Past Love (Part Four of The People of this Parish Saga)

by Nicola Thorne

  Sophie’s eyes filled with tears. She knew some people might accuse her of mawkish sentimentality; but George had been so good and she was sure that, had he lived, he would have continued on the path of goodness. He would have been a wonderful priest, husband and father, returning in time, perhaps after the death of his father, from Papua, New Guinea to be Rector of the Parish of Wenham which had been in the gift of the Woodville family for generations.

  If only things had been different she and George would have grown old together and, surely, their two daughters would have been different under the wise and loving guidance of their father? Surely Deborah would not have turned out as she had if George had been there to correct and instruct her? Oversee her ways? Surely there would have been no illegitimate baby, no elopement with a man so much older, whose child she was now to bear?

  The news that Deborah was pregnant with Bart’s child had sent Sophie scurrying to the church, as she did in all moments of crisis. Under the gaze of George, carved in glass, she tried desperately to seek consolation, inspiration and, in some mystical way, advice.

  It was not that Hubert had been a bad stepfather. On the contrary, he had been a very good one; wise and kind, loving the girls as though they were his own.

  But they were not his own and nor was Sam, and it told. Sam was a hot-headed, difficult young man to whose faults it had been easy to shut her eyes because he spent most of his life away at boarding school.

  He had never done anything dreadful, never been reported or threatened with expulsion. In fact he was a good scholar and sportsman and his reports were excellent. But when he was at home he was difficult and it was always a relief to see Sam go off again back to school or on some activity arranged during the vacations.

  In her heart of hearts Sophie always thought that it had something to do with her attitude towards Sam; the fact that he was only half her child and the other half was the hated Bart.

  She distanced herself from Sam in a way she never had from the others, whose fathers she had loved. It was sad but it was true and, as a result, Sam was defensive and defiant towards her as if in a futile attempt to command her love.

  Her youngest, Timothy, was the complete antithesis of Sam. He was like his father: tubby and cheerful. Unlike his father, however, he was a dunce at lessons, hopeless on the sports field. But he had such a sweet, gentle nature that everyone forgave him his faults.

  He and Ruth were their mother’s consolation. With Sam and Deborah, much as Sophie loved her eldest child, came tribulations galore.

  Christmas had come and gone. The family celebrating as usual with, this year, a forced cheerfulness because of Debbie’s absence and the sad fact that Carson and Connie were, temporarily at least, no longer together.

  They had seemed such a happy couple, such a loving family. Heaven knew what possessed Carson to give shelter to this strange woman who was dying at Ryder’s cottage from consumption. All sorts of rumours abounded, but those who knew the truth, if anyone did, weren’t talking; so better not to ask.

  Debbie’s pregnancy was only a rumour. Mother and daughter had not communicated since Debbie’s elopement, but servants were always a good source of information and Polly had it on the best authority – her sister worked as housemaid for Bart Sadler – that Debbie was expecting a baby in the summer.

  The tears started to roll afresh down Sophie’s cheeks. She looked round to be sure there was no one in the church but, as usual, it was empty.

  Outside it was a cold, dank January day, the skies were leaden, overcast, with the threat of snow. All around the landscape was desolate. It was freezing in the church and she hugged her coat more tightly around her. Inside her heart, like her body, was as cold as ice.

  Sophie got on to her knees and, head bowed, prayed for the Lord to forgive her this doubt and despair, and to help her. But the more she thought about it the more she knew that, for her daughter and herself to bear children from the same man was not only cruel, it was horribly wrong. Sam would be an uncle to his own half-brother. It went against the laws of nature. How could one live with such a situation, with such shame? And how, how could Deborah have done such a thing?

  Sophie got no consolation either from her prayers or from the pious expression of George whose eyes, raised in perpetuity to the heavens, seemed indifferent to her.

  He would pity her and be full of Christian compassion for her situation, but she knew that, in his heart, he would despise her for allowing herself to give into temptation in the first place. She should have said “no” to Bart Sadler. She had allowed him to break down her virtuous nature, and she was now paying the price.

  If it was already known in the town, as Deborah had so cruelly said it was, that Sam was Bart’s son, then what would they say when she had his child too? Oh, it was not to be borne. How could one possibly survive such a situation, let alone live with it?

  Finally, Sophie rose from her knees and went out into the bleak afternoon. She walked towards her house and then changed her mind and wandered slowly down the path to the river. She reached the boathouse where she now knew that Bart and Deborah had begun to form a relationship. He had found her sitting there, and from that day on she was intrigued, captivated, ensnared by him. She told her mother that Bart was such a sympathetic listener. He listened to her and understood her in a way no one ever had before.

  She, Sophie, had failed her daughter. She had failed George. For so many years, while thinking herself to be an example in the parish, people had been sniggering, pitying her behind her back. Hypocrite, they must have thought, saying one thing and doing another.

  Hypocrite. Whited sepulchre.

  For a long time Sophie stood on the water’s edge, brooding on her past mistakes, her mind in a state of turbulence such as she never remembered before in all her fifty-five years. Maybe it was time to end it all, to bring this pretence of goodness and virtue to an end?

