Rachel emitted a groan of exhaustion. ‘Oh, my poor feet! I must sit down.’
‘You sound like an old woman,’ teased her husband. ‘Not the sylph-like girl I know.’ He made her giggle by seizing her and transporting her bodily to the front parlour.
A sullen Bertie trailed after them. ‘Father, you promised.’
Russ looked round, then silenced another outcry from his wife by dumping her on the sofa and holding up his hands. ‘I did, I did! And a promise is a promise, isn’t it, Bertie?’ And with a manly slap of his son’s back he and Bertie went upstairs to the attic.
The first question was always the same. ‘Which one d’you like best?’ Bertie’s covetous eyes brooded over the collection – he always made a different choice. Today it was a turquoise-coloured one. ‘That’n.’ His voice turned wheedling. ‘Can I have it, Father?’ Sometimes if the egg was duplicated his father would allow him to have it. But this one was unique.
‘Nay, we don’t want to split them up.’ Russ tousled his son’s hair lovingly. ‘They’ll all belong to you one day, you know.’
Bertie asked when.
‘Oh, I think they’d make a splendid coming of age gift, don’t you?’
Bertie wasn’t too keen on waiting that long. ‘Wouldn’t it be better for me to have them while I’m young enough to enjoy them?’
His father laughed aloud. ‘Eh, Bertie, you make me feel decrepit!’
After a pause, Bertie asked, ‘Father… have you made a will?’
Russ’ laughter was even more uproarious. ‘Don’t worry, lad, I won’t pop off before I’ve made definite provision for my son and heir.’ He slid the drawer back in the cabinet. ‘Anyway, I’d best go down now, I’m gasping for a cup o’ tea. Hadn’t you better wash the spuds from your lugs like your mother told you?’
‘Aw, can’t I just stay and have another little look?’ pleaded his son.
Russ did not normally allow unsupervised viewing, but after such an enjoyable day he felt charitable enough to say with a soft cuff, ‘Go on then, you young varmint – but try not to touch them, you know how fragile they are. I’ll tell your mother you’re harvesting the King Edwards.’ He left an effusively grateful Bertie drooling over the eggs and went down.
As he reached the bottom stair, there was a knock at the door. ‘Don’t move, Biddy, I’ll get it!’ He headed down the passage and swung the door open.
The young fellow on the doorstep said only one word, but it was sufficient to plunge Russ from his gay mood into a vortex of unbelievable terror.
‘Father?’
Chapter Nine
Petrified, Russ stared into the brown face with its apprehensive smile for three full seconds – then slammed the door! It couldn’t be. It couldn’t! Make it go away, came the futile plea – then with gritted teeth and eyes screwed shut, for Christ’s sake, I don’t pray much but I’m praying now: I’ll do anything, anything, but please make it all be a bloody apparition.
The knock came again. Rachel shouted, ‘Is someone going to answer that door?’
‘Yes, dear!’ Detesting himself and the person on the other side of the door, he pulled it open a crack. ‘Go away!’ he hissed before the boy had time to make further utterance. ‘You’re at the wrong house. For God’s sake clear off!’ Every dreg of mental effort was directed at the boy, willing him to move… but the boy did not.
The face continued to smile at him, if a little bemusedly now, and the voice was polite. ‘You are Mr Hazelwood?’
‘No! You’ve got the wrong person. Now…’
‘Russ, who is it?’
The proximity of his wife’s voice made his scalp crawl with fear. He dared not turn – dared not move one inch. Rachel, lured from her comfortable position by his tardy return, came to peer over his shoulder and immediately assumed that the visitor had knocked to ask for directions. ‘Can I help you?’ she mouthed in the way that one speaks to foreigners and idiots. ‘Where do you want to be?’
‘I was just telling him how to get to Curzon Terrace,’ Russ heard his own voice say, then used his eyes to beseech the boy: please, please don’t ask for Mr Hazelwood.
But Rachel’s prompt answer saved him. ‘Oh, you turned right instead of left. Go back to the end and it’s up that road there.’ She pointed and smiled. ‘You can’t miss it.’
‘Thank you…’ said the boy confusedly. And found the door shut in his face.
