‘Have you seen Bess?’ he asked Laura, who was first out of Annabel’s car.
‘No. I thought she was with you.’
‘She didn’t turn up and she’s nowhere to be found.’
‘Well, something important must have come up. Bess wouldn’t let you down without a good reason.’
James left the three women and went up to his bedroom in his mother’s apartment. He threw himself onto the bed. If something had happened, if Bess had to go to her parents, she would have got a message to him somehow. She wouldn’t have just stood him up. He daren’t think she’d changed her mind. Why would she? Bess loved him as much as he loved her.
While James lay staring at the ceiling in one part of the Hall, Bess had returned and lay unable to sleep in another. What a mess I’ve made of everything, she thought. I’ve knowingly betrayed my friend by making love with the man she plans to marry, so what right have I to feel betrayed when he leaves me for her? I’ve lost the man I love, and because of him, I’ll lose Annabel’s friendship and Laura and Polly’s respect. Bess stared at the ceiling and sobbed.
Relieved to see Sable hadn’t suffered from her late night excursion, Bess led her out of the stables.
‘I’ll catch you up, Bess,’ Mr Porter said, saddling Sultan.
‘Bess! Bess!’ James shouted. ‘Wait!’
Bess heard James calling her, but she didn’t look back. She mounted Sable and galloped off.
‘Thank you, Mr Porter,’ James said, pulling the reins out of the old man’s hands before jumping on Sultan and chasing after Bess.
Bess rode as if the devil himself was after her. She didn’t want to see James or speak to him. She was afraid she might weaken and… ‘James… How could you do this to me?’ she screamed.
‘Whoa, girl.’ Sable faltered, and when Bess brought her to a halt she hobbled. ‘What’s the matter, girl?’ she said, dismounting.
‘Bess, what’s wrong?’ James asked when he caught up with her at the river.
‘Sable’s got a stone in her hoof.’
‘I don’t mean with Sable,’ James said, dismounting to examine Sable’s hoof. ‘I mean with you. Why didn’t you come to the barn last night? We were supposed to go away for the weekend.’
‘I changed my mind,’ Bess lied. She wasn’t going to give James Foxden the satisfaction of knowing he had made a fool of her.
‘You changed your mind? I don’t believe you, Bess. You were looking forward to going away - to us spending time together, alone - as much as I was!’
Bess fought for the right words, as well as to stop her tears. ‘I was, but…’
‘But what? What could possibly have happened to make you change your mind?’
‘I don’t want to talk about it! I’ve changed my mind! That’s all there is to it!’
James took a knife from his jacket pocket and carefully hooked a stone out of Sable’s hoof. ‘There you are, girl,’ he said, holding onto the horse’s reins to steady her, and looking at Bess.
‘Thank you,’ Bess said, and mounted.
‘I love you, Bess. I thought you loved me.’
‘I thought so too,’ Bess replied sharply. ‘I was wrong.’
‘What do you mean, you were wrong? You loved me on New Year’s Eve. What’s changed?’
‘New Year’s Eve was a mistake!’ Bess snapped.
‘How can you say that? For Christ’s sake, Bess, tell me what it is I’ve done!’ James shouted, still holding Sable’s reins.
‘It’s over, James. I’ve made up my mind.’
‘But I love you, Bess. I want to marry you.’
Tears streamed down Bess’s face. She wanted to fall into his arms, say I love you too, that I want nothing more than to marry you, to be your wife. But she knew she would never be able to get the image of James kissing Annabel out of her mind. ‘It’s too late!’ she shouted. ‘Now let go of Sable’s reins!’
Startled by the depth of anger in Bess’s voice, James let go of Sable’s reins – and she galloped away.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
‘Can I help you?’ Bess called, wiping tears from her eyes as she approached two strangers standing next to a black saloon motorcar in front of the Hall.
‘Perhaps you can,’ the taller of the men said. ‘We’re looking for a young woman named Molly McKenna.’
Bess looked from one to the other of the men. ‘May I ask what business you have with Miss McKenna?’
‘We’re employed by the solicitors of Mr Shaunessy McKenna to find his niece.’
