Once Upon a River

by Diane Setterfield

  “What do you want?” Her voice was hard-edged. She stood rigidly upright, arms folded across her chest, her face the kind that didn’t know how to smile. Then something in her altered. A subtle alteration in the set of her shoulders, something brazen in her eyes. Her lips remained set but gave the impression that if he played his cards right, they had it in them to soften. Most people when they saw Mr. Armstrong were so surprised at the color of his skin that they saw nothing else, but some—women mostly—noticed that his face was very handsomely put together.

  Armstrong did not smile and he put no note of coaxing cajolery in his voice. He carried apples for horses and marbles for small children, but for women such as this one he was careful to offer nothing at all.

  “Are you the lady of the house?”

  “Hardly.”

  “The housekeeper?”

  A brief nod.

  “I’m looking for a Mr. Armstrong,” he said neutrally.

  She gave him a challenging look, waiting to see whether the good-looking stranger was going to make any effort to please her, and when he met her gaze with a steadily indifferent look of his own, she shrugged.

  “There is no Mr. Armstrong here.”

  She shut the door.

  It was not an easy matter to linger in a smart Oxford street for any length of time, so, unwilling to draw attention to himself, Armstrong paced the streets that ran parallel. At every intersection of the path, he looked left and right, knowing he ran the risk of missing his object altogether; but when the hands of his watch had gone all the way round one hour and were halfway round the next one, he saw a slight figure with a long plait down her back emerge from the side of number 8. He pressed his pace to catch up with her.

  “Miss! Excuse me, miss!”

  The girl stopped and swung round. “Oh! It’s you.”

  She seemed smaller and even more miserable in the open air than she had in the doorway.

  “Don’t let me hold you up,” he said, seeing her shiver. “Come along. I’ll walk with you.”

  “I don’t know why she didn’t tell you,” the girl offered before he had even asked the question. “Is it you that writes the letters?”

  “Yes, I write to him here.”

  “But he don’t live here.”

  “Doesn’t he?”

  Now Armstrong was really puzzled. He has received answers to his letters. Brief and short—requests for money, mostly—but containing references to his own letters. He must be receiving them. Armstrong frowned.

  The girl sniffed in the cold and turned a corner. She walked at a fast pace for such a small person.

  “Mr. Fisher says never mind the letters and puts them in his pocket,” she adds.

  “Ah.” That was something, anyway. Did he dare go back and ring that gleaming bell at the front step and ask for Mr. Fisher?

  As if she could read his thoughts, the girl told him, “Mr. Fisher won’t be in for hours. Don’t hardly get out of bed till midday, he keeps such late hours at the Green Dragon.”

  He nodded. “And who is this Mr. Fisher?”

  “A rotten man. He hasn’t paid me for seven weeks. What do you want with him, anyway? Does he owe you money? You won’t get it.”

  “I have never met Mr. Fisher. I am the father of Mr. Armstrong. Presumably the two of them are associates.”

  The look she gave him then told him everything he needed to know about Mr. Fisher and his associates. Then he saw something start to dawn in the eyes of the child. If she had no liking for Mr. Fisher and his associates, what was she to make of the father of one of those associates?

  “The thing is,” he reassured her, “I fear that my boy might have fallen in with Mr. Fisher. I’d like to get him out of harm’s way, if I can. Have you seen a friend of Mr. Fisher who is a young man of twenty-four, light brown hair that curls where it meets his collar, and sometimes wears a blue jacket?”

  The girl stopped. Armstrong came to a halt a pace or two later, turned back, and saw her face. If it were possible, she was whiter than before.

  “You said you was Mr. Armstrong’s father!” she hissed.

  “And so I am. He does not resemble me, it is true.”

  “But that man—you just described him—”

  “Yes?”

  “It is Mr. Fisher!” She spat the words at him, with a childish fury at being fooled. Then her face altered suddenly from outrage to fear. “Don’t tell him I told you! I never said a word! I never said nothing!” There was a plea in her voice and tears in her eyes.

