Wait For the Dawn

by Jess Foley

  It was not crowded and they took a vacant seat beside a wall. ‘What would you like to drink?’ Guy asked as Lydia sat down and uncertainly began to peel off her gloves.

  She had no idea what to reply. She wanted nothing alcoholic. ‘Is it – is it possible I could just have a lemonade – or something – please?’

  ‘Of course. Would you like anything to eat? Oh, no, you’ll be going back soon for your landlady’s boiled mutton, I forgot.’

  He left her and moved to the bar, and Lydia watched his tall figure as he stood at the counter, waiting to give the barman the order. She sat there, nervous and unsure in these new surroundings, aware of the clamour of voices coming from the public bar next door. What would her father think to know of her being there – sitting in a public house, waiting for a man who was almost a stranger to bring her a drink?

  Forcing her mind to move to other things, she thought of how good it had been to see Ryllis again, and also how interesting had been her meeting with Thomas Bissett, but here, in spite of her wish to be generous, her thoughts were touched with dismay. She had not been impressed with him at all. But then she thrust the reservations aside. What did it matter what she thought? What mattered was Ryllis. If Ryllis was happy with him and he treated her well, that was the important thing.

  She thought again of her father – as she had done so many times since her departure from Capinfell. She wondered how he was. How was he faring without her? How was he dealing with Mrs Harbutt coming in the evenings to cook his supper? She would go to see him on the coming Saturday, she decided. She would go on the Saturday after her work, and return on the Sunday afternoon.

  Guy came back carrying two glasses – lemonade for Lydia and beer for himself. He set down the drinks, sat down facing her, and smiled at her across the table. ‘There, that was painless,’ he said. He picked up his glass of beer, and waited while Lydia took up her lemonade. Raising his glass, he said, ‘Well, here’s to happy days.’

  ‘Yes,’ she said uncertainly, not knowing how it was done, but raising her glass none the less: ‘To happy days.’

  She took a sip of her lemonade and smiled back at him, but for all the warmth of her smile she felt only uncertainty. Glancing around her she once again took in her surroundings, and wondered at her being there.

  ‘Are you all right?’ she heard Guy say. ‘Is anything wrong?’

  She turned back to him. ‘No, nothing’s wrong. It’s just that – it’s so new.’

  ‘New? This particular place, you mean?’

  ‘No, not just this place. I mean any – public house.’

  ‘You mean –’

  ‘I’ve never been inside one in my life before.’

  He frowned and smiled at the same time. ‘And with a strange man too. Oh, dear. I don’t quite know how to react to that. Should I be sorry that I brought you in here?’ Then with a more serious tone he asked, ‘Are you sure you want to stay? Would you rather leave?’

  ‘Oh, no,’ she said quickly, ‘I don’t want to leave. It’s fascinating – and very nice.’

  ‘I don’t want you to feel uncomfortable,’ he said. ‘Don’t put up with it for my sake.’

  ‘No, it’s not like that. I’m glad to be here.’

  He looked a little relieved. ‘Good,’ he said.

  She drank a little more of her lemonade, then said with an ironic note in her voice, ‘I was wondering what my father would think, if he could see me now. Not only poems by the Bad Lord Byron, but drinking in a public house. Me – in a public.’

  ‘He wouldn’t approve?’

  She shook her head. ‘Oh, most definitely not.’

  ‘So I doubt that he’s ever been into a public either . . .’

  ‘Oh, yes, he has – but never to drink.’

  ‘Then what for?’

  ‘He goes into them occasionally to hand out tracts – but he never stays for a drink, of course, or to converse. Once his tracts are given out, he’s gone.’

  ‘Is he a cleric?’

  ‘No, he’s a foreman in a factory, but in his spare time he’s a lay preacher.’

  ‘I see.’

  ‘He’s done it for as long as I can remember. He should have gone into the church, but it didn’t work out for him to do so. So – he does the next best thing.’

  ‘He has a very strong faith, then.’

  ‘Oh, yes.’

  ‘What about you?’

  ‘Me?’

