by Nancy Carson
She gasped, suddenly trembling, and stared blankly ahead at the windscreen that was starting to mist up, trying to grasp the meaning of his words. It was true that since the stock market crash their relationship had changed. He’d become increasingly disinterested in her, aloof, and sometimes even terse, which had hurt her beyond measure. It had even crossed her mind that perhaps marriage was no longer a foregone conclusion. But, always believing she had his devout love, she silently forgave him and told herself his financial worries were the cause of it, and she should understand.
But this…
‘I see,’ she said quietly, her heart pounding, her mind a-whirl with shock and profound disappointment. ‘No, Billy, that’s a lie. I don’t see… Why should it be all over between us? We love each other…Why? I don’t understand.’
‘Because it’s over.’
‘But I thought you loved me. You’ve told me often enough.’
‘Oh, I did love you, Henzey. I still do in a way, I suppose.’
‘You suppose? Well if you suppose you still do, why do you say it’s all over between us? I really don’t understand.’ He remained silent and she prompted him for an answer. She could hardly let it rest there after all. ‘Tell me, Billy. What’s brought all this on? I think I have a right to know.’
‘I’m about to tell you. But you’re not going to like it…’
‘Just tell me, Billy.’
‘I’m getting married, Henzey.’
‘Married?’ she cried with incredulity. ‘Married to who?’
He sucked ardently on his cigarette again and opened the quarterlight to let out smoke that was filling the car. ‘To Nellie.’
She gasped, as if she’d been punched in the stomach. ‘To Nellie Dewsbury?’ Then she smiled in realisation. ‘I don’t believe you. You’re just trying to kid me, aren’t you? You’re just testing me, to see how much I can take…Aren’t you?’
‘No, I’m not testing you, Henzey. It’s true. I’m getting married to Nellie. It’s all arranged.’
In horror, she buried her head in her hands, trying to make sense of this calamity. ‘But you don’t even like her. You said so yourself. So why are you marrying her? It doesn’t make sense. It doesn’t make any sense at all.’
‘I’m marrying her because she’s pregnant.’
‘Oh, God! Are you saying you got her pregnant?’ She watched him, waiting for his reply. But he said nothing. ‘How do you know it’s you that got her pregnant? It might have been somebody else.’
‘No, it was me.’
He looked sad now, very serious, and she at once wondered whether marrying Nellie might be something he regretted having to do. It gave her renewed hope.
‘Just because she’s pregnant, it doesn’t mean you have to marry her. You don’t have to marry her if you don’t want to.’
‘Henzey, it’s not just because she’s pregnant,’ he sighed. ‘I do happen to love the girl.’
‘But you just said you still love me. How can you love us both?’
He shrugged, pulling on his cigarette. ‘I’ve always thought a lot of you, Henzey, and I’ve enjoyed our times together.’ He turned to look at her briefly. ‘But before I was in love with you I was in love with Nellie…And we had a good time of it really. In the end she was the stronger pull.’ He shrugged, as if further explanation was irrelevant.
‘So you’ve been seeing her on the nights you didn’t see me?’
‘Something like that.’
‘And you’ve made her pregnant…I can’t believe it.’
‘Oh, she’s pregnant all right.’
‘So you’re marrying her because of that?’
‘And because I love her.’
‘You could marry me, Billy. You know I want us to get married. I’ve always wanted it. And I’d be a good wife to you, you know that. Better than Nellie Dewsbury. Anyway, how do you know I’m not pregnant? Or doesn’t it matter if I am?’ She thought she saw him smile, almost mocking, and felt deeply hurt by it.
‘You’re not pregnant, Henzey,’ he scoffed. ‘I know that much. If you are, it’s not mine. I’ve been very careful with you. Very careful.’
At this insinuation she felt tears well up in her eyes, but her indignation forced them back. How could he think such a thing? ‘Then let’s hope you’re right. Let’s hope I’m not pregnant. But you’ve got a nerve suggesting it wouldn’t be yours.’ If only she were having his baby. Next to losing him, it was the greatest disappointment of her life that she was not, for then she would have some hope to cling to, something to fight Nellie Dewsbury with. But he was right; she was not pregnant and she was as certain of it as he. He had been very careful lately. So why on earth hadn’t he exercised the same due care with her?
