by Annie Groves
‘Connie, that is not true. I do,’ Ellie protested uneasily.
‘No, you don’t! You don’t care about the rest of us at all! All you care about is yourself! You are comfortable enough in Hoylake! Do you know what I think, Ellie? I think that you believe yourself too good for Friargate now, and that is why you have not done as you promised!’ Tears filled Connie’s eyes.
‘Connie, please,’ Ellie begged, but her sister hurried out of the room, letting the door slam behind her.
There! That was Connie’s dress finished and only just in time, since she was to return to the vicarage in the morning.
Lizzie would have to take the dress round to Connie for her, Ellie acknowledged, since Mr Parkes had arrived unexpectedly just over an hour ago, to announce that he had a business meeting in Preston and had decided that he would join the family dinner party that the Gibsons were holding that night.
As a special treat for her sister, Ellie had secretly made a new gown, using the dress she was trimming for her as a pattern, but copying a design Connie had been swooning over in a ladies’ magazine. She had stayed up late into the night working on it, ignoring the ache behind her eyes as she painstakingly recreated every tiny pintuck and flounce.
Rubbing her aching neck muscles tiredly, Ellie tensed as she suddenly heard raised voices from her aunt’s room, followed by the sound of breaking furniture and then a shrill scream followed by silence.
She ran out into the corridor, only to find her way blocked by Wrotham, who was barring the door to her aunt and uncle’s room.
‘Something has happened to my aunt,’ Ellie protested anxiously. ‘I must go to her.’
‘It’s nothing for you to worry about, miss,’ Wrotham told Ellie firmly. ‘The mistress just had one of her turns, that’s all. The master is with her and I am just going to get her tonic for her.’
A little uncertainly Ellie looked past the maid to the closed door.
‘You should go back to your own room, miss,’ Wrotham insisted.
‘Very well,’ Ellie agreed, ‘but if my aunt should need me…’
‘You had best be thinking about getting ready for this evening, miss,’ Wrotham told her sharply. ‘The master will not take too kindly to being kept waiting.’
A little reluctantly Ellie returned to her own room to pick up Connie’s gown, which she had thrown down in her anxiety, and to ring for Lizzie.
FOURTEEN
Gideon frowned as Rex the collie began to yip excitedly, the way he did when he knew and welcomed a caller. Closing the book on architecture which he had been reading, Gideon got up and went to the door. His frown deepened as he recognised his visitor.
‘John Pride!’ he exclaimed in astonishment. ‘What are you doing here?’
John was already down on his knees, hugging the wriggling dog, who had thrown itself at him in excited delight.
‘I came to see my dog,’ John told him gruffly. ‘We are to leave tomorrow and I could not go without doing so.’
‘Leave?’ Gideon’s heart was thudding as though he had run too fast, and a peculiar sensation he didn’t want to name was invading his body.
‘Yes. We have all been here for our cousin Cecily’s wedding – Ellie and Connie and our aunts and uncles. I would have come before, but this is the first opportunity I have had to get away,’ John explained.
Ellie was here in Preston! Gideon’s chest constricted and he struggled for breath. Anger, that was what he was feeling, anger, he told himself quickly. What did he care where Ellie Pride was? He didn’t.
Gideon looked at the down-bent tow head as John stroked the dog, guessing that the child wasn’t far from tears. He knew how much the pup had meant to John and how reluctant he had been to part with him – and all so that he could be sent to some damned school. Weren’t there schools enough in Preston, without having to send the lad to live miles away and deprive him of the company of his much-loved pet – and so soon after the loss of his mother? But according to Will Pride it had been John’s mother’s wish that he should go to Hutton.
As John rolled on the floor, playing with the dog, his shirt rode up his back, revealing three angry-looking blood-encrusted weals.
‘What the –’ Gideon began, and then stopped as John turned round.
‘My uncle gave me a whipping for not doing my Latin prep well enough,’ he told him gruffly. ‘He does not like me very much, I think. But it is not just me he beats,’ he added simply. ‘My aunt says that he always wanted children of his own, but I do not think that can be true, for he complains every time the baby cries, and my aunt has to keep him shut away whenever my uncle is there.’
