Daughter of Dark River Farm (31 page)

My private fears vanished as he reached for my hand, his face darkening. ‘No, I’m not. And even if I was, Uncle Jack’s saved more lives than—’

‘Oh, hush,’ she said. ‘I’m not judging anyone. But Lizzy was badly hurt because of that Wingfield wretch; I’m just looking out for my girl.’

‘Oh!’ Lizzy came back from wherever her thoughts had taken her, and noticed mine and Archie’s linked hands. ‘At last!’

‘I told her it was about time,’ said a voice from the doorway, and then Evie and Lizzy were swept up in their own greetings, leaving Archie and me to our silent conversation.

His eyes questioned mine:
regrets?
My smile told him,
none.
My fingers, tightening on his, said,
however long we have, it’s not enough.
His breath, now grazing my temple, replied,
I will not waste a second.
Finally, my hand on his chest asked,
are you feeling the same ache I feel?
And his heartbeat, slow and strong beneath my fingers, told me,
yes
.

It seemed the room had grown enormous around us, so that everyone else in it was far away, and there was just Archie, his gentleness and his strength, and his soft voice whispering my name as if it was something magical. I didn’t think I’d ever be able to move away from him, but the memory of decent manners found us both at the same moment. We sat up straighter, drawing slowly apart, and gradually the world reasserted itself. I tried not to resent it. Evie sat down on my other side.

‘Archie’s told me about Samuel Wingfield,’ Lizzy told her. ‘And I understand you’ve got the Kalteng Star back now?’

Interested again, I looked at Evie, who shrugged. ‘For what it’s worth, yes.’

‘Uncle Jack arranged to pass it over to me just before I came back, sealed inside a shaving brush,’ Archie said. ‘I was supposed take it directly to Oaklands and give it to Lady Creswell, but the house was shut up when I got there.’

‘She’d already left to go to my grandparents,’ Evie said. ‘It’s just a pity you wasted that extra time going there first.’

Archie shot me a brief smile. ‘Well I can’t pretend to be disappointed you’d left. The temptation to travel back here was fairly strong, after all.’

I felt the warmth of his hand on my leg, and tried not to give anything away, focusing instead on Evie. ‘I’m going to give it to Mother to put back in the Creswell vault,’ she was saying, ‘but in any event we’ll only have it until she can arrange to have it presented it to Sir Joseph.’

‘Sir who?’ Lizzy asked.

‘The president of the British North Borneo Company, according to Uncle Matthew. Sir Joseph Ridgeford. Or Ridgeway, maybe? Whoever it is, it can’t happen soon enough for me.’

‘Really? Still?’

‘More so than ever.’ Evie said grimly. ‘As soon as Jack told me, yesterday afternoon, I went back into the village and sent a telegram to the company. That stone is no longer ours. Not now that Lawrence is…’ But she couldn’t finish. She didn’t need to.

‘Why tell them?’ I asked. ‘Why not keep it a little longer?’

She shrugged. ‘They’ll know about Lawrence anyway. They’ll have been waiting for this news from the minute Lawrence signed up for active service. If we’d refused to give it up Mother would be arrested, but with it being officially declared missing there would have been nothing they could do. Now…well, now it’ll be back where it belongs. They’ll send a representative to speak to Mother within a few days, I should think.’

‘And what about Wingfield’s family? Will they ask questions about Samuel?’

Archie gave a short laugh. ‘From what I’ve heard every member of that family would throw every other member in front of a charging rhino, if it meant a closer look at what little money they’ve left.’ He turned to me, his expression suddenly brightening. ‘
That’s
where I’d heard the name before!’

I must have looked completely blank, because he shook his head. ‘Sorry, last night. When you were explaining about the wee girl.’ He jerked his head to the ceiling, to indicate where Amy still slept. ‘When you said the name of her real family.’

‘McKrevie?’

‘That’s the name of the family that near enough bankrupted the Wingfields after they lost the diamond back to the Creswell vault.’

‘I knew they had history,’ Evie put in, looking interested, ‘but I didn’t know why spite should have driven Susannah Wingfield to marry into that family.’

‘It wasn’t entirely out of spite,’ Archie said. ‘Partly, perhaps, to punish her parents for giving the diamond back to your family. But it was more a desperate attempt to avoid paying what they owed. The McKrevies are a loan company.’

