by Pendle, Eve
“Do you really think so?” Annie’s illness had taken over her world. She hadn’t left the house for days. The rent was due, and Mr. Johnson would be waiting. The longer he waited, the more drunk he would be, and the more likely his hands were to wander in a ‘friendly’ way. But after the incident, Lydia still felt wary of leaving with Elizabeth.
A knock at the open bedroom door made Lydia jump.
Mr. Lowe stood in the doorway, his dark hair neat but his tie a little rumpled, and his eyes full of apology.
“Please excuse me.” He shifted awkwardly. “I knocked downstairs, but I think you didn’t hear me. The door wasn’t locked. I took the liberty of coming to check everything was all right.”
There was an uncomfortable pause.
“Everything is fine.” Lydia’s voice was over bright even to her own ears. “Thank you for thinking of us.”
“I brought you some chocolates.” His gaze skipped over her, Annie, then back to her. Always coming back to rest on Lydia’s face, as though it held some magnetism for him.
“I need some fresh water.” Elizabeth stood. “Perhaps you would sit with Mrs. Taylor while I fetch it? It would be a great comfort to her and Annie, I’m sure.” Efficiently, she gathered up the pitcher, wash bowl and glass.
“Yes, yes.” Mr. Lowe’s smile was relieved but disconcerted. He didn’t move from the doorway. Hands full, Elizabeth maneuvered her way around him until he came to with a jolt. He proceeded two feet into the room, allowing Elizabeth to pass, then approached the end of Annie’s bed.
“Would you care to sit?” Lydia offered.
“No. I mean, yes, thank you.” Seeing the other chair, he sank into it. They sat across from each other, both watching Annie’s pale face.
“Here.” He held out the small box to her.
“You shouldn’t have.” Their fingers brushed together as she accepted the gift with as much grace as she could manage. She had to resist the impulse to whip her hand away as if burned. She regarded the box to avoid his gaze. Florid writing announced orange creams. Her favorite.
“I wanted to. I’m sorry,” he added after a moment. “I mean to comfort you. But I think I’m making things worse.”
“You are a comfort.” His gifts and presence were a reminder of everything she’d lost when she’d been cast down, just when she might lose her one consolation–Annie. “I appreciate your call.” She longed for his visits. “I don’t like to leave her.” Her gaze defaulted back to her daughter.
“She needs a great deal of care.” He took a deep breath. “You’re lucky to be able to afford a nurse.”
The involuntary snap of her head upward to look him in the face appeared guilty, even to her. She hadn’t considered how to explain Elizabeth to her neighbors. She paused. She’d told him they could barely afford the rent and here was a nurse.
“She’s paid for by my sister.” No need to mention she still had no idea how Matilda had known.
“I see.” He looked down, seeming to hide some emotion.
Who could have told Matilda? It couldn’t be Mr. Lowe, but it was odd. It made her worry that maybe Annie’s father... But that wasn’t possible. He didn’t know where they were. It had been ten years since Lydia had seen him, and almost as long that he’d ignored her when she’d desperately needed his help.
“You are not in need of financial aid?” Mr. Lowe didn’t look any happier about this than when she’d confessed money was scarce.
“No.” She pulled up the sides of her mouth into a semblance of a smile. “You are kind to ask, though. I don’t accept charity. I have my pride.” She couldn’t accept charity from Mr. Lowe.
“I wasn’t thinking of charity–” he started, then stopped, licking his lips as he thought.
“Fresh water,” Elizabeth announced from the doorway before entering.
* * *
“I shouldn’t interrupt you any longer.” Alfred had mulled over the nurse and the rent, but hadn’t concluded anything other than he was confused. This brief conversation hadn’t improved his understanding.
“Is there anything, any service I might do for you?” He asked out of habit, almost reflexively. But at Lydia’s hesitation, he looked up.
“Tell me.” He tried to sound gentle but insistent, but it came out commanding.
She ran her tongue across her dry lips. “It’s too much to ask.”
“Let me decide that.” Nothing could be too much. He’d happily recreate challenges of Greek heroes for her, if he could. Or if it would change anything for the better.
