Englishman comes riding by and whips her away to this godforsaken country.’ She laughed. ‘That’s what my grandfather used to call England, but I say thank God for it. And my grandfather’s still bending his knee to his Scottish Laird.’
‘You’re glad enough to spend your holidays up there, madam, and run wild on a pony and chat with the master.’
‘Ah! Ah!’ Liz now pointed her finger at Joseph, saying, ‘That’s the word. It always niggles me, “the master”. The very word conjures up slavery.’
‘Get out of me way. Just listen to her. Will you have a biscuit, sir?’
‘No; thank you, Mrs Dunn.’
‘Don’t take any notice to what she says, sir. She talks like a communist at times, and she says she doesn’t vote Labour or Conservative. You know, to this day I don’t know who she votes for. But I know what I vote for.’ And she let out a loud laugh before she added, ‘A good dinner, a drop of the hard and a good night’s rest. What more could you want?’
‘What more indeed!’
He seemed to be smiling all the time.
Mrs Dunn now said, ‘Were you on business round this way, sir?’
‘Yes, you could say that. I’ve…I’ve just bought the villa.’ He pointed towards the wall. ‘I’m in the land and estate business, you know.’
‘Oh. Oh, are you? And the villa. Oh my! What are you going to do with it?’
‘Well, renovate it I hope; then it’ll be for letting.’
‘Oh, the old girl who lived there was a caution.’
The shop bell rang loudly, so saying, ‘Oh, dear, here we go! A woman’s work is never done,’ Mrs Dunn trotted out of the room. Taking a seat on the other side of the fireplace and looking straight at Joseph, Liz explained, ‘That last exchange with mother may have sounded very class-conscious, but I’m always teasing her about Sir Gilbert, because she’s proud of her association with that house.’
He leaned towards her and there was a quirk to his lips as he said, ‘But at rock bottom you are not, are you?’
She laid her head back against the top of the tall chair and gave a little chuckle before she gave her answer: ‘Perhaps. Then again, I’m not against having to work for someone; we’re all working for someone really. We here, in this business, have our masters, but we do seem to have a greater amount of freedom allowed us than in some others, and I’ve always been against the hold one human being has over another, whether it’s in employment or in the family.’
‘What about marriage?’
He hadn’t meant to say that, but it had come out.
‘Yes, you’ve got a point there. But mine didn’t last long enough to test it. I was married a fortnight when he went to France. It was in the middle of nineteen-eighteen, and he was killed within a month.’
The statement sounded unemotional, but he said, ‘Oh, I’m sorry. That must have been awful for you. You’ve got to ask the reason why these…’
‘I’m sorry,’ she cut in sharply now, ‘but I think that is a stupid question, that “why”? I myself asked it at the time, but the answer I got was, why should I be asking it, when John was one of a million or more who died. That particular “why” has never been answered and never will.’
He sat staring at her. The jocular, funny-retort daughter was gone: here was a thinking young woman. She was asking a question now: ‘Were you in the war?’
‘No. They wouldn’t have me; I must have been quite rotten. I tried three or four times, but from my eyes to the soles of my feet they seemed to find something wrong with me.’
And how he had tried to get into that war, not because he wanted to serve King and country, but simply to get away from the war that was brewing around him.
He said, ‘Your name isn’t Dunn then?’ And she answered, ‘No, it’s Lilburn.’
‘Oh, I know a number of Lilburns. Well…I mean, they’re on the books.’
‘Yes, no doubt, because we’re a common lot.’
She was smiling again; and when he stated, ‘Well, I’m glad you said that, not me, else likely I would be taking my leave through the let-in counter by now,’ she laughed loudly as she agreed, ‘No doubt. No doubt.’
After a short silence he asked, ‘Have you lived here long?’
‘Well, they tell me I was born upstairs some twenty-nine years ago. There! My age is out,’ and she pulled a face at him now before going on, ‘My father owned the house, and the business, too. It was a free house. Well, you know what that means, we can buy where we like.’
‘Your father’s dead then?’
‘Yes, about six years ago. He was elderly, being twenty-two years older than mother, and—’ She now shook her head before going on, ‘It’s unbelievable, but that was thought terrible in those days. Baby-snatching, they called it. Yet they were very happy together. But then, my mother is a very easygoing woman. I don’t think I would have been very happy if I had been married to a man like my father.’
‘The master, was he?’ He poked his head towards her.
‘Yes. Yes. Very possessive.’
There was that word again, possessive. ‘You don’t like possessive people then?’
‘It isn’t that I don’t like them, I cannot understand what motivates them, unless it is an inadequacy in themselves, some deep want, and in order to alleviate it in some way, they hang on to another human being. It’s a sort of desire for power. Those who run businesses are possessed in a similar way. They have power over people; and very often, on their whims depends a man’s livelihood.’
He nodded slowly in agreement, and said, ‘Have you ever thought of getting on the council?’
