Rosemary Aitken

by Flowers for Miss Pengelly

  Mrs Thatchell nodded. ‘He kept sending letters through my bank – he knew the branch I used. I kept replying that I could not forgive and I did not want to see him and forbade them to continue forwarding his messages to me. I suppose he came here looking as a last resort. He must have gleaned from them that I was living in Penzance.’

  ‘And it wasn’t you that he was asking for at all, Effie,’ Alex said gently, coming to her side. ‘It was the former Effie – the maid that Mrs Thatchell used to have when she was first married. He tried the haberdashery, because he knew that his lady loved embroidery and when he mentioned “Effie” Miss Blanche thought of you. He thought the maid would plead his cause, perhaps.’

  ‘She would have done, as well,’ Mrs Thatchell snapped. ‘It’s one of the reasons that I was glad to see her go. She was always begging me to let him contact me and saying that the whole unhappy thing had only happened because he’d loved me much too well. Ricky could always charm a girl as soon as look at her. Well, I was not going to let him try his charm on me. I’d fallen for it far too much before. That’s why I didn’t trust myself to let him come.’

  Effie looked at Mr Broadbent. ‘So what will happen now? Who will inherit the dead wife’s estate?’

  Broadbent shook his head. ‘It doesn’t seem that Royston left a will at all, so I suppose that it will go to Chancery. Mrs Thatchell might be able to submit a claim to it, but she says she doesn’t wish to anyway, and it is doubtful whether that would hold in law. Pity, because it means that I won’t get my fee – but there are compensations for my having come.’ He smiled. ‘No doubt Miss Blanche will tell you, if she has not done so yet?’

  Effie had had sufficient puzzles for one day. She shook her head. ‘I only saw Miss Pearl when I went back and she was all peculiar and hardly said a word. But I was only worried about bringing back the silks. I’ve got them, Mrs Thatchell.’ She produced the little bag. ‘And what about this cup of tea? It will be getting cold.’ She looked at the three faces staring back at her. ‘Well, I mean to say, the story you just told me is very, very sad, but it doesn’t really alter anything at all. And you said you didn’t want the news to spread outside this room. Mrs Lane will think it’s odd if you don’t drink some tea.’

  It was oddly reassuring to hear Mrs Thatchell say, in something much more like her normal tone of voice, ‘Very well, Effie. You may start to pour.’

  Four

  Alex did not ask to change his duty roster, after all. Instead, he wrote a little letter to the Knights, thanking them profusely for their hospitality but explaining that – between a complicated case that he was dealing with and the necessity of studying for the forthcoming exam – he was not in a position to avail himself of their kind standing invitation. He read the missive through a dozen times, then added a scribbled ‘for the present anyway’. It was prevarication, but it didn’t sound so bald.

  He felt like a weasel as he sealed the envelope but he had already put off writing this missive several times and it was already close to being impolitely late. He got it stamped in time to catch the early-morning post so that it would reach them by Wednesday afternoon.

  Next day he went, as promised, to put Effie on the bus. He was there before her and he watched her come, pretty as a picture in her best cape and navy skirt, her neat boots tap-tapping on the pavement as she hurried up to him.

  ‘My life, Alex! What a day it’s been. I thought that I was never going to get away at all.’ She looked around. ‘Although the horse-bus isn’t here yet, that’s a mercy anyway. I was afraid we wouldn’t get a chance to do more than say “hello”.’

  He made a sympathetic face at her. ‘Is Mrs Thatchell being difficult? If we can still call her Mrs Thatchell, after what we know. I shouldn’t be surprised if she was quite impossible. This must have been an awful shock for her.’

  Effie shook her head. ‘Not so much that she is difficult, it’s just that she’s made up her mind she’s got to go, and she’s got us clearing out the drawers and making lists of things to pack. I’ve told her till I’m purple in the face that no-one in the town is going to know a thing, but she won’t believe it. Says that in a little town like this, gossip spreads like wild-fire and she could never hold her head up any more – I suppose she means in church, since that’s the only place she ever goes.’

