by Jess Foley
‘Yes. Oh, Gentry, my darling, yes. Yes, yes …’
He kissed her again and she remained in his arms, she sitting, he kneeling in the dry summer grass. When reality came again, thrusting a way between them, she said, pulling back out of his embrace:
‘Gentry, what are we doing? We’re like two lunatics. What are we doing, fooling ourselves like this? Nothing can come of this but unhappiness. You know that.’
‘Don’t say that, Blanche.’
‘You know it’s true. It doesn’t matter what we feel for one another. We’ll never be together, you know that as well as I do.’
‘It could be,’ he said. ‘It could.’
‘Could it? Could you deny your father? You would get nothing if you turned away from Marianne. Nothing. He’s had his heart set on your marriage to her for as long as I can remember. Could you really deny him?’
‘– Yes, I could.’
Blanche nodded.
‘Could you break Marianne’s heart?’
She gazed at him, and watched as with her words he turned away. ‘No,’ she said. ‘You could not. Perhaps you could bring yourself to defy your father, but this other thing …’
‘Blanche –’ he gave a helpless, tortured shake of his head, ‘we can’t live for other people. Aren’t we entitled to find our own happiness?’
She did not answer. He moved his gaze back to her. His eyes were so dark, so intense. His arms moved to draw her to him again. ‘I only know that I love you,’ he breathed.
Lying in the grass, Gentry made love to her. For some moments one part of her mind resisted, trying to shut out the feel of his hands upon her body, the feel of his fingers removing the barrier of the fabric between them, the warmth and hardness of him as he pressed against her. But her own desire was too strong, and even while an echoing voice in her brain cried out that it was madness, she gave herself up to the overwhelming passion of the moment, to her needs, and to the love she felt.
Later, when it was over, they lay side by side in the grass. Above her own breathing Blanche could hear the sound of Gentry’s breathing as it gradually slowed after his exertion. After some time she sat up and began to arrange her hair. Looking down at him, seeing his eyes closed, she said:
‘It doesn’t change anything, Gentry.’
He opened his eyes to her. ‘No, I suppose not.’
‘And now you’re going away. And going away to fight.’
‘I shall be back.’
‘Will you?’ She spoke the words with a sad little smile. Inside her head a voice whispered to him the words she could not say: You might be killed, Gentry. You might die there of disease. If not you will come back to Marianne. Whatever happens I shall never have you.
‘Yes, I shall come back,’ he said again.
‘And who will you come back to?’
‘Oh, Blanche …’ He turned his head, closing his eyes, burying his face in the folds of her skirt. ‘There’s only one thing I’m certain of – and that is that I love you.’
‘And I love you too, Gentry. But sometimes love just isn’t enough.’
She got to her feet. ‘So you go to South Africa to escape the problem for a while. Isn’t that what you’re doing? And what of Marianne and me while you’re gone? Marianne will probably accept your father’s offer and go back to Sicily with him. Have you thought of that? Marianne at your home in Sicily, you in South Africa and me here in Hallowford or somewhere close by. And what happens when the war is over and you come back?’ She turned to look at him as he sat gazing up at her. ‘And in the meantime we both wait for you, and pray for your safe return.’
PART FOUR
Chapter Thirty-One
Marianne and Blanche made their way side by side back up the hill towards Hallowford House, Jacko walking at their heels. They had been to the churchyard, carrying flowers which Marianne had placed upon her parents’ grave, and which Blanche had placed upon the graves of her own parents and siblings. It was an early Saturday evening in August. At the roadside the bracken of the heath looked dry, while on the brambles the berries were green.
