Howard had not noticed her agitation. He smiled. ‘Didn’t you suspect? Miss Plant told me that Frank Chancellor …’
‘I knew she was free with her favours,’ said Elsie, cutting and sharp, ‘but I didn’t think you were so pally with Nellie Plant.’
‘Not pally. She did some braid designs for a friend in the trade.’
‘And she told you her secrets?’ Elsie interrupted. She had no interest in the how and why of his meeting Nellie Plant. It had been the worst moment of her life, turning the register’s pages and seeing Frank’s name. She said, ‘The boy she says she adopted is hers and Frank Chancellor’s! She told you?’
He smiled again. ‘People tell me things, you know. They confide.’
She dared not raise her voice or show her wounded feelings. ‘Why didn’t you tell me?’
‘Miss Plant would hardly want it spreading about. She told me in confidence, some years ago when she heard that I came from Southport.’ He returned, cheerfully, to his plate.
‘Why?’
‘I expect she thought it better to say, at once. In case I’d heard that she had a child. She swore me to secrecy.’
‘And what did you think about it? Weren’t you disgusted? As I am?’ Elsie was toying with her food again. Frank’s betrayal was giving her a pain in the stomach.
He put his knife and fork down and gave her his attention. ‘I’m not as innocent as you seem to think, my dear. I know you had only a brief married life. You’ve had no experience with men. But there are certain men, Elsie – and I’m afraid that Frank Chancellor is one of them – who …’ He began to bounce his hands on the edge of the table while he thought how best to say it. ‘I don’t want to shock you. Some men have a physical – dare I say, sexual hold over women. One woman is not enough. Mrs Chancellor was alive at the time. Men like that satisfy their basest desire wherever they can.’
She said, ‘Nellie Plant must have been over the moon when his wife died.’
‘Oh, no. Frank Chancellor told her he would not marry her. He said she could never be his wife.’
Frank had said the same to Elsie. Was she on a par with Nellie Plant? She took a gulp of wine.
‘Miss Plant asked for my advice. She said, “Do you think he’ll marry me”?’ Howard gave a light, polite cough.
‘And?’ said Elsie.
‘I said, “Miss Plant. The only advice I can give is that which I would say to any woman. For heaven’s sake, believe a man who tells you to your face that he will never marry you. Chancellor means it or he would never say such a thing.”’ Howard was full of importance. ‘I said, “He must provide for you and the child. You should not be in his employ, my dear when you are bringing up his child.”’
The knot in her stomach was so tight she could be sick. She was sick, sick to the heart. How could he come to her, after he’d been with Nellie Plant? To Nellie who, rumour had it, would ‘give pleasure and relief’, whatever that meant, for half a crown.
She must get even. She would let anger claim her now. Frank must not get away with treating her and Lily like nobodies when he’d signed the register for Nellie Plant’s child. He’d set Nellie up as landlady in her own right, with furs and a private school for the child. What had he done for her and Lily? Nothing. The shop was his. She, Elsie, only had what she earned and that which Frank provided: rent and rates and a few groceries. They had nothing to show for her years of toil. Heat was rising in her face. ‘That’s enough. I don’t want to hear any more.’
He was pleased with himself; moistness glistened in his eye as he glanced round the room to be sure they could not be overheard. ‘That’s what I love about you, Elsie,’ he said. ‘Your innocence. But the world is full of men like Frank Chancellor. And women like Miss Plant.’
‘Then how do they become justices of the peace, magistrates and the landladies of public houses?’
‘Adultery is not a crime, Elsie.’ He smiled and patted her hand as he said. ‘A woman such as you needs a man as protector. A woman can spend her energies on a man who gives her his protection.’
Elsie did not reply. He was leading up to it, again. He was going to tell her how much he longed to be her protector.
He went quiet for a second or two, then in a low, earnest voice said, ‘Elsie, dear. A man needs a woman to care for him. Her gentle touch, her gentle hands. I have found it most difficult trying to live as a single man since my dear wife died.’
She said, ‘Howard. If you are going to ask what I think you are, please, wait.’ She put her knife and fork down. She could eat nothing. ‘There’s something I have to tell you.’
