Netherwood01 - Netherwood

by Jane Sanderson

  ‘Cancelled,’ Lady Hoyland said crisply. ‘Haste is of the essence. Tobias is in danger and I’m removing him to the country.’

  ‘Oh! Is he ill, m’lady?’ Eve had seen him just this morning, looking right as rain and whistling as he sauntered through the courtyard to collect the phaeton. To Eve’s great relief, he seemed to have stopped eyeing her up. In fact, she’d felt all but invisible as he passed her without so much as a sideways glance.

  ‘A malady of the mind, not the body,’ the countess said enigmatically. Then she dismissed Eve with no more ado. And now she was seeking Daniel in the garden with a desperate urgency that exposed her previous attempts at calm acceptance as flimsy pretence. She found him on the parterre and, ignoring the lasciviously grinning presence of both Barney and Fred, she threw herself into his arms and let the tears flow, feeling relief, at least, that she was properly acknowledging her grief at having to say goodbye.

  Chapter 53

  Eve disembarked at Hoyland Halt at half-past two on Saturday afternoon, and Absalom Blandford was on the platform. How very awkward, she thought. What a stroke of bad luck. But it turned out he was waiting for her, because he sidled over and attempted a smile.

  ‘Welcome back to Netherwood, Mrs Williams,’ he said. ‘I brought the carriage, and thought we might take the opportunity to talk en route, as it were.’

  She looked at him blankly.

  ‘Is this your trunk?’ It clearly was, since it was the only item on the platform and she was the only passenger.

  Still she stared. Undeterred, Absalom barked orders at the porter to load her luggage on the waiting carriage, then he offered her his arm.

  ‘What are you doin’?’ she said.

  ‘Accompanying you to the carriage, Mrs Williams.’

  ‘Why?’

  He hesitated, feeling a shred of unease. Several weeks had passed since his Damascene conversion to the merits of romantic attachment, and during that time he had thought of Eve – and her accounts book – every day. But, he conceded to himself now, in his excitement he had neglected to give Mrs Williams even the slightest indication that he had chosen her. He chided himself inwardly, though he had no doubt that the situation was retrievable. And there was no time like the present.

  ‘Mrs Williams,’ he said.

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘In the months since we first met I have come to very much admire your, your, your, let’s say, your assets, and I find that the thought of you causes me some considerable agitation.’

  ‘Oh,’ she said. ‘Sorry about that.’ She had no idea where he was going with this.

  He grimaced and dropped down on one knee. She stepped away, as if from a lunatic.

  ‘Please, no need to apologise,’ he said, suffering all the loss of dignity to which knee-height subjected him. ‘Mrs Williams, I intend to do you the honour of making you my wife.’ That sounded wrong, even to him, but he let it be.

  ‘Pardon?’

  He stood now, dusting the gravel off his knee and thinking what a silly business proposing marriage was. Had to be done, however.

  ‘Wedlock, Mrs Williams. Holy wedlock. I have a pleasant house and secure prospects. If you wish, the children can come with you, unless other arrangements can be made …’

  Eve finally cottoned on, though her amazement knew no bounds. The man was out of his mind.

  ‘Thank you, but no thank you,’ she said, and she laughed incredulously. ‘’ave my trunk sent home. I’m walkin’.’

  She turned from him and left the station without so much as a backward glance. He watched, open-mouthed. Had she just spurned him? He believed she had. For the first time in his adult life he felt the unpleasant after-effects of humiliation. And in the merest fraction of a moment, his admiration of Eve Williams twisted itself into hatred; he marvelled at how seamlessly the change was made.

  The porter, having done as he was bid, returned to the platform with the empty trolley.

  ‘Have that trunk removed from my carriage,’ Absalom said.

  ‘Sir? And do what with it, sir?’

  ‘Whatever you like,’ he said. ‘It’s of no account to me.’

  Eve walked through town sparing not a moment’s thought for the surreal encounter with the earl’s bailiff. She was occupied instead by the strange sensation of being at once displaced and at home. The familiar sights of Netherwood lifted her heart, but the complete absence of Daniel dragged it down. She carried a small carpet bag – a gift from Henrietta; it could be used to hold personal effects, but also it opened out flat into a travelling rug, intended to keep off draughts in railway carriages, though she hadn’t felt the need today, and doubted she’d be making many more journeys by rail in the near future. It was a pretty thing though, fashioned out of a fine Persian rug.

