Where Earth Meets Sky

by Annie Murray

  ‘A Daimler, in actual fact – a rather old model now. But I must admit to enjoying a Morgan as well. Damn fine cars. I’m not highly knowledgeable at all. It’s Cosmo who’s the expert there. He’s very keen to race – very keen indeed. He’s trying to find his way into it.’

  As they strolled along the edge of the paddock, Sam told Piers Larstonbury about the new model of Austin being developed at the works – something more affordable for the ordinary driver. And then he found himself talking about Chitty 1 and Specials and somehow Sam announced that he was in the process of building one himself.

  ‘How absolutely marvellous! Are you a driver yourself?’

  ‘Not a racing driver,’ Sam said.

  Piers Larstonbury actually stopped, gazing at him. Sam realized the man was not just being polite, he really did not know much about motoring. He was just a social day tripper, one of the ones who went to the Henley Regatta or racing at Ascot for the social scene, and Sam saw that he was eager to learn and prepared to listen with real attention.

  ‘Course,’ Piers Larstonbury said, ‘a chap like you with all the expertise – it’s ideal! I must say, I rather envy you. All rather new to me, this, you see. I’ve not come to Brooklands before. I came because . . .’ He said no more but the tiny tilt of his head towards Lily and Cosmo gave some explanation. Jack Pye had insisted that Lily was not Piers Larstonbury’s wife. So what was between them? Did Lily love him? Sam tried to stop himself speculating. He had seen nothing in Lily’s eyes which spoke of love for the man, but perhaps that was what he wanted to believe . . .

  They had reached the railings round the paddock. Inside, there were a number of cars parked and clusters of members were standing talking.

  ‘I do wish you luck with your vehicle,’ Piers Larstonbury said. ‘It sounds immensely exciting.’

  Sam knew he had given a misleading picture of the situation, but he was still taken aback to hear Piers Larstonbury speak as if the car was already half built. He could hardly admit now that there was no Special – that he had no money and nowhere to work.

  ‘Well – we’re definitely going for an aero-engine – chain-driven chassis, of course – a Mercedes.’ He found all their dreams pouring out passionately. ‘High gear ratios – we can sort that out with countershaft sprockets. It’d be fantastic to be able to test it on the hill climb here . . . My God,’ he finished, ‘she’s going to be good when we’ve finished. The likes of Chitty 1 will have to look out!’

  ‘Marvellous.’ Piers Larstonbury was looking at him intently. Sam could see he had impressed the man with his know-how and enthusiasm, and he turned to include the others in the conversation.

  ‘Cosmo – Mr Ironside here is in the process of building a Special himself – on a Mercedes chassis. I imagine you have ambitions to race her here when she’s finished?’

  ‘Oh yes, of course,’ Sam said, still full of conviction. Of course that was what they were going to do!

  He could see Cosmo Fairford looking at him with a new respect which he found gratifying. But now he was also face to face with Lily again.

  ‘Cosmo is far more knowledgeable on the subject than I. A devotee, one might say. And a demon driver.’

  ‘Well,’ Sam said, attempting to overcome his instinctive dislike of Cosmo. ‘From what I remember you started very young. Your father had you at the wheel from about the age of four!’

  ‘Yes,’ Lily added suddenly. ‘And for ever after.’

  Piers Larstonbury looked from one to the other of them in puzzlement. Sam’s and Lily’s eyes met and held each other’s gaze steadily, somehow defiantly.

  ‘You two have met before!’

  ‘Yes.’ Lily was in command now, cool and detached as any upper-class mistress of the drawing room. ‘We have, briefly. A very long time ago.’

  Sam felt her words like ice poured into him. They seemed loaded with cruel indifference. And he realized, foolishly, that they were waiting for him to leave. They could see he was not a BARC member and they wanted their tea. Sam felt small and deflated, like a small boy with his nose pressed up against a sweet-shop window. He had been a little diversion in their day of entertainment and now he was holding them up.

  ‘My colleagues are waiting for me over the other side,’ he said brusquely. ‘I just wanted a quick word with Mr Fairford here – for old times’ sake.’ He raised his cap with careful courtesy.

  ‘Well, it’s been a delight to meet you Mr, er, Ironside,’ Piers Larstonbury said, returning the salute. ‘And I wish you every success.’

  And it was time for Sam to take his leave. It was over. And nothing had even begun.