  ‘Do you have a strong faith?’

  She paused, avoiding his eyes, ‘I – I would like to have. I would like to believe in something so completely. To believe, totally – it must be such a comfort. I don’t think I shall ever know that – that utter certainty.’

  When she moved her glance back to his she saw that he was looking at her with a very serious expression on his face, a slight frown on his brow. She gave a little smile. ‘Please, this is not the subject for this time.’

  ‘No,’ he said, ‘perhaps you’re right, but I’m interested in hearing all about you.’

  A little silence between them in the murmur of voices and the clink of glass and pewter, and then he said:

  ‘May I call you Lydia?’

  She hesitated for a second, then said, ‘Yes, of course.’ She could think of no other response.

  He lifted his glass and held it up. ‘Here’s to you, Lydia. And well met.’ He smiled. ‘Enough and more of this Miss Halley–Mr Anderson business, don’t you think?’

  She nodded and smiled back at him and sipped from her lemonade.

  ‘What are you thinking?’ he said.

  ‘Only that I mustn’t forget the time,’ she said. ‘These light evenings, these long days – it’s easy to forget how the time is going.’

  ‘We don’t have to leave just yet,’ he said. ‘I won’t let you be late.’

  ‘Thank you.’ She took another drink from her glass, then ventured, ‘You know a little about me – but I still know hardly anything about you.’

  ‘What else do you want to know?’

  ‘Well – your work. What is it you do?’

  ‘I work in my father’s business – his English business, that is – as opposed to his Italian one, I mean. Here in Redbury.’

  ‘And what is that?’

  ‘He owns a newspaper.’

  ‘Really.’ Lydia was impressed.

  ‘The Wiltshire Courier. I’ve been helping him on it since I got out of the army. What else can I tell you? I’m twenty-five years old, and I’ve just finished several years’ army service. Six to be exact.’

  ‘Was it exciting, your military service?’

  ‘It had its moments. I was in South Africa for part of the time, the Transvaal, but then eventually I decided that enough was enough, and resigned my commission. It wasn’t an easy decision to make.’

  ‘And now you’re working in the family business.’

  ‘That’s right. As my mother tells me, it’s about time I learned all about it and settled down. Particularly as my father is getting on in years. Well, they both are. Oh, I was born late in my mother’s life. She tells me she’d given up all hope of ever having a child, let alone a son – which she had always wanted.’ He grinned. ‘So I suppose in a way I was a late blessing for her.’

  ‘Are you now living back at home with them?’

  ‘Yes, at the family house in Redbury, and it suits me – for the time being, anyway. I’ve got everything I want there, every comfort.’ He smiled. ‘I’m spoiled, in a way.’

  ‘Are both your parents in Redbury now?’

  ‘My mother is. Not my father. At the moment he’s in Italy with his textile business. He plans to sell it up. It’s all getting rather a lot of work for him to take care of.’

  ‘I’m not surprised – and all that travelling.’

  ‘Oh, it’s become too much. That’s one reason I gave up my commission in the army. I came to the conclusion that the time had come when I was really needed at home.’ He sighed. ‘So here I am – and there’s so
much to learn.’

  ‘What exactly are you doing in the business?’

  ‘My father thinks I should learn everything. So I’ve been observing the presses at work, and helping out all the office clerks. Just about every aspect. I’m even being sent out on journalistic assignments.’ He gave a little laugh. ‘So any weddings you want reporting on, let me know.’

  ‘Oh, you laugh,’ she said, ‘but it sounds exciting.’

  ‘No, not terribly exciting, really. Though I enjoy it well enough, and it does have its moments, there’s no denying.’

  ‘You’ve led a very interesting life. All your travelling in the army, and now coming home to work on a newspaper. It sounds fascinating. I haven’t done anything.’

  ‘Oh, I don’t believe that.’

  ‘It’s true. I haven’t had an exciting time like you. I’m twenty-one years old. I was born and brought up in Capinfell, and in all my life I haven’t been further than Swindon in the north and Cannonford in the south.’

