‘What?’ He fixed his gaze upon her firmly, his eyes were speculative.
‘You’ve looked around here, Robert. You’ve seen what I’m doing. You’ve looked at the greys, and the carriage. There’s some silver Spencer forgot about, and didn’t sell. You’ve an idea how much it’s all worth.’
‘Yes.’
She drew a deep breath. ‘Then I’m going to ask you for a loan ‒ with these things as security.’
‘How much?’ His voice didn’t betray either surprise or distaste. He was brisk ‒ the legal and business man.
‘Four or five hundred pounds. As much as I can get.’
‘What would you do with the money?’
‘Well …’ Again she drew a deep breath. ‘There’s the farm first. The stock is badly run down, and we need new rams. And with good rams we’d need better fencing, so that the strain remains pure. There’s a chance I might be able to buy back a field adjoining our land on the Appledore side ‒ good grazing, they say it is. I want to buy feed for the sheep to carry them through the winter better …’
‘Do you really know what you’re talking about, Jane? ‒ or is this just hearsay?’
‘Mostly hearsay,’ she admitted. ‘But I was brought up in the country, you remember ‒ and I’ve learned a great deal from listening to Lucas. He’s been a shepherd ‒ a “looker,” I think he said they call him here ‒ all his life, and I think he’s not without some skill.’
‘It’s true,’ Robert said. ‘Lucas could have had better positions, but he’s preferred to stay at Blake’s Reach. Lord knows why ‒ it wasn’t for love of Spencer. But let us go on, Jane. That’s the sheep ‒ what else?’
‘The roof,’ she said. ‘I went up to the attics to look at it yesterday. Another winter’s rain might be serious. There are windows to be replaced, and in the old wing the plaster is cracking badly, and starting to fall off. There are some rooms where the ceiling’s not safe …’
‘Nothing for yourself, Jane? No gowns or hats?’
‘They’re the only things I don’t need. I’ve trunks full of gowns that once made London goggle, and will certainly keep a country district talking for years.’ Then she shrugged. ‘But there’s always curtains ‒ every pair in the house is rotting on the windows. But they’ll hang for a while yet. Frivolous things ‒ well, I’d like them in plenty. But they can all wait.’
They sat quite still, looking at each other. Robert’s fingers drummed quietly on the arm of his chair; the sound made Jane nervous. She wondered if she had gone too far, if she had misjudged his feelings for Anne, and how far he was susceptible. Suddenly she felt a little afraid of him. He was not like other men; there was little one could guess for certain about Robert Turnbull’s feelings. He lived a life whose inner core was known only to himself. His reserve was deep and close; she wondered if she had tried to make a friend of him too quickly, and now had blundered. He might despise her for the crudeness of her request. He might despise her, and still give her the money, disappointed in her, and unable to forgive her because she was not Anne. The silence dragged out. She held herself straight, determined not to show the nervousness that now swamped her. Everything she had said to Paul about Robert Turnbull seemed true. She had made clumsy excuses for borrowing the money, and he had seen through them. Had he been mocking her about the gowns and hats? ‒ she felt that she had been a fool, and she was about to apologize and take back her request, when he spoke at last.
‘I can make you the loan, Jane ‒ there’s no trouble about that. But why do you risk your own possessions as security when the money would go into the farm and house? It should be a loan to the estate.’
Her head jerked back. ‘Just suppose one fine day Charles Blake walks in here? What then? Have I got to tell him I’ve further mortgaged the place to try out a few ideas I have? I’d look a pretty fool.’
She rose from her chair, and began to pace the room. Then she swung around and looked at him.
‘Can’t you see what it’s like ‒ forever living with the thought that he may come back? I work here, and I scheme and think until my body and my head ache from it. And if he should walk in here it will all have gone for nothing. If you lend the money to me, and not to the estate, I will have a share in Blake’s Reach … If he comes back I’ll have some right here!’
Her voice was shaky. Suddenly she put her hands up to her forehead. ‘If only I knew!’
‘Knew what?’
‘About Charles Blake ‒ dead or alive!’