  She stooped and, carefully searching the ground, picked up a heavy white stone that had once been part of the boathouse and, with difficulty, stuck it in her pocket so that it weighed her down. Then she joined her hands together, eyes tightly shut, and prayed.

  Such exquisite happiness Sarah Jane had never before experienced, she knew, not even with Laurence. Maybe it was because after so many years she had forgotten the rapture of sexual love? Maybe it had been good with Laurence, and she couldn’t remember it?

  Solomon lay on her, his arms under her body, hers wrapped round his; their limbs engaged as though they had been carved from one solid piece of flesh.

  She felt his lips on her face, her cheeks; her mouth opened for him. With such happiness pressing upon her she sometimes felt it would be the right time to die, because it couldn’t possibly last and, in time, there would only be regret.

  They were reckless, she knew it; they took risks. The maids were often in the house when he arrived and they rushed upstairs to make love. Once they had narrowly missed being caught by Ruth who came round looking for her mother-in law. She had paused, they knew, outside the bedroom door but hadn’t tried the handle to find that it was locked. If she had she would have wondered why.

  Solomon eased himself gently from the body of Sarah Jane and then, lying beside her, drew the bedclothes over them both. “It’s cold,” he said, shivering.

  Sophie raised her head and saw that the fire was out. Outside too it was nearly dark. They lay wrapped round each other in the large bed in the room that she’d shared for so long with Laurence, but where she had lain by herself for much much longer.

  “It can’t last,” she murmured into his shoulder.

  “It can. It will. There is no reason for it to end.” She knew that, in the dusk, he was looking past her. “I want you to marry me, Sarah Jane. I have known for some time that I can’t live without you.”

  “Marry me!” she exclaimed. “Whatever will people say?”

  “Who cares what they say?”

  “They’ll laugh.”

  “Let them. John
Yetman was twenty years older than Connie’s mother.”

  “It’s different, you know it is, with a woman.” She swept her hair away from her hot, sticky face. Yes, it was cold in the room, but her body glowed. “I am forty-nine years old this year. Next year I’ll be fifty.”

  “Well?”

  “There could be no children, Solomon.”

  “What about Dora? She just had a baby.”

  “She is a few years younger than me. Besides, even if it were possible I don’t really think I’d want one. I don’t think it would be fair.”

  “I’m not very keen on children anyway.”

  “No desire to have a son and heir?”

  Beside her he shook his head.

  “In time you’ll change your mind.”

  “Your grandchildren will be my children.”

  “That makes me sound very old.”

  “If we married and you really cared about what people thought – I don’t, but I understand your point of view – we can go away. I suggested it before.”

  “I thought then you just wanted me to be your mistress.”

  “Now I want you to be my wife. If we go away no one will know your history or mine. No one will care. No tongues will wag. Abel can have Riversmead ...”

  “What about the house he is building, and your partnership?”

  “He can sell the house, or this. The partnership can be broken. That’s if that’s what you want. Frankly, I am happy to go on living here in a place I like. I don’t give a damn what anyone says.”

  She thought at last that he meant it. He was serious. She couldn’t believe it. Not only was he a youthful, vigorous lover. He was such a nice man; good and kind, thoughtful.

  Could it really be that he loved her to the extent of offering marriage?

  Solomon kissed her again and got out of bed. He ran across the room and began hurriedly to dress, his teeth chattering.

  “You will have to have central heating if we stay on. Here, I’ve had an idea.” He stopped on the point of getting into his trousers. “Why don’t we have Abel’s new home and he can live here? He’s always said he loves the place.”

  Sarah Jane held out her hand.

  “Solomon, not so fast ... let’s think. We are happy as we are. There is no hurry. Let’s give ourselves time to think all this over.”

  “Very well, darling.” Solomon finished dressing and then went to the window to draw the curtains before putting on the light. He reached up and then stopped looking intently out of the window.

  “My God!” he exclaimed, a note of horror in his voice.

  “What is it?” Sarah Jane sat up in bed, clutching the sheet to her naked breasts.

  “Someone’s jumped in the river!”

  “Impossible!”

  “I’ve just seen them. I think it’s a woman ... on a day like this she won’t survive for more than a few minutes.”

  And Solomon grabbed his jacket and ran out of the room.

  Sarah Jane jumped out of bed, ran to the window, saw nothing and, as quickly as she could, got into some warm clothes in order to follow him.

  At first Solomon could see nothing. He began to wonder if it was his imagination, but then he saw a ripple under the water close to the boathouse and the top of a head appeared, only to disappear again. He threw off his jacket, kicked off his shoes and, taking a deep breath, dived into the icy waters by the spot where he’d seen the ripple.

  Almost immediately he found himself next to something bulky that was undoubtedly a woman’s body. He grabbed at it and an arm clutched him with such force that he feared he too would be dragged down. He could feel something very heavy next to him and, searching feverishly with his hand, found an object like a large stone in the drowning woman’s coat pocket. Although he felt that his lungs were bursting, with all his might and a supreme effort of will, he managed to extricate it and let it sink into the water. Released from the weight, immediately the body he was clutching, and which was clutching him, shot to the top taking him with it. He heard a gasp, knew that the victim was still alive and struck out hard for the river bank where Sarah Jane and Blossom were now waiting for him, hands outstretched.

