The Hungry Tide

by Valerie Wood

  John ignored the question and looked so solemn that Isaac too grew serious. ‘And if I do not make a good contract? If the woman I wish to marry has nothing, no dowry to bring, what then?’

  A flush came to Isaac’s face. ‘Why, then I must think again about your inheritance if you are foolhardy enough to make an inappropriate match.’ He stopped as a memory long gone raised its head. What was it? Some girl and John in his youth, some fifteen, sixteen years ago when they first came here? He sighed, he couldn’t remember, his memory was failing.

  ‘I have Lucy to consider, you realize,’ he said rather sharply. ‘You must be mindful that she will be in your charge when I am gone, until she marries that is; and I cannot risk her losing her dowry should your wife not have money of her own to fritter away.’

  He saw the expression of hurt on John’s face. ‘I’m sorry, John, it isn’t a matter of trust, but you know that that is how things are done.’ He leant forward and spoke quietly. ‘You and I both know that there are ways around this situation.’ He waved a finger con- spiratorially. ‘Marry well, and take your pleasure elsewhere if you are so inclined.’

  John bowed stiffly to his uncle, his face cold and pale. ‘As I said, sir, I wished only to know your views and you have explained them perfectly. There will be no question of my having an illicit relationship. None whatsoever. When I make the decision, I intend to make only one contract and no other.’

  Mrs Masterson and Lucy didn’t return until November, and then with some reluctance, Lucy complaining bitterly that she was missing dozens of parties and balls, and enthusing about the quality of the players who graced the stages of the London theatres. She clasped her hands in ecstasy as she told Sarah of the night when she had seen the Prince Regent, and that she was sure that he had noticed her for he gave a slight bow in her direction.

  ‘But Cassandra Hamilton seemed to think, quite wrongly of course, that he was looking towards her.’ She laughed playfully and shook her curls in an affected manner. ‘We all know that he prefers ladies of a fair complexion.’

  Sarah waited patiently for Lucy to finish so that she might ask to be excused. It hadn’t been easy reorganizing the household whilst her mother had been ill, but she had found a woman from Tillington who was a good plain cook, and with Mr Masterson’s approval had taken on two more housemaids to clean the house, which had assumed a neglected look in spite of Lizzie’s and Janey’s efforts.

  ‘And, speaking of Cassandra Hamilton, what do you think?’ Lucy once more had claimed Sarah for her confidante.

  Sarah shook her head. She had no wish to know.

  ‘She’s promised to Mr Anderson! He’s spoken to her father already.’ Lucy’s face was animated and she waited expectantly for Sarah’s response.

  ‘I’m delighted for them,’ she replied evenly. ‘I can’t think of a couple more suited.’ She suppressed a shudder as she recalled the unwanted embrace of the odious Bertram Anderson, and even felt a little sympathy for the disdainful Miss Hamilton who was seemingly willing to join her life to his.

  Lucy dropped her voice. ‘Of course there is a whisper that he’s quite a philanderer, but from what I understand of it, one needs a man of experience when contemplating marriage – you know what I mean, Sarah?’ She nodded her head significantly and pursed her lips.

  ‘No, Miss Lucy, I’m afraid I don’t know, and I must ask you to excuse me, I have duties to attend to before supper.’ She gave a small curtsey and left the room before Lucy could bid her stay. She was dismayed by Lucy’s attitude, and saddened that she had acquired this thin veil of worldly sophistication since her stay in the capital.

  Mrs Masterson too had come home demanding change. The house had to be redecorated in the brighter colours she had seen in London houses. The withdrawing room was to be papared with red, embossed wallpaper, new carpets ordered and sparkling chandeliers chosen from Italian catalogues. The staff were given new uniforms and their old ones given to the poor.

  She hesitated over Sarah, not knowing in which category to place her, as she had in her mother’s absence taken on the temporary role of housekeeper. After some thought she had had made for her a dark grey dress with a large white collar. Had she intended to subdue the girl’s colouring with the shade, then her plans were thwarted, for Sarah’s hair stood out like a flame above the dark material.

