Theirs Was The Kingdom (26 page)

Then he had another idea that at least had the advantage of postponing a decision for a day or so. On the following Saturday, only three days from now, he had arranged a visit to his grandfather, Sam Rawlinson. In view of what old Sam had said concerning Broadbent, he might look for guidance in this quarter, stressing the fact that the Broadbents, one and all, had been at pains to make him welcome during his stay. The decision relieved him of the pressure his discoveries had laid upon him, so that he spent the rest of the day helping to load waggons and unharness returning teams. It was heavy work and gave him something else to think about so that he was able, with no more than a qualm or two, to get through his dinner in the company of the Broadbents, take a soda bath, and retire to bed early, pleading stiffness after all that heaving in the yard.

The next morning brought him a huge Valentine card, obviously from Lizzie, for it bore a local postmark and a verse that ran,

I love but you
Pray love me too.

More to the point was a money order for two pounds from his father, a morocco leather cigar case from his mother, and an assortment of cravats, shirt studs, and other gifts from the younger children. Opening his parcels, he missed his train for the yard so that Broadbent went off in advance, and while the girls were upstairs he showed his gifts to Laura, who admired the cigar case but frowned when she saw the gaudy Valentine card.

“I think that’s right vulgar,” she said. “Harry must have put Lizzie up to it, for she hasn’t the brains to think of it herself. However, since it’s your birthday, I’ve bought you a little something myself,” and she gave him a cardboard box containing a small gold seal in the shape of a wedge, inscribed with his initials and the Swann insignia. “It’s for your watchchain,” she said, “all the fashionable young gentlemen are sporting fobs. Here, let me fasten it for you,” and she faced him, lowering her head to clip the shank of the seal on to his chain.

It might have been her nearness and the heady perfume she used, or perhaps the need of a gesture to express his appreciation. It might even have had something to do with his feelings of guilt that he was likely to be the agent responsible for boosting her out of this comfortable home and setting her adrift with a jobless husband. Whatever it was, he surrendered to it. Holding her by the shoulders, he kissed the top of her head, instantly regretting it and expecting, if not a slap across the face, at least a rebuke for taking such a liberty with her.

Nothing like this happened. All she did was to tuck the thin gold chain back into his waistcoat pocket, straighten herself, and say, with a smile, “That’s not much of a birthday kiss, lad. Here, let me show you how,” and she threw both arms about his neck, inclined her full weight towards him, and kissed him full on the mouth.

He had kissed girls before, perhaps a dozen or so at Christmas parties and hunt balls, but he had neither given nor received a kiss of this sort. It made his senses reel. Her mouth, soft as a petal, touched off a succession of sensations that were at once alarming and extremely pleasurable, so that he was at a loss how to proceed from this point on and was immensely relieved when, standing back, she looked at him with complete unconcern and said, gaily, “Why, lad, don’t look so sad about it! What’s a kiss between friends on the day you come of age? Royalty don’t wait upon twenty-first birthdays, and you’re royalty up here, seeing whose son you are. Besides, it’s time some woman kissed you as if she meant it. You’ve got to start some time, and what better day than this?”

That was the rub, he thought, dismally. What day was it, apart from the one marking his eighteenth birthday? The day he would have to start thinking how much or how little he put into that report he would have to send to Headquarters concerning the secret commissions her husband was milking from Swann hauls. The day when he had it in his power to make paupers of all four of them. He said, hoarsely, “Listen, Mrs. Broadbent… Laura… I… I’d like to say something, something I want you to remember. I’ll be leaving soon. I’m moving to Scotland at the end of the month and maybe I won’t see you again. But whatever happens… whatever comes of my stay up here, I’d like you to know how much I appreciated your kindness. If it hadn’t been for that I would have cut this stint short and moved on almost at once. But you, well… you’re one of the nicest persons I’ve ever met. And one of the prettiest into the bargain!”