‘Dead or alive doesn’t matter, Jane. You shall have the money as soon as you want it. Only it pains me to see you expend yourself and your possessions like this. You’re too young, Jane ‒ there should be other things in life for you. Don’t give everything to Blake’s Reach … Keep a little of your life for living!’
She took her hands down from her head. ‘Someone else said that!’
‘Someone else? Who?’ His tone was sharp.
She bit her lips, realizing that she had almost brought out Paul’s name ‒ and that Robert Turnbull would not have liked to hear it. ‘Who?’ she repeated. ‘Oh … I don’t remember. Perhaps Kate …’
He cut her short. ‘There’s just one stipulation I make … I will give you the money, but I don’t want to hear what you do with it. I don’t want it to stand continually between us. They say you can never make friends between borrower and lender ‒ I don’t want that to happen to us. Do you understand, Jane? Once it is done we won’t talk of it. I’ll collect my debt in say ‒ five years. And that will be the end of it.’
‘Very well,’ she said slowly. ‘That’s how it will be.’
He stood up to take his leave. ‘And the interest on it will be a rose delivered each spring. Agreed!’ He smiled, and fingered his button-hole as he spoke.
‘Yes! Agreed! A rose each spring.’
Jane was uneasy as she gave Patrick the order to bring Robert’s horse around; Robert Turnbull puzzled and disturbed her. He had an air of power and knowledge that went past the simple function of a country attorney; his ordered bachelor’s life didn’t fit with his lack of concern over lending her the money ‒ even more so because he could give it to her without enquiries or stipulations, or seemingly without a man’s desire to manage the affairs of a woman. They stood at the doorway waiting, talking aimlessly of the work she had had done in the garden. She shot a glance sideways at him. The quiet eyes were faintly amused, and she had no idea why.
As Patrick brought his horse, suddenly there was a commotion. William dashed round the side of the house, gave them a brief look, and fled down the slope of the garden to the orchard. General followed him closely.
Robert laughed. ‘Those are energetic playfellows William has conjured up for himself. I wonder if he fancies he’s being pursued by smugglers ‒ or is it the Preventive Officers?’
‘He’s never had so much space to do what he likes with,’ Jane said. ‘And no one has time to mind what he’s at, either. After London it must be a paradise for him. In a few days he’s grown into a little savage … he should have a tutor … or someone.’
Robert laid a restraining hand on her. ‘Time enough. Let him have the summer to run wild … let him get to know the Marsh. For a boy it’s a wonderful place. He ought to feel the Marsh in his bones … he’s a Blake, too.’
William’s red hair was lost among the budding leafiness of the trees. Turnbull swung himself up on his horse.
‘The child should have a pony,’ he said suddenly. ‘It was stupid of me to overlook it. I’ll see what I can find …’ he broke off. ‘I think I may be able to suit him. There’s a pony I have stabled at Rye ‒ belongs to the child of a friend who’s had to go abroad. William could borrow it ‒ keep it exercised.’
‘He would be glad of it,’ Jane said. ‘I know he’d be glad of it.’
Turnbull bent to make his farewell. ‘Take care of yourself, my dear. Blake’s Reach, I know, is in good hands … rather astonishing hands.’ His eyes were no longer amused; his lips w
ere tight and firm, as if he were keeping a check on his words.
There was something in the look that touched Jane strangely ‒ a lost, hesitant look, the look of someone wanting to ask for something, and not daring.
She gave him her hand.
‘One other favour,’ she said.
‘Anything you want!’
‘Invite me to supper!’ she said firmly. ‘Invite me into Rye to eat supper with you!’
His tight line of his lips slackened. ‘Would you do that, Jane? Would you really do that!’
‘Haven’t I just invited myself? I’ll come gladly if you’ll have me.’
‘Bless you, Jane ‒ I’ll be honoured. To-morrow evening, then.’
She watched him ride along the drive, and turn out of sight on the road, his broad square shoulders erect and jaunty. The clip-clop of the horse’s hoofs were loud in the still afternoon air. She leaned against the stone pillars, gazing after him, wondering about this quiet, powerful man, wondering at herself for what she had just done. In the space of an hour she had moved much closer to Robert, and yet was more puzzled by him than before. He seemed aloof, but yet she could not say he was lonely; a solitary man, but not one to invite pity. There was a strength in him that seemed as if it had not met its test. She frowned, and shook her head.