  ‘For your trouble,’ Henrietta had said. ‘For coming to London with little notice, and for going home with even less.’

  It was kind of her, thought Eve. Women in Henrietta’s position rarely gave a thought to how others might be inconvenienced by their actions. Certainly it wasn’t a quality Henrietta had learned at the countess’s knee.

  In the bag was a book, a parting gift from Daniel. She’d said farewell to him last night, knowing that it would be impossible this morning, and they hadn’t made love, but instead lay in each other’s arms and talked, about everything and anything but her leaving. She had finally crept from his room at four o’clock this morning in order to prepare for departure at six, and he’d handed her a small parcel. She should open it on the train, he said, and keep it close to her at home. He loved her, he said. He always would.

  She had waited for the train to leave London, then had unwrapped the present. It was a small book, bound in olive-green cloth and decorated with an illustration of a daffodil. A Dream of a Garden, it was called. A collection of poems by Ellen Clare Pearson. She opened it, and inside was a pressed lily of the valley, perfectly formed and still fragrant. He’d written: ‘Dream of our garden, my darling Eve. You are the life I should have led. Ever yours, Daniel.’

  She had cried again then, and was crying now, at the thought of him.

  ‘Eve, lass?’

  She started. Clem Waterdine, of all people, stood before her on the lane. His old face was creased in consternation.

  ‘What’s up wi’ thee?’ he said.

  She smiled, wiped her eyes. ‘Nowt, Clem, nowt. Summat in my eye.’

  A likely tale, he thought, but he lifted his cap and moved on. No welcome home, no pleased to see you. Yorkshire men didn’t stand on ceremony, especially old ones like Clem. Any fondness they felt was implied, not spoken. Eve smiled again as she watched him go; the fact that he’d stopped and said anything at all was Clem’s way of saying he was happy to see her back where she belonged.

  She walked on, feeling brighter, and instead of heading for Beaumont Lane she turned towards the mill where she reckoned she’d find everyone she wanted to see. There was a new shop on Mill Street, bow-fronted with a fancy gold fascia declaring the existence of Franklin G. Pickles, Pharmacist. The window displayed three vast glass bottles of jewel-coloured liquid: one red, one yellow and one purple. They looked full of the promise of magical properties, which was presumably their point, thought Eve. She walked on, wondering what else she’d missed and feeling a little indignant that anything had dared to change in her absence. Mitchell’s Snicket looked the same, though. She felt a leap of the spirits at the sight of her business, the elegant, substantial building facing her at the end of the lane, and she broke into a run as she approached the arched entrance. In the courtyard she found Ellen, pottering about on the edges of the millstone fountain. The child saw her at once, and, abandoning her game, jumped up, ran across the cobbles and, damp from the water, hot from the sun, barrelled into her mother. Eve scooped her up. She smelled of toasted teacakes, and she pressed her little face against Eve’s until it hurt.

  Thea, unbeknownst to Lady Hoyland, had left London for Stratford-upon-Avon, where she was to spend t
wo weeks studying Shakespeare before returning to the capital. So when Tobias agreed, quite meekly, to join the family migration back north, his mother thought victory was hers. She was completely wrong, of course. In fact, with Lord Hoyland’s blessing, Thea had been invited to Netherwood in mid-September with Joseph and Caroline Choate; they would stay for a few days before travelling together to Glendonoch for the shooting. Tobias had high hopes that a first-hand viewing of the ancestral home and the Scottish seat might prove irresistible to Thea, if she wasn’t already won over by the attentions of an earl-in-waiting. Teddy, for once in agreement with his oldest son, was biding his time before speaking to his wife. It broke all manner of ancient rules and rituals to invite guests without the prior knowledge of the hostess, but Lord Hoyland felt that, just this once, needs must. Clarissa could be won over, he was sure of it. For what it was worth, the earl felt that Thea Sterling could be the making of his son. If he was entirely honest, he thought she probably deserved better.

