The Piper's Tune (31 page)

Tom was lost for words. Florence had once been his ally, had supported him across the bridge of doubt, had taken his daughter from him at a time when he thought that would solve everything. He needed her advice now, but she was no longer here to give it.

‘We'll be all right, won't we, dearest?' Albert said.

‘Yes, Dada. We will be fine.'

‘In that case…' Tom got to his feet.

He had come with the intention of shouldering responsibility for the daughter he had once discarded but when it came down to it he really only wanted to shake off once and for all the emotional debts that had accumulated over the years. He had always felt more indebted to Florence than to Sylvie. He had never been able to engage with Dorothy's child, to forgive Sylvie for being Dorothy's legatee. He realised now that self-recrimination, the folly of fatherhood, had been his one besetting sin.

‘Everyone will be at the funeral,' Sylvie said. ‘All the folk from the church, officers from the Coral Strand. Mama, looking down, will be very proud of what she achieved with her time here with us.'

‘Will there be room at the graveside for me?' Tom asked.

Sylvie said, ‘Yes, Papa, we will make room for you.'

Tom stepped back, fumbling at the buttons of his overcoat.

‘If there's anything I can do…' he said, lamely.

‘Well, yes, there is, as a matter of fact,' said Albert.

‘What's that?' said Tom.

‘Funerals are expensive, Papa,' Sylvie said.

Twice in the space of ten seconds she had addressed him as ‘Papa.' Under the circumstances it gave him no comfort. Sylvie wasn't asking for his love, only his money. Even so, he nodded.

‘You may send the bills to me for payment.'

‘All of them?'

‘All of them,' Tom said, then turned on his heel and left.

*   *   *

Hundreds turned out for the service in the Mission Hall in Damaris Street. Relegated to the rear, Tom listened sceptically to the roll-call of his sister-in-law's virtues. Albert and Sylvie were in the front row, the girl in pure black velvet and, in spite of her tender age, half veiled. Mr Chappell, a Coral Strand representative from London, spoke eloquently about the Hartnells' contribution to the work of the foreign mission and, like a stage magician, produced a small wooden plaque which would be displayed on the wall in the Holborn offices to remind everyone of Florence's dedication.

It was all rather touching and so perfectly sincere that Tom's eyes grew misty when the mission choir sang ‘One Day the Lord Will Walk on Every Coral Strand', and Sylvie, adhering to Albert's arm, led the way up the aisle, out of the hall on to the pavement where, amid a rabble of ragged urchins, a carriage and plumed horses waited to carry Florence's coffin to the Auld Kirk burial ground, near Merkland Quay; the same shabby graveyard in which, a dozen years ago, Dorothy had been laid to rest and which he, Tom, had hoped never to clap eyes on again. He clambered into one of the horse-drawn charabancs that had been laid on at his expense to carry the menfolk to the cemetery.

The last he saw of Sylvie was at the pavement's edge, a little posy of forget-me-nots in one hand, a white handkerchief in the other. She was flanked by women, some shawled, some hatted, but as the procession rolled off down Damaris Street she looked up in a manner just distracted enough to suggest that at last she was missing the woman who had reared her and was moved to search for her presence not in heaven but lingering here on earth.

*   *   *

‘Where were you? I wanted you there. You promised you would come.'

‘I
did
come,' Forbes said. ‘I
was
there.'

‘Where?'

‘In the close opposite.'

‘The whole time?'

‘The whole time.'

‘What was I wearing?'

‘Black, all black, and a hat with a half veil.'

‘What was I carrying?'

‘A bunch of flowers, small blue flowers.'

‘What kind, what variety?'

‘I don't know, do I?' Forbes said.

‘You didn't go to the cemetery with the others?'

‘No, I did not.'

‘Why not?' Sylvie said.

‘I didn't want to be seen.'

‘I thought you might have offered me a kiss, or something.'

‘I wanted to, honey, truly I did. But I didn't dare show myself.'

‘Mama's not here now, Mama's gone, so it doesn't matter.'

‘I'm afraid it matters more than ever,' Forbes said.

