A Haven on Orchard Lane

by Lawana Blackwell

  “Simply leave it off and repeat the first stanza,” Mrs. Deamer said.

  He gave her a grateful look. “Or perhaps you could teach me the correct words?”

  “In your anxious state, your mind would not retain them.”

  Sighing, he sank against his seat. “A minor setback. Still, the perfect song.”

  He gave Rosalind a wounded stare, and she averted her gaze to the window. She didn’t even like him, yet she felt ashamed for inserting discord into his fantasy. No matter that this day would not end well for him, unless no one else auditioned.

  At least there was a silver lining. He would not want them to accompany him.

  “You’ll still accompany me?” he beseeched.

  Rosalind dug her fingernails into her palm. “Very well.”

  “I’m ever so grateful. Matter of fact, I’ll hire a cab!” He gave them a hopeful look. “Though High Street is actually a pleasant stroll.”

  “A cab would be lovely,” Rosalind said.

  The train halted at St. David’s Station on the River Exe. Mr. Clark exited first and scurried off to lay on a cab.

  “I’m in a nightmare and cannot wake,” Rosalind muttered against the babble of voices in the flow of departing passengers.

  “But we’ll be treated to a free concert,” Mrs. Deamer said. “Surely most who audition can sing. And I do so enjoy a tenor voice.”

  “For how long? Mr. Clark is to be among the last, remember? And they’re coming from all over Devon.”

  “How many can relocate on a fortnight’s notice? In any event, there is another train at five. We’ll have ample time to shop.”

  Impulsively, Rosalind linked arms with her. “You’re so kind.”

  “Well, we’re both heading in the same direction.”

  “That is so. But I’m certain I would not have warned him of the faulty lyrics. It would have been a fine story for Mother and Coral.”

  “There is still enough of it to make a fine story,” Mrs. Deamer said.

  From the carriage, Rosalind admired the city’s old Roman town, its castle ruins, Elizabethan houses with projecting storeys, gardens, quaint shops, and spires.

  The long gray line of the cathedral, with its two Norman towers, stood serene above the lime trees. The driver brought them to the west front, and Mr. Clark paid the shilling fare without grumbling. They took some time to admire the choir screen displaying effigies of prophets and saints, martyrs and kings, until Mr. Clark grew noticeably agitated. As they entered through the propped center door, three heads turned upward as one to look at the vast ribbed and vaulted roof.

  “The longest unsupported roof in England, over three hundred feet,” Mrs. Deamer murmured in the reverential quietness. A sign upon a post directed them to the Lady Chapel’s carved pews in the very back, where at least twenty people were gathered. There seemed to be no one in charge as of yet.

  “What time will they begin?” Rosalind whispered.

  “At ten,” Mr. Clark replied.

  She pushed back her sleeve, looked at her watch. Quarter past nine. “We have time to look about.”

  “You’ll join me before?” he pleaded. “You won’t leave?”

  “But of course.”

  Mrs. Deamer leaned close to say, “As you wait, take deep breaths.”

  “Will that help him?” Rosalind asked on their way to inspect the stained-glass windows of the south side.

  “His nerves, yes.” Mrs. Deamer gave her a sad smile. “His voice? Now, that would be a miracle.”

  33

  Rosalind and Mrs. Deamer moved from windows to chapels to tombs, a speck of what there was to see. But unease over abandoning even Mr. Clark was heavy to bear, and Mrs. Deamer reminded her that they could return one day.

  About forty were seated in the Lady Chapel, some women, clearly there to give the same moral support Mr. Clark had asked of them. He grinned and jumped up to offer entrance to his pew. Rosalind stepped first so that Mrs. Deamer would be the one to sit beside him. After all, she felt the most sympathy.

  Only, Mr. Clark moved into the pew after her so that he would be in the middle.

  “Do you mind?” Rosalind heard him murmur.

  “Not at all,” Mrs. Deamer murmured back.

  A gentleman wearing thick eyeglasses and a black suit approached the pulpit.

  “Good morning and welcome. I’m Mr. Thurman, choir director. When your name is called, come to the podium and announce what you will sing. If you have not given your name to Mrs. Hall in the pew to my right, please do so at once.”

