They stopped in their tracks to listen, shivering, rain dripping from them on to the bare boards. There it was again!
‘Maybe she’s ill,’ Clementina whispered. ‘Perhaps we should go and see.’
‘Maybe pigs should fly!’
‘But what if she died?’
Alice rolled her eyes. ‘Oh, all right, come on!’
Hand in hand they approached the door. Alice knocked, gently at first and then a little louder but there was no reply except another moan.
Then Alice opened the door and they both peered in to see the governess sitting on the chair at the table and facing the door. A candle on the table illuminated her face with a flickering light, a yellow oasis in a room of darkness, and they could see that her eyes were closed.
Alice cleared her throat. ‘Are you all right, Miss Viners?’
Miss Viners gave a spine-chilling groan.
‘Bloody hell!’ Clementina whispered.
‘Miss Viners!’ Alice raised her voice. ‘Is there anything me and Miss Clementina can do?’
Another groan, even worse than the first, tore across the room.
‘Would this not put years on you?’ Alice said. ‘We’d better go in.’
Keeping close together, they made their way across to where the governess was sitting. From what they could see through the gloom, she looked a most peculiar colour.
‘I think she’s having a fit,’ Alice said.
‘What’s a fit?’ asked Clementina.
‘It’s a … it’s a… . Do you think I’ve nothing to do but stand here answering your stupid questions?’ Alice burst out in exasperation.
‘What are you going to do then?’
‘Slap her face I suppose!’
Alice never ceased to astonish Clementina. ‘Slap her face?’ the child echoed.
‘To bring her round—that’s what you’re supposed to do.’
Then to Clementina’s horror Alice suddenly gave Miss Viners not just one, but two, hefty blows across the face.
Immediately all was chaos and terror as Miss Viners jumped up and her chair crashed noisily to the ground.
‘Oh, how could you, how could you?’ She clawed at Alice, her eyes rolling like those of a madwoman. ‘You have spoiled everything just when I was making contact. I was in touch with the spirit world … I was speaking with the dead. They are here in this room …’
Alice and Clementina didn’t listen to any more. They were clinging tightly to each other and crying in high-pitched, hysterical sobs.
18
As usual, Mrs Musgrove appeared to be proved right and had her own way in the end. Alice Tait was dismissed. The outrageous accusation from the governess could not be ignored—it seemed that the dreadful girl had actually attacked the poor woman.
‘I must admit I am surprised,’ Lorianna told the housekeeper. ‘Tait always seemed quite a good-natured creature. Not very intelligent of course, but kindly.’
‘There is more to people than meets the eye, madam.’
‘We cannot give her a character, I suppose?’
Mrs Musgrove’s mouth tightened. ‘Certainly not, madam.’ Lorianna sighed. ‘Now we shall have to worry about finding another nursery-maid.’
‘Effie Summers, the under-housemaid, can clean the nursery apartments and wait on Miss Viners and Miss Clementina,’ stated Mrs Musgrove.
‘Oh, very well. I will leave you to see to it.’
‘Yes, madam.’
Lorianna was too depressed to concern herself overmuch with staffing problems. She had stopped going for her daily walks, fearing that even a stroll in the gardens might lead to a dangerous encounter. Instead, she had Jacobs take her for a drive every day, not in the open victoria but in the closed carriage; she kept the window down so that she could enjoy the air, but leaned well back in order that she would not be seen from outside.
Never had she felt so isolated, so alone. It was as if she had cut herself off completely from the rest of humanity. Even when she was entertaining visitors or making calls, she did not feel in the same world as her guests or her hostesses. Jean Dalgleish had remarked on her sad abstraction.
‘Are you feeling all right, my dear? You’ve been looking so terribly wan recently—is there something wrong?’
Lorianna shrugged. ‘I hardly know what’s wrong with me any more. Everything? Nothing?’