  Anna was thrilled about Fortnum and Mason; it sounded to her like just the sort of establishment they should be supplying. The pies would travel once a week by train, to be met in London by a Fortnum’s delivery vehicle. Splendid arrangement, and one which brought honour on the business. King Edward’s interest impressed her less, however. She’d heard about his antics and didn’t approve.

  ‘Scandal follows him around,’ she said. ‘It isn’t kingly.’

  Eve laughed. It was hard to believe in any of it, now she was home. She had kept Daniel to herself, for just that reason. She didn’t want to discuss him with Anna as if he was history, as if it was over. Better, she thought, to keep him to herself. She took another sip of tea, and sighed.

  ‘This is t’first decent brew I’ve ’ad in six weeks,’ Eve said. ‘Proper, dark-brown tea. T’stuff they drink in London’s disgusting.’

  ‘Why?’

  Eve shrugged. ‘Tastes like perfume. And it’s wishy-washy.’

  ‘Wishy-washy,’ said Anna, filing it away for later use. ‘Perhaps it was Earl Grey. Or Lapsang Souchong?’

  ‘You what?’

  ‘My father sold it in our shop in Kiev. There are many different types of tea.’

  ‘Really?’ said Eve. ‘I thought tea was just tea.’ She looked at her friend admiringly. She was a mine of information.

  They were back home in Beaumont Lane, in their favourite spot on the back doorstep. Already, the novelty of her homecoming had faded and the children had drifted away to play. Lilly and Maud had nodded hello, staunchly and deliberately underwhelmed by her reappearance. The house, Eve thought, needed a proper clean, but she would have cut out her tongue sooner than mention it. The children looked well though. Really well. Rosy and cared for. Seth was a little taller and had started filling out around the shoulders. He was first reserve for the knur-and-spell team, he said. Amos wouldn’t be able to play some Saturdays and Mr Medlicott had asked Seth to take his place.

  ‘Why won’t Amos be able to play some Saturdays?’ Eve said.

  ‘Rallies and whatnot,’ said Seth, and Anna clapped her hand over her mouth.

  ‘Oh my,’ she said. ‘You don’t know about Amos!’

  ‘Know what?’

  Anna and Seth exchanged a glance, but Eve could see from their expressions that there was no black secret. Seth spoke up. Amos was sacked for recruiting miners to the union, he said, then walked right into a job at the YMA. He wore a suit to work now, and had a pen in his top pocket.

  ‘He gets t’train to Barnsley every day. He lives in lodgin’s on Sheffield Road. It’s a better job, safer like,’ said Seth. ‘But ’e can’t get to t’allotment so much. It’s more mine really, now.’

  ‘It was always yours, love,’ Eve said. He smiled at her. He looked younger, for all that he had grown. He looked, in fact, happy.

  ‘When did all this happen?’ she said.

  ‘Just,’ said Anna. ‘When was it, Seth?’

  ‘Wednesday,’ he said. ‘He started Wednesday.’

  ‘That’s right,’ said Anna. ‘And he came here to tell us and stayed for dinner.’

  ‘Tea,’ said Seth, and they shared a smile.

  They’re friends, thought Eve. Anna and Seth are friends.

  A week passed effortlessly by, then another, then another. Life fell into its old rhythm. Ginger handed back the reins to Eve, graciously hiding her disappointment that she was back so soon. Anna stepped back from duties at the mill and returned to domesticity, though she had a nice little sideline as a seamstress these days, and was threatening Eve with a new summer uniform for herself and the mill girls; skirts were getting higher, she said, and less full, and they’d all be less mithered in the heat if their shins were free of fabric.

  ‘Mithered?’ Eve said.

  ‘Yes. Hot and bothered,’ Anna said.

  ‘I know what it means! It’s just, you never said it before.’

  ‘Oh, codswallop,’ said Anna, just for effect.

  She kept the book of poems in a cupboard by her bed. They were lovely, but what she read most was his inscription. She had thought she would write to him, but there was too much to say. And in any case, he didn’t write to her. She thought, it’s all for the best. She had the lily of the valley framed, though, and hung it on her bedroom wall.