Hearing Marianne sigh as they walked along together, Blanche turned to look at her. The lingering sadness on Marianne’s face was not due only to the visit to her father’s grave. That afternoon Gentry had left the house – soon to be leaving England, sailing for South Africa. Once he had set his mind upon it he had wasted no time in putting his plans into action, and within weeks of voicing his determination he had joined the Grenadier Guards and, in the rank of lieutenant – the commission bought for him by his father – had taken leave of those at Hallowford House and set off to join his regiment. Blanche, having said her goodbyes to him in the house – and carefully keeping her feelings in check – had later stood at an upstairs window and watched as he and Marianne had got into the landau in preparation to driving into Trowbridge where he would catch his train.
And soon Blanche and Marianne themselves would be leaving Hallowford House, Blanche to take up new employment, and Marianne to go back to Sicily in the company of Edward Harrow.
‘There’s nothing to keep me in Hallowford any longer,’ Marianne had said as she had told Blanche of her intentions to return to Sicily. ‘And I’d prefer to wait for Gentry’s return there with Uncle Edward rather than stay here with Uncle Harold.’
Edward Harrow had tried to persuade Blanche to accompany them to Sicily and spend a holiday there, but with gratitude she had declined the invitation. She had to get back to work, she said, and get on with her life. Besides, she had thought, it was bad enough trying to cope with Gentry’s departure on her own; it would be ten times worse having to see her own unhappiness echoed in Marianne’s eyes.
Even though Blanche had decided not to accompany Marianne back to Sicily, Marianne’s decision to go had nevertheless determined Blanche’s actions. Knowing that she could not possibly remain at the house with Harold Savill in Marianne’s absence – and he had stated clearly his intention of living there – she had decided to give up her employment as governess to the Andrews children and move further afield. So, to the disappointment of Mr and Mrs Andrews, she had given them a month’s notice and set about advertising for another position.
The previous day, Friday, had seen her last day as governess to the Andrews children, and having taken her farewells of them she was now waiting to begin work for her new employer, a Mr George Marsh of Bath, to whose house she was to travel the next day.
Mr Marsh, a shopkeeper in the city, was a widower with an eight-year-old daughter, Clara. After answering Blanche’s advertisement he had travelled to Hallowford House to interview her. She had liked him at once, and had soon accepted his offer of employment – though instrumental in her decision to join his employ was the fact that he would allow her to take Jacko along with her. Had he refused she could not have accepted. Where Mr Marsh was concerned, however, she need have had no worries. He had owned dogs himself in the past, and after seeing Jacko and hearing a little about him he had put up not the slightest resistance to the dog’s accompanying her.
‘Are you looking forward to going to live in Bath?’ Marianne asked now as they turned in at the main gates and started up the drive. She and Edward Harrow had delayed their leaving Hallowford House to coincide with Blanche’s departure.
Blanche nodded. ‘Yes – I think it’ll be a good thing for me to get away from Hallowford for a while.’
‘You know,’ said Marianne, ‘if you had remained with Mr Andrews you could have stayed on here at the house. And for as long as you wish – you know that.’
Blanche nodded. ‘Yes, I know – but it’s time I moved on.’ She paused. ‘There’s only one thing that bothers me …’
‘What’s that?’
‘When Ernest comes back – he’ll look for me here in the village and in Ashton Wick and he won’t be able to find me.’
‘Don’t worry about that,’ Marianne said at once. ‘He’ll find you. Uncle Harold will be here and he knows where you’ll be –
as does Mrs Callow. Ernest will find you all right; don’t worry.’
Side by side the two girls walked through the kitchen garden and into the orchard. Blanche said:
‘You know – I think it will be good for me to go to a place where not everyone knows me. I’ll have a better chance that way.’
‘A better chance? Chance for what?’
‘To – to make a life of my own …’
‘Oh, Blanche,’ Marianne said, ‘I do wish you would come with us.’
‘One day.’ Blanche linked her arm through Marianne’s. ‘Not yet – but one day I shall come and join you in Messina for a long, leisurely holiday in the Sicilian sun.’
‘Yes,’ Marianne said. ‘When Gentry comes back, when this awful war is over – and it will be over any day now, I’m sure – then we can be married, and you shall come to us whenever you want, and stay for as long as you like.’