‘Me! On the council?’ She pulled herself forward on the chair. ‘The only thing I would want to get on the council for is to tell them what I think about their stupidity. Do you know, they’re going to pull Coin Street down. Those beautiful old houses. Do you know the street?’
‘Yes. Yes, I do.’
‘Well, have you looked at the fanlights and the railed balconies?’ She shook her head. ‘They’re really beautiful, and that cotton-wool-brained lot want to pull them down; to build more shops, I suppose.’
‘Then why, if you feel so strongly, don’t you do something about it? As I said, get on the council.’
She pursed her lips. ‘I have no desire to put the world straight and I wouldn’t be so presumptuous,’ she said. ‘Anyway, I have enough trouble keeping my own life in order. I’m like many another, I su
ppose, I sit back and criticise, knowing that if I got the chance to do something definite I’d be afraid to take it.’
He sat looking at her. Here was a young woman who knew herself. He was amazed at her viewpoint, and at her level-headedness, and when he asked her, ‘Have you been in any other business?’ he was even more surprised at her answer.
‘Oh yes; I was secretary to a Mr Blythe, of Baywards Engineering Works, from when I was nineteen, but when Father died I left because Mother was in rather a state at that time, and very lonely.’
He knew Arthur Blythe of Baywards. He had met him through Douglas. He said, ‘Did you enjoy that kind of work?’
‘Yes, very much.’
‘But, ah’—his finger was wagging at her now—‘you were working under a master.’
‘Yes, I suppose so; but he was a very benevolent one and he made no demands upon me. He left me free to run the office.’ She preened herself now as she said, ‘I suppose I should be flattered. But I had a letter from him last week asking me if I would think about returning. I imagine his secretaries have come and gone rather speedily over the past five years, because, as I remember him, he couldn’t suffer fools gladly…I sound big-headed, don’t I? But that was one job I knew, the only job. And I certainly would have been a dud-head if I hadn’t carried it out with some efficiency, because after leaving school at sixteen I went for three years to a Secretarial College. Anyway, why am I giving you the story of my life? You called in just to say thank you, and now you are being burdened, and bored…’
‘I am certainly not being either burdened or bored. Now I’m going to tell you something. I’ve never felt so relaxed or at ease anywhere for a long time. The day I found myself in this room things were hazy, yet during the week or so that followed they seemed to clarify themselves, and I’ve often found myself thinking about it and the two kind ladies who saw to me. And there was a gentleman, too, wasn’t there?’
‘Yes, Bill. He was a friend of my father’s and has remained my mother’s friend since.’
At this point Mrs Dunn entered the kitchen, saying; ‘That was a shipping order, a packet of Woodbines, a packet of Player’s Weights, and five empties brought back, with a pound’s worth of gossip from Mrs Chaytors,’ and without seeming even to draw breath she was addressing Joseph directly: ‘Will you stay and have a bite? Liz has got a hotpot on and although some of her cooking I wouldn’t give to a dog, I can vouch for her hotpot.’
Laughing, he rose to his feet, the cup still in his hand, and he handed it to the older woman, saying, ‘She also makes a good cup of coffee; I’ll vouch for that. Thank you for the invitation, but I must be off. I, too, have got to earn a living, you know.’ He was glancing at the young woman now, and her reply was, ‘And I’m sure you are worked to death.’
‘Eeh! She’s a cheeky monkey, is my daughter. And I must apologise for her. But there you are; you are welcome any time you are passing.’
‘Well, I can assure you now, Mrs Dunn, I’ll take up your invitation whenever I’m this way, and that will be quite often, I should imagine, when I’m seeing to the alterations of the villa. But now I’ll say again, the reason for this particular visit was to thank you for your kindness, both of you.’ And at this, saying, ‘Goodbye, Mrs Lilburn,’ he turned and, accompanied by Mrs Dunn, went from the room…
A minute or so later Janet Dunn had returned to the kitchen and said to her daughter, ‘By, isn’t he a nice man!’
‘Mother!’
‘All right, all right, girl. I was just saying, isn’t he a nice man.’
‘Yes, and I’ve heard you say that before. Well, don’t forget that this one is married and has six children.’
‘Well, lass, the Bible’s a good book and in it it says, Solomon had quite a number of wives.’
When her daughter pushed at her none too gently, then had to steady her against falling, their laughter joined…
Out in the street Joseph walked slowly to his car, but it was odd that he should feel reluctant to get into it. He had the desire to walk, even back across the fields towards the villa, for he had the impression that the iron gates of The Grove had opened and he had passed through into freedom. It was an odd feeling like that which overcame him at times, as if he were in a dream, yet knowing that it was no dream, and often that had been the frightening part of it. But not this time.
Five
‘It’s scandalous! It shouldn’t be allowed.’
‘Oh, Bridget, Bridget, my dear.’
‘Don’t use that tone to me, as if I was a narrow-minded woman. Don’t you realise that that young man is the grandson of your brother’s mistress, and was for ten years or more, and must have cost poor Victoria real heartache?’