  Chapter Fifty

  ‘Damn,’ Sam railed to himself, walking away. ‘Damn and blast it! And damn them!’

  He felt like slamming his hat down on the ground, he was so frustrated and humiliated. He had not managed a single proper word with Lily. Unable to stop himself, he turned back at least to watch her walk away, to have a final glimpse of her.

  His eyes caught hers, just as she had also turned to look back over her shoulder. Neither of them could pretend they were not looking for the other, and he saw Lily hesitate. She paused to say something to Piers Larstonbury, then turned back, leaving the boy, to hurry towards Sam.

  He saw that she was even more beautiful than he remembered. Her face had matured and there was a more chiselled curve to her cheekbones. She seemed more sophisticated and poised, more formidable. The sight of her utterly captivated him. They stood feet apart, in silence, for some moments. He looked into her eyes but her expression was guarded, frightened even. At last, as she said nothing, he could not hold back.

  ‘I saw you – earlier. I knew it was you.’ Looking very directly at her he said, ‘I’d know you anywhere, Lily.’

  There was a moment, a flicker of vulnerability, but then she said coolly, ‘Major Larstonbury felt that he had been very remiss in not inviting you to be our guest for tea in the clubhouse.’

  So Larstonbury was a major as well, Sam thought. Course, he would be. Officer class and all that.

  ‘I have people waiting,’ Sam said with dignity. ‘They’ll already be wondering where I am.’

  Her eyes widened. ‘Family?’ He was glad she asked, that the question mattered to her.

  ‘No. Just a couple of pals.’

  She seemed to decide something, and stepped closer, speaking fast and urgently.

  ‘Sam, you can help – please. I know you can. We’ve got to do something for Cosmo – set him on the right path. He’s been so unhappy. School has been a disaster for him and the family made him go into the bank and he loathes it. I’m so very worried for him. Everything has gone wrong for him . . . Losing his father the way he did – and Isadora. The one thing he wants to do is race – he’s good, really good. He drives on the estate, but he’s had such bad luck. Please, Sam – come back and talk about it with us. At least join us for tea.’

  There was such appeal in her eyes and voice, such passion in her concern for Cosmo that Sam knew he was already being drawn in. For her, not for Cosmo: he’d do anything to be near her. But he had to be honest with her now. He didn’t want to make a complete fool of himself.

  ‘You must understand – we’re not far on at all,’ he said. ‘I may have misled Major Larstonbury. You see, we have no money to begin.’

  Lily shook her head dismissively. ‘Oh, money! Money’s not a problem for these people.’

  It was that which decided him. The way she spoke of them, distancing herself from Piers Larstonbury’s upper-class sort in a way which put her on Sam’s side. For all her learned sophistication it was a class alliance. She looked intensely into his eyes. ‘If you need money, you’re in the right place. And they need you. Come and have tea, Sam. You won’t regret it.’

  And so he walked into something he had never expected, not in his most fanciful of dreams.

  The clubhouse was an airy-looking pavilion, sporting a low turret and a veranda round the sides, with the atmosphere of a
seaside resort. They were served tea round a small table in a wide room full of the genteel sounds of conversation and laughter and teaspoons clinking against china and the sweet scents of cake and strawberry jam. Piers Larstonbury behaved with utter courtesy, apologizing to Sam for his oversight in not inviting him the first time.

  ‘Miss Waters is so much better at these things than I,’ he said. And he shot a look at Lily which revealed, quite nakedly, his feelings.

  He adores her, Sam saw. He watched carefully to try and make sense of it all. Did she feel the same?

  ‘Not at all,’ Sam said carefully.

  ‘This is my son, Hubert,’ Piers Glastonbury said. The little boy, whom Sam guessed to be about five, had just taken a huge mouthful of jam sponge and he stared round-eyed at Sam, who gave him a smile.

  There was a silence and Sam took a sip of tea, then turned to Cosmo. He could swallow his dislike of the fellow for Lily.

  ‘I gather you’re keen to race? What have you done so far?’

  Cosmo came to life then. ‘I’ve driven always – on my uncle’s estate. He’s had a few motors, mostly saloon models, of course, but I’ve hammered those round the track. A couple of friends bring their motors – we have all sorts going round there. One or two Austins, a Mercedes, a Weigel . . .’

  Sam frowned. ‘You mean you’ve got a circuit?’

