A Time Like No Other (7 page)

They talked of everything under the sun from the children and Jamie’s amusing antics with his new presents, to the possibility of snow; the gossip his visit would cause should it be known in Moorend, Harry doing his best to mimic Mrs Frederick Anson, the banker’s wife, making her laugh as once she had done with her cheerful young husband. He spoke to her of the state of the army in the Crimea after the Battle of Inkerman and the appalling inefficiency on the part of the government in providing the soldiers with proper clothing and shelter to meet the winter. All this had been reported in
The Times
during November by Mr W. H. Russell, correspondent for the newspaper in the Crimea, he told her, but then Lally had been so deep in her grieving she had not heard of it.

Biddy heard their voices and her laughter from the kitchen and though she knew the conventional folk of Moorend would be scandalised by the behaviour of the newly widowed Mrs Amalia Fraser, she didn’t care, for it was the first time her lass had enjoyed herself for months. Even before his death, Master Chris had gone out alone, to hunt, to gamble, to drink with his friends, leaving Lally alone since she could not accompany him on account of her condition. She had moped about the place, cursing the bulge that prevented her from doing all the things he did, but now it seemed Mr Sinclair was entertaining her, making her laugh, and on the very day they had all dreaded. When he finally left it was dark and he would have the devil’s own job to find his way across the moors with the gig but it seemed he did not care, for the expression on his face told Biddy all she had hoped for. Miss Lally needed someone to look after her!

Now on the day Master Roly returned Lally had Jenny bring in a pot of hot chocolate on a silver tray which Biddy had found in what had once been the butler’s pantry, cleaning and polishing it to mirror brightness. There was plum cake and hot mince pies left over from Christmas, for though she knew her lass still grieved badly for the loss of her young husband, Mr Sinclair had given her something to fill her days, to occupy her mind and a hope for the future. The Priory was her sons’ inheritance and must be nurtured and from a flighty, thoughtless young wife she must now become the protector of that inheritance. With Mr Sinclair to help her she would succeed.

‘Now tell us where you have been, Roly,’ she was saying, the pretty bracelet Mr Sinclair had given her twinkling on her wrist. ‘Do you know I have never been abroad, even with Chris. I wanted to go to Italy for our honeymoon but . . .’ Her voice tapered off and Harry longed to reach out to her, hold her hand, kiss the back of it and tell her she had only to say the word and he would take her to the ends of the earth if she wished it, but it was Roly who took her hand, looking strangely like Chris, perhaps not in his features but in his manner, his disarmingly frank smile.

He spoke about Rome and its splendours, its architecture, its weather, its food, giving the impression that all he did apart from sell Sinclair cloth, which he did superbly, was visit museums and art galleries, bringing a smile to Harry’s strong face and lifting the corners of his stubborn mouth. Harry knew his brother was a complete hedonist, consorting with actresses, courtesans, the bored young wives of wealthy old gentlemen, giving pleasure to women, and himself, dining in the best restaurants, staying in the best hotels, but at the same time not neglecting the business which took him to many parts of Europe and North America. He would be home for a few weeks, studying the latest designs that came off the Sinclair looms, knowing as much as Harry about the many processes that wool went through, sorting and scouring, blending, carding, spinning and weaving. He might give the impression that he drifted from one pleasure to the next with no thought in his head but where to obtain the best champagne and the prettiest women and the fanciest waistcoats, but he was an astute businessman.

Lally had colour in her face when at last they stood up to leave. She had not run upstairs as Roly had exhorted her to change into one of the lovely gowns he remembered but had promised to think about his invitation to take her to the theatre in Ward’s End in Halifax.

Roly held her hand and kissed her cheek as they left. Harry took her hand and turned away as Roly ran down the steps to where Carly held the two fine horses, Roly’s chestnut gelding, Foxfire, and Harry’s bay, Piper.