Gideon listened to these artless disclosures in angry contemptuous silence.
‘Have you seen the notices for the Wild West Show, Gideon?’ John demanded eagerly. ‘I wish more than anything that I might see it. Will you be going?’
‘Perhaps, if I am not too busy.’
‘Are you busy?’ John enquired. ‘I wish I might leave school and come and live here with you, Gideon, and be your apprentice.’
‘I thought it was a balloonist or a photographer you wanted to be, not a cabinet-maker,’ Gideon reminded him drily.
‘It is,’ John agreed, unabashed, ‘but if I was your apprentice I could live here in Preston. Connie and I wanted Ellie to ask our father if we could come back to live at Friargate, but she doesn’t want to. Connie says she likes living in Hoylake and having lots of new dresses and her own maid too much to care about us!’ John told him sadly.
Gideon’s mouth hardened. He had had a lucky escape when Ellie had rejected his love, that was for sure.
‘Well, now that you have seen your dog, don’t you think you should be getting back before your family start to miss you, John?’ he prompted.
‘No.’ John’s mouth was stubborn, but his eyes were anxious with a fear that aroused all Gideon’s protective instincts as well as reinforcing his angry contempt for Ellie. ‘No, please don’t make me go back, Gideon. Please let me stay here. I won’t be any trouble, I promise.’
Gideon sighed. If he hadn’t seen those nearly fresh strap marks he might have been more inclined to cuff John’s ear and send him straight back where he belonged. As it was…
Hunkering down beside him, he said gently, ‘You know you can’t stay here, John. People are going to miss you and –’
‘No they won’t,’ John insisted. ‘Not yet. They – my aunt and uncle and the others – are to go to our Aunt Gibson’s for dinner tonight, but I am to stay behind at the Bull.’
Gideon gave another small sigh and caved in. ‘I was just about to take Rex for a bit o’ a walk,’ he told John. ‘You could come along with us, if you like, but then it’s straight back to the Bull.’
‘Connie, if you do know where John has gone then please tell us now,’ Ellie begged her younger sister frantically.
They were all in a private salon at the hotel: their Aunt and Uncle Parkes; their Aunt and Uncle Jepson, who had, half an hour ago, discovered that John was missing and raised the alarm; and their Aunt and Uncle Simpkins, summoned from their accommodation to join in the outcry about John’s disappearance and to add their own measure of critical disapproval of his behaviour. And, of course, Ellie, torn between anxiety over her missing brother, and her desire to find a way to placate their angry relatives.
Connie, who had been the last person to see John, was tearful but stubbornly refusing to say a single word to indicate whether or not she knew where John might be. Uncle Parkes was coldly grim-faced as he listened to Uncle Jepson’s furious tirade against John, whilst Aunt Jepson bemoaned his lack of gratitude for the care they had given him.
Aunt Parkes, in contrast, had said nothing, her fingers tugging anxiously at the collar of pearls covering the whole of her throat from just beneath her chin to her collarbone, along which Ellie could see the beginnings of an angry graze, obviously caused earlier when she had fallen. As she lifted her arm, Ellie also noticed the beginnings of a bruise swe
lling the pale skin.
‘Connie, if you know anything about John’s disappearance,’ Ellie whispered to her sister, ‘then –’
‘Do you think I would tell you if I did?’ Connie whispered back furiously. ‘If John wants to see his dog –’
The dog! Of course. Why on earth hadn’t she thought of that?
Under cover of their older relatives’ angry discussion, Ellie looked at her sister. Connie’s defiant expression gave her away immediately.
‘Connie, why didn’t you tell me?’ Ellie demanded.
‘Why should I?’ Connie hissed back. ‘I told John that we can’t go back home because of you and he hates you for it as much as I do.’
Ellie could have cried. Torn between a juvenile desire to defend herself and a more mature need to protect her siblings, she felt both deserted and to blame. Bleakly she recognised how alone she was, and how afraid that made her feel. And all the time inside her head there was still that shocking image of her father in bed with that woman!