Her friend concentrated on pouring tea from an elegant silver teapot. ‘Well, if you were not a happily married woman I should say you were in love. But of course—forgive me, my dear, but I did get a certain impression that all was not well in your marriage. As I understood it, your dear husband was not as keen as you about having another child. I would try to speak to him again about it, if I were you. That’s what is wrong with you, I am sure, and you must make it perfectly clear to him.’
Lorianna sighed. ‘You don’t understand.’
‘Now, now, I know what you are thinking—that because Gavin makes few demands on you, he does not love you. But, my dear, I am sure it’s quite the reverse. Anyone can see he adores you. So put that silly idea out of your mind and cheer up! A little heart-to-heart with Gavin will put everything right, I am sure.’
Afterwards Lorianna considered what Jean had said about being in love. Was it love that made her, even from the shadows of the carriage, keep hoping that she would catch a glimpse of Robert Kelso, striding up the hills on foot or cantering along on horseback, his alert eyes watching the men at work? Even in the streets of Bathgate her eyes kept straying hopefully around.
And there was such an ache inside her.
Then one day she felt she could not bear it any more. The house, the carriage, Gavin, Mrs Musgrove—her whole life became suffocatingly restrictive. She flung a fur-lined cloak on top of her tea-gown and flew from the house.
Her secret gate creaked. Leaves ankle-deep rustled all around her and the lanes were lined with hazelnuts and hips and haws. Further on the cherry leaf was scarlet, the oaks like old parchment, the beech deep bronze.
From somewhere drifted a smell of wood-smoke and the smoke-scent seemed to emphasise the general stillness around her. And in the centre of that stillness she was a vale of tears. Yet the bronze beauty of the countryside affected her, enlarged her spirit and gave it room to breathe.
As if pulled by an invisible cord she continued in the direction of the farm. When she eventually entered the kitchen Kelso was on the settle, leaning forward with elbows on knees, staring into the fire. Closing the door behind her she collapsed against it, suddenly drained of energy again and deploring her outrageous behaviour.
He looked round at her without saying anything, forcing her to break the silence.
‘I felt so depressed.’ She closed her eyes, aware of the inadequacy of the words.
‘You came for comfort?’
‘I don’t know why I came.’
He approached her with slow, easy strides. ‘Don’t you?’
She felt his fingers at her neck unfastening her cloak and they brought a pulse throbbing to her throat. He flung the cloak aside and his hand smoothed round to the warm, vulnerable nape of her neck. It was then that terror engulfed her. Looking up at him, she was aware as never before what a powerfully built man he was; when he ‘attacked’ her, surely it would mean an agony far beyond even what Gavin had subjected her to, far beyond anything she could bear? Yet she could not run away now—it was as if she was hypnotised.
Both his big hands were sliding down over her shoulders now. ‘You’re trembling.’
‘Please don’t hurt me!’
‘Hurt you?’ He raised a quizzical eyebrow. ‘Why should I hurt you?’ His hands moved up to cup her head and tilt it back to accommodate his lips. Once more she found herself melting sweetly under him, absorbing the magic of him, becoming dizzy with him, dangerously light-headed, as if drinking too much champagne.
Before she had time to recover from his kiss she was swept off her feet and carried from the room. Without a word he strode alo
ng the passageway and up the narrow stairs, swinging her to one side and ducking his head because of the lack of height.
The bedroom was tiny and camceiled and the high brass bed with its fawn valance and patchwork quilt took up most of the space. He laid her down on the bed and said, ‘Take that thing off.’
Already he was unbuttoning his waistcoat and shirt and tugging out the striped cotton material from his trousers. She averted her head in a panic of conflicting emotions, fumbling inexpertly with the ribbons of her tea-gown and trying not to think, to blot all thought from her mind.
He had to help her to undress, so unused was she to attending to her own needs. By the time they were both naked and he had come into the bed beside her, Lorianna was trembling again even more violently than before. She was tensing herself and silently weeping with the knuckles of both hands pressed hard against her mouth.
‘My flower,’ he said. ‘What’s wrong? You want me to make love to you, don’t you?’