I thought about Louise’s reluctance to speak of her family’s business—that would certainly explain it. ‘I’ve seen advertisements in the newspapers, for that kind of thing.’

‘Aye. Well when the Wingfields had the diamond they borrowed heavily against it, and then, of course, they lost it. They never expected that and neither did the McKrevies, or they’d never have lent the money. Susannah would have inherited the Star, but it’d gone back to the Creswells the generation before, so she married Ballentyne in the hopes he’d write off the debt. Especially if she gave him a child.’

‘I doubt if he would ever have done that,’ Archie said. ‘But no-one will ever know now. When Susannah died McKrevie took everything she owned in a final settlement from the Wingfields, gave Frank away to the Markhams, and cut all ties with both of them.’

‘What an almighty mess!’ Frances said.

‘How do you know all this?’ I asked Archie.

He cocked an eyebrow at me. ‘Don’t forget I’m a Carlisle.’

‘And Jack was once engaged to Constance Wingfield,’ Lizzy put in.

‘That would have been about ten years after Frank was born and it was all over,’ Evie said, ‘but the Wingfields do like to rake over a grudge long after it’s spent.’ She looked at Lizzy steadily. ‘Part of me was always terrified Samuel would come back. I can’t tell you how relieved I am that you’re safe now.’

‘And so’s Jack,’ Lizzy added. She visibly shook off the shadows we had brought into the day, and turned to dry the bowls Archie had left on the drainer. ‘Right, who hasn’t eaten yet?’

Archie sat back in his seat as the conversation melted into everyday matters again. ‘Oh, Lizzy,’ he said after a moment, ‘I forgot to tell you part of Uncle Jack’s message. I got all caught up in the Wingfield news.’

‘Oh?’

‘Aye. Just as we parted, he called me back, and said…’ He frowned, making sure to get the wording right. ‘Tell Lizzy I said: the small, rattly Ford is still worth a million Silver Ghosts.’

We all looked at Lizzy, puzzled, but the smile that lit her face would not be explained. She shook her head, biting her lip against a laugh, and I suddenly realised she was perilously close to sobbing as well, and I stood up quickly. ‘I have laundry to do before Archie and I can take Amy out,’ I said to the room at large. ‘Please bring everything to me in the next ten minutes, or it will have to wait until next time.’

After lunch, with the washing hanging on the line across the back garden and snapping in a brisk breeze, Archie and I took Amy out in the trap.

‘I don’t think it’s very far past Yelverton,’ I said. ‘Lizzy says her brothers used to play there all the time, and they had to walk to get there.’

‘And it’s a rock, you say?’ Archie said doubtfully.

‘A big rock, apparently. If I ever went into Plymouth I’m sure I’d have seen it.’

Archie seated himself next to Amy with great care, so as not to make her feel crushed between us. She looked up at him with wide blue eyes, and her little mouth pursed but silent, so he smiled down at her, and she looked away, content. She fiddled with the spoon that hung to the middle of her chest, and made no sound as I clicked to Pippin to walk on.

He sounded unconvinced. ‘On its own on the moor.’

‘Yes!’ I started to laugh. ‘Just wait and see. Lizzy knows what she’s talking about.’

Amy tilted her face up to mine, and I realised my laughter was as new to her as it was to me, at least this new, carefree laughter that bubbled up from some deep well that Archie had uncovered. I’d been concerned that he wouldn’t want to have his time taken up with caring for a child, but he’d prepared our picnic tea himself, asking me what she liked to eat and what she didn’t, what she could take to play with, and did she need spare clothing?

We drew closer to Yelverton, the village that lay between ours and Plymouth, and Archie whistled. ‘Some fine houses here.’

I followed his gaze, but then my attention swung back, to a wide open space on our right. I reached over Amy’s head and thumped Archie’s shoulder. ‘Big rock,’ I said, somewhat smugly.

He looked. ‘Very big rock,’ he agreed. ‘Okay, I’ll grant you this one.’

It rose around twenty feet at either end, though was considerably lower in the middle, and the length took it around a hundred feet from north-east to south-west. No-one was climbing on it today, but I could imagine the attraction for children to test themselves. The central part would be easy enough for Amy, I thought, when we’d gone around and stopped the trap on the far side. The ground there was higher, and the slope from rock to ground much more gentle.