  ‘Oh yes!’ Cosmo said proudly and for a second Sam caught a glimpse of the eager young boy. ‘I mean, not like here, of course, not banked and all that, but a track Uncle’s let me carve out round the grounds. He’s plenty of space, after all. There’s even rather a good hill for testing uphill speeds . . .’

  Sam began to feel a real glimmer of excitement. He didn’t like Cosmo, but he could see the passion in him, the real hunger for motors and driving which gave him a sense of kinship. And surely the boy must have some of his father’s qualities?

  ‘Why not have a go building your own, then?’ he asked. ‘Plenty of people give it a go.’

  Cosmo’s face fell, became almost sulky. ‘No idea where to begin, old man. I’ve had a few thoughts, but I’ve no expertise and none of my friends are in that line. They sent me to work in a bank . . .’ he finished in disgust.

  While he was speaking, Sam noticed that Lily and Piers Larstonbury were quietly conferring beside them and he saw, with a dart of deep jealousy, that she had laid her hand on his forearm and was looking into his eyes. Piers Larstonbury gave her a smile of intimate adoration, then he looked at Sam.

  ‘She’s a great persuader, this young woman. Tell me, Mr Ironside. Where do most of these vehicles, these Specials, come to be built?’

  ‘Anywhere anyone gets the chance,’ Sam said. ‘At the back of workshops, in old barns and sheds – I’ve even heard of one or two being pieced together in people’s bedrooms. Course, there are also the workshops here.’ He sighed, not realizing how much longing there was in his voice. ‘This would be the dream place to do it. There are all those workshops away from the track with all sorts going on in them, and you’d be breathing the air in this place, with the company reps on hand for parts and right by the track and the test hill. A lot of these are company-owned, of course, most of the big firms have sheds here. Most amateurs can only dream of anything like that. They’ll work at it every spare moment they’ve got, hardly sleeping, hardly doing anything else to get it built, get it right. But they’ll still be in the shed at the bottom of the garden until what they build is successful. Then, with any luck, they can live on their winnings!’

  Piers Larstonbury smiled at his wistful passion. Sam saw him exchange a glance with Lily. Her eyes burned with feeling and she gave the slightest, persuasive nod. Cosmo seemed unaware what was passing between them and sat eating cake, sunk back into his usual sulkiness.

  ‘Mr Ironside.’ Piers Larstonbury became businesslike, pushing his tea plate to one side and reaching into his breast pocket for a fountain pen and a small notebook. ‘I have a proposal to make to you.’

  Chapter Fifty-One

  Lily sat beside Piers Larstonbury in the front of the Daimler. Little Hubert was so exhausted that he was asleep with his head on Lily’s lap before they had even left the race ground. Even so, Lily kept her head bent low, stroking his hair to hide the tumult of feeling going on inside her. Sam . . . Oh God, seeing Sam again . . .

  After a while she looked out of the window, but it was not the trees and fields of Surrey she was seeing but Sam’s face, the way he had looked at her, searching her eyes in pain and bewilderment. Why should he be in pain when he had hurt her so badly? She gripped the edge of the seat until her left hand ached. All the agony of those years, of Sam, the baby, she had locked away deep in herself.

  Don’t ever look back, she had told herself. Forget. Don’t ever think, don’t expect anything from life, not of love, of having a real life of your own. Just take what you can wherever you can. She had never expected to see him again, but suddenly there he had stood, those deep grey eyes staring into hers, filling her with an agonized sorrow and anger and longing. She had loved him – God how she had loved him. And their child, little Victoria. All of it came back, searing through her.

  ‘Are you all right, my darling?’ Piers Larstonbury asked.

  ‘Yes – thank you. Just a little tired.’ Lily managed a calm voice. ‘I think I might have a little doze if you don’t mind.’

  ‘Of course, my dear. You rest. It’s been a demanding day.’

  She was not in the least sleepy but closing her eyes would give her refuge. Before doing so she turned to look at his gentle face, frowning slightly as he steered the motor car. He was a good man, she knew that. An unlikely looking man to have been a soldier, like so many who were thrown into it, but all she had ever heard of him was praise for his complete dedication to his men and his kindly way with them. He had had a reputation for it. And he was utterly besotted with her. But although at times she appreciated his kindness, her gaze held no returning passion. He was another man she allowed to use her. It had become her way of surviving.