‘I’m so afraid.’
‘What’s there to be afraid of about making love?’
‘It hurts so dreadfully.’
There was a moment’s silence and then he tipped up her chin so that she had to look straight into his eyes. ‘With him,’ he said. ‘Only with him.’
Very gently he kissed her on the lips. Then he murmured against her mouth, ‘Trust me.’
Afterwards she could hardly believe it. The tender stroking, the sensitive tongue, the large fingers exploring so gently. Even when he came on top of her he supported his heavy body with his palms resting on the bed on either side of her, so that she would not feel the weight of him.
Nevertheless, when he entered her she tensed and drew back, but he continued to move smoothly, rhythmically inside her, deeper and deeper and all the time repeating softly, huskily, ‘My flower, my flower …’ Until she was hypnotised by him and drunk with him again and she began to moan in time with his movements, until her moans quickened into breathless gasps and suddenly she was left exhausted and he was lying at her side, forcing himself to take deep smooth breaths.
She could feel the slight tremor of his body. And she could hardly believe the beauty of what she had just experienced. She turned her head to look at him and after a few seconds he turned too and he smiled.
‘All right?’
In answer, she leaned her head a little closer to him so that her mouth could touch his shoulder. He stretched one arm around her and cuddled her to him.
‘All you needed was a bit of proper loving.’
Lorianna half-laughed, half-cried. ‘You sound like a doctor who has just had his diagnosis proved correct.’
‘Nothing in a bottle will make you feel as good as that, flower.’
‘I do believe you are conceited.’
‘Haven’t I a right to be after possessing a beauty like you?’
‘Am I beautiful?’
‘Well … let me see …’ He flung aside the bedclothes, making her grab at them immediately to cover her nakedness. She felt happily shy.
‘You must leave me now so that I can get dressed.’
He threw back his head in a burst of laughter and glanced sideways down at her, his silvery-grey eyes glinting. ’Must?‘
She looked at him in genuine bewilderment. ‘Yes.’
‘No.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘You don’t give me orders while you’re lying in my bed.’
‘Oh!’ she gasped in mock annoyance and gave him a playful punch. ‘What do you want me to say—please?’
‘Why not?’
‘Oh!’
He was an impossible, shocking, impertinent, quite dreadful man. And he had the most wicked eyes she had ever seen.
‘Say it!’ he ordered her.
‘Certainly not.’
‘Say it, or I shall put you over my knee right now and thrash your beautiful arse.’
‘Oh!’ She flushed scarlet at his coarseness. ‘How dare you talk to me like that!’
He tossed the cover aside, swinging his legs from the bed as with one arm he caught hold of her and began dragging her round.
‘No,’ she cried in panic. ‘Please!’
He smiled down at her, then let her go and got up to saunter over and pick up his clothes. She thought he looked beautiful; she watched him put on the coarse cheap clothes and even then he still looked beautiful. She wanted to weep at the sight of him, yet she had never felt so happy. Never in her life.
‘I’ll go down and make a pot of tea,’ he said.
For a while she lay alone in the mountainous bed with the straw mattress that fustled and rustled with every move. She just lay listening contentedly to his heavy tread in the room below, savouring how wonderful her body felt, how soothed her spirit. At last she forced herself to get dressed and go downstairs. A steaming cup of tea awaited her and she sipped it with sensuous enjoyment. Everything seemed wonderful.
‘I’ll take you home,’ he said when she had finished.
Only then did a shaft of darkness fall over the bright wonder of the day and she sighed.
‘No, I ought to go back alone.’
He saw her to the door. ‘Sweet dreams, flower.’ Already she was in a dream—walking back through the dewy wood-scented evening, a smile softening her mouth and shining in her eyes.
