The house of my enemy

by Norrey Ford

  "I think Adam is waiting for you to come to the point," she prompted gently.

  "The short point is that Brown's goes up for sale. Care to borrow the money to buy it, Adam?"

  Verity saw Adam's face change. Up to this moment she had not realized how much and how deeply he desired Brown's. He leaned forward, and she heard the deep draw of his breath.

  Adam took a moment to consider. Then he shook his head. "It's uneconomic, sir. I'd have to borrow every penny, and the business wouldn't stand the strain of a heavy repayment. In any case, I don't care to be under such a vast obligation. I like to pay my way and choose my own path. Whoever lent me the money would be the virtual owner, and might choose to be a dictator."

  Verity pressed her damp hands together in agony. It had been Adam's only chance of getting what he wanted, and he had sent it whistling down the wind.

  A

  "That's the answer I hoped you'd give, Adam. My question wasn't a serious proposition. As a matter of fact, the business isn't for sale. Brown has parted with it."

  "To my father?"

  "John William never was a smart man at a quick decision. It's gone to an outsider."

  Verity held her breath, knowing the depth of Adam's disappointment.

  "It's gone to me." Robert sat back to watch the effect of his announcement.

  Delighted, Verity clapped. "Hurray! Adam, I told you my father was wonderful!"

  Adam said stonily, "It evens the score. According to your lights, you're justified."

  Verity flung her arms round his neck and kissed him. "I knew you'd be thrilled."

  Adam took her arms from about his shoulders. His face was set, his eyes hard as marbles. "It won't do, Verity. It just won't do."

  "It's the solution to all our difficulties."

  Adam swung round to Robert. He brought his clenched fist down on the desk. "You haven't done this, Uncle Robert, thinking of Verity's happiness, nor of mine. You've done it as a particularly neat revenge. You saw a chance to score off my father, and took it. You must have schemed for Years to get your own back, and you thought I'd let you use me as a tool to do it.

  "You're wrong, Robert Bramhall. I may be temporarily at odds with my father, but my first loyalty is to my salt. Whatever my personal quarrel I won't see him made a laughing stock in the town, as he would be if this story got about. I won't see his heart broken."

  Verity seized his arm. "Adam—please! Daddy was trying to help."

  He turned on her furiously. "I warned you not to try and fight my battles. You promised never to do it again, and you've broken that promise. You and Uncle Robert between you have tried to engineer me into a position I won't tolerate—his stooge. An instrument for bringing my father down. Don't you understand, Verity—there are some

  things a man can't and won't do. Sometimes there is a price , too high to pay."

  "But you don't think I knew anything about this plan, do you? You don't think I suggested it?"

  "It's hard to believe you knew nothing about it! And you agreed to it. It didn't rise up and choke you with its rottenness; you were delighted. Let me tell you this; I'm going away from Earlton as far and as fast as I can. I hope never to see the place again—or Bramhall's, or Brown's."

  "But you'll take me with you, Adam?" She clung to him, terrified by the stranger she saw in his face.

  He shook his head. "No, Verity. Sam Brown tried to buy me for his granddaughter, with the bribe of Brown's. Now Robert Bramhall does exactly the same thing, and uses the same bribe. And you thought I'd take it! That's what I can't forgive."

  He rushed out of the room. Verity, stunned by the sudden storm of his rage, sank back into her chair, shivering violently, her teeth chattering.

  Her father came round the desk and put his arms round her. "Don't fret, lassie. I know the Bramhall temper. Maybe I should have wrapped it up a bit better. He'll see which side his bread is buttered when he cools down. He'll come back."

  She twisted savagely away from his embrace. "He'll never come back. You've wounded his pride too deeply. If you'd told me what you were doing, I'd have warned you. You're so conceited, you won't take anyone into your confidence. You've always got to be the great I am."

  His surprise at her attitude was genuine. "Nay, love, I did my level best for you. Wait, I'll get you a drop of brandy, to stop that shivering. The young thug, he'd no business to turn on you like that!"

