Heritage of Shame

by Meg Hutchinson

  ‘This be where we leaves you.’ Unity halted. ‘There be no sense in you passing the Regency works when it’s that place you were meant to visit.’

  ‘What?’ Her voice shaking slightly, Anne blinked the vision of Quenton from her mind. ‘Oh yes… well, I will see you two at home.’

  Watching the slight figure pass through the tall gates marked Regency Leather, Unity walked slowly towards King Street, whose small, closely huddled shops proved the town centre. Fear of the devil… She rounded a corner into Cock Street, bringing the perambulator to a halt outside Thomas Cooper’s pawnbroker shop. Her gaze on the dusty window, she saw nothing of the goods displayed for sale, only the frightened face of a girl staring towards a churchyard.

  ‘Thinkin’ to buy yourself a new outfit, Unity?’

  Startled by the thin voice, Unity forced a quick smile. ‘I heard the King was having a do along of the palace so I thought to get meself a frock.’

  ‘You’ve ’ad your invite then?’

  ‘Of course, postman brought it this morning, special delivery. Have you had yours?’

  Hustling a small enamelled box from a pocket hidden somewhere amid the volumes of black skirt, the sallow faced woman tapped the lid with a forefinger before opening it and offering its contents to Unity.

  ‘’Ad it yesterday.’ Nodding at Unity’s refusal of snuff she sprinkled a little of the tobacco coloured powder onto the back of one hand, then with two quick breaths drew it into each nostril.

  Unity smiled a little more readily. ‘It be no use my going into Thomas Cooper’s then Ginny, for you’ll have had the pick of his stock.’

  ‘Oh ar,’ the other woman laughed raucously, ‘an’ a tiararra to go wi’ it.’

  Coming to the doorway of the grocer’s shop on the opposite side of the street, a figure dressed in the ever present black, which was the badge of the poorer women of the town, stepped sharply back inside but a keen glance remained with the women laughing together a little along the street.

  ‘Be there summat as you’ve forgot?’

  Not removing her glance, Clara Mather nodded, asking a quarter pound of tea be mixed for her, adding sharply she wanted, ‘all leaves and no sweepings’.

  Ignoring the grocer’s offended mumblings she watched the sallow faced woman walk away towards the junction with New Street. The one who was left… it was Unity Hurley, and with a perambulator! That could only hold Anne Corby’s child! Blood quickening in her veins she handed the grocer the five pence he asked for, then, as Unity disappeared into the pawnbroker’s, went quickly into the street. It was empty. Clara drew a rapid breath. She had known there would be a second chance, one like this wouldn’t be offered again.

  Conscious the grocer might just possibly be glancing through his window she made the pretence of settling her purse deep into the bottom of her bag while in reality she released the stopper from the small glass bottle that she now carried everywhere with her.

  She had to do it now, she had to take the chance! With one hand holding the bottle she tipped it, smearing some of its contents over the gloved little finger of the other.

  Now… she must do it now!

  Jabbing the cork back in place, every pulse pounding, she walked steadily the several yards to where the perambulator stood. The street was still empty. Reaching her goal she glanced at the child, his dark eyes wide, a rosebud mouth open in a smile.

  Now, before the Hurley woman came out!

  Quick as the thought itself she thrust her hand towards the gurgling infant, pushing her finger into the tiny mouth.

  It was done! An old fashioned black bonnet bobbing on her head, Clara walked away. She must not hurry, must not draw the attention of anyone who might suddenly appear.

  Reaching the corner with King Street she risked a glance behind her. The way she had come was still deserted. Tension replaced by a soaring jubilation she took care not to appear any different from the other women going about the business of buying their evening meal. It had been a good decision of hers to wear black, this way, the bonnet veil flopping low over her brow, she was faceless among the rest.

  Faceless! She smiled inwardly. And very soon now her brother’s daughter would be childless!

  *

  ‘You knows I’m right, you shouldn’t go there by yourself, the track along through them fields don’t be the safest of places come nightfall.’ Laban Hurley looked at the slight figure facing him, a determined line to the well shaped mouth.