  With a shuffling of feet, three sheepish-looking men hurried over.

  “Amateurs,” Mr. Clark snorted below his breath, and Rosalind elbowed his side.

  When the men were back in their seats, a Mr. Adams was called up to the podium. He fixed his eyes unwaveringly upon a woman in the pew he had left, and cleared his throat.

  “Requiem aeternam dona eis . . .” came out thinly, but his voice grew stronger, clearer. And on key.

  “No stage presence,” Mr. Clark whispered as the man left the podium.

  Rosalind frowned, whispered back, “Stop, or I will leave!”

  Mr. Aunger, next, beautifully sang from Beethoven’s Missa Solemnis, and with eyes taking in everyone in the pews. Mr. Clark shifted in his seat.

  Mr. Candler was either nervous or as delusional as Mr. Clark, for his voice was so painful to hear that Rosalind was embarrassed for him. She tensed, waiting for comment from beside her, but Mr. Clark had apparently taken her command to heart.

  Messieurs Hinshaw and Julian sang equally well. Rosalind did not envy the choir director for having to choose. Mr. Clark fidgeted more and more.

  When Mr. Libby was called, he strode easily up to the podium and smiled.

  “Awake my soul, stretch every nerve,

  And press with vigor on;

  A heavenly race demands thy zeal,

  And an immortal crown . . .”

  His voice was as clear as a bell and met high notes effortlessly. As he returned to his seat, the stillness was as thick as held breath. Even the director waited.

  “Mr. Lloyd,” he called at length.

  Mr. Clark coughed as Mr. Lloyd was leaving his seat, and then again.

  Faces turned in their direction. Rosalind whispered, “Mr. Clark?”

  He gave her a pained look, coughed again, and started getting to his feet.

  “I beg your pardon,” he said to the director. He coughed while moving the length of choir and nave, so swiftly that Rosalind and Mrs. Deamer lagged behind.

  “Well, that was delightful,” Rosalind muttered as they spotted him outside, bent over and panting into a handkerchief.

  She felt some guilt when Mrs. Deamer went over to rest a hand upon his back. “Are you going to be ill, Mr. Clark?”

  “No!” he sobbed.

  Heads turned from passersby on the walk, and from people studying the choir screen.

  “Come,” Mrs. Deamer said, leading them to a park on the north side. Under stately elms, she and Mr. Clark shared a bench. Rosalind settled upon one nearby.

  “Mrs. Grundke’s fault,” Mr. Clark murmured into the handkerchief. “She destroyed my confidence!”

  Rosalind sighed but gentled her voice. “You won’t be the only one not chosen.”

  He looked over at her with teary red eyes. “But I need it most!”

  “You have Saint Paul’s,” she reminded him.

  “Saint Paul’s!”

  “Why was this so important to you?” Mrs. Deamer asked.

  His shoulders rose with his sigh. “It would have been a stepping-stone. I’ve not had the training for the likes of London or even the Bristol stages. This would have sharpened my talent.”

  He’s crushed, Rosalind reminded herself. Besides this not being the proper time, nor her place, to insert some reality, he was unlikely to listen.

  “I’ll be teaching school when I’m an old man,” he said flatly.

  “Well, surely th
ere are rewards to it,” Mrs. Deamer said.

  “Rewards! It’s so tedious that I want to scream!” He panted a minute, blew his nose, rasped, “I want to perform somewhere where audiences don’t smell of fish!”

  And I want to be Princess Beatrice, Rosalind thought.

  Even Mrs. Deamer seemed at the end of her patience. But at a gentle end, for her tone was still laden with compassion. “Mr. Clark, sometimes our grand plans simply do not happen. But we must move on, make the best of it. Now, shall we accompany you to the station? Miss Kent and I really must do some shopping.”

  He blew his nose again. “I can’t go back alone.”

  Both faces turned to Rosalind, Mrs. Deamer’s weary and Mr. Clark’s pleading.

  “I could carry parcels,” he said.

  She shrugged. Why should he stop at ruining the morning, when the whole day lay ahead as a plum to be picked?

  “Thank you!” he cried. “May we have lunch first? I’m quite famished.”

