The Sugar Merchant’s Wife

by Erica Brown

  The other children gathered, their eyes wide with wonder as they ran their hands over the thick woollen blankets and took their pick of the clothes Blanche had left.

  ‘Will we ever live in luxury, Ma?’ they asked.

  Edith could hardly tell them the truth – that they would live and die in a place like this because people like them had to know their place and stick in it. She chose to lie. ‘We won’t ever have a mansion, but one day we might have a little cottage with roses round the door and an apple tree in the corner of the garden.’

  ‘Will we, Ma?’

  The questions finished the moment the food came out. The kids dribbled. Edith found her own mouth was watering. It was hard, but she had to ration things out and thought she always would. Living frugally became a habit that was hard to break.

  ‘Bread and cheese now, then a few biscuits, but that bacon can be hung up.’ She hung it on an iron hook set into a beam, then watched her children, their faces bright with excitement as they shared out the food and turned over the clothes. Would life always be like this? A struggle for existence from one day to the next?

  ‘Are you alright, Ma?’ Lizzie asked.

  Edith rubbed at her eyes. ‘Just crying with happiness ’cos I can’t wait to see our Freddie’s face when he sees all this.’

  Suddenly the door burst open and Freddie rushed in. ‘Look who I’ve brought,’ he shouted excitedly, as a tall figure ducked into the doorway behind him.

  Edith almost dropped the piece of pie she’d cut for herself. ‘Captain Tom!’

  Tom smiled as he took off his hat. ‘Hello, Edith.’

  ‘That’s two visitors we’ve had today,’ cried an excited Lizzie. ‘The other visitor left us food and clothes and blankets and she was dressed in blue and was very beautiful. Ma said it was her friend Blanche.’

  ‘Blanche was here?’ Tom could hardly believe his timing.

  ‘She’s only just left,’ said Lizzie. ‘Ma wouldn’t open the door ’cos we don’t live in a palace.’

  He knew where Blanche lived, knew he could find her alone if he so wished, but the fact that he’d missed her by a few minutes seemed unfair. It was as if he’d been about to reach out and touch her, and fate had snatched her away. It made him think and act irresponsibly, and no doubt later he would regret it.

  ‘Which way did she go?’

  ‘That way,’ said the boy who had held the horse. He’d been drawn to the doorway, his nose twitching in response to the smell that had wafted out into the yard. ‘She’s wearing a blue bonnet with feathers in lots of different blues.’

  Tom paused before he left. ‘Edith, I will see you again. The Demerara Queen is still berthed on St Augustine’s Quay. Come and see me there.’

  He didn’t wait for an answer.

  Edith was left gawping after him. She stamped her foot. ‘I didn’t even get a chance to thank him!’

  She sighed. More pressingly, the money was fast running out. It would have lasted much longer if she hadn’t helped poor Molly out. The fact was she could do with a little more, and although she was proud, her children and bread on the table came first.

  ‘When shall we visit the captain?’ Freddie asked impatiently.

  ‘Dressed like this?’ Edith waved her work worn hands at her patched and faded clothes.

  ‘It’s only St Augustine’s Quay,’ said Freddie.

  Edith sucked in her bottom lip and thought about it. St Augustine’s Quay wasn’t far and perhaps she wouldn’t feel out of place.

  ‘All right,’ she said. ‘We’ll do that.’

  Just then, an almighty shriek sounded and Molly McBean appeared, her dirty nails digging into her cheeks and her peg-like teeth trembling in her open mouth. ‘My baby! My baby’s dead,’ she wailed.

  Edith sighed. ‘Tomorrow. We’ll go tomorrow,’ she said to Freddie, and went off with Molly to see what could be done.

  * * *

  Blanche sat quietly, as they left Lewins Mead behind and re-crossed St Augustine’s Bridge and bore south towards St Mary Redcliffe.

  She’d so wanted to help Edith and tell her about getting involved in the fight against disease and was disappointed at not seeing her. Reacquainting herself with an old friend who had also lost children to cholera would have meant so much to her.