  Isaac, as soon as he was able, took himself back to his comfortable office in Hull. Though he was still in some discomfort and walked with a limp, leaning heavily on his cane, there were times when he preferred the bustle of the busy town and the rough voices of the seamen to the constant demands of Isobel and the mindless chatter and complaints of Lucy. He thought with pleasure of the gentle care Sarah had given him before his wife and daughter had returned. She had known in some inexplicable way when the pain was unbearable and stayed by his side, soothing him with medication and soft words, and withdrawing quietly when he needed to be alone. But she’d stopped coming after his wife’s return, as if sensing her displeasure, and confined herself to running the household as Mrs Masterson demanded.

  ‘Can I talk to you, Fayther?’ Deliberately Sarah had sought her father out as he walked home towards Field House after his day’s work.

  She had watched him as he appeared over the fields with a sack of kindling over his shoulders and a pair of rabbits tied to a stick. He walked now with a slight stoop and, although he was wearing his long, strong knee boots which Mr Masterson had made for him every year, he limped badly as if in pain. His old wound had opened up and was often raw and bloody.

  ‘Aye, lass. What brings thee out of ’house. No work to do?’

  She smiled ironically. ‘There’s always work to do at the Hall. Mrs Masterson never seems to be satisfied, nothing is ever quite right for her.’

  ‘Aye, well, thy ma is about ready to go back. She seems to be ’only one who can please ’mistress. I try to keep out of her road, she’s never got a civil word for me, but then she never did.’

  A cold, hard look passed across his face momentarily and Sarah was surprised, for her father didn’t often complain, but it was gone in seconds and his eyes, which reflected the colour of the sea, smiled down at her. ‘But it doesn’t matter, Sal. We are very, very lucky. Tha won’t appreciate what we’ve got, having always had advantages. Tha’s never had owt different, but had we been still in ’town, why, thy ma would have died with this fever. We might even have been in ’charity home afore now.’

  ‘I know, Fayther.’ She had heard this tale so often in one form or other, always from her father, never from her mother. It was as if he was constantly having to convince himself that he had done the right thing in bringing them here. ‘That’s what I want to talk to you about. About Garston Hall!’

  ‘Aye, what about Garston Hall?’

  ‘I – I don’t think I can stay there any longer.’ Her words came out in a rush. ‘I don’t seem to fit in any more. There isn’t a place for me.’

  ‘No place for thee? There’s always a place there, for all of us, tha knows that. We have that security for ever. ’Mastersons would never turn us out, never. Look how Ma Scryven spent her last years there, even though she couldn’t do much work. Nay, only if we did summat really bad – otherwise we’re here for ever.’

  He narrowed his eyes. ‘Tha’s not been upsetting Miss Lucy? Or—’ A sudden possibility crossed his mind. ‘Tha’s not been getting into trouble in London – stepping out of turn?’

  ‘Stepping out of turn! Would I do that, Fayther? Am I not always so careful not to offend that it’s second nature to me?’

  ‘Then what is it, lass?’ It was unusual for Sarah to become so agitated.

  ‘There isn’t a place for me there any more. Miss Lucy doesn’t need me. Oh, she thinks she does, when she wants someone to listen to her gossip, but she will be going away again soon and she might or might not expect me to go too. Or else I will be expected to stay here and become a housemaid under Ma.’

  Will grew angry, his temper s
wift to rise. ‘And is tha too good for that, miss? It seems to me that tha’s getting ideas above thy station.’

  ‘No, Fayther, you know that isn’t true! And you were the one who said that I would be wasted just being a servant, remember?’

  He did remember, and he recalled, too, how proud they had all been of her intelligence and cleverness and her ability to read and write.

  ‘I know, lass,’ he said more gently. ‘But tha can go no further, at least, not unless tha leaves Monkston, and tha won’t do that.’

  No, she wouldn’t do that. Couldn’t do that. Especially not now, not whilst there was a possibility of seeing John. And that was another difficulty. When he came to visit Garston Hall they had to be so careful not to be seen alone together, but sometimes their eyes would meet and it was as if there was no-one else in the room; when she felt as if his lips were touching hers and she could hear his soft whispered words in her ears. But she knew that Lucy had eyes like a hawk and sooner or later she or Mrs Masterson would start to become suspicious.