  Blossom, who was a large, strong, capable girl, knelt down on the water’s edge, and Solomon caught hold of her extended hand, nearly pulling her in. But Sarah Jane had her arms tightly round Blossom’s waist and, feeling the shallow part of the bank now beneath his feet, Solomon clutched at some reeds and dragged the inert body of the woman after him.

  Sarah Jane jumped in the water beside him and, together, they managed to bring the body to the side and haul it slowly up upon the bank. Sarah Jane immediately got on to her knees and began frantically to administer artificial respiration. At first she thought the woman showed no signs of life.

  Solomon knelt beside her and detected a pulse at her neck, very faint but palpable. Suddenly she coughed and spewed out a stream of water. Blossom burst into tears, but Sarah Jane, grim-faced, continued the technique she’d been taught in First Aid during the war, how to revive a drowning person. Solomon kept his finger on the victim’s neck and gradually the pulse grew stronger. Sarah Jane had by now pealed aside the heavy coat and, baring her breast, administered vigorous external heart massage.

  “She’s coming to!” she cried triumphantly, looking at Solomon.

  “Oh my God, madam,” Blossom raised her hands to her face in horror, “if it b’ain’t Mrs Turner, the rector’s wife.”

  Hubert sat, as he had for so many days, beside her bed, sometimes watching, sometimes reading, sometimes praying. Sophie was now sleeping peacefully, but at times she would wake and look very afraid and ask where she was. He would soothe her and tell her she was safe, but the fear wouldn’t go away and usually her dreams were troubled.

  She had caught pneumonia from the shock and the cold, and it had been feared that this would do what the water failed to accomplish. But she rallied and was now out of danger.

  Sometimes she prayed aloud, begging for God’s forgiveness, and Hubert would tell her tenderly that God had already forgiven her. He, her husband, was God’s minister and in God’s name he forgave her.

  But why had she done such a thing, such a terrible thing? She, of all people, knew as he did that it was a sin against the Holy Ghost to attempt to kill oneself; the final act of despair, of denial of God’s goodness. And there was no doubt that she had intended self-immolation by deliberately putting a large stone in her pocket and jumping.

  It was a miracle Solomon had seen her at that instant. Had he not Sophie would almost certainly be dead, and it was doubtful if her body would have been found by now, weighed down as it was. It would have lodged in the mud at the bottom of the river, or perhaps have become snagged by the reeds on the river bed, and it might never have been found because no one would have looked for her there. To all intents and purposes she would have vanished. She would have become another missing person.

  The parish rallied round and sent flowers and messages, offers of help. The official story was that it was an accident. The rector’s wife had been taking a walk and missed her footing in the dusk on the slippery river bank. Luckily Solomon Palmer had been visiting Riversmead and saved her life. Why had Solomon been visiting when Abel Yetman was known to be away in Scotland with his wife? No one asked.

  But Blossom knew it was not an accident and the doctor, speedily summoned, knew it wasn’t, and it was doubtful that the truth would remain a secret for very long.

  No matter. Hubert put down his book, leaned back his head and closed his eyes. He felt very tired, extraordinarily tired. He had known his wife was depressed, had been for some time, but he wasn’t altogether sure why. They were a devoted couple but not much given to confidences. Of course she was not happy about Deborah, but who was? And the split between Carson and Connie was a great source of grief, but they were not immediate family, well, not to Sophie anyway, close as they always felt to the Woodvilles.

  Sometimes he wondered if that family
was somehow cursed, never to know real happiness, never to enjoy peace and, because Sophie had been the wife of a Woodville and was the mother of two Woodville girls, somehow she was tainted in that way? Certainly she suffered but, especially since Debbie’s elopement, she seemed to have suffered more and drawn further into herself.

  And then of course the day it had happened she had heard from a gossiping servant that Debbie was expecting a baby.

  Of all people, Hubert Turner knew that that would scarcely cause her joy.

  He opened his eyes to see Sophie gazing at him. A wan smile on her face, she held out her hand, and he took it, clasped it to his lips.

  “I’m so sorry, Hubert.” Her eyes filled with tears.

  “That’s all right,” he leaned over towards her, “I know you didn’t mean it.”

  “I did.”

  He put a finger on her lips. “No, don’t say it,” but she brushed his hand away.

  “I did. I committed the ultimate sin of despair. God will never forgive me now.”

  “He has. I am his minister on earth and in His name I have forgiven you. You did not despair.” He put his hand on her brow and began to stroke it. He was not a demonstrative man and she had never known him so tender. “You temporarily lacked the courage to go on. If you had come to me, my dear, I would have helped you. You must not despair ever again, but have faith in the love of Christ and gather strength from that love.”

  “Christ does not love me.” Sophie shook her head. Then she looked again at her husband, a pitiful expression on her face. “You know why, Hubert?”

  “I think I do.”

  “It is because of Bart.”

  “I know.”

  For a moment she looked puzzled.

  “But how do you know?”

  “I’ve always known.”

  The bewilderment on her face increased. “That Bart ...?”