I lifted Amy down from the trap. ‘This is
entirely
unseemly for a young lady,’ I told her with an exaggeratedly aristocratic accent, then reverted to my own tones. ‘But it’ll be
fun!
Which is far better for you, I think you’ll agree.’

I watched with amusement as the boy in Archie leapt to the fore, proving me right. He scrambled up the side of the rock, stepping onto the higher mass at the end, his hands and feet finding their way easily until he stood on the top, sheltering his eyes from the glare of the sun.

Last night’s storm had left puddles in the rock face, and I eyed them carefully as I held Amy’s hand and helped her over the lower boulders, wondering with an inward smile how long it would be before she discovered them and the possibilities they held. I looked back up at Archie and felt the now familiar jolt of happy surprise in the pit of my stomach, that he was here, and he was mine. For a moment I didn’t move, just admired the tall, strong outline of him up there, one foot braced on an outcrop of rock, his shoulders square against the sky.

He looked down and grinned at me, and my heart lifted even further. ‘Be careful!’ I shouted up to him, and it had been on the tip of my tongue to say something about breaking his ankle and having to stay laid up for a while, but I bit it back; today was not a day for thinking of returning to the war.

He came back down, leaping the last eight feet to land, laughing at my gasp of horror. Then he stooped to lift Amy, swinging her around so she sat on his shoulders. ‘Want to go for a wee ride, lass?’

‘Ride. Mulls!’

‘Archie’s not a pony!’ I smiled. ‘Go on then, but don’t be long.’ I sat down on one of the lower rocks, and watched Archie stride away over the grass, his arms raised to grip Amy’s hands, her little legs firmly hooked over his shoulders. I could have gone with them, but it was too nice to see Amy’s gradual relaxation into complete trust. Archie seemed to understand that she was no delicate flower, that she was unused to flounces and frills, and more used to shouting and dirt. But here in Devon she had softened, smiled more, and although her speech was still well behind that of other children her age, I had the feeling she was taking it all in, nevertheless.

I leaned back against the sun-warmed rock, hoping no-one else would come here today and the three of us would be alone until the sun went down. Wanting Archie to see me at my best, I had dressed in my best skirt and I could feel the gentle tug of the breeze on the loose material. It pulled at my blouse, too, and I let myself remember the strong, gentle touch of Archie’s hand at my breast last night, in the rain. I closed my eyes and settled more comfortably, using my hat as a pillow, and took a deep, deep breath. Letting it out, I felt every sour thing, every grain of darkness I’d held inside me, drifting out with it, and when I took another cleansing breath I was smiling.

‘God, you’re lovely when you smile,’ Archie said. My eyes flew open, and I saw him lifting Amy carefully off his shoulders and putting her feet back on the ground. She was a little dizzy, and wobbled, but he caught her and steadied her. Then he came to sit beside me, slipping one arm around my shoulders. I nestled against him with a deep sigh of contentment, and we watched Amy squatting down to pick at the grass, examining each blade closely before throwing it away.

‘I meant it,’ Archie went on. ‘Looking at you there, almost asleep, that little smile on your face… You looked like an angel.’ I turned to him with a retort ready, but he wasn’t teasing. ‘Aye, a tough little red-headed angel, with a heart I’d die for.’ He kissed me, not a deep kiss, but a gentle, questioning one. I pressed a little closer and rested my hand at the open collar of his shirt, loving the low vibration of his voice as he spoke again, echoing my earlier thoughts.

‘I canna quite believe you’re mine. Even now.’

I kissed him again. ‘Well, you’d better start, Captain Buchanan, because I’m not going anywhere.’

He smiled and leaned back. My hand drifted down across his chest as a natural result of his movement, and came to rest at his heart; I left it there and he covered it with his own hand. We didn’t speak for a long time, just watched Amy picking up stones, putting some in her pocket, and dropping the others in the little puddles in the rock.

‘Why is she saving them, do you suppose?’ Archie murmured sleepily.

‘Keeping them to play with later, I expect. She still forms attachments to the oddest things.’

‘We’ve all collected wee treasures like that, as kids, but with her it’s…’ I felt him shrug ‘…it’s almost as if she thinks she’ll never see these things again.’

‘I wish I could make her understand, but she’ll be here a good long while before that, I think.’

We fell into an easy, contented quiet, and after a little while we heard voices. I sat up and looked around the side of the rock, to see a group of walkers and their dogs approaching from the Tavistock road.

Archie sighed. ‘Time to go?’