  ‘Is it a nice place, Capinfell?’

  ‘Oh, well, it’s nice enough. It’s very small. Just a village. There’s the smithy and a post office, and that’s about it. If you want anything else you must go to Hurstleigh or Merinville.’

  He shook his head. ‘I don’t know any of those places. They’re only names to me.’ He paused. ‘I can only say how glad I am that you decided to come to Redbury that day, and that you and your sister missed one another.’

  Lydia looked down, unable to meet his steady gaze, the faint smile that still hovered on his mouth.

  ‘When are you going back to Capinfell?’ he asked.

  ‘Next Saturday. My father will be most disappointed if I don’t go.’

  ‘I’m sure.’ He sighed. ‘Ah, well.’

  As he continued to look across the table at her, she said, raising her glance to meet his own, ‘I shall have to go soon. I think it’s time.’

  ‘Yes, I’m afraid it is. I’ll take you home.’ He took up his beer, drank the last of it and set the glass back down on the table. ‘Come on. Let’s go.’

  Outside in the yard the stable boy brought the mare and carriage to them, and Guy gave the lad a couple of coins and then helped Lydia up into the seat and climbed up after her.

  As they drove back along the road, Lydia felt very conscious of his presence beside her. For the most part she kept her eyes on the way ahead, rarely turning to take in the face of the man at her side, but many times as they jogged along she could see on the periphery of her vision that he was looking at her. She sat with her hands clasped.

  ‘Now, whereabouts are you staying?’ he asked as they moved into the outlying streets of the city.

  ‘Little Marsh Street. Number 15. It’s close to the Victoria Gardens, near Somerton Walk.’

  ‘Oh, yes, I know roughly where it is.’

  They drove on, past the gasworks, the railway station, the Great Western Hotel. There was little traffic on the roads and they made their way steadily, their pace uninterrupted. When the public gardens came in view Lydia stirred in her seat. The ending of the day was looming.

  As they drew alongside the gardens, Guy called out to the mare, ‘All rightie, Tess. Whoah there, old girl,’ and pulled her to a halt. He turned to Lydia.

  ‘I don’t want to take you back yet,’ he said. ‘So I’m putting it off.’

  ‘But I have to get back,’ she said. ‘I told you, I shall upset Mrs Obdermann, and I can’t have that.’ Her heart thumped as she looked at him. This past time with him – although they had done nothing that anyone could think of as remarkable – she felt that nothing quite like it had ever happened to her before.

  ‘Mr Anderson –’ she said.

  ‘Guy.’

  ‘Guy.’ She paused, then added, ‘May we go on, please?’

  Ignoring her request, he gave a smile of satisfaction. ‘You know, that’s the first time I’ve heard you say my name.’

  ‘Please –’ she began, but he broke in, interrupting:

  ‘I’d like to see you again. May I?’

  ‘Well . . .’ She did not know how to respond. She wanted to say, Yes, oh, yes, but she had no knowledge of what to do. She was far from home and this was all so new to her. ‘Well . . .’ she said again. How foolish she must sound, she thought; how naïve she must appear in his eyes.

  ‘Don’t say well,’ he smiled. ‘Say yes.’

  She remained silent, and he stayed silent also for some seconds. Then he said, ‘When you’re back in Capinfell I’d like to come and call on you, if I may. I know it’s probably a bit of a distance, but I –’

  ‘When I’m back in Capinfell?’ Lydia said, ‘What do you mean? I’m not going back to live in Capinfell. Well, at least I have no plans to – not yet, anyway.’

  ‘But you said you’d be returning there next Saturday . . .’

  ‘That’s just for the weekend. I’ll be going on Saturday and coming back on Sunday. I’m just going to visit my father, that’s all.’

  ‘Oh,’ he said with a grin, ‘I misunderstood. I somehow got the idea that you had come here simply for a break from the routine – for a week’s holiday.’

  Lydia gave a little chuckle. ‘I couldn’t afford to come here for a holiday.’

  ‘Then, what are –’

  ‘I’m staying here. I’m living here. This is the end of my first week.’