  ‘Sarah? Tha won’t leave Monkston?’ Her father repeated himself as he saw an obscure shadow flit across her face.

  ‘What? Oh no, never. Fayther – what if I should want to get married?’

  He laughed. ‘Tha can’t do that, lass. Tha’s too good for most of ’men around here.’

  ‘So!’ She laughed back, sharing the joke with him, her lips smiling but her eyes anxious. ‘I’ll have to choose a gentleman then, someone rich and handsome?’

  His smile died away and he shook his head. ‘I’m right sorry for thee, Sarah, tha’s fallen between two stools. There’s no gentleman will have thee to wed, not without becoming a laughing stock.’ He put both his hands around her face and lovingly stroked her cheeks, and she could smell the blood of the rabbits on his fingers. ‘And don’t ever think on becoming somebody’s doxy – for I’d kill thee first, and him as well.’

  It was a cold, bleak February before she finally made up her mind. She had spent many long, lonely hours over the last few weeks walking along the cliff top, buffeted by the strong winds which blew in vigorously from across the sea and which whipped her skirts and cloak with such ferocity it was as if they were trying to tear them from her. It was almost like a battle and she leaned into the icy gusts, forcing herself on and defying the elements to do their worst. At times she cried out aloud, ‘You can’t deny me, I belong here. This is mine.’

  She took shelter when the weather was particularly bad in the doorway of Ma Scryven’s cottage, crouched down in the corner so that the drips from the bedraggled old thatch didn’t run down her neck, and it was as she was there one wild and gusty day, looking seawards at the pitching and plunging of the white seahorses on the boisterous grey water, that she remembered that she had been given the key, that the cottage now was hers, to do with as she wished.

  She got up from her uncomfortable position on the doorstep and gathering her cloak around her went into the garden. It was wild and overgrown, and swathes of bramble smothered what had once been the old woman’s flourishing glory of colour, scent and herbal splendour. She sadly ran her fingers through a battered lavender hedge and the perfume rose up towards her, invoking memories of her first visit here with her mother, when she’d scattered sprigs of lavender and sweet smelling rose petals and delighted in their faded and delicate colours.

  ‘Tha must take my place,’ Ma Scryven had said. ‘Put aside thine own desires.’ Sarah sighed deeply. She had made herbal preparations for her mother and Mr Masterson when they were ill; she had been hesitant about doing so for it had been a long time since she had made any remedies, but it had come back to her, easier than she had thought it would, as she remembered Ma Scryven’s instructions from a long time ago.

  ‘We buy it in the market.’ She remembered the comment from Rose, Miss Pardoe’s maid, as they’d unpacked the lavender-fragrant gowns from the travelling trunks. ‘We don’t have the bother of growing it.’

  Well, it’s no bother to me, she thought excitedly, her heart thumping furiously as an idea grew into a positive thought. She looked more closely at the dishevelled land. Many of the shrubs had died from the harsh winters, others were straggly and neglected, but some were struggling to survive with a hardiness that came from being reared in the blustering east wind.

  She’d whispered a word to John on his following visit, asking him to meet her by the old church, that she needed to talk to him, and his face had brightened at the prospect. He was there before her, a dark shadow in the church porch as she arrived breathlessly, having run all the way after being held up by some whim of Lucy’s.

  He didn’t wait for her to speak, but gathered her up into his arms and kissed her yielding mouth and upturned throat, and with a sigh buried his face in her soft hair, breathing in the warm fragrance of her body as she clung to him.

  ‘Oh, Sarah, I can’t go on like this. I need you so desperately. We must go away. Away from here, where no-one knows us, or cares. We’ll go abroad where it won’t matter who we are, and start a new life together.’

  She hushed him then with a kiss and held her fingers over his lips, and he opened his mouth and gently bit them. She groaned softly as she felt the warmth of his tongue on her finger tips and the strength of his body close to hers. She pulled away. ‘This is madness, John. You know that I love you and always will, there will never be another, but you know that we can’t go away. You can’t leave Mr Masterson, he needs you, he’s old now and can’t run the company alone – and the men who work for you, they need you.’