  ‘There is nothing to fear, I have walked that way many times before.’

  ‘Ar, no doubt you have!’ Laban was curt. ‘But how many of them times alone? You be a young woman—’

  ‘Laban, it is sweet of you to worry for me but really there is no need.’

  Setting aside the semi-circular bladed round knife he was using to thin the edges of a piece of leather, Laban’s jaw set in the no nonsense mode Anne had seen him use when speaking of any tradesman who had dared suggest a less than top quality product could easily pass as the best and bring the same money. Now that look was directed at her.

  Laban’s hands came up to his chest, the thumbs hooking into the straps of the hide apron reaching past his knees. ‘No need, is it! Then there be the same need of you going to Bentley Grange!’

  ‘But Sir Corbett—’

  ‘Be shaken but not badly injured!’

  Laban was not going to be moved. Glancing to where Abel Preston was working on a saddle, Anne caught the slight essence of a smile accompanied by the merest lift of powerful shoulders. She would get no support from that quarter. But she could not leave it at that. Sir Corbett Foley had been too kind in the past for her to simply ignore him now.

  ‘I’m sorry.’ Anne’s answer was firm, matching that of Laban in its determination. ‘Sir Corbett is an old and much respected friend of my family and I see it as a duty to call on him to ask after his health.’

  ‘And I see it as my duty to go along with you!’

  Anne’s eyes softened. Laban was concerned for her safety but walking all the way to Bentley and back after a long day’s work was too much to ask; though he would rather die than admit it, Laban sometimes showed his years and she could not ask him to tire himself even more on her account.

  ‘No,’ she shook her head, ‘I can’t ask—’

  ‘Laban!’ The quietly spoken interruption brought two pairs of eyes to rest on the man now openly watching from the long sunlit workbench. ‘If it isn’t too forward a suggestion on my part, perhaps I could accompany Miss Corby to Bentley?’

  ‘But—’

  ‘There is nothing else to do with the evening,’ Abel swiftly cut Anne’s objection. ‘If it is alright with both of you then I would quite enjoy a walk to Bentley.’

  ‘Alright!’ Laban beamed. ‘It be more’n alright, it be the perfect answer, don’t it, Anne?’

  ‘Thank you, Abel.’ Beneath Anne’s smile rested the unsaid finish to her sentence: that would be the perfect answer.

  15

  Laban had insisted they leave for Bentley Grange as soon as Abel had washed his hands and face in the rain barrel kept in the yard at the rear of the building. ‘No sense in going home to change your clothes, lad,’ he had said, ‘it be close on evenin’ now and it’ll be quite dark by the time you’ve done that; it’s my guess you’ll not be wanting to do other than wait in that kitchen so changing of your clothes be naught but a wastin’ of time… an’ I’ll have enough explaining to do to Unity, her’ll be worrying as it is when her hears, without adding to the time it’ll tek to get that visit over and this wench back home in Blockall.’

  Walking beside the tall, broad shouldered figure Anne hid a smile. Of all the reasons in the world Unity might think of to fear for her well being, Abel Preston was not one of them.

  ‘Laban says you are thinking of having your son christened.’

  He said it easily, no note of censure in his tone but that did not necessarily mean he held her free of blame. ‘It takes two to play that particular
game’ was a phrase often murmured in Darlaston when a girl fell pregnant the wrong side of marriage, and she was not married nor never had been so why should he think differently of her? After all, he knew of the child, why should he not know he was illegitimate?

  ‘Unity thought it time.’

  ‘And you?’ He answered the flat tone, not looking at the girl who barely reached his shoulder.

  She did not have to answer, she was under no commitment to tell him anything; yet deep inside Anne knew she wanted to, felt some strange urge to confide in the man who had so often as a lad taken her side against Quenton and his mother.

  ‘I – I wasn’t sure,’ hot blood surged to her cheeks, ‘I wasn’t sure the church would baptise…’ Anne felt her throat close.