He held his wrist up to the light from outside and looked at his watch. ‘I’ll have to go.’
‘Go then,’ she said, with a feeble attempt at indifference. But her heart was screaming out for him to take her in his arms, to tell her that he was just testing her after all. ‘So where are you going all dressed up like that?’
‘To a dinner party at the Dewsburys. I’m late already.’
‘To celebrate your engagement I shouldn’t be surprised.’ Tears prickled her eyes again but she forced them back. In a sudden spurt of defiance she opened the car door and let herself out. ‘Have a nice time,’ she called, scarcely able to believe she’d torn herself away as she slammed it shut.
It was biting cold, but as she began walking back up the station drive she hardly noticed it. She was hardly aware of where she was going, of what she was doing. She was, however, aware of him drawing alongside her in his car; of him opening the window and leaning over towards her.
‘Get in, Henzey. I’ll take you back home. Come on, get back in.’
‘It doesn’t matter,’ she replied, not yet fully comprehending why all this had happened. She tried to sound hurt and haughty, but all the time she was longing to get back into the car, to be with him. Only her injured pride was preventing her. ‘You’re late already. I don’t want you to be even later on my account.’
‘Come on. I shan’t ask you again.’
She wanted to say that if ever he needed her he should send for her, that nothing should keep them apart, certainly not Nellie Dewsbury. But she could not bring herself to say it. She had too much self-esteem; deep down she was aware he did not deserve such an offer.
‘Come on, it’s the least I can do.’
His voice seemed a long way away and she felt that her heart had spiralled into a deep chasm of loneliness, as if she were the only person left in the world, as if nobody cared for her, or ever would again. He didn’t want her any more but he was calling her back, as if giving her a lift home would appease his guilt.
‘Oh, Billy,’ she cried, ‘The least you can do now is leave me alone. Please?’
He shrugged and drove off.
It was about half past seven when she got out of bed. She put on her dressing gown and stood shivering at the window that overlooked the back of the house and the field. Dawn was breaking, but daylight was still a drab, grey hour away. She heard Richard’s infant voice as he cried to be fed, then a bump as her mother got out of bed to suckle him. Then all went quiet while his hunger was satisfied.
That dismal morning there was within Henzey a pain so deep that it seemed to ooze uncontrolled from some part of her too out-of-the-way to have experienced feelings before. Never had she known such despair. There seemed to be an aching, throbbing void where her heart should be gently beating. She felt empty and desolate. Mentally she’d had no time to come to terms with this anguish. All her dreams had been shattered, all her hopes destroyed. Her life was in ruins and was not worth the living. It had crumbled, and lay in ashes.
Vacantly, she gazed out. Had she been able to see herself in the darkness she would have seen how pale she was, how her normally sparkling eyes were puffy and red. She took her saturated handkerchief and wiped her nose. She had cried so much, alone in the night, t
hat she must surely have no more tears left to cry. Was it her own fault for thinking him so godlike and perfect? Had she been a fool for trusting him in the same way that she herself could be trusted? Had she brought this dark, sinister shadow of disillusionment upon herself? Maybe she had. But it was the principle of trust that mattered. It was that fundamental, basic ethic and his total disregard for it that had really shaken her. He had taken her trust and betrayed it as if it never existed; as if it was of no significance whatsoever. This was the galling part. This was what really hurt deep inside. Having believed he was perfect, it turned out he was not. Far from it, he had many faults, and would that she had recognised them long ago. His shortcomings would never have restrained her love, but an awareness of them might have enabled her to make some allowances, or given her at least some insight into the sort of deeds of which he was capable. She had her faults, too, and many they were, but betraying a trust was not one of them.
There was the possibility, of course, that this was all a horrible dream, that not a minute too soon she would wake up and all would be as it should be. But no. This was no dream. Nor even a nightmare. For nightmares ended. This trauma could go on for ever.