She watched them walk, then break into a gallop down the drive which Barty and Froglet did their best to keep raked and clear of weeds, but as she watched them go she suddenly felt tired, for it was all so hard. There seemed to be no joy in her life. Roly’s call had rejuvenated her for an hour, as had the Christmas Day she had spent with Harry, taking her back to those magical days of their childhood and later when she and Roly and Chris had ridden and played and laughed their way through their days of golden youth – which was a strange thing to say when she was twenty years old and Roly only twenty-three – but now, with him gone, it was bleak again. She did not for a moment consider the man who, though she was not aware of it, loved her with a growing strength and passion that would have astounded her. It was not the love of a young and eager man, which was how Chris had loved her, but with the depth, the immutability of the stones that scattered the great stretches of moorland, which was Harry Sinclair’s world.

She trailed up the staircase, her hand touching the banister, turning at the bend in the stairs, her black gown dragging on the wide and shallow steps. A past Fraser had taken a fancy to a cast-iron statue of a full-sized stag which stood at the turn of the stairs and on which she and Chris and Roly had often sat as they played games the two boys made up. All part of those days when . . . when she . . .

Suddenly she stood still just as she was about to pass it. There was an enormous gilt-framed mirror, old and flaking, just above the stag and as she caught sight of the dreary figure in black she wondered for a moment who she was. Dear God, it was Lally Fraser, pale, listless,
dull and graceless
and as she stared she came to a sudden decision. She was
twenty years old
for God’s sake and though she would love Chris for the rest of her days was she to drift about looking as dead as he was? Was she to have no joy in her life again? She had her children, her two boys who must be cared for and this house and the estate which Harry Sinclair was doing his best to help her run but need she look like a crow while she did it?

Picking up her skirts, she ran up the rest of the stairs and along the wide hallway to her room. Inside she tore off the black gown and corset – Lord, why did she need a corset with a waist that measured no more than nineteen inches? – and stood in her chemise and petticoats while she rummaged through her wardrobe. Her clothes had been much talked about when she was young Chris Fraser’s bride and she had not enquired where the money had come from to buy them. Chris loved to see her well dressed and that was enough for her. She was seventeen, attractive and in love! She had plain, pastel-tinted afternoon gowns, delicate creams, near whites. Richly patterned crimson and emerald-green silk shawls. A walking dress of coffee-coloured
foulard des Indes
trimmed with velvet. Light summer dresses with sleeves of puffed muslin and tulle with wrist bands of ribbon and pearl and a dozen sparkling butterflies to choose from to fasten in the dark curls of her short hair. She had once been a butterfly herself in colours ranging from ecru, tawny brown, crimson, flame, apricot, honey gold to sea green and duck-egg blue!

She found a lovely rose-pink woollen gown, tight-waisted and with a full skirt. The bodice had buttons from waist to neck, each one covered in rose-pink satin and around the waist was a broad sash to match. It was plain, simple and very becoming and the moment she put it on she felt better. The colour put a flush in her cheeks and her eyes sparkled with that particular blue-green which Chris had called turquoise, the whites clear, her long lashes, dark and thick, outlining them as though with ink. She looked quite . . . quite lovely, she thought, and more like the woman she had been before Chris died. There, she had allowed the thought – the word – into her head and she must get used to it.
Died
. That was the word she had been unable to say, even to herself, but now she had said it and must get on with life and she would start right now with the rose-pink dress and she would accept Roly’s invitation to go to the theatre. She would take the estate management into her hands, learn all that Harry Sinclair could teach her and . . . and . . .

She bent her head and stared at the threadbare carpet, despair doing its best to enslave her again, then she lifted it, lifted it high and, turning on her heel, moved to the door of her bedroom. Slowly she descended the stairs knowing she would get ‘what-for’ from Biddy and she did!

Clara was scrubbing the massive wooden table which had been scrubbed so often over the years the wood was almost white. Jenny was in the scullery washing vegetables and Biddy was poring over the household accounts book, doing her best to make a halfpenny do the work of a penny. A rich aroma of beef broth assailed Lally’s nostrils, while coals glowed red beneath the simmering stew pot. A kettle emitted a puff of steam and the blackleaded range gleamed beneath the hanging utensils. The tabby cat which was stretched before the fire opened one eye to study her then closed it again and the two dogs rose, their tails waving lazily as they ambled across the kitchen to greet her.

All three woman looked up as she entered and utter silence followed, a silence so dense the sound of the simmering broth was quite deafening. The two maids stood as though petrified, their hands stilled.