  In the estate office, in a new daily ritual, Absalom Blandford studied the ledger relating to Eve’s Puddings & Pies with a saboteur’s eye. One of these days he would discover a discrepancy or a deception, even if he had to invent one himself. It would have to be clever and convincing; something small, perhaps, but worrying enough to trouble the earl with, and from that seed of suspicion, who knew what might grow? He could wait years, if he had to, for the ruin of Eve Williams. The longer it took, the more satisfying it would be. He whistled as his finger traversed the pages. He had never felt more content.

  One Sunday in August, Anna had taken the children to the common with Amos, who had bought a kite in Barnsley and wanted an audience for the maiden flight. He’d come back to Beaumont Lane after chapel, and shared their Sunday roast, then all of them had gone, loud and excitable, moving like a maelstrom out of the house, down the entry and into the street. For Eve, the treat was being alone in her house. The business took so much of her time now. Eve’s Puddings & Pies was doing a roaring trade, and people travelled to Netherwood from other towns, just to shop and eat there. It still astonished her that she could be their destination, when once upon a time selling to her neighbours had seemed ambitious. With the wages from her spell in London and the weekly income from the business, there was too much money, really, to keep safely in the house, even after wages were paid and ingredients bought. Samuel Farrimond suggested a bank account, and she promised to think about it. Anna suggested a bigger house. There was a fine stone villa for rent on the edge of town, detached, with views across the common. Five bedrooms, an indoor lavatory and a kitchen as big as this backyard, she said. Eve could practically buy it outright with what she had stuffed in the housekeeping tin. She promised to think about that too. For now, she just needed to return to normal.

  She dealt with the dishes, washed them, dried them, put them away. Nothing was ever left to drain when she was in charge. She carried water from the rain butt to the set pot, and poured it in. Wash day tomorrow. Then she wrapped what was left of the roast beef, and put it away. If it was up to her, there’d be hash tomorrow but Anna probably had other plans, involving paprika. Then, finally finished, she stood for a while, looking at nothing through the kitchen window. In these moments of absolute stillness, few enough though they were, she was vulnerable to melancholy. It lurked in the silences, waiting for its moment, and it stole up on her now. She wondered if, after all, she should have gone with the others to the common, let the fresh air blow away her sorrows. It wasn’t too late, though. Before she could think again and submit to the miseries, she took her red jacket from the peg at the foot of the stairs and shrugged herself into it. She stepped out of the house and pulled the door shut
behind her, then headed off up Watson Street so brisk and purposeful that when Daniel MacLeod rounded the corner from Allott’s Way, she landed right in his arms, as squarely and perfectly timed as if it had been their intention all along.

  She took him to Bluebell Wood, not to the common; all those awkward introductions and significant glances between Amos and Anna could wait until later. The bluebells were done, but you could see where they’d been, the ground an unbroken bed of tender green leaves, spent and flattened as they worked at sending their strength and goodness back underground for their show next May. He’d be here to see them, he said. They sat, side by side, on the long, low bench formed by a fallen beech tree, and contemplated a life together.

  There was a post at Netherwood Hall, he said. Old Hislop was being pensioned off, and the countess had mentioned it to Daniel, half-heartedly, because she thought he was entirely wedded to his garden at Fulton House, but found she was mistaken.

  ‘You’re to be ’ead gardener?’ Eve said.

  ‘I am,’ he said.

  ‘’ave you seen t’size of that garden?’

  He nodded. ‘A lot of work,’ he said. ‘But thirty-four under-gardeners. Thirty-four.’

  ‘And you’ll need every one of ’em. Who’ll tend your garden? I mean, at Fulton ’ouse?’

  ‘Fred. He’s already older than I was when I started there.’

  ‘Daniel.’

  She sounded serious; he looked at her and found she was.

  ‘You must be absolutely sure,’ she said.

  ‘I am, I—’

  ‘No, listen. It’s marvellous that you’re ’ere. A miracle. But everything’ll be different for you now. So different.’ She laughed, not because the differences were funny, but because they were legion. ‘You like London, you told me so. Netherwood’s small and mucky and everyone talks like me, or worse. And that enormous garden, working on t’estate – you won’t be your own man.’