‘Sorry,’ she said.
‘Don’t be,’ he smiled. ‘I haven’t enjoyed being knocked into and having me arm squeezed so much in ages.’
Clarrie spluttered with laughter. They stood for a moment considering each other. He was as handsome as she remembered and she was sure he was attracted to her too.
‘Maybe I can help Mr Milner’s business in another way,’ she said.
‘And how would that be?’ Jack eyed her.
‘By having a regular tea delivery to the Stocks,’ Clarrie answered. ‘After all, I’m in charge of ordering. The grocer we use has a very limited range of teas compared to yours.’
‘I’d be happy to oblige,’ Jack gave a cheeky grin, ‘specially if you were there to take in the delivery.’
‘Of course.’ Clarrie smiled broadly.
They parted, Clarrie hurrying back to Summerhill more light-hearted than she had been in all the long weeks since Louisa’s death. She liked to think her decision to have tea delivered by the Tyneside Tea Company was an act of support for the fledgling business. But the way her heart skipped a beat when she thought of Jack’s dimpled face and lively eyes, she knew there was a further motive — the hope that she would see a lot more of Milner’s young delivery man.
CHAPTER 15
As Clarrie stood outside Herbert’s study door, gathering the courage to knock, she felt her heart thud with nervousness as it used to do when dealing with her mercurial father. But she would not shirk this task; it was eight months since Louisa’s death and Herbert must be coaxed from his grief if the household was to survive. Will was increasingly running wild, Bertie and Verity’s engagement was under strain through lack of marriage plans and Herbert was becoming a bad-tempered recluse just as her father had, neglecting his clients and leaving more and more of his work to a resentful Bertie. He no longer took pride in his appearance, allowing his hair to grow too long and a ragged grey beard to cover his once smooth chin.
‘Go away!’ he growled beyond the closed door.
Clarrie disobeyed and went in with a tray of home-made lemonade and shortbread. Herbert was sitting in the gloom of the late evening, staring out of the window, a book lying unread in his lap. He looked like some wild-haired prophet silhouetted in the May dusk.
‘I’ve brought you a drink, sir,’ she said in a soothing voice that belied her hammering pulse.
‘I said not to come in. Please take it away.’
‘I’ll leave it and you can help yourself, then,’ Clarrie replied, advancing towards the table in the window and putting the tray down right next to him. He did not even glance at her. She took a deep breath. ‘I was wondering if you’d heard from Mr Daniel Milner, sir, the tea merchant? We’ve started using his delivery service. I know he has a business problem and suggested you might be able to help.’
‘Who?’ he sighed impatiently, still not looking round.
‘Mr Milner of the Tyneside Tea Company. Some of the other tea traders are trying to force him out of business — I’m not sure quite how—’
‘You and your wretched tea!’ he snapped, abruptly twisting round to glare at her. ‘What is it to me?’
Clarrie flinched. ‘I thought he sounded the sort of decent businessman you’d be pleased to help; he’s building up an honest trade and other more powerful men are trying to put him out of business.’
Herbert sank back into his winged chair. ‘Business, trade, honest or crooked, what’s the difference? No matter how hard we work, we all go the same way in the end, to a cold grave.’
Clarrie was aghast at his bleak words. ‘Of course it matters, sir! Everything matters; from the way we greet each other in the morning to the way the flowers close up for the night. Why would God give us life if none of it mattered?’
His hands tightened their grip on the chair arms. ‘If life matters, why is it snatched away so easily, so randomly, so cruelly?’ he hissed.
Clarrie stepped towards him and answered, ‘I don’t know. But doesn’t that make it all the more important that we live each day to the full and don’t waste time locked away in darkened rooms, cut off from what can comfort us?’
‘Comfort?’ he said bleakly. ‘What is there of comfort in this world?’
‘Your sons,’ Clarrie dared to say, ‘and your friends who want to see you happy again.’
Herbert thumped the chair in agitation and leaned forward to glare at her.
‘I will never be happy again, never! How dare you even suggest it! You know nothing of love if you think I could ever get over such a loss.’