Biddy rose to her feet and over her face rippled a look Lally knew well. She had seen it a hundred times over the years whenever she had done, or was about to do, something of which Biddy disapproved. Biddy, though Lally was not aware of it, cared nothing for convention, nor the rules of society as applied to herself. Before she had worked for Mrs Atkins, Lally’s mama, she had done many jobs Miss Lally knew nothing about, though Delphine Atkins had. It was Delphine Atkins who had rescued her one evening from the clutches of a drunken soldier who had dragged her into a doorway and had her skirt up around her waist. It wasn’t the poor chap’s fault really because she had been working the streets for several months when she lost her job as a scullery maid. But for some reason she had objected to him and had screamed out for help and it was Miss Lally’s mam, passing by in her carriage, who had rescued her.

But Miss Lally had been brought up as a lady. She
was
a lady and ladies did not discard their mourning and change into a rose-pink gown six weeks after the death of a husband. Miss Lally, if she was to retain her position in society, must not deviate an inch from the path that society demanded.

‘What do you think you’re doing?’ she asked, her voice icy, her face rigid with displeasure.

Lally swung the full skirt of her gown. ‘I can’t think what you mean . . .’

‘Don’t try to cod me, lady. Go upstairs immediately and take off that dress and put on the black.’

Lally hesitated for a minute, the habit of listening to Biddy strong in her, then, quietly, for she was her own mistress and was about to start on a new phase in her life, she answered her.

‘I don’t think I will, Biddy. Now, I would be glad of tea if Jenny could bring it through to the drawing room,’ and turning gracefully she left the kitchen, leaving all three women open-mouthed in astonishment.

5

He paid her a great deal of attention and gradually the people of Moorend began to notice and not only to notice but to disapprove.

The first time she accompanied him to the theatre in Ward’s End, a play by Shakespeare was being performed. In the audience, three rows from the front where they had a good view of the boxes, were Mr and Mrs Frederick Anson with their friends, Mr and Mrs George Bracken, and all four were shocked into stunned silence when they saw the widow and Roly Sinclair, who was known as a ladies’ man, enter one of them. The play was
The Merry Wives of Windsor
, described as a romantic comedy, but the two upright and leading citizens and their wives, especially their wives, could hardly have told you a word of its content, since their whole concentration was centred on Amalia Fraser, a widow of no more than ten weeks, positively
flirting
with her companion. Alone, the pair of them, in a private box which must have cost the earth but then the Sinclairs were probably the wealthiest family in the Halifax area and could afford it. She was dressed in a gown in a pale shade of what Mrs Anson would call duck-egg blue, with a low-cut de’colletage and in her dark hair nestled a glittering jewelled butterfly, and who had bought her that, they whispered among themselves? On her wrist they could distinctly see the sparkle of what looked like an expensive bracelet! He was, of course, in full evening dress, handsome in black and white.

Harry Sinclair, from a seat in the back row of the auditorium, watched Lally and his brother but, unlike them, he also noticed the reaction of the audience, many of whom knew Lally Fraser and Roly Sinclair, and had known Chris Fraser. They were horrified that one of their own should be guilty of such an atrocious error of judgement, a wicked deviation from the accepted code of conduct. It was not a crime for a widow to remarry, of course, but only after a decent period of mourning and that had certainly not passed in the case of Lally Fraser. Indeed she should not even have been seen in a theatre and absolutely not alone in the company of a young, unmarried gentleman. Even with a relative it would have been unthinkable!

He felt the pain in his chest where his heart lay, the bitter pain caused by the malevolent pangs of jealousy, and yet at the same time a sadness that Lally had so easily succumbed to his brother’s pleading. But could you expect her to be wise at her age? She was young, twenty years old and could not be expected to suffer the living death of widowhood for twelve months or even, as in some cases, a lifetime. Many widows, in fact most of them, had been married for years when their husbands passed on and had lived in their shadow in all that time. They had brought up children who were probably themselves married if daughters, and their sons were out in the world. These elderly widows were content to live in some seclusion, paying calls and receiving them, going about with friends, women friends and relatives, virtually retired from life and certainly not pushing themselves forward, for they had been taught to believe they had none!