  She stared at him wonderingly. All Adam had said had not made the least impression. "Haven't you the slightest notion that human beings can't be bought? You bought me —all my life you've been loading me with presents, buying my love. I don't believe you've once asked yourself what I really wanted, what I was like inside."

  "Are you turning against me, child? Dear knows I meant well."

  "You meant well, I'll grant you. But you don't understand me, and you don't understand Adam. You thought you could buy him for me with a nice little present, just the way you've always bought me anything you thought I wanted."

  He looked older, his face sunken, and for a moment she was arrested by the realization of the hurt she was giving him. But Adam's face was still vivid in her mind. "The awful thing is that he thinks I'm mixed up in it, too. Probably he imagines I put you up to it."

  She pushed past him, unable to bear the atmosphere of the house another moment. She ran outside, not caring where she was going.

  The cool air steadied her. She took her car and drove fast and capably to the sea. She left it by a gate and started on a long cliff-top walk, leaning into the brisk wind and hearing only the surge of the waves and gulls screaming. She had to be alone, to think for herself, and to decide what was best to do.

  No one could help her anymore. She had to reach her own decision. She had no means of knowing how much of Adam's flood of angry words could be put down to pure temper, how much he really meant. From experience, she knew he would take hours or days to cool down and be prepared to listen to reason.

  She understood him. If only she could talk to him and tell him how well she knew that Robert's offer had cut deep into his pride. A man doesn't want his wife and his future handed to him wrapped up neatly like a toffee apple given to a child.

  She understood Robert too, because she loved him. Though she couldn't approve of his action, she understood his childlike delight in killing two birds with one stone; giving his loved little daughter the toy she coveted, and turning the tables neatly on his brother at the same time. Tears stood in her eyes when she remembered how happily he'd rubbed his hands in glee, with his secret still up his

  sleeve. It had been almost a shame to spoil that boyish enjoyment of his own cleverness.

  The wind tore at her coat, pressed her hair back from

  her head in a flaming bush. The gulls wheeled and screamed.

  Adam—Robert—John William. Between the three of them, she was tossed from pillar to post, torn this way and that. Each man thinking of himself.

  Braced to the wind, she stood and faced the realization which had come like a blinding flash of light.

  "Not one of them," she said aloud to the gulls and the empty shore, "thinks of me. Each thinks of what he wants, or doesn't want. Neither Daddy nor Adam once stopped to ask me what I wanted or didn't want. They think they love me—and in their way they do. But first of all they love themselves, and their great swollen Bramhall pride; I can be hurt, but oh dear me, not that ridiculous touch-me-not bundle of absurd self-regard!"

  After that momentous discovery there was only one decision to make. The sooner it was made, and acted upon, the better. It would hurt, but it would be a good clean hurt with no bitterness in it.

  Back at Nutmeg House, she spread on the floor a set of matched white travel-cases which had been a Christmas gift from Robert, and packed them methodically. When they were filled and locked, there was no more to do but write a letter to Robert Bramhall.

  Blankly she stared at the writing paper, unable to put down a single word. The elegant inlaid writing table had
been her eighteenth birthday present.

  I'm leaving for ever, she had to say. I'm going back to where I started. Mary Bell, orphan. Unless I stop being your daughter I'll never possess my own soul. I shall never be myself.

  The right words would not come. She loved Robert Bramhall so dearly. She knew he loved her, in his way. A man's way.

  She remembered the days and nights of her childhood, when he'd tried to be father and mother both, seeking to console and to be consoled; the time she'd had mumps, the

  day she failed her music test; the delight he'd taken in giving her the presents which enchant a little girl. A toy theatre, a real ballet skirt, a pony.

  She buried her face in her hands. I can't—it's too hard. How will he manage without me? He'll only have Aunt Fidget, and he doesn't love her the way he loves me.

  He'd been bewildered when he'd said I meant well! His gesture had been a crashing failure, but it had been made with love. And she had received it with cruel, hurting words.

  And Adam? Where was he now, nursing his hurt and his anger? If only she could reach out to him and explain that it wasn't her doing, explain how Robert Bramhall loved to play Little Tin God, most of the pain would be smoothed away.