  ‘So you’ve left Capinfell.’

  ‘Well – yes. Now I’m working here in Redbury. When we met that first time I had just come in for the day to have an interview for employment.’ She smiled. ‘And I got the situation I was after.’

  He nodded, smiling along with her. ‘That’s even better. I wasn’t looking forward to the jaunt to Capinfell, but now it won’t even be necessary. Where are you working in the town?’

  ‘At Seager’s. I’ve got a job in the postal order department.’

  ‘That’s good,’ he said, ‘to know that you won’t be rushing away out of town.’ He smiled at her a moment longer, then, turning, took up the reins. ‘I’d better get you back to Little Marsh Street.’ Clicking his tongue at the mare, he called to her, ‘Come on, Tess – heyup!’ and they set off again.

  A few minutes later he was helping Lydia down outside number 15.

  ‘I’ll be in touch with you,’ he said. ‘Is that all right?’

  She paused before replying: ‘Yes . . .’

  ‘Then I shall be. Depend upon it.’

  As she let herself into the house she was aware of him standing at the gate, watching her. At the last moment, just as she was closing the door, she looked back out at him, and gave a little wave. When the door was closed she leaned back against it for a second, smiling.

  Chapter Eight

  During the following day, Monday, Lydia frequently found her thoughts returning to Guy, and as frequently found herself wondering whether she would hear from him again. The day dragged interminably, and she could not wait for the time when she could leave the office and return to her lodgings.

  The first thing she saw on entering the hallway of the narrow house in Little Marsh Street was the letter waiting for her on the small table near the looking glass. It had no stamp, but was marked in the top right corner By hand. The handwriting that gave her name and address was unfamiliar.

  Upstairs she took off her hat and jacket, sat down in the little worn armchair and opened the envelope. It was from Guy. He had written:

  Datchet House

  Lincoln Street

  Redbury

  Monday 14th July 1890

  Dear Lydia,

  (Or perhaps I should have been a little more formal and addressed you as Miss Halley. Whatever . . . If I am in the wrong, please excuse it and put it down to enthusiasm.)

  I am writing this soon after getting into the office, and I shall see it delivered to your lodgings later today. I couldn’t wait to say how much I enjoyed meeting you yesterday. Your sister too for that matter, of course, but my first thoughts are of you. Oh, Lydia,
Miss Halley, what a pleasure it was, and if you received half the joy from the meeting that I received, then you are a happy young woman indeed.

  Well, now I must ask it, and risk refusal: would you care to meet again? I hope you will say yes; and in the hope that you will, I will wait for you at the south entrance to the Victoria Gardens at eight o’clock on Tuesday. If you are not there, then I shall live in the hope that your absence is due to your having been prevented from being there, and not from any lack of wish on your part.

  With my hopes held high, then, I shall look forward to the chance of meeting you again, and in the meantime I shall remain

  Yours truly,

  Guy Anderson

  With her eyes closed and her lips in a faint smile, Lydia briefly pressed the letter to her breast. Then, holding it away again, she sat for long moments just looking at it. She had read it through many times before she went down to the dining room to have her supper.

  After she had eaten, and was back in her room, Lydia sat down to write to Ryllis and to her father. To Ryllis she wrote that she was very pleased at their having been able to spend some time together, and added, with a lie, that she had enjoyed meeting Thomas. To her father she wrote that her work was going well, that she had spent part of the Sunday with Ryllis, and that she would be returning to Capinfell on Saturday to spend some time with him. Afterwards she went out and posted her letters.

  *

  The next day, at five minutes to eight, having eaten her supper some half-hour before, Lydia left the house to walk to the Victoria Gardens.

  Guy was already there, she could see as she approached, standing beside the main gate, facing away from her. He turned as she drew near and saw her, and raised his hat, smiling his broad smile.

  ‘Miss Halley,’ he said, as she came to him, and then in a lower voice: ‘Lydia.’

  ‘Hello . . .’ Briefly she pondered on her next word, but could not bring herself to utter his name, so ended adding nothing.