There was no one she could turn to – no one at all.
But right now what mattered more than her own feelings was getting John back before he got into any more trouble. It was still an hour before they were due to leave for Winckley Square, and so Ellie excused herself and hurried from the room.
There was no time for her to change out of her evening finery – and she had no idea where Gideon Walker was living. Neither could she bring herself to return to Friargate to ask her father, but she suspected that her uncle, Will Pride, would know.
In her bedroom, Ellie pulled on a coat over her gown, and then hurried downstairs, leaving the Bull by a rear entrance. Her uncle lived on the opposite side of the town to the Bull and Royal, and the easiest way to get there, without drawing attention to herself in her finery, would be for her to cut through the park.
Wryly, Gideon slowed his step to match John’s dragging feet. It was growing late and Gideon’s belly was grumbling with hunger, but he could sense John’s reluctance to return to his family.
They had left the river and crossed into the park, somewhere that Gideon avoided whenever he could. For him, the park and Ellie were inextricably linked.
Rex, tired after his walk and content to lollop at Gideon’s side, suddenly gave an excited whine and started to run. Up ahead of them a young woman was hurrying in the direction of the park, the thin coat she had on doing little to conceal the expensive elegance of the evening dress she was wearing beneath it, her golden hair framing her face.
As she heard the dog she stopped and turned, stretching out her hands to fend off its enthusiastic greeting.
At Gideon’s side, John burst out in a voice of wary dismay, ‘Ellie!’ But Gideon hadn’t needed John’s recognition of his sister to tell him who the young woman was.
Across the distance separating them he could sense her stillness, his heart angered by the hauteur of her erect carriage. It was obvious that she considered herself too good to come to them, Gideon seethed, but, even as he formed the thought, suddenly Ellie came hurrying towards them. When she reached them her face was flushed, and Gideon saw how her hand trembled as she reached out to touch John, who immediately stepped back from her.
‘John, John, quickly. We must get back. You are in such trouble,’ Ellie told him. ‘You should not –’
‘You can’t tell me what to do, Ellie,’ John burst out, knuckling his eyes with his fists in a gesture that betrayed rather than hid his tears, and which tore at Ellie’s sensitive heart. She ached to put her arms around him and hug him but sensed that he would reject her if she did.
All the time she was talking to John, Ellie was hideously conscious of Gideon’s presence. Her heart had almost burst out of her body when she had seen the dog come racing towards her and had then looked up and seen John and Gideon. When she had hurried out to find John she had not given a thought to how it might affect her to see Gideon! The stays Lizzie had laced in to narrow her waist made it hard enough for her to run and breathe without Gideon adding to her weakness.
Ellie could feel her whole face burning – and not just her face. The imploring hand she had lifted towards John had started to tremble, and quickly she snatched it back.
Ellie looked just as he might have imagined, Gideon decided bitterly. That fancy dress her coat was doing little to conceal must have cost a pretty penny, and probably as much as he earned in a full quarter! Beneath the fine fabric he could see Ellie’s breasts rising and falling with the quickness of her breathing, caused no doubt by her temper at being thus put out by her brother. What would she say if he were to pull up young John’s shirt and show her the marks on his back? Didn’t he already know from John just how little Ellie cared about her siblings? Bitterness hardened his mouth and his eyes, and he was looking at her with contempt, and Ellie, seeing it, felt as though he had struck her.
Gideon had changed, Ellie decided, unable to stop herself from stealing a quick greedy look at him whilst John clung to his dog. His shoulders had broadened and so, surely, had his chest. Ellie blushed at the waywardness of her thoughts. Gideon’s body hair would not be grey, it would be dark and silky and…Ellie discovered that she was trembling.