“I need to take the eggs to Mr. and Mrs. Dhesi at the shop, they sell them for me.”
He hadn’t realized she kept chickens, and he nodded, agreeing to the task.
“Also, the Post Office to pick up my widow’s pension. Then to Mr. Johnson at the pub to pay the rent.”
“That does sound an unreasonable amount of work to ask of anyone,” he said ironically. “It will take me all of half an hour.”
“Are you sure?” She asked him with sincere reluctance, but the emerging relief on her face was plain.
“I’m sure I can collect eggs if you give me a basket.
“I…” Lydia’s gaze flicked between her daughter, Elizabeth, and Alfred. She seemed to make a decision and stood. “I’ll fetch it.”
He followed her downstairs and as he took the basket their gazes met. Then their fingers brushed on the wicker handle. A skirting touch that barely deserved the name, but the thrill spread across his skin like ripples in a pond. He wondered how the rest of her skin might feel against his.
Her eyes widened and he cursed inwardly. Drawing back, he broke away and looked at the basket. It was old, the wicker brittle and split in places, darkened from use.
“Could you write a note for Mr. Maugham at the Post Office, while I collect the eggs, just so he knows it’s all right for him to give me your pension?”
“Yes, that’s an excellent…” She flushed scarlet. “That’s not necessary.”
“It won’t take long,” he assured her. But then he realized it wasn’t about the time. It was something else. “Can you not write?” He’d heard of people who despite education and a keen intellect struggled to read and write because the words moved for them.
She flushed even deeper red, if that was possible. “I can write,” she said in a whisper. “But I haven’t any paper. I… ran out.”
She couldn’t afford any. The obviousness of this hit him like a slap. He drew from his left inner pocket a little leather-bound notebook and pencil. They were always on him, for ideas and reflections, or writing down issues to remember for school. He went to put the book into her hands, but was suddenly conscious that the book had been over his heart and it was warm from his skin. Instead, he ripped a pair of pages from the middle. Setting the pages and the pencil on the table, he nodded. “I’ll only be a minute collecting the eggs.”
Outside, the brightness left him blinking and insistent clucking made him wince. Golden balls of feathers mobbed his ankles. With a loud, ‘buuuuccccckkkk!’, one ball revealed a head and pecked at his shoelaces. The chickens. There was probably more than a dozen, plus a fierce cockerel with a massive red and orange tail who made indignant squawks.
“No,” he told them. “Not right now.” At the rear of the henhouse he found the snug circular nest the hens had formed in the hay. From it he collected ten creamy-brown shelled eggs while one hen squawked and hopped around, the others having apparently decided he was not worthwhile following.
This done, he went back to the house, carefully wiping his feet at the mat before entering. The door needed repainting and the mat was worn, he noted. He hadn’t seen the poor condition when he’d come outside in the dark, but now it was all too obvious. The house wasn’t as well maintained as one might hope, for a tenanted cottage. He’d thought Sir Thomas a diligent landlord, but it seemed he was not considerate enough to paint a back door. A short-sighted principle that might save money on paint and labor now, but with time th
e wood would rot away. Hardly the excellent business of Sir Thomas’ reputation.
Lydia wasn’t in the kitchen, but she’d left the paper and pencil on the table. Tucking the pencil into his inner pocket, he examined the paper. She had a bold hand, with no flourishes of pretension. Beautiful in its simplicity, just like her. He shook himself. Nothing was to be gained by such wistfulness. There were pecuniary affairs to be completed.
Alfred went to the shop first, where Mrs. Dhesi look the eggs with thanks and a speculative gleam in her eye. She gave him five pence from her cash box and he pocketed the coins.
At the Post Office Mr. Maugham peered over his glasses when Alfred asked for Mrs. Taylor’s pension. As Alfred had predicted, Mr. Maugham wouldn’t release Lydia’s money, a postal order in a formal envelope with the name of a private life insurance company written on the front, without seeing her note. The twenty-five shillings, in the form of two half-sovereigns and two half-crowns, felt heavier in his hand than his own salary of two sovereigns a week.
