“I don’t know. I don’t think so. But Aunt Sophie and Mr Turner visit him.”
“What a very sad story,” Bart said thoughtfully, pausing once more as they entered the house. “Sad for everyone concerned.”
“It is,” Abel agreed. “They say Deborah never got over it, and will spend the rest of her life as a recluse.”
Dora lay in bed and gazed at the ceiling. For a second the room seemed to spin round and she was aware of that awful feeling of queasiness that she had so often these days. Sometimes she was actually physically sick.
May had noticed her pallor and commented on it, watching her with concern like an ancient mother hen.
The spring days had lengthened into summer and, in many ways, her relationship with May had grown a little stale. She felt sometimes that they were like a pair of castaways who had landed on an island far from anywhere, and all they had for company was the beautiful but essentially passive scenery of the Yorkshire Dales.
They went for long walks, shopping expeditions into Skipton or Harrogate, but Dora tired easily. May, convinced she was not well, begged her to see the doctor.
But Dora knew what was the matter with her. Her one and only experience with a man had had a totally unexpected and unpredictable result. At the age of forty-five she was convinced she was expecting a child.
Her first thought, as the suspicion grew, was to get rid of it. Not very nice, but there were ways and means of doing this. A call to a few friends in London, a visit to an establishment in Harley Street where one entered and exited by the back door. This kind of thing happened all the time.
And yet, and yet ...
The longer she pondered the more difficult she knew it would be to get rid of it, both emotionally and physically. Then her thoughts flew to Debbie and the stigma that had accrued to her as the unwed mother of a child. But Debbie was much younger and she, Dora, was married. There was nothing at all reprehensible or shameful in having a baby by one’s husband, however unusual the circumstances.
But did she really want a child at her age? It would create enormous problems and the thing was: how to tell May?
Her mother had always said that May was a rather ordinary, difficult woman with a chip about class on her shoulder. Dora hadn’t seen it at the time May lived with them at Upper Park, but now that they had been closeted alone together for almost six months, her mother’s opinion of May seemed more realistic than hers.
She had once seen May not only as a capable superior in a front line hospital, someone she looked up to and admired, but as someone whom she loved. Now she knew how little they had in common.
Her love for Jean had been different but, maybe, in time it had eased her away from her obsession with May, the despair and isolation she had felt when May married Bernard.
But since her return from France nothing had been the same.
There was a tension between the two women which this new situation, Dora thought, would do nothing to resolve.
In her dilemma she rather longed for the wise counsel of Jean. How happy he would be, and how wrong it would seem to get rid of his child. Her thoughts often went back to the days they had spent together, the renewed feeling of intimacy that had grown between them, leading to the final culmination: the single act of marital love.
It was hard not to recollect her thoughts about that experience: confusion, bewilderment, resistance but not the radical distaste she had expected. It had been neither thrilling nor satisfying, it had been very brief, and afterwards they had lain together and slept in each other’s arms, and it had seemed right.
But, afraid of being ensnared and entrapped once more, Dora had left almost immediately without, however, taking the bulk of her belongings back with her.
It was very difficult to think of a way out of this dilemma, to know what to do, and Dora found herself longing for the wise counsel of her mother, or the sensible advice of Jean.
There was a tap on the door and May popped her head round.
“Tea, dear?”
“That would be lovely.” Dora propped herself up on her arms as May entered, carrying a tray on which there were two cups, a teapot and milk jug.
She put it on the table beside Dora’s bed, poured and, as she handed her her cup, she looked at her with concern.
“I do wish you’d see a doctor, dear. You look so peaky.” Cup in hand she perched on the bed close to Dora.
Dora lay back and sipped her tea, her expression thoughtful. She had always had a reputation for being forthright and straightforward, someone who didn’t procrastinate, who called a spade a spade. What was the matter with her now?
“I think I’m going to have a baby,” she said, finishing the tea and putting the cup back on the tray. “Thanks, that was lovely.”
She looked across at May, who was staring at her, her expression aghast.