  Laying her head back, she thought instead of the young person who had been her one enduring passion. She felt a surge of satisfaction. At last today she had managed to achieve something for Cosmo, to please him, set him on the road to a life he really wanted. The thrill of seeing his face when Piers and Sam had shook hands on their agreement to let him race was reward enough. It had been she who had engineered that exchange, who had taken Piers’s hand and looked deeply into his eyes, knowing that in those rare moments, when he thought she was truly responding to him, she could ask of him almost anything. Major Piers Larstonbury was an unhappily married man and Lily, as he told her endlessly, was the true light of his life.

  ‘I just don’t know what I’d do if you were to leave,’ he told her sometimes. ‘My darling Lily, I simply couldn’t bear it.’

  And she remembered almost the same words on Sam’s lips, and those of Ewan McBride and Harold Arkwright, in whose household she had worked briefly when she first came back to England: those same old words, she thought, quite empty of meaning, and in the end, so cruel. Never ever would she believe anyone again who said those words to her. But she knew Cosmo would not leave her. He depended on her in a way he had never been able to do with his mother. She had been the one who had held him in her arms for so many days of his childhood. She had written to him faithfully at school, she had been the one to visit him during the war when Susan Fairford was in France, trying to bury her own grief in her work as a VAD. Lily knew Cosmo needed her, even though he was so often rude and disagreeable. And just occasionally she was repaid by him becoming sweet and vulnerable, his buying her bunches of flowers and apologizing for his behaviour.

  ‘You’re the only one who’s ever really bothered about me, Lily,’ he’d say despondently, looking wretched in a way that melted her heart. ‘You’ve been like a mother and sister to me in one.’

  Yes, he was her boy. She needed no one else and she would do anything in her power to help him. T
hat was her mission in life, other than her own survival: her devotion to Cosmo. Anything else that might truly have been hers had been cruelly snatched away.

  Piers Larstonbury was simply a means to an end. She had gone to his house to earn her living and as the months passed he had become more and more obsessed with her, as men always seemed to. And in her need to earn a living, and seeing his wealth as an opportunity, she had given in to him, becoming his lover, allowing him to quench his loneliness with her. She would not admit to her own loneliness. Her heart was cold and closed now, since Ewan McBride and above all since little Victoria. She was untouchable – and that was how she had intended to remain, and had done. Until today, when Sam Ironside stood in front of her and looked into her eyes, and she was torn open again.

  Chapter Fifty-Two

  Once she had stepped out of the Bethel Home that day, leaving Birmingham for London, knowing that she would never see her baby Victoria again, Lily had vowed that she would not look back. If she did, she would not be able to go on.

  She had secured her job with the Arkwrights, in a comfortable home in Islington. Harold and Letitia Arkwright had three small daughters. Letitia Arkwright informed Lily on her arrival that the last nanny had ‘got herself into trouble’ and had to depart. She was a thin, wrung-out-looking woman even though still only in her twenties, who looked perpetually anxious, screwing up her face as she spoke as if the sun was too bright, even though they were in a darkened room.

  ‘I must be sure of having someone of good character this time,’ she said.

  Lily, who had no desire to go near another man ever again, had no difficulty in reassuring her.

  A month passed and she and the three girls, who were not too difficult a challenge, all got used to each other. But long after that, things went quickly to the bad when Harold Arkwright started on her. It began with long, lingering stares from his mud-coloured eyes when he met her on the stairs or when she presented the girls to their parents in the evening. Lily soon realized the cause of the last nanny’s ‘trouble’, though poor Letitia Arkwright seemed not to have recognized the rabid womanizer she was married to, even though his attempts at seduction happened quite blatantly under her own roof. Harold Arkwright owned a number of successful millinery businesses in different quarters of London. He also displayed a shrewd ability for making money on stock and shares and the family were certainly comfortable, if not extravagantly, wealthy. He was a short, stocky man with very thick, black hair, an impressive moustache and an air of urgent muscular energy which contrasted rather pitifully with his wife. Letitia spent most of her evenings reclining on the couch exhausted, reading a novel and not inviting company. Harold, as soon as he came home from attending to business, began to spend his evenings in pursuit of Lily. Though she slept in the nursery she had her own tiny sitting room, very simple, with just a couple of easy chairs and a small table, and an old Turkey rug partly covering the dark floorboards. Over the little leaded fireplace was a shadowy oil painting of chrysanthemums. Mr Arkwright started appearing there in the evenings, tapping discreetly on the door. At first she didn’t feel she could refuse to open it.