  The old wound in her heart threatened to open up again. If she allowed it to happen, the old melancholy would return, but for now it couldn’t be helped.

  ‘I shall be going out again when we get back, John. I shall need the trap,’ said Blanche.

  ‘Do you wish me to come, madam?’

  ‘No. If my husband asks, tell him I’m gone to Little Paradise.’

  John nodded in understanding. Everyone in the house understood and sympathized with her need to be alone. Little Paradise was her refuge.

  The cottage was empty of furniture, but was clean and pretty. In one of the bedrooms, tiny violets were hand-painted all over the wall. Someone had loved the place as much as she did, at least, that was what she liked to think.

  * * *

  Tom had never taken much notice of women’s fashions before, but he certainly did so now. Ahead of him was the bonnet described by the boy. At present the pony and trap was caught in traffic, but once the area around St Augustine’s Bridge was left behind, it would speed away.

  He remembered that Blanche lived with her husband at Somerset Parade, and clambered into a cab, intending to follow her there, despite his earlier misgivings about visiting her at home.

  He stuck his head out of the window at frequent intervals, saw the pony and trap ahead and knew they were going in the right direction.

  The mansard roofs of Somerset Parade threw ink-black shadows over the riverbanks at their rear. The smell of flowers and scythed grass obliterated the smell of the river and the mix of smoke from the sugar refinery, the chocolate factory, the shot tower and the glass kilns. The blue sky was gone and it was raining.

  He directed the cabbie to stop at the end of the street of fine town and mews houses.

  ‘Wait here,’ he said and got out. He walked just a few paces then stopped. The evening had turned gloomy – more like November than June. The sycamores and beech trees dripped moisture. Shivering, he turned his coat collar up against the relentless drizzle as it trickled down his neck and dropped from the end of his nose.

  He suddenly felt a fool. What was he achieving by standing here? Was he going to knock on her door? He wanted to, but it wouldn’t be right. The best thing he could do was to go home.

  As he turned to leave, he saw the horse’s ears prick at a muted sound. The pony and trap came back out of Somerset Parade and turned left, heading towards Redcliffe Church. Blanche was driving and she was alone.

  Without regard now for how seemly it might be, he urged the cabbie to follow.

  They followed the trap down over Redcliffe Hill and across the bridge. It was within walking distance, and though they had crossed ‘The Cut’, the fine houses of Redcliffe were still in view. But this was Bedminster. ‘The Cut’ was a man made stretch of water that took the river’s tide. Once it was crossed, grim colliers’ cottages, dwarfed by winding wheels, scarred what had once been farmland on the left of the road. On the right-hand side, nothing had changed. The old common, the fields and the copses gathered protectively around the last of pretty cottages where farm labourers and boatmen used to dwell.

  Blanche turned into Apple Tree Lane at the bottom of the hill. By the time Tom had arrived, the horse was already resting on three legs, its head beginning to droop until it became aware of another horse entering the lane. Pricking its ears and raising its head, it let out a long neigh.

  ‘Stop here,’ Tom ordered the driver. ‘And wait.’

  There were no lights on in the house. He had presumed she was visiting someone, but if this was so, why were there no candles or oil lamps lit?

  On entering the garden, he saw that the door had been left slightly ajar and was swinging on its hinges. The gap it left, le
aking out a little of the dark mysteriousness of whatever was within, beckoned him. It creaked on its hinges as he pushed it open.

  He entered, smelt her and felt his blood thundering into his head. This was madness. It should have been easy to leave, but he found it wasn’t. He’d never sleep tonight if he didn’t see her now.

  * * *

  The moment Blanche entered the cottage she knew that something had changed. Little Paradise had been her sanctuary since Anne’s death, the place she had come to gaze across at the common and imagine her daughter picking dandelion clocks. This evening she had no wish to do that. Her heart felt lighter and her mind seemed filled with other things, not least knowing Edith’s situation and the more positive aspect of fighting what had caused Anne’s death.