As she turned to go indoors, Patrick moved nearer.
‘You’ll excuse me, Mistress ‒ did I hear Mr. Turnbull say he stabled a pony for a friend that Master William could use?’
‘Yes? ‒ what about it?’
‘Well, now ‒ isn’t that the strange thing! Sure wasn’t that fine fella from the livery stables in Rye ‒ the same that brought Blonde Bess, Mistress ‒ wasn’t he boastin’ o’ the string o’ fine horses Mr. Turnbull stables with them, and there was never a mention of a pony. Never a mention! Sure I’m thinkin’ Mr. Turnbull has only to snap his fingers for a piece of fine horse-flesh to appear.’
She fixed her gaze on him coldly. ‘And if he does, Patrick ‒ is that any concern of ours? We’ll just be glad of what he’s sent, and not ask questions about it.’
‘Yes, Mistress,’ he concurred. ‘We’ll do that.’
II
Quite a large part of the people of Rye, drawn into the narrow, cobbled streets by the mildness of the spring evening, saw the carriage standing before Robert Turnbull’s house at the top of Mermaid Street. The carriage was handsome enough to attract attention, and the pair of finely matched greys would have drawn a crowd anywhere. A small crowd did gather, in fact, and the two young boys who had been lavishly tipped to hold the horses’ heads were puffed with pride, Patrick, decked in a coat of livery that dazzled the passers-by, leaned against the door, ready and willing to answer almost any question asked of him.
And so it was that one part of Rye’s population learned that Anne Blake’s daughter, Jane, was inside having supper with Robert Turnbull; and yet another part of the townspeople actually saw her when she came out on Turnbull’s arm, and headed up the lane towards the church. It was a sight Rye would talk about for the next month.
They could see that she was tall, red-headed, and moved well, and those who could remember said she had more than a passing likeness to Anne Blake. But it was her costume that they would mostly talk of ‒ the costume, the carriage and the horses. Which was just as Jane had planned it should be. She had thought out each detail of her dress, knowing well enough that she was overdressed for the occasion, but knowing also that perfect taste was always too subdued to call for comment. So her gown was low cut enough for the women to say it was indecent, and the men to ogle; she wore a small fur piece about her shoulders, and ostrich feathers on the wide brim of her hat. It would have been a fashionable costume for Vauxhall ‒ and she had worn it as much for Robert Turnbull as for the townsfolk of Rye.
She had asked to see a little of the town before they ate supper, so with her hand in Robert’s arm, she walked Rye’s streets ‒ passed the square-towered church to Rye’s grim old fortress, the Ypres Tower, that had endured through five centuries of weather and attack from across the Channel. Robert pointed out his firm’s offices in Watchbell Street, and took her to stand on Rye’s cliff face, looking across the Camber Sands to the ruined Castle, and beyond it to the sea that washed over what had been the town of Old Winchelsea.
‘Drowned, Jane,’ he said. ‘Drowned in one of the storms that silted up the harbours of the Cinque Ports, changed the course of the rivers, and helped make the Marsh as you see it now …’
‘It used to be a great town,’ he said as they turned back. ‘One of the greatest in the kingdom. Queen Elizabeth came here once … and of course Rye sent its quota of ships against the Armada. The beginning of the Navy, back in the days of Edward the First, came from these Ports. Great sailors, these men were ‒ great men with ships!’
‘So they are even now,’ she said dryly. ‘They make the run to France pretty quickly.’
He nodded. ‘Yes ‒ and they take risks to do it. You’ve heard, I suppose, that smugglers taken prisoner aren’t sent to gaol? ‒ as sailors they’re much too valuable to rot in prisons. They’re impressed into the Navy, and a bos’n counts himself lucky to get a Romney Marsh smuggler.’
‘Your mind turns on smugglers, doesn’t it,’ she said, forcing herself to make the remark come lightly.
‘So does the mind of everyone in these parts,’ he answered. ‘There isn’t any escaping it.’