  Alex was frowning. ‘You mean she’s really going to leave Penzance?’ Then, as Effie nodded, he asked, ‘So where’s she going to go?’

  ‘Back up to London where she came from, I believe. I think the fact that this Royston man is dead has given her a sort of freedom to do that – she says at least she won’t be running into him. Or his wife and family either, come to that. It’s strange. She’s almost got more human, since it all came out. I thought she’d want to see the back of me, since I was the one that brought this trouble home, but it’s quite the opposite – she’s asked me to go with her.’

  Alex felt as though his heart had missed a beat. ‘And are you going to do that?’

  She looked at him as though he were an idiot. ‘Well, of course I said I couldn’t – not with Pa the way he is. Anyway, I’d be frightened in the capital. I know that lots of it is marvellous – Miss Blanche was telling me – parks and palaces and all sorts of things. But all those crowds of people! And miles and miles of streets. They say that you can walk all day and still be in London at the end of it!’

  Alex made a little joke to cover his relief. ‘I can walk quite slowly in Penzance when I put my mind to it.’ Then he added, more seriously, ‘So you’re going to lose your position? What are you going to do?’

  She grinned at him – a grin of open-hearted simple joy, so different from the cultivated simper of Miss Knight. ‘I shouldn’t really tell you, because I promised that I wouldn’t say anything until it was arranged. But there is a possibility of something else – an expected vacancy elsewhere – and a friend’s put in a word to recommend me for the post. It’s something that I’d love, though I don’t really have the experience I’d need. But I think that there’s a chance. Mrs Thatchell herself was asked and has put in a word for me.’

  ‘Has she?’ Alex said. He didn’t mention that he had a fair idea of what this exciting vacancy might be. He’d never spoken to anyone at all about that embarrassing lunchtime at the Knights. ‘That’s very good of her.’

  Effie smiled. ‘She’s not a bad stick, really, when you come to think. She was ever so good about giving me the time to go and visit Pa when he was bad, and Cook says that it was the same with her, when she had sickness in the family. It’s just that she can be a Tartar when she tries!’

  ‘I wonder if Miss Caroline is worse, though, all the same?’ Alex said, but then rather wished he’d held his tongue. He grinned at her ruefully. ‘I imagine that’s the vacancy that you are speaking of? I know that your friend Lettie has moved on from there.’ That was as tactful as he knew how to be.

  But Effie was staring at him, perplexed. ‘Oh that! No, that isn’t what I am thinking of. I suppose I could apply for that, if this other thing falls through. But what I’m hoping for is something else. I suppose I could tell you . . .’ She leaned over and almost whispered in his ear. ‘Miss Blanche is getting married and will be going away. She wants Miss Pearl to have me in the shop – there’s even a spare room that I could have, she says. All those lovely silks and the library besides – she says that I could even get to read the books, to make sure which ones are really suitable! And they would pay me four and six a week, with only a small deduction for my keep. Sounds like the sort of job I should pay them to let me have!’

  Her eyes were shining with the thought of it and she would obviously have liked to tell him more, but there was the horse-bus clopping up the street so he had to help her into it and could only stand and watch as it bore her away. He wished he’d done what it had crossed his mind to do: put on flannels and a sports coat and catch the bus with her – and spring himself upon her family if it came to it.

  And it would come
to it. Sooner or later it would have to come to it. These weeks without her had taught him that, at least: one day he would have to meet her family and, what was more daunting, take her to meet his. And if the relatives did not approve, then he and Effie would have to brave the storm. Because he knew, with certainty, that he was going to ask her for her hand. It did not occur to him that she might not accept.

  He was still turning over that resolution in his mind as he walked back to the police-station, and his upstairs room. He would devote his Thursdays to studying his books and earn that promotion: if he could get a solo posting with a house attached to it, he could offer Effie marriage in a year or two.