‘Dada says you will look after me.'

‘Does he?' Forbes said. ‘Does he, indeed? Where is he, Sylvie? Has he gone out collecting on his own?'

‘He doesn't want to go collecting any more.'

‘I'll bet he doesn't,' Forbes said. ‘He knows I'll take care of you.'

‘Marry me?'

Forbes refrained from answering that question. ‘Is he over at Kirby's?'

‘I think he might be. He said you would take me home.'

‘I will. Of course and I will. But not until you answer me one question.' He reached across the Imperial's brass-topped table and caught her hand. Through the suede gloves he could feel the delicate structure of her fingers. ‘Why was Tom Calder at your mother's funeral?'

‘Who?'

‘Tom Calder, chief designer for Franklin Shipbuilders.'

‘I really and truly don't—'

‘Your name isn't Hartnell at all, is it?' Forbes said.

Another veil was attached to her hat tonight, not black but grey. She had escaped from full mourning already, from black to grey and dark green, shades that flattered her. He doubted if Lindsay had such an expensive range of clothing. Sylvie stared at him, eyes empty. If she had been a true artist, she would have squeezed out a tear or two to temper her eagerness. Perhaps she sensed that he and she were stamped from the same mould and painted the same colour, like little tin soldiers.

‘I think you're Tom Calder's daughter.'

‘What if I am?' Sylvie said.

‘Why didn't you tell me? Did Bertie imagine there might be an advantage in keeping quiet?'

‘I thought you might leave me if you knew who I was.'

‘I'm not going to leave you,' Forbes said.

‘Are you going to marry me?'

‘It depends what you mean by “marry”.'

‘Become my husband. Make me your wife.'

‘No, I'm not going to do that,' Forbes said.

‘Because you don't love me?'

‘Because I do love you,' Forbes said. ‘I love you more than any other girl I've ever met and I'm going to go on loving you, come what may.'

It was enough, just enough, to give her pause.

She snuggled her hand into his and squinted at him from under the veil.

Then she said, ‘You just want to take me to bed.'

‘Yes, I do want to take you to bed.'

‘I've never been with a man before.'

‘I'm glad of that,' Forbes said.

‘Have you been in bed with her?'

He did not have to ask who. Everything was moving in the right direction, though, and he felt his desire grow and expand: a strange sort of desire, not like his feelings for Lindsay, not calculating. The things he'd said to shock his cousins were coming home to roost at last, for in Sylvie Hartnell – Sylvie Calder – he recognised not just compliance but complicity.

‘No,' he said.

‘Don't you want to be in bed with her?'

‘I want to be in bed with you.'

‘She's the one you'll marry, though?' Sylvie said.

‘Yes, she's the one I'll marry,' Forbes said. ‘There you are, darling. I'm being straight with you. I'm not making false promises. The fact that you happen to be Tom Calder's daughter makes no real difference. If anything it just makes things more interesting.'

‘Interesting?'

‘Complicated,' Forbes said. ‘I like things complicated, don't you?'

She was beginning to comprehend. She might have been fathered by Honest Tom but she had been raised by Bertie Hartnell. He had never met the woman whom Sylvie had called ‘Mama' and could only guess how her influence had acted upon the wild inheritance that George Crush had told him about in lurid detail, how Tom Calder had had the horns put on him by his wife, Sylvie's mother, who had slept with half the men in Glasgow apparently before she had succumbed to a galloping consumption.

‘Yes,' Sylvie answered, with just the trace of a lisp. ‘Yes, I do.'

‘Did your dada tell you why I'm going to marry Lindsay Franklin?'

‘For the money?'

‘Exactly.'

‘I thought you had money of your own.'

‘I do – but not enough.'

‘Not enough to let her go and marry me instead?'

‘Not nearly enough for that,' he said.

Forbes felt the lies thicken in his throat. The ease with which he lied to Lindsay failed him when he studied Sylvie's grey eyes, blonde ringlets and unblemished complexion. She did not have to seduce him. She did not even have to deceive him. She loved him. He knew that she loved him and that she would do anything he asked of her because of it. For an insane moment he was tempted to throw away his future, snatch Sylvie's hand and run off with her.