At Marianne’s words Blanche was aware of a sudden, sharp stab of resentment. Marianne blithely spoke as if Gentry belonged to her; she was so sure of him. Gazing at her, Blanche said to herself: But he loves me. He loves me.
Near the orchard wall was a rough-hewn seat and the girls sat on it side by side. The sun was sinking low in the sky. After a little silence Marianne said:
‘There’s something I want to say to you …’
‘What’s that?’
‘Well – I don’t know how you felt at the reading of Papa’s will – whether you felt any – any disappointment at all …’
Blanche opened her mouth to protest, but Marianne continued:
‘Anyway, I just want to say that his will did not reflect his true wishes. I know that, Blanche.’
‘Marianne, please …’
‘No, listen to me. I want to tell you that when everything is mine – really mine – I shall see that you have a part of it. I know it’s what Papa wanted – and what he would have arranged if he’d been better prepared.’ She gave a little shrug. ‘But he wasn’t prepared, and so … Anyway, I shall do what he would have wished.’ She laid her hand on Blanche’s hand as it rested on her knee. ‘Come December of next year we shall be twenty-one. And on my birthday I shall have control of what Papa left to me. When that happens I shall see that some of it goes to you.’
‘Marianne, I –’
Marianne lifted her hand against Blanche’s protests. ‘It doesn’t matter what you say. I’ve already decided. I shall have plenty of money – and Gentry will as well.’ She pressed Blanche’s hand. ‘I want to make sure that you don’t have to keep on working all your life.’ She smiled, adding, ‘And now we’ll say no more about it.’ Turning on the seat she looked back towards the house. ‘You know, Blanche? – I shall probably never live here again.’
‘No?’
‘No. My home will be where Gentry’s home is. And he’ll want to stay in Sicily.’ She turned back to face Blanche. ‘Why do you look like that?’
‘– Like what?’
‘I don’t know. A strange expression on your face.’
Blanche laughed. ‘Oh, Marianne …’
Going back to her original thought, Marianne said, ‘I don’t think I’ll miss it, though – Hallowford. Does that sound odd? But – oh, the house just won’t be the same. Not with Papa gone – and you in Bath … And I have no interest in the mill. There’s nothing for me here now.’
The next morning Marianne and Edward Harrow left Hallowford House, Blanche and Harold Savill waving them off from the front steps. As soon as the carriage was out of sight Blanche made final preparations for her own departure. Mr Marsh was sending a carriage for her later that afternoon. When it arrived she got in, and with Jacko beside her and her box safely under her feet, she left the house. There had been a brief, tearful scene of goodbye with Mrs Callow, the housekeeper, but she had said no word of farewell to Harold Savill. Where he was concerned she would be happy never to see him again.
Mr Marsh, his elderly mother beside him, was ready to welcome her on her arrival at the house, which was situated on Almond Street, a quiet street on the edge of the city. At once she was shown to her room on the second floor, Jacko afterwards being taken into the yard, to a kennel there that had housed a pet belonging to the family in earlier days.
Apart from Mr Marsh and his mother and daughter, the house held two servants, a cook and a maid. Marsh’s draper’s shop was situated a mile away near the city centre and every business morning he set off to walk to work. He was a quiet man of forty, with a gentle manner. Of less than average height, with a round face and receding hairline he was by no means handsome, yet Blanche was quick to recognize in him qualities of kindness and consideration. His mother, too, though a little gruff in her nature, was nevertheless of an essentially kind disposition. The personalities of the two were echoed in George Marsh’s small daughter Clara, a shy, affectionate little dark-haired girl. In a very short time Blanche was convinced that if she could be happy in any kind of employment then her present situation was ideal.