He talked tripe at times. As if looking after a man would be a full-time job! She’d done a full-time job, kept house, brought up a child and kept a demanding man happy. But she put a sweet, secret expression on her face and said, ‘There’s something you don’t know, Howard. Before you ask your question, we’d better have a little talk.’
It would give him the shock of his life. But it must be done. Certificates would have to be produced if she married. She glanced round the room again. The waiters were nowhere near. Elsie pushed her plate aside and, demurely casting her eyes down, said, in a small, pathetic little voice, ‘I was never married, Howard.’
There was silence. She heard the click of a knife on his plate. She half expected to see a sympathetic expression on his face. Instead she saw that he had taken umbrage.
‘I take it that it was a single fall from grace? Did he force himself upon you? I wish you had told me the truth at the time …’
‘Oh, dear.’
‘… letting me think you had fallen in love with a cousin you had never mentioned before. You know that it was because I was disappointed in you that I married on the rebound?’
Why did he always make himself the subject under discussion? His feelings? Not hers. Elsie said, ‘That is all in the past, Howard. I won’t tell you who Lily’s father was. I’m telling you this in confidence. Please keep my secret just as you kept Nellie Plant’s.’
‘You need not tell me.’ His face was red. He leaned a little way over the table. ‘I think I know. There’s only one man. Only one over whom you’d so lower yourself. Only one with whom you’d so let yourself down …’
Lower yourself? Let yourself down? He was such a prude. He might not propose now. Elsie dabbed the corner of her mouth with the napkin. Even if he did she’d make him wait until tomorrow for her answer. She had never felt any desire for Howard. He had kissed her twice; chaste, respectful kisses that seemed to pain him.
She’d have to think it out, ask herself if it would be possible for a woman to respond to a man she felt nothing for. A man who had no passion in him? Howard had juvenile ways. He had the impulses of a boy of thirteen, not a man of fifty-one. He liked to tickle, tease, pretend to have fires he’d no inkling of. Did other women feel this way? She thought not – otherwise how could they let their husbands touch them? Bert Grimshaw? Albert Leadbetter? No. Their wives must not be able to feel the passionate love that she had for Frank. But how many other women had known passionate love with Frank?
She was beginning to feel faint. She said, ‘Howard? Do you think I might have a large brandy? Reaction to all these shocks is setting in.’
The first thing Lily saw when she woke up was a ruby-red silk dress hanging over the wardrobe door. Its deep V neck was trimmed with ecru lace, as was the narrow shawl collar that came from the hip seam and went up, skimming the shoulder of the sleeveless top, fastening with a jet clasp at the back of the neck. The bias-cut skirt was ankle-length. Her first long dress was the prettiest she’d ever seen.
Beside the bed was a note in Mam’s wobbly handwriting, the important words emphasised by capital letters. ‘Gone to Doctor’s. Howard is meeting me out. Will buy your Towels. Two more on Dressing Table.’ Lily glanced over to where two Southalls were laid out. Then she blushed, remembering Ian. The rest of the note said, ‘Do not have a Bath. Do not Wash your Hair. Do not stand with Bare Feet on a cold
floor. When you are Unwell bad blood rushes to the head. We are going to a Dinner Dance tonight. Try on the dress. Your loving Mam.’
She hopped out of bed, slipped off her nightdress and tried on the ruby dress. It was a perfect fit, and when she lifted her hair into a cascade at the back and whirled round in front of the mirror it startled her, seeing that she looked seventeen, at last.
No sooner had she dressed and eaten breakfast than there came a knock at the bedroom door. ‘Coo-ee, you there?’
It was Sylvia and Rowena, holding armfuls of flowers and fruit, which they dumped on the bed. ‘Ian said you’d live to tell the tale!’ Rowena was tall and dark like Ian, and evidently as direct and unaffected. ‘I didn’t think you were the sort to have the vapours,’ she said. ‘I’m learning all about it at nursing school.’
‘I’ve never been given flowers before.’
‘Are you well enough to go out?’ Sylvia asked.
‘Course she is!’ Rowena poked her finger into the soft upper part of Lily’s arm. ‘Put your jacket on. Where do you want to go?’
Lily picked up her long cardigan, slid her arms in and said. ‘Floral Hall gardens. Listen to the band.’
‘I’d have thought a brisk walk,’ Rowena said.