The Red Lion where Mr. Johnson collected rents was a respectable public house, during the early afternoon at least, when all the workers were still in the fields. At this time of day, it was an altogether rowdier location. Mr. Johnson was at the bar with a pint of bitter, laughing with a couple of other men Alfred didn’t recognize. It was more usual for a land agent collecting rents to sit quietly and professionally at a table. Mr. Johnson however, looked like a man at leisure, until one noticed the few pages of crumpled foolscap size paper at his elbow.
Alfred approached as there was a lull in the conversation and Mr. Johnson downed his pint.
“You are Mr. Johnson, Sir Thomas’ agent, are you not?” Alfred said as Mr. Johnson’s gaze slid past him. “Mrs. Taylor has given me her rent to pay to you.”
“Mrs. Taylor, eh?” Mr. Johnson banged his tankard down and ruffled his own hair.
“I am the teacher of Miss Taylor, amongst others, at the village school.” A more honest occupation than standing around in a pub, drinking and collecting money.
“Oh, her teacher are you,” Mr. Johnson said dismissively. “If that’s what you call it,” he said under his breath, and his cronies laughed.
Alfred’s jaw clenched. It wouldn’t benefit anyone to cause a scene. “The rent, Mr. Johnson.”
“That’ll be a pound.” Mr. Johnson held out a hand while looking toward the landlord to catch his attention.
He fetched the half-sovereigns from his pocket and placed them on the bar in front of Mr. Johnson, who nodded vaguely.
A pound per week for a house where the back door hadn’t been painted in years. Admittedly, Alfred paid the same for his lodging. But then, that was for two rooms within the vicarage, all his food provided by the cook, his clothes perfectly laundered each week, his shoes polished daily by one of the house-maids, a bath provided as frequently as he requested, and his chamber pot emptied as if by magic.
Mr. Johnson ordered a new pint and as he picked it up scooped the rent into his pocket without checking the amount. When he noticed Alfred, he seemed surprised he was still standing there.
“A receipt, if you please, Mr. Johnson. I should like to see the note in your ledger and have a note to return to Mrs. Taylor.”
Mr. Johnson rolled his eyes. “Hark at him,” he muttered to his friends.
Mr. Johnson made a great show of opening his bottle of ink, sipping at his pint after every few movements, and writing a note in barely legible handwriting, saying he’d received the rent for that week. “There you go, hope that’s good enough for you, teacher.”
Alfred didn’t pretend to smile. “Thank you.” He took the note and left, hearing chuckles as he exited the pub.
Only outside, in the fresh air with his task completed, did his back stop crawling.
Chapter Six
The problem of Lydia’s disproportionate rent nagged at the edge of his thoughts all day. While he was reciting times tables and dictating from The Geography of the British Empire, it scratched at him. It was probably futile. Sir Thomas set the rents, his agent collected them. Even if Mr. Johnson was an odious drunk who threatened women, most people wouldn’t see much wrong with that.
It was during the mathematics lesson, late in the afternoon that it occurred to him what might be happening. Simple addition. One boy, John, had added up the sum incorrectly. He’d forgotten to carry a ten. It had taken Alfred a second to see the mistake, as it was subtle. It would be easy to miss a shilling here or there, while the pennies added up. What if Sir Thomas had no idea and his agent was taking half the rents from the most vulnerable tenants for himself?
The question was then how to discover if his surmise was correct. As Alfred watched children walk toward their homes, some alone, some with brothers and sisters, other with their mothers, he realized. The solution struck like a bramble from a hedge whipping across his arm. He had a way of knowing about every child in Elmswell.
Back inside the schoolhouse, he flicked through the records until he found the one he wanted. A list of children eligible for their fees to be paid by the state, and also a note of their parents’ names. Pulling out a sheet of paper and a pen, he opened his notebook and began to write. He’d get to the bottom of this.
His first stop was John Cubert. The eldest of three children, John received free schooling, and Mr. Cubert was absent.
He walked to the far end of the village where their cottage with a small allotment attached was. He dodged the pig outside the house and knocked on the door.