  There was a noise.

  The sound of creaking joinery was not unusual in the old cottage, but there was something different about this. She couldn’t recollect hearing such regular rhythm before.

  Footsteps! It could only be footsteps.

  Although her spirits were higher than they’d been for a long time, she still valued her right to privacy. Conrad knew very well that she liked to be alone here.

  Her eyes flashed angrily as she shouted at the door. ‘Honestly, Conrad, you could have left me to my own healing for a little while longer.’

  The door opened slowly. The years rolled away.

  Dark hair, blue eyes; exactly the strong face she remembered, mostly in her dreams.

  He straightened with a casual grace that belied his height and firm build.

  It was ridiculous, but for a moment she found it hard to say his name. It had remained unspoken for so long. At last it came. ‘Tom.’

  He smiled as though he’d never left, as though the years had never intervened. ‘I followed you.’

  Blanche gasped and shook her head. ‘You shouldn’t be here, Tom.’

  Her gaze dropped to his hands as they played over his hat. They were tanned, she remembered they’d always been tanned.

  ‘I’ve come to run a shipping company.’ He smiled as though something had amused him. ‘Steamships. That’s why I came back to Bristol.’

  ‘I see.’

  ‘I also wanted to see you. I needed to know how you were. I understand you lost a child.’

  She nodded, her mouth opening and shutting soundlessly.

  Tom took two steps closer, then a third and a fourth. She counted them. Why would she do that? Vaguely, she realized it might be linked with the way she’d counted her strides as she ran along the Barbadian beach of her youth. Perhaps his presence was a bridge between her more recent past and further back.

  He looked almost boyish when he began to explain, though a few grey hairs gleamed at his temples.

  ‘Nelson persuaded me to come back – a business venture – I wasn’t going to but… there was nothing left for me in Boston. My wife died and my in-laws preferred to dispense with my services.’

  He kept fiddling with his hat, looking down at it as if searching for the right words to say.

  ‘And you followed me.’

  He nodded. ‘I couldn’t resist.’

  ‘You shouldn’t have.’

  He tilted his head to one side, so boyish again. ‘Why?’

  Reasons seemed suddenly hard to find. ‘Because it isn’t right.’

  She turned away and raised her hands to her face. Her palms were cool against the heat of her cheeks. Her blood was rushing; her heart was racing. She felt like a girl again. No! Of course it wasn’t right.

  ‘I’m sorry. I came here as an old friend. I went to your house in Somerset Parade and saw you driving your trap. I wondered where you were going.’

  Blanche sank down onto the window seat and turned her face to the scene outside the window. ‘I like to come here alone. I sit and look at the common and imagine my daughter playing there before she died.’

  ‘I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have come.’ Head bowed he made for the door.

  ‘No! No need.’

  Her exclamation was spontaneous. She looked at him, remembering what had been between them and feeling again the old passion. Her protectiveness of Little Paradise seemed less important than it had been. It was almost, she thought, as though Tom had broken a spell that had kept her tied to this place.

  ‘Tell me about your life in America,’ she said.

  He sat beside her on the stone seat and told her about Margaret, Boston, the Indians and the Clipper ships with their tall masts and acres of sail. He told her about coming home and his plans for expanding the Strong family interests into steamships.

  ‘You always were ambitious.’

  Tom looked surprised. ‘Was I?’

  She smiled in that smooth, soft way of hers that made him want to kiss her. ‘You just didn’t know it. You’re too strong a man to be otherwise. It runs in the family.’

  ‘But I’m not a Strong. You know that. In fact, I haven’t a clue who my father is.’

  Blanche touched his hand. ‘Whoever he was, I think he’d be proud of you.’

  ‘Now tell me what you’ve been up to,’ he said.

  She didn’t hesitate but told him about the family, her household and her keenness to get involved with helping people like Edith.

  ‘The city Corporation are looking into ways of improving the sewerage and water supply in the city so that cholera never strikes again. I went to a meeting about it.’