  So he was astonished, as he was making for the stairs, to be summoned by the sergeant. ‘Ah! PC Dawes! I know you are off duty until six o’clock, but could you step into the inner office, please. There’s someone here who’d like to speak to you.’ He stepped back to usher Alex in.

  Dear Heaven! Who was this now? Mater? She had done it once before, dropped in without warning and made him look a chump. But no – he couldn’t see clearly through the patterned glass, but enough to know the visitor was certainly a man. Surely it could not be Major Knight? However offended Caroline’s Papa might be, he would not seek a public confrontation in this way. Or would he? Alex walked in with a thumping heart.

  What awaited him could hardly have surprised him more if it had been the King himself. It was ‘Old Broughton’, the Chief Inspector of the Borough Police in person, with his famous beaky nose and stone-blue eyes turned towards Alex as he came into the room.

  ‘You asked for me, sir?’ He had the wit to put his helmet underneath his arm and stand stiffly to attention as if on parade.

  Broughton nodded. ‘Stand easy, Constable.’ He turned to the other policeman who was hovering at the door. ‘You may leave us, Sergeant,’ he said, while Alex did a text-book exercise of counting out the moves, as he shifted to the other regulation pose.

  Broughton made a little steeple of his hands and rested his long chin on the central fingertips. ‘I imagine that you know why I have sent for you?’

  ‘No idea at all, sir!’ said Alex, truthfully.

  ‘Hmm! I’ve had my eye on you, young fellow, for a little while. Did well in your examinations up to now, I think – and your sergeant gives me a good report of you. Says that you managed to clear up an “unidentified” which had been on the books for better than a year, by keeping your eyes open and your mind engaged. Is that a fair assessment?’

  Alex made a deprecating noise. Whatever else, he had not expected this.

  ‘Thing is, young fellow, I am looking for a man – subject to the outcome of the next exam, of course – to work on attachment to a little country station out towards St Just. There is a sergeant out there who is getting on a bit and he’s starting to find the duties are too much for him, especially in the evenings, when he’s trying to patrol – the country’s hilly, even though he’s got a bicycle. Needs a younger fellow that he could train up a bit, who could take over in a year or two, when he’s ready to retire. Would you like to be considered for the posting, Dawes?’

  Alex took a deep, unsteady breath. ‘Well, of course I’m very flattered, sir, and I would love the job . . .’ More than the Commissioner could possibly suppose, in fact. It must be near Penvarris, which would be a dream come true. ‘But honesty compels me to make something clear. I believe you may have selected me for this on the basis of a recommendation you received from outside of the force. Would that be correct?’

  Broughton brought his beetle-brows into a frown. ‘Well, yes, that is certainly the case. I have received the warmest commendation of your skill, from someone whose opinion I attach importance to. Quite unexpected too – someone I spoke to at a charity affair. He came up to me, entirely unasked, and wanted to tell me what an ornament you were . . .’

  Alex shook his head. ‘That’s what I was afraid of. Sir, I am sure that it was kindly meant, but I cannot in good conscience permit you to believe that this was an impartial testimonial. I fear that the gentleman had hopes of me as a potential son-in-law. It is only fair to tell you that, since those hopes are false, it is unlikely that he would say the same again.’

  Broughton looked puzzled. ‘But I understood the fellow had no family at all. And he didn’t even seem to know your name. But he was quite specific – he wrote your number down. He told me he’d had dealings with you in Penzance, and had been so impressed that he intended to write a letter commending you to me, though he hadn’t managed to get round to it. He’d just moved into the St Just district, he was telling me, and when he heard that I was looking for a younger man to help the sergeant there, he thought of you at once – promised to send me your number, which he did next day. You’d be ideal, he said. Understanding and patient with a country way of life. Said you were most helpful when he lost his pig, when other people simply took no interest at all.’

