Still Waters (10 page)

‘Likely you wouldn’t,’ Bessie said placidly, but inwardly her mind was racing. What could you say to a jealous child to ease the pain of rejection? She guessed that Tess, used to being the centre of her adored father’s life, had sensed that this was no longer so. Even in an hour, confidence could be sapped, well she knew it. When she and Reg had been courting he’d gone off on the sly one night with Pussy Bradfield, a little slut known for her generosity to anyone who wanted a quick roll in the grass. Give her a ha’penny and she’d have her knickers off before you could ask for your change, the village girls said scornfully. Bessie, determined to save herself for her wedding night, had been told how Reggie had gone off with Pussy after the weekly hop and had known, for two whole days, the awful, gnawing pain of jealousy. Reggie wanted to marry her, but he couldn’t wait for the wedding night, like she could. He had to have a bit, afore, and if she weren’t willin’ – and she weren’t – then Pussy would do the necessary.

Next day, she’d faced him out.

‘You went wi’ Pussy,’ she said. ‘An’ we were s’posed to be gettin’ wed.’

‘That’s right,’ Reg said. ‘I took her home on the back of my bike, ’cos she felled out wi’ that feller from Stalham way what’s been eyein’ her up. Wha’s wrong wi’ that?’

‘Pussy’s what’s wrong. I know what you done, Reg, so don’t you try to pull no wool over my eyes. I can read you like a book, that I can!’

‘Well, if you know what I done, you should be happy enough, so why are you glarin’ at me?’ Reg had said reasonably. ‘Do you’d got doubts, that ’ud be different.’

Oh, he was smooth-tongued was Reg, in those days! And handsome, too, Bessie thought with a reminiscent glow. Bronzed from working on the Broad and in the fields all year, his dark hair had a gold sheen to it in summer . . . oh, all the girls were after Reggie, that they were.

‘I don’t have no doubts, Reggie,’ she said ominously, however. ‘You’re been with that – that tart, in’t you?’

‘I took her home on the back of my bike, I telled you once,’ Reg had said. ‘Wha’s wrong wi’ that, gal Bessie? Or did I oughter ha’ let her walk?’

‘Did you kiss her?’ Bessie had demanded at last, goaded into saying what was on her mind. ‘Did you tell her good-night in that shed at the bottom of her Pa’s garden?’

Reg had grinned wickedly, but shaken his head. ‘What kinda bloke d’you think I am? Aren’t we promised to one another?’

And of course she had believed him, and been right to do so. But the remembered pain could be conjured up right now, after all those years, after nine sons and a daughter, after getting on for two dozen years of scrimping and saving . . . and loving in the old brass bedstead. Jealousy is a powerful thing, Bessie thought, and turned to speak to Tess, for inwardly reliving that terrible time all those years ago had not taken more than two blinks of an eyelash. And Tess was staring at her with the hurt writ plain on her face and bewilderment in her dark-blue eyes. I’ve got to put it real careful, Bessie realised, or there’s goin’ to be trouble at the Old House.

Accordingly, she took a deep breath and crossed the room, to take Tess’s small hands in her own water-softened ones.

‘Tess, my woman, there’s the love between a man and a woman and the love between a man an’ his daughter, and they’re different. Your father, he need a woman. I know he’re got you, but that in’t the same.’

Tess pulled away, began to shake her head vehemently, but Bessie hung on, and pulled the child closer yet.

‘No, don’t shake your hid, just you listen to me first! How d’you think I’d hev managed down at Pallin’ without Mr Thrower, hey? How d’you think he’d hev managed without
me
?’

She saw Tess’s mouth open, then close again, whilst a thoughtful expression crossed the small face. Tess was listening now, taking her seriously.

‘We-ell,’ she said at last. ‘It wouldn’t have been the same, Mrs Thrower. I don’t think Mr Thrower could have managed on his own, do you?’

‘No, my woman, I don’t think he could. But your dad’s been managin’ on his own for a good few years, and I reckon he thinks it’s time someone give him a hand, like. You’re gettin’ to be a big gal, soon you’re goin’ to need all sort o’ things which your dad can’t give you. Women’s things. Advice, explainings . . . them sort o’ things.’

‘But couldn’t you . . .’ Tess began, but stopped when Mrs Thrower shook her head.

‘Not rightly, I couldn’t, love. That in’t my place, for a start off. And I in’t always around, not like a mother would be. So will you give this here mademoiselle a chance, my woman? You’ll mebbe find she in’t so bad at that.’