“I guess it must be a shock,” Dora went on. “It is to me too. After all I’m forty-five. I didn’t think such a thing was possible at my age.”
“When? How?” May managed to gasp. Then, more censoriously: “Above all, who?”
“Who is easy. Jean, my husband –”
“But I thought you were going to ...” May’s eyes narrowed spitefully. “You really are a terrible liar, Dora. I can’t believe what I’m hearing.” She finished her tea and moved along the bed as though to put distance between herself and her friend, and clasped her knees tightly with her hands.
“I am not a liar.”
“You said it was a leave-taking. A parting of the ways. It was all over.”
“That’s what I thought when I went there. I really object to being called a liar.” Dora looked coldly at May and the distance between her and her friend seemed to widen.
“I should have known when you came back without all your things.”
“Well, he is a very nice man. I mean ...”
“What you mean is beside the point Dora,” May cried, jumping up. “I feel utterly betrayed and humiliated by you.”
“Well, I don’t see why you should.” Dora reached for a cigarette and then decided against it. Smoking in the morning made her feel even queasier.
“You’ve deceived me.”
“Nothing of the sort. I –”
“You said you’d never slept with him!” May stamped her foot on the floor like an adolescent in a fit of temper.
“I hadn’t. On this occasion we did. Once.”
“I’m expected to believe you?”
“I don’t care if you believe me or not. It’s true.” Dora turned back the bedclothes and sat on the side of the bed, facing her friend. “Look, May, once upon a time you had no compunction in leaving me for a man. I thought we were going to spend our lives together. You deceived me.” She stood up and flung her dressing gown around her shoulders. “Now, if you don’t mind I’m going to take a bath.”
When Dora came into the living room an hour or so later after a leisurely bath she realised the house was empty. May would have gone off on her shopping expedition. She felt uneasy at what had occurred, thought she’d handled it badly.
Spontaneity was not always a good or kind thing. She hadn’t meant to hurt May, but now she knew it had helped her make up her mind.
She wanted the baby, and she would have it. If she hadn’t she could have slunk off and had an abortion without telling May. The very fact that she’d told her had sealed her fate, and May’s. What would happen now?
It was a lovely June day. The scenery was beautiful and she was about eight weeks pregnant. She went and sat on the terrace in a basket chair, her feet up, a large sun-hat on her head. There was no sound but the buzzing of bees among the lavender in the garden. The green sward of lawn swept down to the meadow, at the bottom of which lazily trundled the river. Birds swooped in and out of the trees on the far bank and up on the hill towards Simon’s Seat. Occasionally the bleat of a sheep or moo of a cow broke the silence.
Perfection. Dora lay back and closed her eyes, yet she knew that every
thing was, in reality, far from peaceful. Around her raged a storm.
Chapter Seven
“Alexander has such a fine seat on a horse,” Eliza said admiringly, shielding her eyes from the sun. In the paddock at the end of the garden Alexander was practising the intricate steps of the dressage carefully supervised by Dora who sat on a chair by the fence.
“He has come on enormously since Dora has been coaching him.” Lally looked at her son with pride. For he was her son, whatever the nature of his true parentage. She had had him since a few days of his birth, and he was as precious to her as her own flesh and blood.
“Poor Dora,” Eliza sighed.
“Poor Dora! Why?” Lally looked at her.
“What is to become of her? I am so anxious about this baby. The danger to a woman of her age is considerable. I feel so apprehensive.”
Lally reached for Eliza’s hand. They sat in the shelter of a tree, with rugs over their laps as, although the weather was fine, there was an autumnal breeze in the air.
“I wish she had told Jean,” Lally said firmly. “Not to tell her husband is absurd. It is wrong.”
“But she is not sure if she wants to return to him.”
“It is still wrong. After all it is his child. Besides, at this time a woman needs the protection of a man.”
Eliza grew alarmed at Lally’s vehemence.
“But you don’t mind having her here?”