She heard her mother cooing contentedly to the baby, then Jesse coughed and murmured something. A door opened on the landing; Jesse’s bare feet padded on the oil-cloth when he visited the bathroom; the bathroom door shut, quietly. She heard an intermittent trickling as Jesse’s lengthy pee alternated between the sides of the pan and the water contained in it; then the amazing sound, as of somebody ripping a piece of best barathea, as he broke first wind of the day. The cistern flushed.
Henzey ignored the habitual sounds of morning and continued to look out of the window with this intolerable ache in her heart. Dawn was breaking so painfully. The happiness of the last ten months had vanished overnight. Now all she possessed of him were memories. Now she could only imagine him caressing her. He might as well have never existed. Never again would she thrill to his touch, nor feel the excitement of his kisses, nor indulge the yearning for his love. And that longing would take years to diminish, if ever.
Such was her commitment to him that she had always commenced love-making with little thought for the likely consequences. If she had become pregnant, then so be it; marriage would have been the remedy. At least that’s how it had been until yesterday; or, rather, that’s how she believed it had been. But what if she were pregnant after all, now that he had gone? What if she found out in a few weeks’ time that she was indeed carrying his child? If only! She would endure it gladly. It would be nothing compared to this heartbreak. A child would at least be a part of him; a souvenir of that love which would doubtless last her lifetime. She searched her memory for occasions since her last monthly bleeding when she might have been at risk, but either he, or providence, had ordained that there were none. He had been extra careful. Each time they made love lately, he had used a sheath. In the beginning, of course, he had not, but for some reason lately he had.
An early blackbird stalked the stunted, winter grass of the field in search of his breakfast. He tapped the turf with his beak as if it were a trapdoor, then tugged at a worm when it answered. If only it were always that easy to get what you want, Henzey thought.
She became aware of the clammy cold creeping over her skin and she shivered. Her bare feet were like ice on the oilcloth, and her fingers were numb. She huddled inside her dressing gown and quit the cheerless, misty view in favour of her bed. The bedclothes were still warm and she hunched under them again, desperately pining for her lost love, profoundly miserable, until she fell back to sleep and dreamed more of him and Nellie Dewsbury.
It was five to ten when her mother came into her room and woke her, carrying a cup of hot tea. Lizzie put down the tea at the side of the bed and flung open the curtains. Henzey stirred and frowned at the invading light.
‘Come on, madam, rouse yourself,’ Lizzie said. ‘It’s nearly ten.’ Henzey sat up drowsily, reluctantly, and yawned, her hair bedraggled, her eyes still puffy and red. ‘Whatever’s the matter, our Henzey? You’ve been crying.’ Henzey reached down for the cup of tea and asked how Richard was, avoiding her mother’s eyes. But Lizzie was not to be side-tracked. ‘What’s the matter, my flower? Why’ve you been crying?’
Henzey sipped her hot tea and savoured its sweet warmth. It was like a warming elixir to her dry, dingy mouth, good to the taste, somehow regenerative. She gave a deep, shuddering sigh.
‘Oh, it’s him, Mom.’
‘What about him?’
‘We’ve finished.’
‘Finished?’
Henzey nodded in confirmation and shrugged miserably.
‘Oh…I thought you’d come home early last night. Well, I can’t say as I’m sorry, our Henzey. I was never that keen on him. He was too fly for you, my darling. Anyway, what happened? D’you want to tell me?’
‘He’s been seeing that Nellie Dewsbury again – the one he used to court before me – Councillor Dewsbury’s daughter. He’s put her in the family way.’ She sighed again.
‘He’s what?’
She placed her cup of tea down, still avoiding her mother’s eyes. ‘Oh, you heard me right, Mom. She’s in the family way.’
Lizzie’s face was a mask of resentment. ‘Oh, my flower, what a dirty trick. I can see you’re hurt, our Henzey. I am sorry.’ Despite her dislike of Billy, Lizzie could not help but sympathise with her daughter, since it had been obvious all along that she was besotted. And yet she felt a great relief that he was all at once out of her life.
‘Of course I’m hurt, Mom. I idolise him. I trusted him.’