Clarrie wanted to shout at him that she and Olive knew all about loss. It was he who could not imagine what it had been like to lose everything — their beloved parents, their home, their childhood friends — and all before they had reached adulthood. But she swallowed her indignation.
‘No one expects you to recover quickly from such a tragedy,’ she said gently, ‘but you aren’t the only one suffering. By cutting yourself off from Mr Bertie and Master Will, you are making them suffer doubly. Mr Bertie is anxious to be wed and Master Will is a very unhappy lad—’
Herbert sprang to his feet. ‘Don’t you lecture me on my family! You of all people.’
‘What do you mean, sir?’ Clarrie stepped back, shocked by his vehemence.
‘If you had done your job properly, my wife would be alive today,’ he accused her, his look tortured. ‘I trusted you to look after her and you failed me — just as Bertie said you would. If only I had listened to him, instead of letting Louisa’s pity for your situation colour my judgement. I’ll regret that to my dying day!’
Clarrie staggered back as if he had struck her. ‘I will not take the blame for her death,’ she gasped. ‘I was her housekeeper, not her husband, and the poor lady was ill long before I came here. She was ill with grief for her baby daughter — the baby no one would talk about — that’s what ate away at her health.’ Clarrie could not stop herself as the anguish and frustration of the past months came pouring out.
‘Did you know that Will blamed himself for his sister’s death because he dared to touch her and no one took the trouble to explain to him what had happened?’ she cried. ‘Have you ever stopped to consider how miserable you’re making him now by refusing to comfort him? He’s lost his mother — he adored her just as much as you in his own way — and he gave her comfort in her dying moments by playing to her. But you won’t let him comfort you, so he thinks that his mother’s death is somehow his fault too.’ She shook as she spoke. ‘Why are you so hard on him — hard on yourself — hard on everyone around you, who care for you most?’
He stood staring at her, his whole body rigid with rage. For a moment she thought he would strike her. She had gone too far. What had possessed her to say all she had? He would sack her on the spot.
‘Go now,’ he hissed between clenched teeth. ‘Get out of my sight!’
Clarrie turned and fled. At the door she heard a loud crash of smashing glass and turned in fright. He had upended the tray of lemonade on the polished floor. Clarrie saw him pick up a paperweight and aim it in her direction. He let out a furious roar. She dashed through the door and yanked it shut as the missile thudded against the woodwork. It was just what her drunken father would have done, but to see such rage in teetotal Herbert was terrifying. She ran for the stairs, gulping back a sob in her throat. Her good intentions had rebounded and made things ten times worse, all because of her outspokenness.
Up in her room, she burst into tears. What a useless housekeeper she was! She would never get used to having to curb her opinions in deference to others. In a few moments of madness she had undone all her hard work of the past year and more. How could she face her employer again?
Clarrie covered her mouth to stifle her crying. She had left herself no option but to hand in her resignation. Herbert would expect it; Bertie would rejoice in it. And Will? He hardly spoke to her these days, so perhaps he would no longer care.
Clarrie forced herself to stop weeping an
d dried her face. She must put in a good word for Olive — she at least should not lose her job. The recklessness was hers and hers alone. Even Herbert would see that.
She lay awake all night, and early the next morning she went downstairs with her letter of apology and offer of resignation. She slid it under Herbert’s bedroom door and went below to stoke up the range and make tea and porridge.
Twenty minutes later, an imperious ring from the study bell startled her. Her insides clenched as she made her way upstairs, preparing for Herbert’s wrath.
‘Come in,’ he ordered when she knocked.
She found him standing in the window, the dawn light illuminating the grey streaks in his unruly hair. He held up her letter, turned to her and shook it accusingly.
‘I’m sorry, sir,’ she gulped. ‘I had no right to say all those things.’
‘No, you did not,’ he said, his look severe. He stepped away from the window and limped round the desk. He regarded her for a long moment. His face was drawn, deeply lined with pain and fatigue. He looked as if he had aged ten years in less than one. ‘But you spoke the truth. I have been selfish in my grief; I have felt so guilty—’ He broke off, swallowing hard. There were tears in his eyes. ‘And it took the frank words of a young woman to make me see it.’
To Clarrie’s astonishment he handed back her letter. ‘I’d like you to reconsider.’