And installed in her little room in Mr Marsh’s house in Bath, she watched the time passing by, and the war dragging on. In the past the reported progress of the war had not really touched her. Now, though, knowing that Gentry was out there, she avidly followed the accounts in the newspapers. Of Gentry himself she learned what news she could in the letters that came from Marianne, who wrote to him regularly and received letters in reply. It appeared, judging by the news that Marianne passed on, that Gentry was making light of his experiences. Further, it was clear to Blanche that Marianne herself, living in Messina with Gentry’s father, found it difficult to resign herself to Gentry’s absence; her letters to Blanche were full of expressions of her love for him, and of how much she missed him. Blanche, in writing back to her friend, had to stifle any such expressions.
The Marsh household in Bath was by no means a luxurious one, and Blanche soon gained the impression that there was not a great deal of money to spare once all the expenses had been met. George Marsh had inherited the business, Marsh & Son, from his late father. And Blanche suspected that the business could very likely do a great deal better than it did. Marsh was an unadventurous man, however, unwilling to take any chances, and consequently – so it seemed to Blanche – opportunities were passing him by. But it was no concern of hers, she told herself, and for all the lack of luxury in the house she was as happy as she could expect to be under the circumstances.
She asked for very little. During the days she taught Clara, and in the evenings she often spent time conversing with Mr Marsh or his mother. At other times she was alone. Not that she had any wish to be otherwise – not with things as they were. The three people who meant most to her had gone out of her life. Gentry was on the other side of the world, fighting on some South African plain. Marianne was in Sicily, living in some villa in Messina. And Ernest? God knew where Ernest was.
Apart from her continuing concern at the lack of any word of Ernest, all Blanche seemed able to do was think of Gentry’s safety and his return. Beyond that she seemed not fully to exist. And it was madness, she said to herself; for she could wait forever for Gentry to return, but when he did leave South Africa he would be returning not to her but to Marianne.
Chapter Thirty-Two
It was 1901, the first year of the twentieth century, and January brought in that first year – what should have been a year of hope and promise – with England still at war, and no sign of the war ending. On the 22nd of the month the Queen died, to be succeeded by her son, Edward VII.
Amid the respective sorrow and excitement generated by the death of one monarch and the advent of a new one the distressing reports continued to pour in from South Africa where the British troops were dying in their hundreds, the majority falling victim not to the actions of the guerrillas – who certainly claimed their share – but to disease, which had become endemic in most of the camps. Where the guerrillas were concerned, they were at last having things a little less their own way; for to combat the success of their actions
Lord Kitchener was building chains of blockhouses and was denuding the country of its farms. Without bases at which to muster, the guerrillas were proving to be less effective.
In Messina, in Edward Harrow’s villa on the fashionable Via Gabriele, Marianne waited impatiently for the war to come to an end. And she had soon found that being domiciled in Sicily was a distinct disadvantage where news of the war was concerned. The Italians, not being involved in it, gave relatively little space to it in the newspapers compared to the coverage it received in the British press. As a result, Marianne often found herself frustrated at the lack of news – though there was only one piece of news she wanted to hear, and that was that the war was over. And while she waited for such tidings she looked forward impatiently to Gentry’s letters, and with the receipt of each one breathed a deep, heartfelt sigh of relief at the knowledge that, at least at the time he had written, he was still safe.
And the days and the weeks and the months passed. And like Blanche in Bath, Marianne felt herself to be in some state of limbo. If everything had gone according to plan she would be married now to Gentry and would be living with him here in the city. But instead everything had changed; everything had gone wrong; her father had died and Gentry had gone off to fight.
Apart from worrying about Gentry’s safety, she also knew some other vague unease that touched her when she was least prepared. It had something to do with the tone of his letters. She had hoped for warmer words from him, more evidence of his love for her, in which she so needed to believe, and to which belief she so fervently clung. But then, she would ask herself, how could she expect him to write of passionate love when he was in such a desperate situation?
So, going from day to day, from week to week, and from month to month, she eked out the days of her existence, in a city in which she did not belong – where could she belong without Gentry? – and waited for the time to pass.