‘That’s a bit of a novelty,’ said Rachel brightly as she moved back to the parlour.
‘What?’ Russ lingered, still in turmoil. The way that boy had looked at him…
‘You don’t see too many of his kind round here. It’ll give Mrs Phillips something to gossip about – Russ, come on, don’t dawdle.’ She had tarried at the door of the parlour and was regarding him strangely. ‘That sun hasn’t made you ill, has it?’
‘Wh… oh, no! No.’ He struggled with his migrant senses – how the hell had he got here? Christ, what was he going to do? – then went none too willingly to join his wife.
* * *
Charlie picked up his holdall and took a backward step from the Hazelwoods’ front door. The reception had bewildered him and he needed a few moments in which to decide upon his action. All of a sudden, he felt very cold and hungry. Though the sun shone it was a different kind of sun to the one at home. His discomfort was augmented by the chill that had begun to spread from within. He had never seen his father, yet he knew for sure that he was the man who had just turned him away – even if the woman had not verified this by the use of his Christian name – his mother had talked about him so often, so descriptively that even without the uniform and the added years Charlie would know him anywhere. But why had he turned Charlie away? Why had he looked so afraid? Perhaps it was because of the woman. Father Guillaume had told him that his father had another wife who knew nothing of Charlie. Yes, that would be it. He had better wait for a while to see if the woman went out, then he would knock again… for he had nowhere else to go.
The manliness he felt on making his decision to come here was suddenly stripped away. He felt very young and vulnerable. Wandering across the narrow road, he leaned his back against the iron railings to wait.
* * *
‘I still say you pushed her into me on purpose!’ Bertie, having rejoined his sisters in their cramped room, was now accusing one of them. ‘Just because you wanted my egg.’
‘I couldn’t give a snot for your stinking old egg,’ retorted Lyn. ‘I’ve changed my mind about starting an egg collection anyway.’
‘No, she’s going to collect the nests instead,’ announced Robina importantly.
‘Oh, you stupid idiot, Beany!’ Lyn collapsed. ‘I told you that wasn’t for human consumption. Now he’ll pinch all the nests before I get to ’em.’
‘Don’t you call me an idiot!’
‘Well, you are!’ Lyn slapped her sister, who slapped her back and was promptly punched in the chest. Beany threw herself on the floor, screeching in fury.
Rowena, always the peacemaker, was searching for something to distract her sisters when a glance from the window brought an observation, ‘Oh, come and look at the darkie, everyone!’ and the rage miraculously dispersed as all clustered round the window. Biddy, here to supervise washing, stood flannel in hand, craning her sun-reddened neck over a row of different-coloured heads. ‘Jaze, I’ve never seen the like…’ she breathed.
‘What’s he staring at our house for?’ demanded Lyn of her elder sister.
‘How should I know?’ Rowena was fascinated by the boy. ‘Why don’t we go and ask him?’
‘Ooh aye, let’s!’ Becky clapped her hands. ‘I’d love to talk to him.’
‘How d’you know he speaks English?’ put forward Bertie. ‘Anyhow, I don’t know that I want to talk to him, he’s got a bloomin’ cheek staring at our house like that.’
At this juncture, Charlie’s disconsolate eyes caught the movement at the window. His misery was displaced by a charming smile. This furth
er captured Becky. ‘Ooh, look! He’s smiling at us – aw, go on, Bid let us go an’ speak to him.’
‘Well, I don’t know as how…’
‘Aw, go on, Bid!’ chorused the girls.
‘Why should you need to ask her?’ said an arrogant Bertie. ‘Just go if you really want to.’
‘Your mother might not be very pleased at your talking to savages, Bertie,’ warned the maid. ‘Anyway, she said you were to get washed.’
‘Master Bertie to you,’ came the retort, and making a sudden, laughing jump he draped a towel over Biddy’s head and ran to the door, urging the others to be quiet as they stepped onto the landing.
Very stealthily, so as not to alert their mother, they descended the stairs. But once in the street they burst forth in a mad helter-skelter to encircle their discovery. Russ chanced a peep from the parlour window and almost died.
‘What’s going on out there?’ asked Rachel, making as if to get up.