  She had done many things that she regretted, ending a man’s life by pushing him backwards onto a spike, not loading the rifle beneath her mother’s rug before setting off from that inn in Radiyeska, then later stopping at that house for a drink of water… but she would not be adding Abel Preston to that list.

  Waiting a moment, wanting yet not wanting to answer, Anne swallowed hard against the conflict of emotions blocking her throat.

  ‘I…’ her voice trembled, ‘I thought that seeing he… seeing he has no father—’

  ‘Your husband—’

  ‘I have no husband!’ Shooting from her in a force that shook her to the core, the words dropped into silence, then as he made no reply added whisperingly, ‘I have no husband.’

  Beside her Abel Preston’s sympathy welled like a tide. Anne Corby’s life seemed to have had more than its share of ups and downs and now to be left widowed and with a child to care for.

  ‘Did it happen while you were abroad… did your husband die before your return to England?’

  He did not know, Laban had not told Abel Preston of her disgrace. Suddenly Anne felt a wild desire to laugh, to let go the rein, release that tight hold she struggled with day after day, the self-condemnation, the blame for her own stupidity. Instead she turned her face away, answering quietly.

  ‘Yes, it happened whilst I was abroad, but no, my husband did not die… you see, I was not married.’

  Now Abel Preston would walk away from her, think of her as no better than a slut, a common whore; from this moment any trace of their old friendship would be gone.

  ‘Did the man know you carried his child?’

  The quietness of it shook her. If he had accused her, reproached her as a wanton she could maybe have handled it better. Teeth clenched, Anne felt the tears spill silently onto her cheeks.

  ‘No.’ She shook her head. Then, unable to contain it any longer, whispered the whole terrifying ordeal.

  Hands tightening at his sides, Abel fought cold anger which minutes before had been laughter. What kind of man was it could do that to a girl, agree to her taking a drink of water from a well then knocking her to the ground and raping her? What sort of sly, worthless…? Quenton! The swine had tried it in that churchyard! For a moment rage overcame common sense and Abel let it flow. Had it been in Mather’s mind to shame his cousin in this despicable way, burdening her with his child, letting her face the world alone and leaving it to the spiteful tongues of Darlaston to drive her from the town? No. He breathed deeply, grasping his thoughts back into his own control. She had said it had happened in Russia, the man responsible was a Russian; Quenton Mather had never been absent from Darlaston for more than a couple of weeks at a time.

  Anne forced herself to go on, aware of Abel’s silence, aware of what he must be thinking, that a man didn’t do such a thing unless a girl had first led him on. ‘That was why I thought the church… with there being no father with me, with not being able to tell his name or show a marriage certificate… I thought baptism might be refused a – a bastard.’

  There, she had said it! She had said aloud what others probably whispered behind her back; but Abel Preston would always know he had heard it from her lips, that she had made no pretence, no effort to hide the truth of her child.

  He could hear it in the tremble of her voice, see it in the shaking of her clasped hands, the pain coursing through Anne Corby at the thought of the life facing her son.

  ‘You must not blame yourself, and the child once he is old enough to reason for himself will not blame you…’

  Soft as the evening breeze fanning her blazing cheeks, Abel’s words bore no sign of contempt, no essence of disgust but only the gentle tenderness one might use to an unhappy child.

  ‘You were innocent. Truth be you were probably never told of such things by your parents, never warned to be wary or given to dream there were such men as would take advantage of and abuse a young girl.’

  Only half of that was true! The pang of guilt she had so often felt during that long traumatic journey across Europe at last found the basis of its existence in Anne’s mind. Her parents had never spoken to her on any subject to do with the side of life involving relations between a man and a woman. It would have been totally unacceptable to her Bible spouting father, whilst her gentle, so caring mother maybe had thought a girl of so few years to be too young to be introduced to a topic of such intimate nature. Whichever the cause, she herself had been given a glimpse of the lust felt by some men, that alone should have been her warning. She ought to have realised following that encounter in the inn at Radiyeska, those men sitting around the stove, the landlord, his vile intention… she should have known! But she had not and now an innocent child must suffer her naivety, her carelessness, must bear the brunt of that for all of his life, live with the heritage she bequeathed him, a heritage of shame.