  Seeing she was about to flee, Armstrong put his hand in his pocket and drew out coins. She suppressed the instinct to run and eyed the money. “How much does he owe you?” he asked gently. “Does this cover it?”

  Several times her gaze shifted between the coins and him. She was wary, as though he were some kind of monster and the money most likely a trick. When it came, the snatch of her fingers was unexpected. In a flash the money was gone and she with it, apron strings and plait flying behind her as far as the first side street, where she turned and disappeared.

  Armstrong got himself away from the moneyed part of town and, when he came to a busy street of shops and workplaces, entered the first public house he came to. He bought himself a drink, and one for the blind man who sat by the fireside. It was easy enough to lead the conversation from this public house to drinking places in general and then to the Green Dragon in particular.

  “It’s decent enough between May and September,” the man told him. “They put wooden tables outside and get some girls to serve the drinks. They water the beer and they overcharge, but at least you can’t see how rotten it is, for the roses they has clambering all over everywhere.”

  “And in winter?”

  “It’s a bad sort of place. Damp in the timbers. Thatch wanted renewing when I could see, and that was twenty year ago. They say the windows are so cracked, it’s only the dirt what holds them together.”

  “And the people?”

  “Bad ’uns. You can buy and sell anything you wants at the Green Dragon: rubies, women, souls. If you have a difficulty in your life, go to the Green Dragon between the beginning of September and the middle of April and you’ll find someone to remove it for you. For the right money. That’s what they say, and it’s true enough.”

  “What do you do if you have a difficulty in spring or summer?”

  “You ’ave to wait. Or do it yourself.”

  “And where is it, this place?” he asked as he reached the bottom of his glass.

  “You don’t want to be going there. You’re not the kind. I might not see very much, but I can hear your voice. It’s not a place for a gentleman such as yourself.”

  “I must. There is someone there and I must find him.”

  “Do he want to be found?”

  “Not by me.”

  “Does he owe you money? It’s not worth it.”

  “It’s not money. It’s . . . family.”

  “Family?” The man looked wistful.

  “My son. I fear he’s got in with the wrong sort.”

  The blind man reached out a hand, and when Armstrong took it, he felt the man’s other hand grip his forearm, measuring the size and power of it.

  “I’d say you’re a man that can look after yourself.”

  “If I have to.”

  “Then I’ll tell you where to find the Dragon. For your son’s sake.”

  The directions Armstrong received took him right across town once more and out the other side. As he walked it began to rain. He came to a meadow as the sky was turning shades of pink and apricot. On the other side of it was the river. He crossed a bridge and turned upstream. The path was edged with brambles and willows that dripped rainwater onto his hat, and the knuckles of ancient tree roots protruded from the ground beneath his feet. The light grew dimmer, as did his thoughts, and then he perceived through thickets of yew and holly and elder the outline of a building and squares of dull light that were its windows. He knew he was in the r
ight place, for it had the unmistakable air of having been adopted by people who like to keep their doings out of sight and in the dark. Armstrong paused at the window and peered through the thick glass.

  Inside was a low room, made lower still where the ceiling bulged in the middle. A pillar of oak, thick as three men standing together, had been placed as a support to hold it up. Gas lamps struggled to make an impact on the shadows, and were scarcely aided by the candles on the tables. It was only the end of the afternoon, but the place had the feeling of night. A few solitary drinkers sat in the shadows along the walls, but the best illumination came from the fire which was blazing in the hearth, and near it was a table around which five men were seated. Four of the five men had their heads bent over a card game, but one sat up, his chair tilted on its back legs and leaning against the wall. His eyes were almost shut, and Armstrong guessed from the angle of his head that the appearance was a ruse. Between the narrow slits of his eyes, his son—for it was Robin—was casting about for a glimpse of the other men’s cards.