‘Oh, it’s only kids,’ he said casually, but was swift in pressing her back into her seat. ‘Just relax and enjoy the peace.’ He seated himself away from the window in order to draw her eyes from it… but his own kept creeping back.
‘Who’re you?’ demanded Bertie squaring up to the stranger. ‘And what d’you think you’re staring at?’
‘I think I’m your brother,’ replied the stranger in a foreign but well-spoken accent, bringing gasps of incredulity from the girls.
‘How can you be our brother?’ scoffed Bertie. ‘You’re a darkie.’ He looked the boy up and down; his clothes were exceedingly crumpled and shabby, in great contrast to their own.
Charlie’s smile remained intact. Father Guillaume had explained that his father had other children who would be unaware of Charlie’s existence. Likely it was a shock to them. ‘Mr Hazelwood is your father?’ he asked them and received a stiff nod from Bertie. He had got it right then. ‘Then I’m your brother – he’s my father too.’
‘He never mentioned you,’ returned Bertie distrustfully, starting to be worried. ‘And neither did Mother.’
‘Oh, your mother isn’t my mother.’ Charlie’s teeth disappeared. ‘My mother is dead. My father met her while he was a soldier in my country.’
‘What country?’ came the immediate enquiry. Bertie knew that his father had only ever been on foreign service in Africa, so if the boy said otherwise it was obviously some sort of trick.
‘South Africa,’ said Charlie, inserting another sliver of torment under Bertie’s skin.
‘How can you have the same father but not the same mother?’ Bertie hung on doggedly to the interrogation, while the girls simply admired, searching for a likeness to their father. Despite the boy’s complexion, Rowena noticed a definite similarity, especially round the nose; his eyes, albeit brown and not blue, had the same mischievous twinkle when he smiled. His dark kinky hair, however, was clearly inherited from his mother – though his uneven teeth were once again Father’s.
In response to Bertie’s query, Charlie performed a shrug; he found it puzzling too. From his Catholic instruction he knew that a man must only have one wife – yet only a few miles up the road from the mission there was a man who had ten wives! Adulthood was full of contradictions.
Becky jumped in to ask the attractive boy his name. When he told her, she seemed disillusioned that it was not more exotic. ‘Have you killed a lion?’
Charlie, by his hearty guffaw, showed he considered this a strange question. ‘No, have you?’
She clutched two handfuls of pinafore and gave a bubbling laugh, infecting the others. ‘We don’t have lions round here!’ Then she thought to introduce her brother and sisters. ‘This is Bertie, Wena, Lyn, Beany, Mona – oh, all right!’ she stilled the last child’s objection. ‘I mean Rhona, and I’m Becky.’
Charlie liked this girl who had inherited her mother’s sunny smile. He liked the gentle-looking one as well, but he wasn’t sure about the others.
Rhona started to ask a question but Lyn interjected. ‘How far can you spit?’
‘Lyn! You know Mother’d be cross if she caught you doing that,’ said Rowena as her sister demonstrated her prowess.
‘I don’t suppose I could do it as far as that,’ replied Charlie. ‘And my mouth’s too dry.’
‘We’ll give you a drink, won’t we?’ piped up Rhona.
‘If you can beat me at arm-wrestling,’ said Lyn and presented her arm. ‘Bend over, Becky, an’ let’s use your back.’ Her sister formed a platform for the contest. ‘You won’t win, though. I can beat anybody.’
‘Apart from me,’ corrected Bertie.
‘What’re you talking about! I beat you the other day easy.’
‘That was a fluke!’
But Lyn ignored her brother’s objections to grapple with Charlie. He overpowered her easily, but on noticing that the loser’s face had darkened to a sulk, said, ‘Best of three?’ It was allies he needed here, not enemies.
‘Ow, stop diggin’ your elbows in!’ complained Becky as they struggled over her back.
After being allowed to win the two following bouts, Lyn said magnanimously, ‘You’ve got more muscle than Bertie.’
‘I told you that was a fluke! I wasn’t ready.’
‘Challenge him, then,’ goaded Lyn. Bertie muttered that he didn’t see why he should. ‘No, you’re afraid you’ll lose.’