19
Lorianna’s ears now sharpened at any mention of him. From various conversations between Gavin and Gilbert spaced over a period of time, she pieced together different aspects of his character and different scenes. Even at dinner parties the general conversation would occasionally turn to boasting or, more often, complaining about servants. Usually it was the grieves and their feats of strength which were boasted about, although as far as the Blackwood estate was concerned it was Gilbert who did the boasting. Gavin more often complained about Robert Kelso—he never went to church, for instance, and apparently Gavin had once tackled him about it and said that he did not agree that people in his employ should not be regular churchgoers. Robert Kelso had not said anything until Gavin had pressed him for a reply; then he had simply shrugged and said, ‘Then you must disagree.’
Gavin also frowned on the fact that Kelso was not a temperance man. Indeed at harvest time there had apparently been a serious clash of wills.
It was the custom for a bucket of ale to be brought to the fields for the workers who worked all day in the heat, sometimes until the harvest sun disappeared down over the horizon. Gavin had been against the supply of ale, insisting that good spring water would serve the purpose. The grieve had been equally insistent, not arguing so much as stubbornly refusing to agree.
‘A most infuriating man,’ Gavin said, angrily polishing his glasses as he recalled the incident. ‘I told him that if we were to remain on good terms, indeed if he were to remain in my employ, he must concur with my wishes in this matter.’
Robert Kelso had apparently thought for a minute or two and then said, ‘I have no wish to find a new place, but if that’s to be the way of it I shall be leaving your service come the term day.’
‘Nothing would have pleased me better than to have allowed him to leave,’ Gavin said. ‘But at the same time I am not a fool and I know his services are too good to part with. So ale it was.’
Someone at the dinner table had laughed. ‘Well, I suppose he’s not called the Iron Man for nothing.’
Lorianna later had occasion to witness evidence of Robert Kelso’s lack of temperance principles and she had to admit to herself that she was surprised and shocked.
She and Gavin were returning from an evening at Mr and Mrs McKeiller’s house in Edinburgh. They had gone by train and alighted at Bathgate station where Jacobs was waiting for them with the coach. The station was down Whitburn Road, off the Steel Yard, and as they approached the Steel Yard, the horses clip-clopping and the light from the coach lanterns swaying and flickering, she had heard a burst of deep laughter and seen—under the pool of gaslight in front of the Railway Tavern—Robert K
elso and two or three other men in roistering mood. She could not be sure if they were actually drunk, but there was no doubt that they had been drinking.
The scene made her feel unexpectedly afraid and insecure. She had thought she knew him: a thoughtful man, a man who did not believe in wasting words; a man closely attuned to nature; an independent man whose life was regulated only by the unalterable cycle of the year. Only the turn of the seasons imposed their order on his life.
A dependable man, she had considered him. But now, seeing him in a coarse, noisy scene outside a public house, she suddenly realised he was a stranger.
The next time she visited the farmhouse she had tackled him about it, worriedly, indignantly. But all she had got for her trouble as he moved about the farm kitchen, dishing potatoes from the iron barrel of a pot on to his huge willow pattern dinner-plate, was a dismissive, ‘Be quiet, woman!’
He was, as Gavin said, a most infuriating man.
Yet she loved him. Oh, how she loved him!
She wanted to do things for him and sometimes she even tried, to his amusement, to prepare his meal—she who had never made a pot of tea in her life.
Every afternoon she went to the farmhouse, eager to be with him for the most precious hour of her day. All she lived for was to be with him. Sometimes he was not there and she would sit alone or pace the floor, listening anxiously for his heavy leisurely tread along the passage. When there was only the slow relentless tick of the clock and no sound of him, she wept with disappointment and desolation.
Next day she would angrily upbraid him. ‘I depend on your being here always,’ she would say.
And he would shake his head. ‘Don’t do that.’
‘Why not?’
‘There’s no future in it.’
‘What do you mean?’
And he would look at her sadly and say. ‘There is no future for you and me.’
She would not accept that. It was impossible to accept it.
‘But I love you.’
‘And I love you, flower.’
Lorianna was full to overflowing with hopes and plans: they would run away together!
Robert always smiled at her wild enthusiasms. ‘Where to?’
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