‘You — you don’t want me to go?’ Clarrie stammered in confusion.
‘No, I don’t,’ he replied. ‘Please stay, Clarrie — for my sake as well as Will’s.’
She could see how hard it was for him to humble himself to her. At once she said, ‘Of course I’ll stay. I don’t want to leave at all. Thank you, sir.’
‘No, Clarrie, it’s me who should be thanking you.’ He gave the ghost of a smile.
She quickly shoved the letter into her apron and turned to go.
‘And Clarrie,’ Herbert stopped her, ‘tell Will I’d like to have breakfast with him before he goes to school.’
‘Yes, sir,’ Clarrie said, her heart lifting in joy as she closed the door behind her.
CHAPTER 16
Summer 1907
That summer was the happiest Clarrie had experienced since the death of her father. She often met Rachel for tea or walks in the park on fine afternoons. With the extra wages she now had to spend, she treated Olive to an easel and paints, and twice they borrowed the Stocks’ bicycles and cycled to the edge of the city to picnic while Olive painted. Most of all, Clarrie looked forward impatiently to Thursday afternoons when Jack would call with their tea delivery and she would find some excuse for him to stay — a dripping tap to fix or a kitchen implement to mend — and then reward him with a cup of tea and Dolly’s home-made seed cake.
‘What you scribbling?’ Jack once asked of Olive, sitting across the table from him.
Olive blushed. ‘Just sketching.’
‘Show him,’ Clarrie encouraged her.
Olive shook her head vigorously but Jack reached over and snatched it.
‘No, don’t!’ Olive squealed.
Jack barked with laughter. ‘It’s me and you, lass,’ he said, showing it to Clarrie, ‘with Cupid sitting on the teapot!’
Clarrie put her hands to her face and spluttered. ‘Really, Olive!’
Red-faced, Olive grabbed it back. ‘It’s just a bit of fun. Jack wasn’t supposed to see it.’
Jack found their consternation amusing. ‘How many other drawings have you done of me, eh? Got a rogues’ gallery in yer bedroom?’
‘Hark at him!’ Clarrie joked. ‘Won’t be able to get back out the door with the size of his head.’
‘Yes,’ Olive pouted and snapped shut the sketchpad, ‘you’re not that good-looking.’
Jack snorted with amusement. ‘By, you Belhaven lasses know how to keep a lad in his place. I’m the envy of all the delivery men this side of the Tyne; little do they knaw how badly I’m tret.’
Clarrie gave him a playful shove as he pulled on his cap and stood to go. At the door he asked her, ‘Would you like to gan to the Pavilion tomorra night?’
Her eyes widened in delight, but she hesitated. ‘I don’t know if I can get away in time. Miss Landsdowne’s coming for supper.’
‘I’ll serve them,’ Olive offered.
Clarrie shot her a grateful look. ‘Are you sure?’
‘Course I am,’ her sister replied. ‘I’ve done more dishing out than you ever have.’
Jack grinned. ‘That’s settled then. I’ll call for you at quarter to eight.’ He blew Olive a mocking kiss. ‘Ta very much, me little cupid.’
Olive rolled her eyes. ‘I’m doing it for Clarrie, not you,’ she retorted.
Jack went, chuckling with laughter.
Through the summer months, Clarrie and Jack went several times to the music hall and cinema. He would buy her chocolates and afterwards walk her home, give her bashful kisses at the kitchen door and tell her she was bonny. For all his banter about lasses and being a ladies’ man, his embraces were inexperienced and fumbling. It made Clarrie blush to think that her only comparison was with the passionate and assured touch of Wesley Robson. She should not even be comparing them! Jack was kind and funny and ten times more the gentleman than the brazen Robson would ever be, despite Wesley’s social advantage. Yet it irked Clarrie that she could not quite banish Wesley from her mind whenever Jack put his arms round her and gave her a goodnight kiss.
The household at Summerhill saw changes that summer too. Herbert gradually came out of the depths of his depression, making an effort to spend mealtimes with Will and throwing himself back into his work. Bertie and Verity’s wedding was set for September and Verity returned with enthusiasm to refurbishing rooms on the second floor. Will was moved to a smaller bedroom but seemed not to mind.