  He answered her sharply. ‘The men would find other work, whaling is booming, there’s always a ship for a good man.’ But he knew as he spoke that it would be on his conscience to leave his uncle who now relied on him totally, and who had supported him and been his guardian throughout his childhood.

  ‘I’m sorry.’ He stroked her cheek. ‘We’ll think of some way that we can be together. But these stolen moments are not enough for me, Sarah. I think of nothing else but being with you. You fill my mind night and day; you take over my thoughts so totally that I can’t work, I can’t sleep. It’s as if I am not in charge of my own life any more.’

  She drew back in dismay, her hand to her forehead. ‘That’s my fault,’ she breathed. ‘I’ve thought of you so much these last few weeks that my mind has spun out to meet yours.’

  He laughed at her. ‘What a darling goose you are. It’s not just your mind that bothers me, it’s the whole of you, the completeness of you which has captured me.’

  He held her close again and kissed her tenderly, but she pushed him away. ‘It wasn’t meant to be funny, John, I mean it. I have tried to picture you – where you are, what you are doing, trying to make you think of me. That’s why you can’t think of anything else. I don’t know how, but I have linked your mind to mine, tied it as securely as if it was bound by thread.’

  He smiled down at her indulgently. ‘You’re a witch,’ he whispered teasingly, ‘and you have me in your power!’

  ‘Hush, don’t say that, not ever. You don’t know how superstitious country folk are.’ She hesitated. ‘And especially not when I tell you what I am going to do.’

  ‘Wait,’ he said softly, putting his hand up in warning. ‘I thought I heard something. Footsteps!’

  They stood silently, holding their breath, but nothing could be heard above the sound of the wind and the waves.

  ‘I could have sworn that I heard someone,’ he breathed, ‘but I must have been mistaken.’

  ‘No-one comes here any more,’ she whispered. ‘Ma Scryven’s funeral was the last service. They’ve removed the altar and the silver and taken it to Tillington.’ She shivered violently and he put his arms about her, thinking that she was cold. Her voice dropped low and she spoke in hushed, ominous tones. ‘The church will soon be in the sea – drowned, along with all the scattered bones of the poor dead souls in the graveyard.’

  He shook her gently for he could see by the grey light filtering into
the porch that she was nervous and uneasy. ‘That’s enough of such morbid talk. Now tell me what it is you are going to do.’

  She shook her head to rid her mind of vague, melancholy thoughts and said impulsively, ‘I’m going to be a herb woman, like Ma Scryven. I’m going to make potions and oils, so that the villagers can come to me when they are sick. But more than that, I’m going to sell what I grow in the markets at Hull and Beverley.’

  He gazed at her in astonishment. ‘What will you sell?’

  ‘Oh, lavender and rosemary, sage and comfrey. Things that townspeople can’t grow themselves.’

  ‘But you can’t, Sarah.’ He was aghast. ‘How can you think of it? How can you think of standing in a market selling wares? There are villains and thieves there. I know it, don’t think that I don’t. Men who would cut your throat for a copper. You haven’t been brought up to it, you won’t survive!’

  She drew away from him and surveyed him coldly, then her eyes flashed. ‘Don’t tell me that I’m too good for that sort of life. That I have been too gently brought up!’

  ‘That is what I’m saying,’ he replied heatedly. ‘You’re not like your mother or father, or even Lizzie. They survived because that was all they knew. You have had a kinder existence!’

  She gave a small sob. ‘It seems then that I am just a misfit. Too good for one kind of life and not good enough for another.’ She held up her head defiantly. ‘But as I can’t seem to please anybody, then I shall please myself. I shall live alone in Ma Scryven’s cottage where I shall bother no-one, and I shall survive, you’ll see. I have the strength!’

  ‘Sarah, please, don’t talk like that,’ he pleaded. ‘I need you, we need each other. We shall be nothing if we are apart – and I shall never have a moment’s peace if I know that you are alone here with no-one to protect you.’ He looked around at the ravages that the winter had wrought on the coastline, at the cracked and falling stonework of the church, at the dilapidated buildings hanging on the edge, waiting for the final crack that would precipitate them into the sea.