‘I’ll give her a chance,’ Tess said, after a moment. ‘But . . . Daddy
is
going to marry her, isn’t he? That’s what all the whispering was about?’

‘You’ll ha’ to ask your dad,’ Mrs Thrower said. ‘He’ll tell you. And I’ll tell you somethin, young ’un. You and your dad have always been good pals; that’s more than many a child can say. So remember, it in’t only the mademoiselle you’re givin’ a chance to. It’s your dad, as well.’

When Peter got back from taking Marianne home, he found that Tess had made paste sandwiches, brewed a pot of tea, set a fruit-cake on a dish, and was sitting demurely on the terrace, waiting for him.

‘It’s afternoon tea,’ she said, when he asked her whether this was instead of the promised fish and chips. ‘You said we’d talk, Daddy, so I thought we could have afternoon tea and talk out here, on the lawn. Mrs Thrower sent the cake.’

Peter nodded approvingly. The sun was still warm enough to be pleasant and the tea-table was shaded by the boughs of an elderly laburnum tree. Furthermore, he recognised the cake as Mrs Thrower’s famous date and walnut, a rare treat. ‘All right, darling, we’ll talk,’ he promised. ‘But would you pour me a cuppa, first? I’ll cut us both some cake.’

‘Sandwiches first,’ Tess reminded him. ‘It’s not ordinary paste either, Daddy, it’s Mrs Thrower’s home-made. It’s crab.’

‘It’s delicious,’ Peter said, through a large mouthful. ‘Ah, tea – nice and strong, just as I like it. I’m longing to hear about the holiday, but I imagine you want to ask me some questions, first.’

‘Yes, please,’ Tess said. ‘Tell me about the lady.’

Peter took a deep breath. He’d known what she would ask of course, but this was not going to be easy. ‘I’ve known Marianne for a couple of years,’ he said. ‘We’ve gone out a bit together, been friendly, that sort of thing.’

‘You never brought her home,’ his daughter observed, eating crab paste sandwiches with gusto. ‘You never even said her name.’

‘No. Because she seemed to be just a friend, no more. But lately, I’ve found myself wishing . . . wishing that we could be – well, closer. More than friends.’

‘Married, d’you mean?’ Tess said. She took a sip of her milk – she did not like tea – and cocked a bright and knowing eye at her parent. ‘Like you were with my mummy, years ago?’

Peter swallowed; she was making it easy for him, there must be a snag. He had seen the way she had looked at Marianne earlier in the day, he could not kid himself that this was going to be a simple matter of intention divulged and acceptance handed over on a plate.

‘Umm . . . yes. Married. And – and perhaps you might have a little brother or sister . . .’

He got no further. Tess’s whole face lit up. She bounced in her cane garden seat, waving her sandwich vaguely in the direction of her mouth without attempting to bite into it, beaming at her father as though he had promised to give her her heart’s desire – and perhaps I have, Peter thought humbly. Perhaps I really have.

‘Daddy!’ Tess squeaked, cheeks turning pink. ‘Oh, Daddy, I’d love not to be an only child! It would be wonderful to have a baby of our own! When will it come?’

‘My darling, I don’t know when . . . people have to be married first, you see . . . but probably – probably quite soon. You’d like that, would you?’

‘Oh, yes – so much! Of course I’d like the baby right away, but I know it takes time. I believe Podge took
years
coming, and Mr and Mrs Thrower were married hundreds of years ago, so ours is bound to take time. Well, of course, now I see why you want to marry . . . I mean . . .’

‘I like Marianne very much and I think you’ll like her too, when you get to know her,’ Peter said gently. ‘She told me she’s longing to be a mother to you and I believe she means it. She was dreadfully sorry we gave you such a shock earlier. Look, darling, I do think we ought to have a chat about Marianne as well as about a little brother or sister. Shall I tell you about her?’

Tess stopped bouncing and looked attentive. ‘Yes, tell me, but I know I’m going to like her. You like her, so I shall. It isn’t as though I could feel she was taking my own mother’s place, because I can’t remember Mummy at all, can I? And there aren’t any photographs.’

‘Well, not of you with Mummy, because she died . . .’

‘No, I mean none of your wedding, anything like that. Nor of when you were just being friends, like you are with Marianne.’

Peter leaned across the table and took Tess’s hands in his. He smiled into her innocently enquiring face. ‘Darling, I’ve not talked about Mummy because it hurts me to remember she’s dead. I don’t have photographs about for the same reason, because when I lost her I didn’t want to be reminded of what I’d lost. But there weren’t many photographs, in fact I’ve only one left, which was taken on our wedding day . . . look, wait here.’