  Mrs. Deamer suggested the tea shop connected to Bournemouth’s, their first shopping stop. They ordered sandwiches and cucumber salads and some strong Earl Grey tea, as well as iced lemonade for a morose Mr. Clark. His gratitude did not extend to offering to pay, but then, his schoolmaster wages may not have allowed. In spite of herself, Rosalind regretted the hired carriage.

  “Lunch is my treat,” she insisted. When Mrs. Deamer protested, Rosalind reminded her of the purpose of this mission.

  Bournemouth’s should have been named Behemoth’s for its size, Rosalind thought. Two shop assistants in identical white blouses and navy serge skirts assisted her in the fitting room. When she could not decide between a handkerchief dress of moss green batiste with a red-and-pink border, and a second of yellow print with a side flounce, Mrs. Deamer suggested she get both.

  Rosalind took her advice. It felt very good to feel feminine.

  “Now, I should like to buy one for you,” she said to Mrs. Deamer.

  “No, thank you,” Mrs. Deamer said firmly. “I have several gowns.”

  Mr. Clark said, “I could do with another hat.”

  When she did not yield to his hint, he shrugged and took the parcels. He waited on a bench outside Mrs. Sutten’s Ladies’ Shop, where she purchased underclothing and stockings, and Gladdishe’s Fine Shoes, where she bought a pair of low boots with a modest heel.

  On St. David’s platform, Mr. Clark and Mrs. Deamer settled upon a bench with parcels piled between them while Rosalind went inside the station house.

  “Are you holding a trunk for Hetty Whitecrest?” she asked at the clerk’s desk.

  The clerk opened a narrow box. Fingers spidered through some cards. He took one out, handed it to her with a pencil. “Here we are, Miss Whitecrest.”

  “Will you have it loaded on the South Devon to Port Stilwell?”

  “But of course.”

  On the platform, Mr. Clark jumped up to give her his place on the bench.

  “Thank you, Mr. Clark,” she said, “and for carrying my parcels.”

  “You’re welcome.” Nearby benches were occupied, so he leaned his back against a post with arms folded.

  “MISS WHITECREST?” a voice boomed.

  Faces turned toward the porter near the station doorway.

  “MISS HETTY WHITECREST?”

  What was there to do? Rosalind bounced to her feet and hurried over.

  The porter took off his cap. “I regret to say this, Miss Whitecrest, but your trunk fell when they was puttin’ it into storage. The corner got crushed, but we wrapped string around it so naught would fall out. Would you care to see before we load it?”

  “No, thank you. I’m sure it’s fine.”

  “Who is Hetty Whitecrest?” Mr. Clark said at her elbow.

  Rosalind turned. Mrs. Deamer, standing at the bench, sent her a worried look.

  “None of your affair,” Rosalind said.

  But he brought it up again from his backward-facing seat in the railway carriage.

  “You’re a dark horse, Miss Kent. First, your mother claims you’re too busy to receive letters. Then you’re home before end of term. Are you a schoolmistress at all?”

  “Of course I am. Would you like to hear the Base Angle Theorem?”

  “The what?”

  “Mr. Clark, that will be quite enough,” Mrs. Deamer said softly but authoritatively. “Has no one ever given you a nickname?”

  He looked wounded. Staring at his knees, he muttered, “Clara.”

  “Clara?” Rosalind said.

  “Because of my love for music, I was a target for every schoolyard bully. That’s why I don’t wish to work with my father in the mercantile and be forced to wait upon those same brutes.”

  What was there to say?

  Mrs. Deamer said it. “I’m sorry, Mr. Clark. No child deserves that.”

  “Nor any man,” he said. “Everyone in town will gloat over my failure today.”

  “What failure?” Rosalind said. “You didn’t audition.”

  “You simply changed your mind,” said Mrs. Deamer

  After a moment, his face brightened. “Why, that is so. Thank you, Miss Kent, Mrs. Deamer.”

  He winked at Rosalind. “Or should I say, Miss Whitecrest?”

  “It’s your choice,” Rosalind said. “But if you address me as Miss Whitecrest, I shall never speak to you again, so choose wisely.”

  “Kent, it is,” he said with a little chuckle that made her smile in spite of herself. Still, she was happy to be shed of him at Port Stilwell Station.