He was astonished to see her blush, to watch the colour surge into her cheeks, and then, swiftly it seemed to him, ebb as she said, with a rather pitiful attempt to sound gay, “Well, thank
you
, George! That was a lot more than a watchchain seal merits. And far more than I deserve in the circumstances,” and without commenting on his hint, she walked quickly through into the kitchen quarters where he heard her call sharply to one of the maids.

4

George had been dreading the birthday dinner all day but when it was well launched, and he had swallowed three glasses of Madeira, the wine worked on him in a way that kept harassment at a safe distance. Broadbent was excessively jovial, and even Lizzie seemed worth looking at after her father had given her permission to drink a glass of the wine on top of the sherry she had used to drink his health. When George blew out the eighteen cake candles there was another toast, after which Broadbent, saying briefly he had a call to make, rose and filled George’s glass with port, urging him not to hurry over his coffee for he would be gone some time and the ladies would entertain him. He then left, Lizzie accompanying him to the door and Hester helping to clear the table. For a moment or so he and Laura were alone in the room.

He noticed then that she looked particularly drained and listless, so that he said, jocularly, “Here, take a glass of port. It’s very good,” and poured it. George ignored her gesture as she said, in what seemed a very urgent voice, “Listen, George… I really must talk…” But then the front door slammed and Lizzie came bouncing back into the room, pretending to be tipsy on her one glass of sherry and one glass of Madeira, and Laura Broadbent, addressing her sharply, said, “For heaven’s sake grow up, Lizzie! Drink a cup of coffee. A big cup.”

He was getting the slightest bit muddle-headed with all that food and wine, and the heat of the room, with its banked-up fire and windows closed against the cheerless night outside, but not too tipsy to miss the swift exchange of glances between Lizzie and Laura, so that he wondered if the day had seen yet another of their tiffs. Nothing more was said, however, and they all carried their coffee into the parlour, where the atmosphere was even more oppressive. Presently, after she had tinkled the piano for a spell, and Laura had left to carry the coffee tray into the kitchen, Lizzie poured him a generous brandy from a new bottle on the sideboard, saying that her father said he was to sample it, for it was a brand he had laid in on the advice of his vintner, Mr. Gossage.

George sipped the brandy and it seemed to settle very comfortably on top of the port and Madeira, so that a haze of geniality surrounded him like a gauze curtain, enabling him to see Lizzie, lolling on the arm of his chair, in a role that was new to him. He had always thought of her as a sallow, rather angular girl, with very little that was prepossessing about her; but now, cheerfully admitting to himself that he was well on the way to being drunk, he reached out and pinched her thigh so that she giggled and told him to behave and finish his brandy before Laura came back, for she wouldn’t approve of him drinking brandy after all he had taken at table. He thought this likely and tossed it back, whereupon Lizzie exclaimed, shrilly, “Why, I do declare you’re bottled, George!” and when, unconvincingly, he denied it, “All right. Walk a straight line as far as the piano!” He did, but not as straight as all that. When Mrs. Broadbent returned they were both walking lines to and fro across the patterned carpet so that she said, sharply, “That’s enough, both of you! George, upstairs to bed and sleep it off! You too, Lizzie, before you make a complete fool of yourself! I’ll see to the fires and gas.” But Lizzie replied, calmly, “Don’t forget father is out. If you draw the bolt at the front he’ll bring us all down with his knocking, the way he did last time!”

“It was you who drew the bolt on that occasion,” Mrs. Broadbent snapped and Lizzie, turning sulky, said, “I was only telling you…” and left, George following her after a carefully articulated goodnight to Laura.

On the way upstairs he banged against the banister and ricocheted, so that he suddenly felt very irritated with himself, thinking, “Great God, I couldn’t have shipped that much! If I can’t hold my liquor better than this…” But then Lizzie was there to help him, giggling like a schoolgirl and saying she had to be sure he knew his own room, for gentlemen in his condition were often not too particular where they laid themselves down.