She found sharing a meal with Robert a fascinating and unique experience. He lived in a compact little house with a walled garden, from whose windows she could see the Mermaid Inn. It was a house devoted entirely to the care and comfort of one man, and everything in it reflected taste, and a feeling for beauty. It was a man’s world, richly but soberly furnished, smelling of expensive cigars and old, fine leather. His housekeeper was a silent, neat creature long ago trained to anticipate Robert’s wants; she lived at the lower end of the town, and had learned that Robert Turnbull was a man who enjoyed his own company. After serving her excellently cooked meal, she left discreetly; they heard the door snap after her, and her footsteps on the cobbled street.
The contrast between the house and Blake’s Reach was great, and Jane found herself responding to the atmosphere. They seemed to laugh together a great deal; Robert’s attention was flattering and respectful ‒ the wine was good, and it was potent. It was a relief to talk to Robert, and to know that from him there were no secrets kept; she could talk at will about The Feathers, about Anne in London, about her visits to Hampstead ‒ even about Lord O’Neill. On only one subject did she keep silent; she never mentioned Paul Fletcher’s name. Robert sat opposite her, the candle-light keeping his face a little in shadow, and he looked like a man well content.
During the evening he had given her five hundred pounds in bank notes, and she had insisted upon a form of receipt and acknowledgement of the loan which she could sign. She felt the bulkiness of the money in her reticule as she gathered up her things and prepared to leave; suddenly she was uneasy, the enormity of what she was doing breaking upon her coldly.
As he came forward with her wrap, Robert paused. ‘Jane, what is it? What is the matter?’
She touched the reticule. ‘This money … it frightens me! Two months ago I wouldn’t have known what to do with it. Am I like Anne, do you think? ‒ or Spencer? Perhaps I’ll do nothing more than add to the debts the Blakes have piled up.’
Gently he laid the wrap about her shoulders. ‘Have courage, Jane. Nothing is won except by the daring. And even I …’
For a startled second she felt his fingers on her bare throat, a fleeting and sensitive caress, like the brush of a bird’s wing against her. She turned around. Robert held her by the shoulders. He leaned towards her slightly, and she thought he was going to kiss her. Her body went rigid in her effort not to show surprise.
Abruptly he dropped his hands and straightened.
‘No …’ He shook his head. ‘No ‒ nothing is won by those who venture nothing.’
All the way back to Blake’s Reach Jane clutched the reticule tightly to her, gritting her teeth against the jolts of the carriage and the pain that shot through her head. She had drunk too much wine; the world swam before her in a mist in which the lights of the cottages along the road were fiery blurs. But her anger and contempt for herself were living things within her, fiercer than the pain in her head, more real than the wad of money in her hands.
‘Fool!’ she told herself. ‘Fool! … fool! What a little country idiot you are that you don’t know what can be done to a man … Smile at him, listen to him, ask and take favours from him. Yes ‒ even bare your breasts for his eyes. And then you’re surprised when he wants to kiss you! You’ve made yourself into the image of the woman he loved, and you’re surprised at his caress … You thought you could play Anne’s game, but you don’t know even the first rule of it. Idiot! …’
The tears of anger and humiliation started to stream down her face, falling unheeded, and spotting the bright silk. The carriage jolted cruelly in the ruts, and she shivered and wept through the miles to Blake’s Reach.
III
When the first streak of dawn appeared across the eastern sky of the Marsh, Jane had saddled Blonde Bess and started towards Paul’s cottage. The roads were lonely and unfriendly in the grey light; the flush of the rising sun was low and small on the horizon; but the mists of the night still lay over the dykes, and wrapped like grey moss upon the trees. She would have taken to the fields, but a countless number of dykes lay between her and Old Romney ‒ some narrow and weed-choked, others wide enough to halt Blonde Bess. There were bridges, Paul had told her, but it needed years on the Marsh to remember all of them; to the stranger they were a nightmare maze. She hunched her shoulders to keep out a chill that was partly of her own imagining; it seemed to her that at this hour, between night and morning, the Marsh had slipped back to the times before its wastes had been reclaimed, when little boats carrying raiders from across the Channel had used its swampy creeks. It was eerie and silent, a land possessed of old secrets and old terrors.
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