‘Rowena!’ Sylvia laughed. ‘This is a sedate English seaside town. Not the rugged highlands, you know.’
They went out on to the promenade. ‘Any other time I’d love to walk,’ Lily said happily to Rowena as they went in the crowd towards the Floral Hall. ‘I love walking on the hills above Archerfield.’
‘Good! Then when you come to Edinburgh we’ll walk over the Pentlands when I’m not on duty,’ Rowena said.
They had joined the queue. ‘When I come to Edinburgh?’
‘Yes. Why not? Ian wants you to come with Sylvia!’
They hired deckchairs a few rows back from the brass band. Sylvia said, ‘Will you, Lily? Come with me to Edinburgh?’
‘If I’m invited,’ she said. ‘I’m sure Mam won’t mind.’
Sylvia said, ‘Oh, you are a good friend. I always feel so out of place at Uncle Kenneth’s. Everyone’s so dedicated.’
Rowena said, as she adjusted the deckchair, ‘We don’t have a conventional family life.’
‘Oh dear!’ Sylvia said. ‘It’s not that. You make everyone welcome.’
‘Dad’s always spurring us on.’ Rowena was louder than anyone else around them. ‘He has no time for slackers. “Forward! Onward and upward by your own efforts!” is Dad’s motto.’ She paid no heed to the people who were watching her. Her dark hair was flying about her face as she tugged off her jacket and threw it over the back of the deckchair. ‘A bit of advice, Lily, for when you come to stay. Never say you are bored. Dad sees it as his duty to “fill the unforgiving minute with sixty seconds’ worth of distance run.”’
‘Rowena! Sit down!’ Sylvia ordered. ‘You’re making a spectacle of yourself.’
Rowena dropped on to the canvas chair with an apologetic sigh. ‘I’ve probably put you off coming to Edinburgh.’
‘You haven’t. Not in the least,’ Lily said. It would be an education in itself, spending time with an assured, uncomplicated girl like Rowena. And it sounded like a marvellous family to her – a household with a good, kind dad who encouraged his children forward, onward and upward.
When Rowena and Sylvia had caught their tram on Lord Street, to return to their hotel, Lily bought Shandy a pokerwork motto: ‘Friendship is Golden’. She took it back and was wrapping it, standing in the window recess, when she saw Mam and Howard Willey-Leigh coming along the promenade, arm in arm in broad daylight.
Mam came in and Lily said, ‘I saw you! Spooning with him.’
‘That’s enough!’ Mam sat, and put her bag on to the bed.
‘I’m worried,’ Lily said. ‘What did the doctor say?’
‘It’s diabetes but I’ve not got it badly.’
‘What’s he given you for it?’
‘The needle. In my arm. I have to watch what I eat.’
‘And drink? Did you tell him you drink?’
‘He said a little drink every day won’t harm me as long as I count it in as one of my sugars. I can have four ounces of bread a day but if I don’t want the bread I can have a sherry instead.’
Mam said, ‘I have to see him every morning and teatime and take a specimen.’
‘A specimen?’
‘Of my water. I have to test my water. Get the needle twice a day until they’ve got the dose right. Then I shall have to do it myself. The trouble is, I’m a coward. I’ll never be able to give myself the needle.’
Lily was relieved that an injection was all that was necessary to cure Mam. ‘I’ll learn how to do it. Don‘t worry.’
‘It’s going to be a new lease of life. The doctor said, “The needles will transform you, Mrs Stanway.”’ She studied her hands, went quiet for a minute, then said, ‘Lil, I’ve something to tell you …’ Her face was pale and determined and immediately Lily got the familiar, sinking feeling in her stomach. She was about to hear something she’d rather not know.
Mam went to sit by the window, pointed to the other chair and said, ‘Come here. Sit and listen.’
Lily sat facing her, but Mam stared out of the window before, carefully choosing her words, she said, ‘You remember what I said, when we walked home from the will-reading?’
Lily’s stomach turned over. Mam was going to tell her the truth at last. She had no control over her mouth, but sat looking intently at Mam, who averted her eyes again and stared out to sea. Lily waited for the bombshell, barely breathing, in an agony of suspense. In a flat, expressionless voice Mam said, ‘Hah-d has asked me to marry him. I told him I’d ask you first.’ She glanced at Lily and away again. ‘Well? What do you say?’