Bess was suddenly on her guard. ‘What makes you think Miss McKenna is here?’
‘In our search for Miss McKenna we found the lady she lodged with before--’
‘You found Mrs McAllister?’ Bess screamed.
‘Yes. It was Mrs McAllister who thought Miss McKenna might be staying here with a young woman named Bess Dudley.’
‘Molly is here. She’s well and she’s safe. But what of Mrs McAllister?’ Bess asked frantically. ‘When did you see her? How was she? Do you know where she is now?’
‘I’m here, Bess,’ a familiar voice called from inside the car.
‘Mrs McAllister!’ Bess cried. ‘Is it really you?’ Bess helped her old friend out of the car and threw her arms around her. ‘We searched for days. We looked everywhere for you.’
‘I know, dear. I took a blow to the head in the bombing and lost my memory. I wandered from place to place. Then one day these gentlemen found me. I’m fully recovered now and it’s thanks to Molly’s uncle.’
‘Molly’s uncle?’
‘Yes, dear! I’ll tell you all about it later, but first I must keep the promise I made to him.’
Bess took the small party from London up to the sitting room and invited the two gentlemen to take a seat while she and Mrs McAllister went to the nursery. Molly and Elizabeth were in the playroom with Nurse Ambler. Molly was sitting on the floor with Elizabeth, building a tower out of colourful bricks. Every time she carefully balanced the last brick on top of the stack, Elizabeth knocked the tower down and squealed with joy.
With her forefinger at her lips, Bess beckoned Nurse Ambler. ‘Would you ask Miss Armstrong to come up, please? You’ll find her on the ground floor, in the small office next to his Lordship’s study.’
Nurse Ambler nodded. ‘It’s time I brought the children in for lunch. I’ll tell her on my way.’
‘Thank you,’ Bess said, and when the nurse had left, she went into the nursery. ‘Molly, there’s someone here to see you.’
‘Who is it?’ Molly asked, jumping up.
‘It’s me, Molly dear,’ Mrs McAllister said, entering the room behind Bess.
Molly stood for a long moment, wide-eyed and open-mouthed, before flying into Mrs McAllister’s arms.
‘I’ll go and rustle up some tea,’ Bess said to Miss Armstrong, who had dashed upstairs after hearing the description of the visitor and was standing beside Bess watching the reunion of Molly and Mrs Mac. ‘I’ll take it to the sitting room. Come along when you’re ready,’ Bess said, and left her old friends from London to get re-acquainted.
Molly and Miss Armstrong sat either side of Mrs McAllister while Mrs Mac cuddled Elizabeth. Elizabeth gave her new friend a broad smile, showing off her two front teeth, before snuggling down with her thumb in her mouth against Mrs Mac’s now not so ample chest. Content in Mrs Mac’s arms, the little girl closed her eyes and went to sleep.
After tea one of the men from the solicitors asked Molly if he could speak to her alone.
Molly quite firmly said that anything he had to say to her could be said in front of her friends. ‘We have no secrets from one another,’ she added.
‘As you wish,’ the man said, and cleared his throat. ‘While your uncle, Mr Shaunessy McKenna, who had been ill for some time, was convalescing in a sanatorium on the west coast of Ireland, he heard on the wireless that the Luftwaffe had bombed parts of Kensington. He telephoned your lodgings, but there was no reply, so he returned to London imme
diately. He went to Arcadia Avenue, to the house where you had lived but, as you know, it was no longer there. He knocked on every door of every house that was still standing in the avenue, and asked everyone he met if they knew where you or any of the other residents from number seventy-nine were. No one knew of your whereabouts.
‘Your uncle was frantic with worry for you and the baby but his health was failing so he employed us, his solicitors, to find you. And it was while we were looking for you that we found Mrs McAllister.’
‘I’d been ill too,’ Mrs McAllister explained. ‘Not in the same way as your uncle, but after the house was bombed I suffered a sort of shell shock. I lost my memory and was very confused. I tramped the streets for months, walking from one hostel to another, looking for someone. I knew I had lost someone that was dear to me, and I was determined to find them, but I didn’t know who it was. I didn’t know who I was at the time. But I ended up back in west London, living in a hostel for homeless women, and that’s where these gentlemen found me.’