“Of course I don’t mind having her here. What a thing to suggest! I love Dora and always have. She is no trouble. It is the future that I am concerned about.”
And, indeed, what was the future to bring? Lally was right. To have a baby at forty-six was quite an age. Dora was now five months pregnant, and had returned to her mother in July, following a row with May. May had grown very vindictive, according to Dora. Her attitude and comments had got her down until she felt they were undermining her health. One day while May was out she had simply left, driven away without a word. Cowardice, perhaps, but she had been unable to face any more scenes. So, as she’d always instinctively wanted, she went home to Mother.
Once at Forest House, and with several hundred miles between them, she immediately wrote to May offering a settlement that was not unlike a divorce. She would continue to pay the rent of the house and give May an allowance until she decided what she wanted to do, take a job or return to her husband. After all, she was a qualified nurse whose services would be in demand at any hospital.
Or rather it wasn’t Dora who was paying. As usual it was Eliza. Eliza who stumped up for everything, Dora having no income of her own.
In Lally’s opinion, much as she loved her, Dora was spoilt. She was indulged by her mother who not only could refuse her nothing, but had the wherewithal to do it. In Lally’s opinion it did a grown woman no good at all to be so dependent on her mother.
But it was true that Dora, who no longer rode, had been of enormous help to Alexander. She was a fine horsewoman and a fine coach and the two spent hours together during the vacation as Alexander prepared to take up a place at Trinity College Cambridge in October.
For Alexander it had been a golden summer. He had gone to Paris and travelled through France, Italy and the Balkans with some school friends to Greece.
And then when Dora came down she helped him choose a new horse and began to coach him in the art of dressage at which she excelled. Now as he performed the complex steps she rose from her chair and, getting closer to him, began to direct him, her arms swaying backwards and forwards as though she was directing a ballet, which dressage in so many ways resembled.
“Dora seems very much to want this baby,” Eliza murmured. “I’m quite surprised.”
“But Dora’s always loved children and been good with them.”
“I thought she and Jean had no marriage. It just shows how wrong you can be.” Eliza sat back. “I’m glad, though. It is fulfilling for a woman to have a child, however much heartbreak goes with it. And I will be always there to support her or, rather, when I am not here my money will enable her to lead a good life and give her child one.” Eliza sighed again. “How I wish I had Upper Park to leave her. Lally,” looking across at her, Eliza seemed to hesitate, “I am presuming too much on your hospitality. Now that Dora is to have a baby in four months’ time I feel I should find us a house.”
“But I love you being here.”
“And I love being here. But it is not the same as a home of one’s own, especially after the baby comes.”
“I understand.” Lally nodded, her eyes on the two in the far paddock. “By the way, an invitation came this morning ... I think you had one too.” She glanced across at her friend.
“I threw it in the waste paper basket. The cheek of the man. Shall you go?”
“I don’t really know what to do,” Lally said. “I believe the house looks beautiful and you know he will have invited all your family: Carson and Connie, Elizabeth and Graham, Sarah Jane and, of course, Abel who worked on the house.” She paused and looked at her friend. “Sometimes I think bygones should be bygones.”
“Please feel free to go if you wish,” Eliza said frostily. “Don’t for a moment be influenced by me. Personally I shall never step inside Upper Park again, nor have I any wish ever to meet Bart Sadler. Whatever people say about him, and it doesn’t take long for them to change their tune, I consider him a rogue and a cheat.”
Not too far away from Forest House someone else was also studying the invitation with some perplexity and, indeed, apprehension.
Mr Bartholomew Sadler requests the pleasure of the company of the Rev Hubert and Mrs Turner together with the Misses Deborah and Ruth Woodville at a soirée to be held on October 1st 1929 at Upper Park, Nether Upton, Wenham, Dorset to celebrate its restoration 7.30 pm for 8 pm Carriages from 1 am
RSVP
White Tie
When it had been placed on the breakfast table, together with the rest of the mail, it had of course been Hubert who had opened it and, with a cry of pleasure, announced its contents to his assembled family. Ruth was very pleased, Deborah said nothing and the boys were suitably downcast that they had not been asked. Their father reminded them that they would be back at school and, anyway, this was an occasion strictly for grown-ups.