  Adam, my dear, dear love! How could you hurt me so much? How could I hurt you?

  Slowly, she came to the heart of her problem. Slowly, as the hours slid by, she grew up into a woman.

  It was true that both men had been more concerned with what they wanted than with seeking to know what she wanted. But that was the way of a man; a girl might resent it, but a grown-up woman must adapt herself to the strange unpredictable creatures. A man's world revolved round himself, and a woman's world must revolve round her man.

  But which man? She had to choose between the two beings she loved best. Whichever she chose, she'd have to suffer in losing and loving the other.

  Worse, she had to inflict hurt on one of them. The pain in her own heart was her affair, but what of the hurt she would inflict on Adam if she chose Robert? And what of Robert Bramhall, to whom she owed so much, if she left his house and went to her beloved Adam?

  Adam or her father? And the decision for the rest of their three lives.

  Aunt Fidget tapped at the door, asking anxiously if she

  wasn't coining downstairs for something to eat. She called

  out that she had a headache and didn't want to be disturbed "Please go away, Auntie. I'll be all right."

  "But it's so late, dear. Shall I send a tray?"

  To save Aunt Fidget's interminable fussing, she agreed, but when the tray came up she could not touch anything on it. She lay on her bed and stared with sightless eyes at the ceiling. Heavy tears slid slowly down her face and into the pillow.

  She was awakened by a maid with breakfast on a tray. "Why, you've slept on top of the bed in your clothes, Miss Verity? Are you ill? Shall I fetch Mrs. Fidget?"

  "Certainly not. And don't tell her, or she'll fuss." They smiled at each other with understanding. "I was thinking, and I simply fell asleep. I'll have a shower and change." She stretched stiffly. "Ugh, it feels horrid. Don't tell, now."

  "I won't, Miss Verity."

  She was ravenously hungry, and ate her breakfast with the hearty young appetite that even an aching heart could not defeat. Then she had a shower and dressed in her plainest suit.

  Adam had said that if she married without Robert's blessing, she should take with her nothing he'd paid for. At the time, she'd thought Adam foolish. Now she understood what he meant.

  She unpacked all her cases as methodically as she'd packed them, putting only necessities in the smallest.

  She opened her bedroom door and peered out. The house was silent, except for the faint hum of an electric cleaner downstairs. At this hour, Aunt Fidget would be breakfasting in bed, or telephoning the tradesmen from the extension in her room.

  Turning back, she took a last look at the room which had been her own for as long as she could remember; the thick white carpet, the coffee-coloured satin curtains and counterpane; a gold and ivory dressing-set which had been Elfrida Bramhall's. Twin wardrobes, full of exquisite clothes bought for Verity Bramhall.

  Quietly, she closed the door behind her.

  She walked briskly down the road to the bus stop. She had a little money with her; enough, she hoped, to last till she earned her first week's wages. She tried to remember where the Employment Exchange was

  Leaving the bus station in Earlton, she heard her name called. For a moment she had an urge to run, to pretend she hadn't heard. Then she turned and faced Tom Cooper.

  "Verity! What brings you to town so bright and early in the morning? Not the bus? Is your car in dock?"

  "In a way."

  "Bad luck!" He scrutinized her, puzzled. "Can I give you a lift somewhere? And let me carry that case."

  "Do you know where the Employment Exchange is? I'd be glad of a lift there, Tom, unless we're practically on top of it. I simply can't remember."

  "It's a fair distance. Come on, my car's round the corner. What's this, a domestic crisis at Nutmeg House? Has the cook walked out on you?"

  "I've walked out."

  He looked concerned. "Hop in the car. I'll drive round a bit. Do you want to tell old Uncle Tom all about it—or not?"

  "Not, if you don't mind. It would take too long and I might cry, which would be horrid for you. Just drive. Are you sure you've time?"

  "I'll make time. I can drive you home again if you want to go back. No trouble at all."