  Armstrong passed the window and opened the door. As he stepped inside, all five players turned in his direction; but the air was thick with smoke and he was half-concealed behind the pillar—he was not yet recognized. Robin lowered his chair to the floor and signaled to someone in a dark corner as he squinted blindly through the fug to where Armstrong stood. A second later Armstrong felt his arms gripped by an unseen person from behind. His assailant was smaller than he was by a head and a half, and his arms were slim, yet they gripped him like wire rope. The sensation of being held against his will was unfamiliar to Armstrong. He was not certain of being able to free himself, for all that the man was so small, the brim of his hat jutted the space between Armstrong’s shoulder blades. A second fellow, with a single black brow that sat low over his eyes, came close and scrutinized him.

  “Peculiar-looking fellow. Don’t know ’im,” he announced.

  “Get rid of him, then,” Robin said.

  The men tried to turn him back to the door, but he resisted.

  “Good evening, gentlemen,” he said, knowing that his voice alone would be enough to perturb things. He felt surprise in the hold of the wire rope man, but the strength did not loosen. The monobrow peered at him again and, uncertain, turned back to the table, too late to see what Armstrong had seen: the flash of surprise on Robin’s face, instantly suppressed.

  “I think you’ll find your Mr. Fisher will see me,” Armstrong said.

  Robin rose. He nodded to his guards, and Armstrong felt his arms released.

  The two men returned to the shadows and Robin approached. He wore the same face that Armstrong had seen a thousand times before, from early childhood to dawning manhood. It was the petulant fury of a child whose parent stood in his way. He was surprised to see how intimidating it looked on the face of a grown man. Had he not been Robin’s father, had he been a less powerfully built man, he might well have been afraid.

  “Outside,” Robin muttered. They stepped out of the inn and stood a yard apart, in semidarkness, on a bank of gravel between the river and the inn.

  “Is this where your money goes? Gambling? Or is it the house you’re always in need of funds for? You are living beyond your means.”

  A puff of disdain emerged from his son’s nostrils. “How did you find me?” he asked dully.

  Armstrong couldn’t help being surprised by his son. Always he expected something better. “Have you no better greeting than that for your father?”

  “What do you want?”

  “And your mother—you don’t ask after her?”

  “You’d tell me, I suppose, if anything was wrong.”

  “Something is wrong. But it is not your mother.”

  “It’s raining. Say what you have come to say so I can go back inside.”

  “What are your intentions regarding the child?”

  “Ha! Is that all?”

  “All? Robin, this is a child we are talking about. The happiness of two families is at stake here. These are not things to make light of. Why the delay?”

  In the fast-dying light he thought he saw his son’s lip give a cynical twist.

  “Is she yours? If she is, what do you mean to do about it? And if not—”

  “It’s none of your business.”

  Armstrong sighed. He shook his head and took another direction. “I went to Bampton.”

  Robin looked at Armstrong more intently but said nothing.

  “I went to the house where your wife lodged. Where she died.”

  Robin still said nothing, and the intensity of his hostility did not waver.

  “This lover your wife took—they know nothing of such a man.”

  Still nothing.

  “Who have you told this to?” There was menace in Robin’s voice.

  “I meant to bring the landlady to Buscot to see the child, but she—”

  “How dare you? This is my business—mine alone. I’m warning you: Keep out of my affairs.”

  It took Armstrong a moment to recover. “Your business? Robin, there is a child’s future at stake here. If she is your child, then she is my grandchild. If she is not your child, she is the Vaughans’ child. In neither instance can it be said that it is your business. One way or the other, it is family business.”

  “Family!” Robin spat out the word like a curse.

  “Who is her father, Robin? A child needs a father.”

  “I’ve done all right without one.”