Once more it was left to Rowena to mediate. ‘As he’s our brother we should really invite him in for a drink of lemonade.’
Though Bertie abhorred the idea of having his position of only son usurped, his father might be annoyed if they left a relative standing on the pavement. ‘I suppose so,’ came his cautious drawl.
And with this permission the crowd of giggling females gave Charlie only enough time to seize his holdall before bearing him across the road and into the house. After the slightest hesitation Bertie dashed after them, trying to overtake before they reached the front parlour. If there were any announcements to be made then he would be the one to make them… but he had already decided that Charlie wouldn’t be staying.
The parlour door burst open, drawing a tiny shriek of alarm from Rachel, who berated the children. ‘How many times have I told you not to… oh, have you got lost again?’ The last comment was directed at Charlie, who smiled uncertainly, then looked to his father for support.
Russ had risen and was coming towards the boy, his face stark. But little bodies got in the way, little bodies, that swelled to great immovable proportions… before he could spirit Charlie to the safety of the street, the guillotine began its rumbling descent.
‘You don’t know this boy, Mother,’ said Rowena, forestalling Bertie’s explanation as she and the others pushed the stranger forward. ‘But Father does, don’t you, Father?’
‘No! At least… we did meet a few minutes ago.’
‘There you are! I knew he was lying.’ Bertie had a smug twist to his mouth.
‘Robert!’ protested his mother. ‘You do not use such words in this house.’
‘Sorry, Mother – but I was only trying to save you from entertaining an impostor.’ Bertie was asked for explanation. ‘He said he was our brother, but I said a darkie couldn’t possibly…’
‘Brother?’ Rachel gave a titter of ridicule… then her brow became furrowed.
‘Father knew this boy’s mother in Africa, didn’t you, Father?’
At Rowena’s innocent divulgence, Rachel’s head snapped round to meet her husband’s drained face, read the awful truth in his expression – and promptly swooned.
* * *
Horror immobilized him. He couldn’t think straight, couldn’t think what to do – his wife was lying in a heap on the carpet, one of his daughters had begun to weep in alarm, and he could not think what to do. Somehow, he overcame the paralysis sufficiently to ring the hand-bell for Biddy, not noticing that the maid had been there all along. She stepped forward, big red hands playing out her uncertainty on her apron. Her agitation captured his staring eye
. ‘Biddy, take the children into the kitchen and give them tea.’
‘Sure, they’ve just had their picnic tea, sir.’
‘Well… give them some more.’
‘Yes, sir… what about the young gentleman, sir?’ He looked at her dazedly, the fingers of one hand gouging white hollows in his cheeks. ‘What’ll I do with him, sir?’ She cocked her head at Charlie. Russ closed his eyes then, blotting out the cause of this disaster.
‘Better take him too.’
‘What’re ye going to do about the mistress, sir?’
He unveiled his eyes to stare at the supine form. His wife was just coming round. ‘I’ll see to her. You just take the children out.’
As the last child was being hustled from the room, Russ went to his wife, supporting her head, then lifting her gently to a dining chair. Neither offered a word as Russ poured out two glasses of sherry, knocking his own back straight away and refilling his glass before handing one to his wife. Rachel accepted it dumbly, staring right through him. ‘Drink it up,’ he ordered.
Vague eyes drifted up to his and Rachel lifted the glass. But instead of tipping it into her mouth, she flung the sherry directly at his face. He did not move. A glob of the sweet liquid had dribbled over his lips and was licked away by his tongue-tip before he pulled out a handkerchief to dab at the rest.
‘Are you going to tell me?’ She searched his face. ‘Are you just going to stand there as if nothing had happened?’
Shoving the handkerchief back in his pocket, he moved away slowly and trained his eyes on the window, downing his second glass of sherry. How did he tell her?
She slammed her glass on the table, uncaring of the wood. ‘That was your son, wasn’t it? Your… wild oat!’ At his shame-faced nod she expelled a noisy breath. ‘My God! What sort of woman must she be to do such a thing – to steal another’s husband…’
It was time he offered some excuse. ‘It wasn’t like that! She thought I was her husband. We had a sort of marriage.’
My Father, My Son Page 13