He spent most of his spare time with his school friend Johnny Watson or performing with the church choir. Olive still gave him occasional violin lessons, but during the long summer evenings he preferred to be playing tennis or helping out at stables belonging to Johnny’s father. He finished his final term at prep school and once the school holidays came went away for three weeks to Scotland with Johnny’s family, returning ruddy-cheeked and more diffident with the servants.
Talk of sending him to boarding school resurfaced. Bertie was keen.
‘It’ll make a man of him,’ he told his father. ‘He’s been tied to Belhaven’s apron strings for too long. I’d have given anything to have such an opportunity. Look at Verity’s brother — so accomplished in sport as well as business — a true leader. That’s what boarding school did for Clive.’
‘I’m not so sure,’ Herbert prevaricated. ‘He seems happy enough at home.’
‘That’s hardly the point,’ Bertie replied. ‘He’ll never have the gumption to leave home if you don’t make him.’
Herbert sighed. ‘We’ll see what the boy wants.’
To Clarrie’s surprise and dismay, Will elected to start the next term at the school in Yorkshire that Clive Landsdowne had attended.
‘Won’t you miss it here?’ she asked him when he came downstairs looking for food. The boy was constantly hungry and growing like a runner bean.
Will shrugged. ‘Of course I’ll miss you and Olive and Dolly — and Papa,’ he added quickly. ‘But it’s not the same without Mama.’
Clarrie put an arm about him. ‘No, it’s not.’
Gently he wriggled from her hold. ‘And Clive says it’s great fun at this school and I can do riding at weekends. I’ll have proper music lessons too.’ He blushed and stammered, ‘N-not that Olive isn’t a good teacher.’
‘And what about your friend Johnny,’ Clarrie asked, thinking of reasons to make him stay, ‘won’t you miss him?’
‘That’s babyish talk.’ Will was scornful. ‘Anyhow, Johnny’s going to school in Edinburgh next term.’
Clarrie could see he was determined to go. ‘Well, I’ll miss you very much,’ she admitted, patting his wavy hair.
He patted her back playfully on the head and smiled. ‘No you won’t, you’ll be too busy going about with Jack the tea boy.’
Clarrie laughed and prodded him. ‘Don’t be so cheeky!’
He swung himself off the table, snatching one of Lily’s pork pies as he went, and ran out of the kitchen giggling.
It was during August that Clarrie met Daniel Milner, the tea merchant, for the first time. He came for a meeting at the house — the first time a client had been seen at Summerhill since Louisa’s death — and Clarrie laid on a light luncheon. He was a small wiry man with dark hair, a bushy moustache that lifted when he smiled and a forthright manner.
‘Miss Belhaven? I believe it’s you I have to thank for introducing me to Mr Stock. My lad Brewis has told me all about you.’ Clarrie blushed as he added, ‘All of it good, of course.’
Clarrie smiled. ‘I hope you’re going to stay in business, sir, ‘cos we all like your tea very much.’
‘Good.’ Milner looked pleased. ‘I’m glad it’s not just our Jack that takes your fancy.’
At this point, Herbert appeared. ‘Who’s Jack?’ he asked.
‘My delivery man,’ the merchant said. ‘Did you not know he’s courting your bonny housekeeper?’
Herbert gave Clarrie a startled look. ‘Are you, Clarrie?’
‘No — not really, sir,’ Clarrie stammered, her cheeks burning. ‘We’re friendly, that’s all.’
He gave her a quizzical little smile. ‘Well, it’s none of my business. I just hate the thought of losing such a good housekeeper so soon.’
‘You won’t, sir,’ Clarrie answered and hurried to pour out a glass of sherry for his visitor.
As she came in and out during luncheon, she could not help overhearing some of their conversation. She was fascinated by their talk; she had always taken more interest in business and commerce than in music and literature.
She gathered that other tea merchants were trying to force Milner out of business by cheating him on prices. Clarrie knew that nearly all tea was sold at auction on Mincing Lane in London.
THE TEA PLANTER'S DAUGHTER:A wonderfully moving story of courage and enduring love: First in the India Tea Series Page 18