“You will have to get a new dress for the occasion, my dear,” Hubert had said, looking at his wife. “I can’t remember when you last had something new.”
“And I need a new dress too, Father,” Ruth told her stepfather. “And Debbie ...”
“I shall not be going,” Deborah said.
“But you must, my dear.” Hubert leaned towards her. “You are specifically invited. I think it will be fun.” He looked round hopefully, but saw only one pair of interested eyes.
“But I don’t want to go,” Debbie replied.
“It will do you good.”
“I shan’t go either.” Sophie sat back, a sense of relief at Deborah’s attitude which so mirrored her own.
“But why, my dear?” The rector looked downcast. “It will be the event of the season.”
“Besides I’m dying to know how Upper Park looks.” Ruth’s cheeks were flushed with excitement. “Abel says it looks very fine. Aren’t you curious, Mother?”
“Not a bit.” Sophie popped a piece of cold toast in her mouth. “You can tell me what it’s like.”
“I really must insist you accompany us, dear.” The Reverend Turner was normally a mild man but on this occasion his tone was firm. “It will look very bad if you don’t accompany us.”
“Why will it look bad, dearest?” Sophie’s expression was rebellious.
“Because you are the rector’s wife. People expect it of you.”
Deborah had been surprised by her mother’s obvious dismay at the invitation and this made her recall the conversation she’d had some months before with Mr Sadler at the water’s edge. Being of a secretive nature she had never told a soul about the encounter. Now she began to wonder, and her memory travelled back in time to the
far-off days when, as a small child, Mr Sadler used to come and play with them while they lived with their mother at Pelham’s Oak looking after Grandpa. She had been eight or nine at the time, Ruth two years younger and, although it was so long ago, the harder she thought the clearer her memory became and she seemed to recall the expression on her mother’s face as she looked at Mr Sadler and how her eyes lit up when he entered the room, and how close they sat together on the driving seat of his cart.
Sophie looked up from the invitation as Deborah entered her sanctum, a small room off the hall where she did her accounts and planned her work for the parish. In front of her on the table was the invitation and Sophie’s eye seemed to fly to it guiltily and she tried to hide it by leaning an elbow on it.
Deborah sat down by the window and looked at her mother.
“I’ve been thinking I should go to Mr Sadler’s party, Mother.”
“But why on earth ...” Suddenly Sophie appeared covered with confusion.
“Well, it is most unfair of me to keep you away.”
“I assure you I don’t wish to go, Debbie. I am very happy to stay at home with you. There, dear, the matter is settled.”
“But Father is so upset. After you left the dining room this morning I could see how upset he was. He said that there were so few occasions we went to as a family. Besides, everyone we know will be there, Uncle Carson and Connie, all the Yetmans ...”
“How do you know that?”
“Abel told Ruth. His mother has finally become reconciled to her brother. And if she can forgive him, Mother,” Deborah looked at her levelly, “I think you should forgive him too.”
“There is nothing to forgive,” Sophie said, clearly still flustered in a way Deborah, who sometimes resented the iron control of her mother, had never seen before. Her mother was usually the one without emotion: so cool, calm and collected in any emergency or crisis.
“I don’t know what you mean. Mr Sadler was a mere acquaintance in the past. Nothing more. I can assure you of that.”
Bart Sadler, resplendent in full evening dress, stood in the splendidly restored entrance hall of his newly refurbished home flanked by members of his immediate family, similarly attired. Sarah Jane was there with Abel on one side, her daughters Martha and Felicity on the other. Also there in the receiving line were his farmer brothers, John and Tom, with their wives Hettie and Ethel, his elder sister Maureen and her husband Ernest who was a prosperous boat builder in Poole.
Past Love (Part Four of The People of this Parish Saga) Page 10