  Robin swiveled, scattering the gravel under his heels, and was starting back to the Green Dragon when Armstrong gripped his shoulder. Armstrong was only half-surprised when his son swung round violently and a fist came towards him. Instinct brought his arm up to protect himself, but before the wildly thrown fist could make contact, his own fist met flesh and teeth, and Robin cursed.

  “Forgive me,” Armstrong said. “Robin—I’m sorry. Are you hurt?”

  But Robin continued directing kicks and punches towards his father in an awkward scuffle, while Armstrong gripped his shoulders to hold him at a distance so that fists and feet landed their blows at the far extent of their reach, when most of the power was gone out of them. He had held Robin off like this numerous times when he was a child and a juvenile; then his only concern had been to stop Robin hurting himself in his fury. Now his son’s blows were more expert, and there was greater strength behind them, but they were still no match for his own greater height and power. Gravel flew, and curses, and Armstrong was aware that the noise would almost certainly bring observers to the windows.

  What ended the affray was the sound of the inn door opening.

  “All right?” came a voice through the rain.

  Abruptly, Robin abandoned the fight. “All right,” he answered.

  The inn door remained open: presumably someone continued to watch from the doorway.

  His son turned to go without a handshake.

  “Robin!” Armstrong called in a low voice after him. And lower still: “Son!”

  A few yards away, Robin turned. He spoke low too, barely audible above the rain, but his words reached their target and hurt as his fists could never have done: “You are not my father, and I am not your son!”

  He reached the door, exchanged a word with his companion, and they went inside, closing the door without looking back.

  Armstrong walked back along the river. He blundered into a willow, half tripped on one of the gnarled roots that lurked in the dark, and rainwater ran down his neck. His knuckle was stinging. The damage he’d barely felt at the time was now intensely painful. He had caught Robin’s lip and teeth. Raising his hand to his mouth, he tasted blood. His own or his son’s?

  The river ran past, agitated by the rain and its own rush, and Armstrong stood silent and still in the rain, lost in his own reflections. You are not my father, and I am not your son. He would give anything to take that moment back. What could he have done differently? What could he have said to make it better? He had blundered, and perhaps
that blundering had severed ties that might otherwise—in a few weeks or months or years—have been stimulated to warmth and affection again. What had just happened felt like the end of everything. He had lost his son and, with him, the world.

  The rainwater ran with his tears, and the words sounded again and again in his thoughts. You are not my father, and I am not your son.

  At last, wet and cold, he shook his head. “Robin,” he answered, in words only the river heard, “you may not want to be my son, but I cannot help but be your father.”

  He turned downstream and began the long journey home.

  Some Stories Are Not for Telling

  There are stories that may be told aloud, and stories that must be told in whispers, and there are stories that are never told at all. The story of the marriage of Mr. and Mrs. Armstrong was one of these latter ones, known only to the two parties to whom it belonged and the river. But as secret visitors to this world, as border crossers between one world and another, there is nothing to prevent us sitting by the river and opening our ears; then we will know it too.

  When Mr. Armstrong turned twenty-one, his father gave him a farm. A land agent suggested a number of properties, and Robert went to visit them all. The one that matched his hopes and expectations the best was that belonging to a man called Frederick May. Mr. May had been a good farmer, but he had had only daughters, and those daughters had married men with land enough of their own, all except one who was crippled and unmarried and stayed at home. Now that Mr. May was old, he and his wife had decided to sell up, all but the patch of land around the small cottage that they also owned, not far from the farmhouse. They would live in the cottage and grow vegetables and flowers and let someone else have the trouble of the land and the big house. With the proceeds of the farm they would be well off, and if the prospect of a good dowry was not enough to marry off their youngest child, well, at least the money would be a safeguard for her when they had passed away.

  Robert Armstrong looked over the land and saw that it was irrigated by the river. He saw that the banks were firm and the waterway free from weeds and rubbish. He noticed how well maintained were the hedgerows, and that the cattle were gleaming and the fields plowed straight. “Yes,” he said. “I’ll have it.”