‘No,' he said, sharply. ‘No.'

‘It is her money you want, isn't it, dearest? Not her?'

‘I want you,' he said, not lying. ‘Only you.'

‘Then we will not speak of it again.'

‘What?'

‘Her.'

‘Sylvie, I…'

‘Dada says you may take me home.'

‘To your house, do you mean?'

‘Yes,' Sylvie said. ‘To my house.'

‘Will Bertie – will your dada be there?' Forbes asked.

And Sylvie answered, ‘Not until we've done what it is we have to do.'

*   *   *

Lindsay was quiet all through dinner.

Arthur was concerned that Nanny's death had left a mark upon her, though her appetite did not seem affected and she ate with her usual gusto. Eleanor had been a brick. Cook too. Even Maddy had had sense enough not to go whistling and rattling about the house but to observe respect for the mourning atmosphere. He missed Nanny Cheadle but there was an element of relief in him too, for the house was undoubtedly more civilised now that the old woman had taken her leave.

It had been a strange end to summer, all fuss and bother, everything askew. He had not been able to enjoy the things that would normally have given him pleasure. He had lost enthusiasm for the choir's performances under the exhibition dome and had not, so he believed, sung as well as he was able to do. Even the Glasgow Choirs' rendering of ‘The Cameronian's Dream' had lacked punch, though why the paleness of one male voice out of three hundred should make a difference Arthur was at a loss to explain.

The Japanese launching, the
Hashitaka
's imminent trials, Nanny's funeral, a procession of up-and-coming weddings, Lindsay's, perhaps, among them, and a programme of work that allowed no rest had resulted in moods of uncertainty that manifested themselves as anxiety about absolutely everything.

He went upstairs after dinner, not really to work but to ponder. He had been set a problem in the design of air supply to boiler-rooms and had no idea where to begin. He sat on the edge of the table with a pad on his lap and a pencil in his hand and waited for inspiration. He could not apply himself, though, could not bring his mind to bear on fan casings and deflectors, on cowls and foul weather shutters and was relieved when Lindsay entered the study.

‘Am I disturbing you?'

He put the pad to one side. ‘Not at all.'

He watched her warily, sensing her seriousness. Her mother had had the same sort of transparency, an inability to hide her feelings. It had been one of Margaret's more appealing qualities but in Lindsay directness was more challenging. She looked so pretty and mature in black, almost, he thought sadly, like a little widow herself.

‘May I speak with you?' Lindsay said.

‘Of course.'

‘It's important.'

‘I gathered that by your expression.'

‘Forbes and I wish to marry.'

‘That isn't exactly news,' Arthur said.

‘To set a date,' Lindsay said.

‘Before or after Martin's wedding?' Arthur said. ‘Before or after Cissie and Tom Calder make their trip to the altar?'

‘I'm serious, Papa.'

‘I know you are.'

‘We want to come and live here with you.'

‘Forbes's idea?' Arthur asked.

‘It's a sensible thing to do.'

‘Practical, certainly,' Arthur said.

He had already considered the matter and knew that he would capitulate. If she had come in off the street with some beggar as a would-be husband his answer would have been exactly the same. He felt shrivelled inside, though, withered by the realisation that his safe, sad, comfortable existence was coming to an end, that he had fulfilled his dream, and Margaret's too, by successfully raising a child to adulthood.

She stood before him now with her hands on her hips like some little washerwoman. ‘It need not be a large wedding, if that's what concerns you.'

‘That isn't what concerns me,' Arthur said.

‘Forbes doubts that his father will attend.'

‘Kay will come, no doubt of that.'

‘What do you have against your sister?'

‘I honestly do not know.'

‘Can't you forgive and forget, Papa?'

The question was too raw. He still could not answer it without heat. At all costs he must avoid a squabble that could escalate into bitterness. He had been through that already with the self-same sister, with Kay. There was no drama in their feud, only a vain need to prove that she was right, he wrong, without ever defining what had been at stake in the first place.

‘It's the upper floor you want, isn't it?' he said.