Mrs. Cubert was a middle-aged woman with dark curly hair, bright eyes, and a wry expression of tired resignation when she saw it was the schoolteacher. The family had lived in Elmswell for years, according to school records. But a family who looked different, with no man of the house, would be ideal prey for Mr. Johnson.
“Has John been naughty?” Mrs. Cubert asked after she’d invited Alfred in and he was sat at the table in the best chair, with a cushion and curved arms.
“No, no. Nothing like that.” He realized this would be a reoccurring issue in his task.
John shot him a paradoxical look of grateful suspicion from across the table from him, eating an unappetizing scented stew of what appeared to mainly be potato.
“I’m checking that families are eligible for free education.”
“Oh.” Mrs. Cubert, who had continued agitating the washing pot on the stove filled with linens, scowled.
“If your income minus your rent is below a certain amount, you qualify for the children to have free schooling,” he explained. That wasn’t strictly true. It was calculated on income. But he needed to know about the rent and this sounded plausible.
“They already have free schooling.” Mrs. Cubert looked suspicious and agitated harder. “I don’t want it taken away.”
“This is just a routine check,” he assured her. “If you could just let me know what your approximate income is weekly, and the rental payment. Just to ensure the records are up to date.” Perhaps the stew wasn’t as unappetizing as he’d thought, watching John eat it. The smell might be mingling with the soap to make it seem inedible.
Mrs. Cubert stroked her earlobe and seemed about to make a protest.
“If we don’t keep the records correct, the free schooling will stop.”
“Between all of us,” she indicated herself and the children, “We earn about 18 shillings a week. We pay 15 shillings in rent.” She returned her attention to the washing and began to bang it with unnecessary force.
Alfred wrote the figures down, along with Mrs. Cubert’s name, address and John’s name, then closed his book. “Your rent seems quite high.”
“It didn’t use to be. It’s increased, year on year,” Mrs. Cubert replied to his verbal nudge. “One shilling, then two. It’s Sir Thomas.”
He had to stop his mouth falling open. Sir Thomas was to blame? Jolly Sir Thomas, who dipped into his own pocket to ensure there were hard-wearing coats for the Elmswell children in the winter?
“Mr. Johnson says it’s Sir Thomas who keeps getting greedy.” Mrs. Cubert’s eyes flashed with the injustice. “Just wrong, that’s what it is. That’s what Mr. Johnson says.”
“Really?” Alfred found that unlikely.
“He looks after us, does Mr. Johnson.” She looked from side to side, as if someone might overhear her in her own home. “Last month we were short. He allowed me to be short on the rent, without reporting it to Sir Thomas. For four weeks.”
Since she was looking to him for confirmation of Mr. Johnson’s benevolence, Alfred nodded obligingly. “That was kind of him.” Sort of.
“He says Sir Thomas would find someone else if I refused to pay what he wants. That he’ll evict me. Plenty more would happily pay the rent. And Mr. Johnson says if I leave or complain he has orders to ensure I can’t find anywhere else to live.”
She stopped beating the clothes in the pot and tugged at her earlobe again. “I’ll be destitute if they throw me out my home. And the children.” Her tone softened to a plea. “I must have education for them. They need something more than this.” She indicated the shabby house and herself. “I’m clinging on here.”
“I understand.” And he was beginning to understand. Mr. Johnson was a champion at manipulation. He was taking a slice of the rents, playing lord bountiful by occasionally allowing the tenants to not pay his exorbitant fee, all while dishonoring the name of his employer. But to prove it, he needed more evidence.
“Don’t worry, you’re still eligible for free education.” He smiled at her relief. “And John will do very well if he applies himself. He made an excellent attempt at a tricky sum this afternoon.” He gave John a meaningful look and gave Mrs. Cubert a reassuring nod. “Now, I must get on. Thank you for your time.”
He had a lot more houses to visit, and only one he was looking forward to.
* * *
Alfred found her looking out of the window in Annie’s bedroom. Elizabeth had answered the door in an apron, then retired back to the kitchen where she was making gruel. He’d managed seven visits to investigate rents before giving in and letting his feet take him to Mrs. Taylor’s house.