  ‘You are not to blame, you have to believe that, Anne. If you and your son are to have any kind of life you have to believe in your own innocence… I do.’ Taking her arm, Abel turned her gently to face him, his chest tightening at the tears glinting on flushed cheeks. ‘I always believed in you, Anne,’ he repeated quietly, ‘and I always will.’

  *

  Shown into the dimly lit bedroom, lamp thrown shadows flickering over heavy, ornate furniture, Anne felt the needlepoint of alarm prick at her nerves. Sir Corbett had been bruised that day she had seen him at the leather works, bruised and leaning a little more heavily on his stick, but she had thought it no more than a stiffness of the joints caused by his motor carriage accident; it was, after all, only to be expected that he be not quite his old self, but to find him taken to his bed!

  Seeing the anxiety mirrored on her face a hand flapped limply before dropping back onto the exquisitely embroidered bedcover.

  ‘No need to look like that, girl, I’m not about to depart for the hereafter just yet; be the idea of that doctor fellah, insists on a few weeks’ rest in bed… huh! The man’s a fool! I told him I’d tek a few weeks of rest only after they dresses me in a shroud and sets me in me box… and that ain’t going to be for a long time yet.’

  Glancing at the manservant who had accompanied her to the room he ordered another lamp to be lit and then, when the offer of refreshment was refused, demanded he himself be brought a glass of brandy after which the servant was dismissed, leaving them alone.

  Swallowing first a mouthful of brandy, he laid the glass aside.

  ‘I’m glad you came, Anne,’ he beckoned her to a chair drawn beside the bed, ‘I intended sending you a note asking you to come to see me; there – there are things I wish to talk to you about.’

  The doctor had been right to insist on bed rest. Anne caught the shadow of weariness flick across the bruised face as his head relaxed back into the huge, white, frilled pillows.

  ‘Not now,’ she answered gently, ‘whatever it is it will keep until you are up and about.’

  ‘Up and about!’ He snorted. ‘I’ll have to shoot that damned doctor first, he’s like an old hen… fuss, fuss! I tell you it’s enough to drive a man mad.’

  ‘He wants only what is best for you.’

  ‘And who is to know what be better forra man than the man himself!’

  Tr
uculent as she remembered he could be, Sir Corbett Foley frowned back at her, causing Anne to smile.

  ‘Viola,’ his gaze drifted so he smiled at a different face in a different time, ‘you were the prettiest girl this town ever saw and I loved…’

  It tailed away and Anne watched the mists of sadness form a silver veil over eyes heavy with unhappiness.

  … and I loved…

  The words echoed and re-echoed. Had Sir Corbett Foley been in love with her mother… could that have been the real reason for her father having dragged them half across the world… had his proselytising been for true love of God or a jealous regard of his wife’s love?

  ‘I’m sorry, girl, I drifted off for a moment… an old man’s habit, I’m afraid.’

  With the mist blinked away the usual brightness lit the man’s eyes but the unhappiness remained etched in lines not so easily disguised. He had lived with pain, Anne realised with shock, not in the limbs, not pain which a doctor could cure but the pain of a broken heart. Sir Corbett Foley had loved deeply but that love had been lost to him.

  ‘I wanted to see you—’

  He was speaking again. Anne pushed her thoughts away.

  ‘—there is something I wish to tell you.’

  Not of his love for her mother. Sir Corbett was a gentleman of his time, he was of an era the world would not see again, and what lay hidden beneath the cloud of unhappiness evident now on his fine features would go with him to his grave.

  ‘You were no more than a child when your parents left this town and not old enough to know what your mother planned for you. Your father left everything in his sister’s hands, he trusted her but your mother did not, Viola could be wise in some things but blind to others, she did not see—’