He hurried indoors, up to his room. He unlocked a small Victorian writing desk which stood on his tallboy, extracted a photograph and returned to his daughter and the garden. He sat down, pulling his chair alongside hers.

‘Here . . . your mother. On her wedding day.’

Tess took the photograph and stared and stared. Peter, watching her face, saw the puzzlement on it. He looked at the photograph himself, realising as he did so that he hadn’t looked at it, not properly, for years. Truth to tell you couldn’t see much of Leonora because of the long, voluminous white dress which reached to just above her ankles, and the circlet of white roses worn rather low on her brow, and the veil. He hadn’t looked critically at the photo before, and suddenly he was sorry he had produced it. The camera, he thought, had robbed Leonora of her fey, elfin beauty and made her look prosaic, whilst the veil hid her mass of glorious hair and made her face seem too thin.

Tess, however, was studying the picture with close attention. Then she looked up and smiled uncertainly at him. ‘She looks so sad, Daddy.’

It could not have surprised him more, nor taken the wind so completely out of his sails. He started to say that his wife must have been nervous, then found his voice suspended by a lump in his throat. Sad? How could she have been sad, on her wedding day? And what had made Tess say that, of all things? He looked at the photograph again. Leonora’s smooth young face looked back at him. Staring at the photograph, he could feel again the touch of her as she pressed against him at the photographer’s request, feel the sunshine warming his hair after the cold inside the church, the hard brim of the unfamiliar top hat in his left hand, Leonora’s cool fingers in his right. Had she been sad then as they stood close, heads together, after the ceremony that had made them man and wife?

‘But you look happy as happy,’ Tess said quickly, sensing she had said the wrong thing. ‘And you look so proud, Daddy!’

‘I was proud,’ Peter muttered. ‘Leonora was a beautiful thing. The photograph doesn’t show how lovely she was.’

‘Leonora? Oh Daddy, what a pretty name!’

Peter stared at Tess. ‘You must have known her name! I must have mentioned it a hundred times . . .’

Tess shook her head. ‘You always call her “Mummy”, or “your mother”,’ she said. ‘Only you don’t talk about her much, do you, Daddy? Hardly ever, really.’

Peter swallowed. ‘No, darling, I don’t,’ he said. ‘And I want you to ask me as many questions as you like now, and I’ll do my best to answer them. But it wouldn’t be fair on Marianne if we talked about your mother after she and I are married. So . . . ask away.’

‘How old was she, when she had me?’

Peter smiled. ‘She wasn’t twenty, darling. We married very young.’

Tess nodded. She took another sandwich but did not bite into it. Instead, she stared at it thoughtfully, as though she might find the questions she wanted – needed – to ask printed upon its white surface.

‘Where did she live? Not just with you, but with her own mother and father.’

‘She lived in a village called Blofield, which is on the road between Norwich and Yarmouth. Her parents were old and they didn’t approve of Leonora and me getting married, so they never saw you at all. But they died years ago.’

‘I see. So you met, and fell in love . . . where did you meet her, Daddy? Can you tell me things like that, or doesn’t that count?’

‘Anything I can tell you, I will,’ Peter said. ‘I’d known her for some while, but when we first met she had another boyfriend, a chap called Ziggy Freeman. Then he died and I asked if she’d come out with me. She said she would so I took her to a dance, and I knew immediately that she was the one for me. I think she knew, too, because we were married quite soon after that first date.’

‘And where did you live then?’

‘We didn’t have a house of our own, just a rented one, because we had very little money. You and I moved to Barton after . . . after she died.’

Tess stared at him. She frowned, started to speak, then stopped short. ‘Directly after she died? You and I came to the Old House?’

‘Yes, right here, to this very house. Anything else?’

Tess stared at him for a moment, then began to eat her sandwich. She bit, chewed, swallowed, then shook her head. ‘Nothing else,’ she said. ‘Because . . . no, nothing else.’

‘Right. Then pass me a sandwich, pet – and can you pour me another cup of tea?’

Tess poured the tea carefully into the cup and handed it to her father. No more questions, she thought to herself. Because what was the point, once you knew you weren’t being answered truthfully? Daddy had
fibbed,
because Mrs Thrower had told her many times how she had watched Mr Delamere moving in, and him with a child of Janet’s age – around three years old – and not so much as a housekeeper or a maid to give an eye to the kid.