‘My dear Bridget, if I’m to go by what Bright told me, Victoria was thankful that he had such a diversion, for it kept him out of the house and out of her sight, and she was certainly more than thankful that it kept him out of Henrietta’s way. Anyway, my dear, Joseph is her father, and he likes the young man and he’s given his consent, and Amy can do nothing whatever about it. Anyway, what’s it to do with her? These outraged feelings are simply another way of expressing her frustration or whatever’s happening to her at this time. She had no real knowledge of Victoria; in fact, I realised it, whether you did or not, my dear, that during the short time Victoria was with us before she died, Amy had taken a dislike to her. Perhaps it was because you were then showering your affection upon her and Henrietta. In a way, you were making up for the loss of Amy in your life, and our dear daughter was quick to recognise that she was being easily replaced.’
‘Oh, Douglas, you file everything down to a hair’s breadth.’ He bent forward and took her hand, saying, ‘But you know inside that logical head of yours that I’m right; and I can tell you this much, and I can see it happening, our dear granddaughter, Alice, though a very sweet girl, has a strong streak in her that she may have inherited from’—he pulled a face now—‘her grandmother, and should her mother lead her hell—oh yes, my dear Bridget, that’s what Amy’s doing at the present moment—well, I can see our granddaughter, who is verging on eighteen, just picking up her skirts and walking out, if not actually running out. Apparently she said as much to her father.’
‘Has…has Joseph been talking about this to you?’
‘Of course, my dear, he’s been talking about this to me. Who else would he discuss it with? Amy is up in arms at the very thought of it. By the way, as we are mentioning Joseph, I think my…our…your decision to give him a free hand was a very good move, at least for him, because he’s changed, hasn’t he? He’s not so cool or taciturn as he has been of late, more free and easy. Has Amy said anything to you? Oh, come on, come on, she talks to you, as Joseph talks to me.’
‘Yes, she talks to me but about nothing of importance with regard to Joseph, except that since he has taken up the business on his own, he is hardly ever at home.’
‘Well, why don’t you point out to her, dear, that he would stay at home if there was…well, less quarrelling.’
‘It takes two to make a quarrel, Douglas.’
‘Yes, I suppose so. Anyway, there’s more news, good and bad, that I can tell you. I saw Joseph this morning. I ran across him as I was going to pick you up, but there was plenty of time, so we had a coffee together, and he told me rather gleefully that there was another courting in the offing. Malcolm has apparently been introduced to James Fordyce’s cousin Delia. She is, by the way, Lady Delia, the only daughter of Lord Breck. So, of course, that would please Amy, wouldn’t it? But the bad news is, Amy says if he doesn’t do something to stop Henrietta coming over to the house, evidently just to see him, then the next time she appears she will lock the doors on her. Now, it was natural for Joseph at this stage to ask me what I was going to do about it, and now I ask you, dear, what are we going to do about it? She slipped Nell’s coils last week and we thought that was impossible…Bridget—’ He took hold of both her hands and looking fully into her face he said, ‘I’
ll soon be sixty-seven years old, and you are sixty-three, so have you thought what will happen to her when we go, as go we must, sooner or later? And she’s likely to go on living for many more years yet. So, I ask you, what will happen to her? She’ll have to be put under some restraint.’
‘Yes, I know, Douglas. I’ve thought of that; in fact I’ve thought about it a lot.’
‘Oh, I’m glad to hear that, dear. I know how fond you are of her.’
She smiled at him now as she said, ‘Not as fond as I once was. I suppose it’s age, but I find her a trial at times. At the same time, though, I cannot bear to think of her incarcerated in any asylum, not as I know them to be.’
‘There are private places, dear.’
‘Yes, I have thought of that, too.’
‘Well now, dear’—he gripped her hands more tightly—‘when we are on these serious subjects I must tell you what has been in my mind for some time, too, and that is, I think the house…The Grove, should be left entirely to Joseph. I’ve always thought it to be his by rights, and so…’
‘Oh, no, Douglas! What about Amy?’
‘She is his wife, dear, and naturally her son would inherit.’
‘But she expects him to inherit in any case, I mean…’
‘Dearest’—he let go of her hands—‘I know what you mean, but Joseph is a strong-willed man; I wouldn’t like to come up against him in a Court of Justice. And there is something afoot in Parliament. I think it’s merely at the discussion stage, but…but there are, I surmise, a number of men up there, you know, with offspring in the same position as Joseph, and they are men of some honour who want to see justice done, and so it is they who will be putting this bill forward, which will allow an illegitimate son the right to inherit, at least, where an estate is entailed, give the owner of that estate the power to will it in specific words to his illegitimate son. But, in the case of Joseph, should he take it into his head to press his claim, then I would be the only one standing in his way. And just think, dear, if my ancestors hadn’t willed it that the estate should pass to the male line, it could have gone to Henrietta, God forbid.’
The Black Candle Page 46