‘Mr McKenna insisted that Mrs McAllister was brought to his house in Surrey, where he provided round-the-clock nursing until she was well again. And, as Mrs McAllister’s health improved, she began to remember what had happened on the night of the bombing.’
‘Yes,’ Mrs McAllister cut in. ‘It all came back to me - the bombs, Molly and Elizabeth, Miss Armstrong, and Bess. I remembered Bess came from a village near Lowarth. I also remembered that she was coming to London for Elizabeth’s christening, which should have taken place the day after the bombing.’ Mrs McAllister turned and smiled at Bess. ‘I knew she’d have taken you and the baby and Miss Armstrong back to the country with her, where you’d be safe. So here we are.’
‘And my uncle?’ Molly asked. ‘When can I see him?’
‘I’m afraid your uncle passed away, miss.’
Molly’s eyes filled with tears. ‘No, please don’t say that. He was the only family I had, until I lodged with Mrs McAllister,’ she said, as if somehow that piece of information would change what the solicitor had told her.
Mrs Mac put her arms round her young friend. ‘And he loved you very much.’
‘Poor uncle. Now I’ll never be able to ask him to forgive me.’
‘My dear child,’ Mrs McAllister said, looking into Molly’s big blue eyes. ‘Your uncle told me that he deeply regretted turning you away when you told him you were having a baby. He said he wanted so much to be part of your life, and Elizabeth’s. And he made me promise to tell you how much he loved you, and how very sorry he was that he’d let you down when you needed him most. He hoped you would forgive him.’
‘There’s nothing to forgive,’ Molly said.
‘Miss McKenna, we would like you to come to our offices in London as soon as it’s convenient,’ the shorter of the two men said, handing Molly a business card. ‘As sole beneficiary of your late uncle’s estate there are papers you must sign. The house in Surrey--’
‘My uncle’s house?’
‘It’s your house now, miss,’ the man said.
‘My house? Did you hear that, Mrs McAllister? We have a home again. I can’t believe it,’ Molly said, taking hold of Mrs Mac’s hand and holding out her other hand to Miss Armstrong, who joined them as they hugged each other.
‘Why had you been crying this morning?’ Miss Armstrong asked Bess after she had looked in on Molly and Elizabeth, who were both sound asleep.
‘It was emotional seeing Mrs Mac again.’
‘I mean earlier. You’d been crying before you saw Mrs McAllister,’ Miss Armstrong said, with concern in her voice.
Bess wasn’t sure if Miss Armstrong knew about her relationship with James. If she did, she probably wouldn’t approve. Laura knew; she had noticed the way Bess and James looked at each other, even before Bess had told her that she and James were in love. Thinking about it, the land girls probably suspected something was going on. They had stopped talking once or twice when Bess entered the dorm, or changed the subject abruptly and loudly, which was always a giveaway. ‘I’d seen James,’ Bess said at last.
‘And what did he do or say that upset you so terribly?’
‘He told me he loved me and asked me to marry him.’
‘What’s so terrible about that?’ Miss Armstrong asked.
‘He isn’t free. James is betrothed, or whatever it is the upper classes call it, to Annabel. Their parents want them to marry.’
‘Does James want to marry Annabel?’
Bess shrugged her shoulders.
‘Does he love her?’
‘I don’t know, but I saw them embracing last night, on St. Valentine’s.’
‘There could be a dozen reasons for that.’
‘And he kissed her.’
‘Have you spoken to James? Asked him why he kissed Annabel?’
‘No.’
‘Have you spoken to Annabel?’
‘No, I couldn’t. She looked so happy to be back from Kent. I couldn’t take that away from her.’ Bess lowered her eyes. ‘I felt bad enough about loving James before I knew Annabel. Now we’re friends, good friends, I’m ashamed that I’ve been disloyal to her. If she knew that James and I...’ Bess shook her head. ‘It would break her heart.’
‘Let me get this straight. You love James and James loves you. He has asked you to marry him, but you’ve turned him down because you think Annabel loves him. Don’t you know?’