‘I know,’ she said comfortingly. ‘And I daresay the hurt will last a month or two. But it won’t last for ever, believe me. We’ve all been through the mill, our Henzey, and we all have to go through it at some time or other. If we had no bad times we wouldn’t appreciate the good times. I went through it enough with your father. More than three years of torture I had with him away in the war, God bless him, not knowing whether he was dead or alive from one day to the next. When he finally came home it was just as heartbreaking to see him, the state he was in.’
Henzey nodded. Having tasted real love herself she could at last appreciate the torment her mother had suffered. ‘Did it make you cry, Mom?’
‘Our Henzey, my heart would break a hundred times a day. Every time I thought of him, imagining him shot, lying dead in some filthy muddy trench. I was frightened to answer the door in case it was a telegram.’
Henzey shook her head in sympathy, trying to imagine it. But it did not make her own situation any more tolerable. It did not make the raw wound in her heart any easier to bear. She broke down again in a flood of tears.
‘It doesn’t help knowing he’s been lying with her in her bed when I trusted him. He knew how I felt about him, Mom. Why did he have to do that? Wasn’t I good enough for him?’
‘Not good enough for him? Huh! Too good, I should say.’ Lizzie put a consoling arm around Henzey’s shoulders and felt her shake with sobbing. ‘There’s worse could happen. What if you were pregnant yourself?’
‘You need have no fear.’
‘Lucky for him then, else there’d be hell to pay. He’d think his father’s firecoal had come.’
Henzey saw it differently. Had she been pregnant she might now be making plans for her own wedding, instead of being tormented by Nellie’s. They were silent for a few minutes while Henzey wiped her tears and blew her nose, trying to regain some composure.
Lizzie tightened her lips in agitation. What Billy had done came as no great surprise, but it sickened her all the same. She said, ‘I knew he’d bring you heartache. At first he seemed all right, but it didn’t take me long to see what he was really like. Count your blessings, my girl, that you’re free of him. He’ll be no good to any woman, and that includes Nellie Dewsbury. If one woman isn’t enough, twenty aren’t too many. You’re best off without him, take it from me.’
‘But I l
ove him, Mom.’ The tears flowed again with renewed vigour. ‘I love him and I can’t help it. And I was that sure he loved me…I still believe he loves me. I really can’t understand why he’s done it.’ She wiped her eyes again to stem another flood of tears. ‘He always said he loved me. I know he meant it.’
‘He told you he loved you ’cause you looked good on his arm, my flower. If he really loved you, why did he do that? Why’s he been having it off with Councillor Dewsbury’s daughter?’
Henzey shook her head. ‘I don’t know why. I wish I did.’
‘I bet I know.’
Henzey looked up at Lizzie through a haze of tears. ‘Why d’you reckon he’s done it then?’
‘Money. It’s obvious. He’s lost his and you’ve got none. But the Dewsburys have got plenty.’
Henzey pondered hard her rejection while Lizzie continued to console her. In the beginning they, Henzey and he, were so engrossed in each other that the prospect of a child would merely have accelerated a marriage, of that she was sure, even though the possibility had remained unspoken. A love child would have been so romantic, too; so romantic that they could have overlooked any social denigration. But was money really the reason he had started to see Nellie again? Was it really because he was broke and needed her to get back in the financial swim? If so, he must have intended to make her pregnant. That, in turn, must eliminate the possibility of him fathering a child elsewhere, since if she, Henzey, also became pregnant it would foil his plan and thus his future. Perhaps that was why he had begun to use those French letters.
It was beginning to make sense.
Ever since the stock market crash last October she might have seen this heartbreak coming, but she was not of a cynical enough nature to have spotted it. To insinuate himself with Nellie and her family was the only way he saw of securing his financial future, and to put Nellie in the family way made his position rock solid. Henzey began to wonder whether he realised it was a short-sighted view, recalling what he had told her of her moods and tantrums. Perhaps she had been the biggest fool that ever wore a pair of shoes for believing she could compete with Nellie. Nellie came from a wealthy family; had had a privileged education; boasted incomparable looks and elegance. So, despite her failings, she still had plenty going for her.