  It was so unexpected that Alex laughed aloud. ‘Oh, the pig! In that case, I am happy that the owner thought so well of me. At least it’s genuine. I thought the commendation might have come from . . .’ He tailed off, in dismay.

  ‘Major Knight, I take it?’ Broughton leaned back in his chair and looked at him. ‘He did go wittering on the other day about one of our recruits. I didn’t pay too much attention, I’m afraid. Don’t hold with these military Johnnies, trying to exert their influence on the civilian force.’ He glared at Alex. ‘So it was you, again? I see. He seemed to have some notion that we should train you up so you could go and join the Army afterwards. What do you say to that?’

  ‘My father was in the Army and my two brothers are. I have every respect for them, of course, but if I had wished to join them, then I would have done,’ Alex said simply. ‘My family hoped I would – and of course, if there was a threat to England, that would be different. My father seems to think there might be trouble soon, with Germany re-arming and all that sort of thing, and of course if that happened I should enlist at once. But generally I have no thirst for shooting things – and people least of all. I’m much more interested in keeping Cornwall safe.’

  For the first time, Broughton gave him an approving smile. ‘Well said, my boy. In my case it was Navy – but otherwise my situation was very much the same! I chose the police force and it’s served me very well.’ He gestured vaguely at his insignia of rank. ‘I think that my informant was correct. I think you would be an ideal candidate. I’ll put your name forward when the time comes, then – depending on the outcome of the yearly test, of course. I think I made that clear.’ He scribbled something on a notepad which he had in front of him, and then looked up again. ‘Very well, Six-six-three, that will be all for now. You will be hearing from me in due course, I hope.’

  Alex was dismissed. He floated up the stairs as if he had a bubble under him, and he could hardly concentrate upon his books at all. Promotion to a country station near Penvarris Mine, where there was accommodation and he could take a wife! That would be something to tell Effie, the next time they met!

  In the meantime there was Mater’s letter to attend to – he had forgotten it. He pulled it out and read it. It was full of recrimination and reproach. He had left a luncheon early, snubbed Miss Caroline and was suspected of involvement with that awful maidservant, who had seemed to know him and had now left in disgrace. Would he write back instantly and swear it wasn’t true.

  Alex was more than happy to oblige. There was a young lady he was fond of, he agreed, but she was not the ‘awful maidservant’. She was a young lady of good character. He left it at that, this time – but wouldn’t it be splendid to be able to report that his ‘young lady’ was not a maid at all, but a more socially acceptable assistant in a shop? He hoped with all his heart that Effie would get that position with Miss Pearl.

  Mater would grumble that it was ‘only trade’ of course, and look down on them both – but haberdashery was the most respectable and ladylike of trades. Besides, if strait-laced Mrs Thatchell, all those
years ago, had defied her family to marry the young man of her choice, and if Miss Blanche had found

  the courage to do something similar, shouldn’t he be willing to stand up for his choice?

  He grinned. He’d have to give Effie a few lessons on how to use a knife and fork, but she’d learn a few graces living with Miss Pearl. And Pater would approve of Effie’s love of books.

  Perhaps it would be possible to introduce them after all.

  Lettie’s wedding was a very hurried, small affair. Fayther managed to take the afternoon off work to lead her down the aisle, in last year’s Whitson dress that was getting far too tight, and her stepmother and the senior Symonses were there to witness it. And that was all. They didn’t even go back for tea and sandwiches because Reg Symons said he had to go and mind the shop, and if Lettie was going to be a Symons now as well, she had bally-well better come and start to earn her keep.

  So Lettie spent the first hours of her married life weighing out sugar and putting it in bags. In fact, she found she didn’t mind it very much and – since she was nicer to the customers than her in-laws were apt to be – she found that people were soon queuing up to have her deal with them. It very nearly caused a row, in fact, until the till was shut and trade was proved to be quite sharply up on what it generally was.