It was a slap in the face. Lily’s mouth was as dry as dust. She jumped to her feet and went to stand between Mam’s chair and the window so Mam would have to face her. ‘You don’t love him. You can’t marry him.’
Mam said, ‘I can. I asked what you thought.’
‘I can’t abide him,’ Lily said defiantly. ‘How can you think of it?’
Suddenly Mam’s eyes blazed. ‘Because I’ve been the world’s biggest fool. I’ve been treated like …’ She took a deep breath.
‘Like what?’ Lily said. ‘Not by me, you haven’t.’
Mam had control of her voice again. ‘I want us to live the way we ought to be living. In a nice house. Looked up to.’
‘His house? In Southport?’
‘No. A new house in Macc. Hah-d will take on my responsibilities when I marry him.’ Mam said it in a flat voice, without any feeling.
The sick feeling was back. ‘When you marry him? I don’t have a choice then, do I?’
Mam was not going to give an inch. ‘You do have a choice. Hah-d wants to adopt you. I want to get you away from the Central School and those medical records. Send you to a private school. St Ursula‘s in Southport. You can be a boarder. Learn to be a lady. You’ll have a new birth certificate. You will be the legitimate daughter of a man of means.’ She waited for a few seconds, then, as if to dangle another carrot, said, ‘You could choose your own name. Start afresh. If you don’t want to be Lily Willey-Leigh …’
Lily could just picture the delight Doreen would take in taunting her – Silly Lily … Her eyes filled with tears. ‘Or what? What’s the alternative?’
‘Keep on being illegitimate. Keep the name of Stanway. Keep on at the Central School … and go to live with Nanna and Grandpa. Hah-d won’t take you on any other terms!’
Tears were brimming over. They had it all planned. If she kept her mother she’d lose her home, her name and her school. She made a foolish appeal to Mam’s motherly love. ‘Who do you love? Him or me?’
She ought to have known better. It sparked off the tinder. Mam said, ‘I won’t be given an ultimatum! It’s my life. The Stanways have been cheated out of everything! First the mill. Then my chance of marriage was snatched f
rom under my nose by that Scotch … !’ She stopped and made an effort to control her temper. ‘A man must be master in his house. Hah-d – you’ll call him Father – has always wanted a daughter. He can’t have one with a different name from his.’ She was red in the face. ‘Unless you can give me a good, solid reason for saying no, I’m going to accept his proposal.’
The thought of calling that man Father was repulsive to Lily. The seconds dragged by as Mam waited. Then Mam touched her shoulder affectionately, rather shyly, softened and said, ‘I don’t want to lose you, Lil. We’ve been through thick and thin together. Go on! Say yes. Let me tell Hah-d you want him for a father. Go on, Lil!’ Mam was pleading with her. She had asked her to give her a good, solid reason why she shouldn’t marry. If Lily told her about the time Howard Leigh had put his hand on her bare bottom Mam would call it off and never have the happiness she wanted. Or, she’d think Lily was lying. Either way, as it was for Mam, this was Lily’s only chance of legitimacy.
‘Well?’ Mam said. ‘What have you got to say?’
Lily blew her nose hard. ‘I can’t think straight.’
‘And you can’t give me a straight answer. Is that it? You don’t want me to be happy?’
‘Give me time. It’s not that …’
‘What then?’
Lily swallowed hard. ‘I can’t choose between you and Nanna.’
At last Mam let her anger show. Her face was set, her mouth tight. ‘We all have to make choices. I’ve made mine.’
Lily was glad they were going out that evening. Mam didn’t expect her to make up her mind in a hurry, and they were too busy getting ready for the dinner and dance to argue.
Mam pinned Lily’s hair so that it looked as if it fell naturally that way. She lent her own dancing shoes and a touch of lipstick, did her nose with a fluff of powder, showed her how to put boot-blacking on her eyelashes and gave her a spray of her precious Lanvin scent, My Sin.
They set off at seven o’clock in Mr Leigh’s Lanchester. ‘Where are we going?’ Lily asked him. He was dressed in tail suit and white tie.
A Daughter's Shame Page 25