  He drove round the familiar town; the domed town hall, the Customs House, the statue of Queen Victoria, the art gallery. Once, a dock had lain in the heart of the town's shopping centre, and the traffic might be held up while a ship sailed across the road to blend masts and spars and funnels with chimneys and the stone horses prancing above the Guildhall; but Earlton businessmen had become impatient of the delay and were, perhaps, no longer moved by the sight of a ship. The dock had been filled in, and covered with grass and concrete walks, and a statue of the town's greatest citizen. Tom stopped the car by this garden, and suggested a walk. The air was always brisk and breezy across the grass, as if the very wind remembered the tall ships and salt water.

  "Quite sure you don't want to go home?"

  She shook her head decidedly. "I'm sure. From now on, I belong to myself. Not to Robert Bramhall, or Adam, or

  even to Verity Bramhall. I have to be a real person, not a sham. To be myself."

  He looked puzzled. "But you always have been yourself. I never Met a girl with more individuality."

  "You only met Verity Bramhall. But underneath there was another girl—a girl who'd never had a chance to exist, to develop her personality. She's been popping up more and more lately, demanding her life, insisting on being heard. Now—she's taken over, that's all. She's going places. She's said goodbye to Verity Bramhall and all the life that belonged to Verity."

  He steered her towards a seat. "Is this true?" "Absolutely."

  you have no regrets?"

  "Many. But it's all behind me now. I've said goodbye to it all, in my heart."

  "You're a strange girl. Will you believe me when I say I truly loved Verity Bramhall?"

  " do believe you. And it there'd only been Verity, I think I could have loved you. But it never quite came off, did it? I could never give myself wholeheartedly to loving you, and you were troubled by the ghost of Mary Bell. You never loved me with your whole being."

  "I genuinely believed I did. You enchanted me. It wasn't until I began to love a girl with my whole heart that I realized I'd offered you second best. You told me once that Cupid wasn't a pretty boy, but a strong man. I know it now."

  Her face lit up. "You're in love with someone—really and truly, Tom? Oh, I am glad. That makes me terribly happy. I suppose every woman has a tender feeling towards a man who once wanted to marry her, even if—if she couldn't. Does she love you? Do I know her?"

  "It'll surprise you. It's Rosemary."

  "Bu
t that's impossible! You were always quarrelling. You seemed to hate each other."

  "I suppose we were fighting the love we had for each other. I never thought of loving Rosemary—we'd known each other all our lives and took each other for granted. But when she told me she was going to marry Adam, it

  annoyed me. And of course when she thought I was to marry you, she bit and scratched."

  "How did you find out?"

  "On New Year's Eve. She set that paper on fire deliberately, Verity."

  "But she might have killed a hundred people! How could that make you love her?"

  "It's easy to love someone who's on top of the world. If you love them when they're beaten down and utterly defeated, then—you know. It's the real thing."

  "I'm glad, and I hope you'll be wonderfully happy. Someday, Tom, will you tell Rosemary that I know—about New Year's Eve? And that I understand, and wish her happiness?"

  "I will. You're a grand girl and I wish you happiness, too."

  "And now, please drive me to the Exchange. I have to find myself a job."

  "I can give you one. Let me take you to our offices."

  "No, thank you. I have to do this on my own."

  He set her down at the entrance to the Employment Exchange, and they shook hands.

  "Good luck, Mary Bell! I'll give your message to Rosemary, someday. Oh, by the way, that was rotten luck about your Uncle John William."

  "What was rotten luck?"

  "Didn't you know? He had a stroke last night. Touch and go with him, so I've heard. They've sent for Adam."

  She stood alone on the sunlit pavement. So—Adam goes back to his father, and Mary Bell goes her own way!

  John William Bramhall was propped up on pillows. The stroke had not been as severe as was first feared. His left arm was almost useless, but his speech was not badly affected. He could still make himself understood.

  Adam took the chilly, nerveless hand in his warm strong grip. "I'm here, Father. It's Adam "

  A smile twisted the old lips. "Come to your cakes and milk, eh?"

  "I'm here because you're ill, and for no other reason. Can I do anything?"