She piloted him across the landing and would have followed him over the threshold but suddenly, inexplicably it seemed to George, Laura was there again, saying in a voice with a keen edge to it, “Leave him be, Lizzie! What are you thinking of, following him to bed? Next thing you’ll be undressing the boy!” to Lizzie replied, “I’ll leave that to you. You’re well used to it, I daresay!”

George, now sitting on the bed, had not been fully aware of the exchange, but suddenly he saw Laura’s hand fly out and heard the sharp smack and the yelp of dismay it produced from Lizzie. Then, without really comprehending what had occurred, he leaned back and the ceiling descended to blend with the counterpane and there was a roaring in his ears as if he was standing beside a waterfall.

He had no idea what time it was when he awakened, dry-mouthed but more clear-headed than he would have expected and well aware that the door of his room had opened and closed and that someone was standing there, over by the window.

He was still wearing his clothes, with the exception of jacket, waistcoat, and boots, so that he had no immediate access to his watch and lay still trying to count the slow chimes of Bowdon Church clock. It told him nothing, save that it was striking a half-hour. He called, presently, “Who is it? Who’s there?” and Laura’s voice answered pitched low and charged with anxiety.

“Me. Laura… Get up and find the rest of your clothes, but quietly… You must go now, before Harry gets back…”

He sat up then, running his hand through his hair and trying to make out her outline over by the curtained window.

“Go where? What time is it? Light the gas…” but she said, urgently, “No! If I do he’ll see it when he comes up the path and he’s due any minute. It’s half past midnight but you sound sober enough.
Are
you?”

“I’m quite sober. It was the heat of the room as much as the wine and all that food… What on earth’s the matter? Why do you want me to go?”

“Because they’re up to something.”

“Mr. Broadbent’s up to something?”

“Him and Lizzie. Don’t ask me how I know. I just sense it… He had no plans to go out again tonight, but Lizzie went to the front door with him, and they were whispering. She’s not been in here, has she?”

“Lizzie? Not as far as I know. Why should she? She’s asleep, isn’t she?”

“She’s in her room but she isn’t asleep. She’s waiting until she hears her father’s key in the lock in order to time it properly. I almost decided to slap it out of her but then I realised this way is better. You can just leave. Go to a hotel, then home first thing in the morning.”

His bewilderment increased. She sounded so tense and fearful, almost as though she was here to warn him Broadbent and his daughter were plotting against his life. He said, spiritedly, “Look here, Laura, I can’t do that. I can’t just walk out, in the middle of the night, without saying why or even knowing why. What’s happened that concerns me?”

“You won’t take my word for it and go?”

“No, I won’t, and I’ve got reasons, apart from it being idiotic.”

“What reasons?”

“Private reasons. Concerning the yard.”

She was silent a moment. Then she said, with resignation, “You’re on to him, aren’t you?” and he absorbed this, disturbed that she was obviously aware of Harry Broadbent’s practices and feeling very deflated on that account. For he had wanted very much to believe she had no knowledge of what was going on down there.

“You
knew about it?”

“I know that Harry and that man Shawe are up to monkey tricks involving your father’s equipment and money. He’s told me nothing and I wouldn’t expect him to. But it’s always been plain to me we couldn’t live in this style on what he earns in salary and commission. Is that why you came here? Did your father send you up here to watch him?”

“
No
, Laura.”

He swung his legs down on the floor. “I found out accidentally… It was his manner more than anything. He went out of his way to be affable but tried his damnedest to keep me away from the yard and the paperwork. I haven’t found anything very important. Just that he’s taking a percentage of Barlow’s hauls and charging the firm for first-class hay when the horses get seconds. It’s the kind of pilfering that goes on in lots of places.”

“You’ve said nothing to him?”

“Not yet. I only found out yesterday.”

“What had you got in mind?”

“I shall have to tell Headquarters. In a few days perhaps, when I’ve had time to think.”

“Why do you need time to think? It’s robbery, isn’t it?”

“There’s you and the girls to consider. He’ll get discharged and Tybalt, the head clerk, would try and persuade my father to prosecute. But that doesn’t mean he would.”