‘John, come along. We must return,’ she insisted, anger quickening her to attack as she saw the contempt with which Gideon was regarding her. ‘This is all your fault,’ she told him, unable to hold back the words. ‘If you had not encouraged him to –’
‘Whoa there,’ Gideon stopped her, his mouth folding into an angry rebuttal of her accusation. ‘This is none of my doing. Young John here took it upon himself to come looking for his pet. Not that I wouldn’t have taken the dog to see John myself had I thought we would be welcome,’ he added pointedly.
It pleased Gideon to see the way her face burned, and to know too that she needed his co-operation to persuade John, now glued to his side, to go back with her.
With every word Ellie had said John had crept closer to Gideon, and Ellie felt her heart turn over as she looked at them both.
‘John, we must get back,’ she repeated. John was just behaving like this because he was missing his dog, Ellie tried to reassure herself. It had always been their mother’s intention that he should go to Hutton. All boys hated school.
John was leaning into Gideon’s side and Gideon had his hand on John’s shoulder in a gesture of comfort and masculine solidarity. Ellie felt a fresh spurt of anger burn through her as she looked pointedly at Gideon, forcing herself to meet his gaze. His eyes were openly mocking her, taunting her, Ellie recognised bitterly. Instinctively she knew that if he chose to do so, Gideon could walk away from her and take John with him, and that her brother would follow him willingly. What would happen if she returned to the Bull and Royal without her brother? She had already been gone far longer than she had intended, and her absence was bound to have been noticed.
In desperation she insisted, ‘John, it is already a quarter to the hour and I am to be at our Aunt Gibson’s for the hour. We must go.’
‘Yes, John, you must not delay your sister in her entertainment,’ Gideon cut across her, his mouth twisting unkindly.
But as Ellie stared at him, her face burning beneath his insulting scrutiny, he pushed John towards her, and leashed the dog.
Even through her own disruptive emotions, Ellie still felt a sharp pang of pain for her brother as he bent to give Rex a fierce hug.
Over John’s head, his voice so low that only Ellie could hear, Gideon said softly to her, ‘You cannot know how pleased I am to have had this chance of meeting with you. Or how much it means to me,’ he added, his voice even lower.
Ellie’s emotions were in turmoil. Without knowing she had done so she took a step towards Gideon, driven by something inside her that was beyond her control. ‘Gideon…’ His name whispered past her lips.
‘Yes?’ Gideon swept her face with an acid look. ‘Aye, it’s just as I thought! Seeing you like this has made me thank God that you are no longer in my life! In fact, I cannot
imagine why I was ever foolish enough to believe I loved you. You are wearing a fine and expensive gown, Miss Pride,’ he told her tauntingly, ‘but your fine clothes cannot hide your true nature. I am grateful that I have been spared the fate that has been handed to your brother and sister, and that my future happiness does not lie in your hands. Aye, for had it done, I know that there would be no happiness for me.’
Then, without giving Ellie a chance to say anything, he turned round and said firmly to John, ‘John, you had best go with your sister, but I promise you that Rex will be safe with me.’
With that he turned on his heel and started to walk away from them, leaving Ellie to stand staring after him, consumed with pain and humiliation.
They had almost reached the Bull and Royal when John burst out, ‘Why didn’t you marry Gideon, Ellie? If you had done so then we would all have been happy, because Connie and me and the baby could have lived with you.’
And then he ran the rest of the distance to the hotel, leaving her to follow him.
The aunts and uncles were lined up waiting in the private parlour, immediately demanding an explanation for Ellie’s absence, whilst her Uncle Jepson had grabbed hold of John by his ear and was loudly berating him.
‘How dare you leave this place without my permission? A sound whipping is what you deserve, my lad, and a sound whipping is what you shall get.’
Ellie stiffened, all her protective instincts aroused at this threat to her brother.
‘No,’ she protested. ‘You must not blame John, Uncle. I am the one who is to blame. Until Connie reminded me, I had forgotten that John had asked me if it would be all right for him to go and see his dog.’ Ellie could see the fury in her uncle’s eyes but she refused to be cowed by it. She would not stand by and see her brother whipped!
‘Indeed, and since when have you had the authority to say what anyone should and shouldn’t have permission to do, miss?’ her Aunt Emily demanded peevishly.