  34

  Coral stood at the stove, muttering. “Light, you old dinosaur!”

  “Coral?”

  She spun around, a flaming match in hand. “You gave me a start, Mrs. Kent!”

  “Forgive me.” Charlotte stepped closer. “Don’t burn yourself.”

  Coral shook out the match, lit another. She put the iron kettle on the burner flame. “Just a bit and I’ll have you a cuppa. You’ve risen early, Mrs. Kent.”

  “I thought to have a chat with you. Shall we sit?”

  With a worried expression, Coral followed her to the worktable.

  “I have retained Mr. Lockhart,” Charlotte said. “Do you know of him?”

  “The solicitor. He owns the orchards. But why?”

  “My husband, Lord Fosberry, wishes to divorce me.”

  Coral blinked at her. “But you’re widowed.”

  “I was, yes. Before Lord Fosberry.”

  “You’re married to a lord? But why would he divorce you, such a lovely person?”

  “As are you, dear. But to sum up a dreary tale, he desires another woman, one of considerable wealth. Which is what he assumed of me before we married.”

  “Men!” Coral frowned. “Are there no good ones?”

  “There are. But Lord Fosberry is not, as he threatens to accuse me of adultery. And people will believe it.”

  “I don’t believe it!”

  “Thank you, Coral. Most will not be so charitable.”

  However trustworthy she believed Coral to be, Charlotte thought again of her wee-hours decision to be transparent. On the one hand, it would save her, Rosalind, and Mrs. Deamer of having to guard their speech. But on the other, nothing delighted youth and impulsivity more than a good secret.

  Coral touched Charlotte’s sleeve. “Mrs. Kent? I know how it is to have your goings-on traded from cottage to cottage like a cup of sugar. I’ll cut off my tongue before causing you harm.”

  Charlotte’s eyes filled even as she smiled at the severity of that grim pledge. She filled in the details of her life for Coral.

  “Oh my!” Coral said. “It’s like something from a novel!”

  “I confess I fear the ending.”

  “Well, you’re not to worry. If any stranger comes asking for you, he’ll feel the underside of my skillet!”

  “I would appreciate your not going that far,” Charlotte said with a little chuckle. “But thank you. By the by, until I’m able to venture ou
t again, Miss Kent and Mrs. Deamer and I will have our worship here.”

  Coral looked uneasy. “I have choir, or I would . . .”

  “Of course. And you must go.”

  She left the kitchen with a lighter burden.

  Rosalind attempted to heap bricks upon it over breakfast.

  “But why, Mother?”

  “I have to trust her,” Charlotte replied. “Let us say no more of it today, please.”

  After breakfast, Charlotte, Rosalind, and Mrs. Deamer gathered in the parlor. It seemed more in the spirit of corporate worship to sit together upon the sofa, rather than in separate chairs.

  “I’m not certain how to go about this,” Charlotte confessed.

  “I have had students who were of the Society of Friends,” Rosalind said. “As one explained it, every member is a minister but speaks only when led to do so. They call it waiting worship.”

  “Waiting for someone to speak?” Charlotte asked.

  “Most definitely. For God. When you think of it, prayer is conversing with Him. But too often it’s one-sided, at least on my part.”

  Charlotte nodded. “Mine as well.”

  “‘Be still, and know that I am God,’” Mrs. Deamer said. “Should we close our eyes?”

  Silently, Charlotte made her usual requests for the health and safety of everyone in her life. She asked forgiveness for failings and gave thanks for blessings.

  And then she waited. After a while, listening to her own breathing, she had the irreverent thought, How long should this take?

  Forgive me, Father. Please speak to me.

  Waiting. God was not to be summoned with the snap of a finger like some cosmic errand boy.

  The clock ticked on. The silence thickened, swelled.

  Rosalind’s hand slipped into hers, squeezed, and Charlotte’s eyes teared.

  No audible voice. Something so much better. She felt enveloped by love, compassion, strength.

  On her other side, Mrs. Deamer sniffed.

  Albert and Danny entered Charlotte’s mind. As much as she cared for them, this was not the time, she said to herself, and she focused upon the powerful silence.

  Another picture came to her mind. A bank teller with a bulbous nose.

  This time, she smiled.