  Tom laughed as he shook his head. ‘I’m amazed. You and all those stuffy old men talking about sewage!’

  Blanche frowned at him. ‘You’re being condescending.’

  Tom adopted a sheepish look. ‘I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to be.’

  ‘Besides, I wasn’t the only woman there. Horatia was there too, though I don’t think for the same reason. I hear she has her eyes on the contracts that such projects produce. She’s quite a formidable woman.’

  Now it was Tom who frowned. ‘Yes. She is.’

  An awkward silence seemed to fall between them. Blanche got up, found her legs were weak and almost sat down beside him again. It was tempting to do so, but she was aware of where it might lead.

  ‘We shouldn’t be here alone. I think I should go.’

  Tom got up too. ‘Of course.’ He followed her down the stairs. At the bottom he offered her his hand. ‘It’s good to see you again, Mrs Heinkel.’

  ‘Blanche,’ she said taking his hand. ‘I was always Blanche to you and always will be. Nothing has changed.’

  The hand that held hers was warm.

  ‘Nothing?’

  No, she thought, looking up into his face, nothing at all. Excitement, warmth, anticipation; they were all there, just as in the time preceding her marriage to Conrad.

  ‘Welcome home,’ she said, and felt her eyes misting with tears. ‘I’ve lost a child and gained a friend.’

  He nodded. ‘Regained a friend.’

  He held both her hands and kissed her forehead. She did not object. This was about comfort and the warmth between friends – at least, that was what she told herself. Deep down she knew it wasn’t true.

  A sudden shaft of brightness pierced the mauves and greys of the leaden sky, brightening the room and making her face glow.

  She heard Tom’s intake of breath. ‘Blanche!’

  She did not protest when he cradled her head against his shoulder. It was what she needed. All the pent-up emotion of the past years spilled out. Deep sobs racked her body.

  He held her close, one hand in the small of her back. ‘Blanche! My darling Blanche!’

  She reminded herself that she had children, but it was no good. She could not dismiss her feelings that easily, but she had to, she just had to.

  ‘No,’ she said, breaking away.

  He stood against the window, his profile dark against the gathering dusk. ‘Will you still come here? Will you come here to see me?’

  She looked at him and remembered how it had been when she’d first come to England from Barbados, expecting to be accept
ed as a member of the Strong family, and ending up as nurse to those who turned out to be her half-brothers and sisters.

  Tom too had not really belonged, but had risen above it all, so much so that Horatia had fallen in love with him. It was only natural that they should have been attracted to each other. After Tom had gone to sea and Blanche had married the kind and generous Conrad Heinkel, who had badly wanted a new mother for his children, she’d assumed her feelings for Tom Strong were well behind her. But they were still there, flirting with her mind and her heart.

  ‘You seem uncertain.’

  ‘I’m married, Tom. I have three children. I come here with them sometimes.’

  ‘But mostly you come by yourself?’

  She nodded.

  ‘Then I will come here when you are alone.’

  Blanche shook her head. She didn’t like the way she was feeling. The way her body had reacted to his touch had unsettled her, and she didn’t like him assuming that nothing had changed between them – though it hadn’t. She knew it hadn’t. All the same, her confusion spilled out in sudden anger.

  ‘You can’t come back here after all these years as though you’ve never been gone and expect to take up where you left off. It isn’t right, and I won’t be taken for granted.’

  ‘I wouldn’t do that.’ He returned no anger. His voice was even.

  ‘We can’t do this, Tom. We have different lives.’

  Tom shook his head. ‘We each have only one life. Despite my marriage you were never far from my thoughts. We’re meant for each other, you and I. You know it just as well as I do but what we do about it is up to us as individuals. Don’t ask me to dissuade you or promise not to come here again. I can’t promise any such thing. If you’re here I will come. The day you’re no longer here and the door is closed against me, I will leave you in peace.’

  It seemed so sensible, an open-ended bargain. She could make a decision about it when the occasion arose. ‘And that’s your promise?’

  He nodded. ‘It is.’