‘No. We’ve never talked about James in that way. We’ve talked light-heartedly about what James and my brother Tom used to get up to when they were young. We’ve talked about horses, the war, the west wing, and of course, Foxden Acres. Even when the girls talk about their sweethearts, Annabel never says anything about James.’
‘Bess, you’re not being fair to yourself, or to James – or to Annabel, for that matter. If you end your relationship with James and he marries Annabel, you won’t only be responsible for breaking his heart – and your own – you’ll be responsible for breaking Annabel’s heart too, if James doesn’t love her.
‘Go and talk to him, Bess. Don’t throw the love you have for each other away. To give James up because you think it’s the right thing to do, or because it’s what his family want, is absolute tosh. I know from bitter experience that doing the right thing doesn’t make things better, it makes them worse. Do you love James, Bess?’
‘Yes I do, very much.’
‘Then tell him. If you don’t you’ll regret it for the rest of your life. Believe me, I know what I’m talking about.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘I’ve been in love,’ Miss Armstrong confided, ‘secretly, for several years. The man I love, Cyril, my boss at Mademoiselle Modes, was married. I’d known for as long as I’d worked with him that he and his wife led separate lives but, like you, I felt guilty. So rather than be responsible for breaking up his marriage, I told him I didn’t love him.’
‘Poor man,’ Bess said. ‘What happened to him?’
‘He was heartbroken. He moved to work for Denton and Christie. I missed him terribly, so I selfishly followed him. He gave me a job as Senior Sales Supervisor, but he couldn’t cope with seeing me every day. So when I was on leave, he brought Miss Simpson in from another department and gave her my job. The week before I was due to return to work, I received a letter saying there had been a drop in sales, because of rationing, and I had been made redundant.
‘The humiliation I felt coloured my feelings towards Cyril. I began to hate him. But when I saw him again on the day we went to Denton and Christie, after number seventy-nine had been bombed, I knew I still loved him.’
‘And his wife?’
‘She ran away with a door-to-door salesman.’
Both women laughed. ‘So where do you go from here?’ Bess asked.
‘We’ve been writing to each other. Cyril has decided to ignore his male pride and divorce his wife for adultery. So when he’s free, we’re going to be married.’ Miss Armstrong took Bess’s hands in hers. ‘Everyone de
serves to be happy, Bess, to love and to be loved. Life is short enough, but because of this damn war, no one knows what’s round the corner. Don’t throw away what you and James have. Go to him, tell him how you feel and give him the chance to explain.’
‘Thank you, Miss Armstrong, I will,’ Bess said. ‘I’ll go to see him first thing tomorrow.’
Bess said goodbye to her friends Molly and baby Elizabeth, Miss Armstrong and Mrs McAllister on Sunday morning – and had every intention of taking Miss Armstrong’s advice and telling James how much she loved him. First she needed to do what she believed was right. She needed to tell Annabel.
As she walked towards the Hall, Bess could see Annabel sitting in the bay window of the ballroom reading the Sunday newspaper to Frank Donnelly, Bess’s old boyfriend who, until six weeks ago, was missing in action, presumed dead. Frank had come to Foxden from the Walsgrave hospital in Coventry to recover after having an operation to remove his left eye. He wasn’t able to see, but his spirits were high and he was looking forward to having his bandages removed.
Annabel welcomed Bess with a warm smile.
‘Hello, Frank,’ Bess said, including Annabel in the greeting. ‘Do you mind if I steal Annabel for a few minutes? I won’t keep her long.’
‘And I thought you’d come to see me,’ Frank joked.
‘What is it, Bess?’ Annabel asked when she and Bess were out of earshot of the other soldiers in the ballroom.
‘I have something important to tell you, Annabel.’
‘Go on,’ Annabel said, fearing Bess was the bearer of bad news.
‘I am in love with James.’
‘Oh my God,’ Annabel said. ‘I--’
‘And James loves me!’
‘I know! I know James loves you,’ Annabel said, laughing. ‘I probably knew before he did. I certainly knew before you did.’
Foxden Acres (The Dudley Sisters Quartet Book 1) Page 25
