A House Divided: An Easterleigh Hall Novel (28 page)

Bridie's nose was bleeding. ‘Yes, I'm sorry. Of course I'm sorry.'

Her father said, ‘Did you ever tell Uncle Jack and Aunt Grace that Tim punched you at Old Bert's Field and cracked your ribs? Did you tell anyone, ever?'

She shook her head. ‘No. James was there, and we said nothing.'

Jack looked shocked. Gracie had begun to cry, wailing, ‘Oh, Bridie, why didn't you say?'

‘Because it wasn't him, not really, or I didn't think it was, to begin with, but then I saw he enjoyed it, so how could I tell anyone that? But his face was different when Prancer died. I should have seen it. I didn't. I just kept seeing him when he hit me, and I knew how mean he'd been to you. It was enough that Prancer was dead, without more. I'm sorry. I wanted to tell you, but I was a coward.'

Her father said, ‘No, you were not a coward. I failed you. I could tell there was something from the way you moved, and I made it my business to ask general questions about the melee at Old Bert's Field, but nothing more.'

Evie was with her now, leading her from the room, but Gracie came after her with the other women. Gracie slipped her arm around her. ‘Poor Bridie. Let's clean you up. I'm so very sorry, about it all. How could he? How could I? What's happening, that's what I keep thinking: to the world, to him, and now, to me? Where on earth is it all going to end?'

Though her nose throbbed, Bridie felt as though a darkness was lifting. James was a prisoner, and not dead, and Jack would talk to Tim, and they might all be friends again. It wouldn't matter if he couldn't help, because she knew that if he was the old Tim, he would at least try.

She said, ‘I'm sure he felt sorry when he came, because now I see him, I see myself when I came back from Arles. I'm so sorry, everyone, and so sorry for Tim. I need to tell
him
that, too.'

Mart, Charlie and Aub walked with Jack to the indoor exercise yard, drawing up their collars in the whipping easterly wind. Aub thought that the waves at Fordington would be a sight and sound to glory in. ‘What can we do, Jacko?' Aub asked quietly as they entered the exercise barn. Immediately the sound of the wind faded, and they watched Clive take Marigold through her paces.

‘Nothing, bonny lad,' Jack said. ‘It's what I have to do, and should have done a long time ago, but after Prancer and his no show, Gracie and I felt it was up to him. Bloody hard for us it's been an' all. So now I'll go and try to sort it all out, and not before time. My lad came for Prancer, and was sent away. No-one's fault, not really, and nowhere near as bad as punching Bridie. D'you know, lads, he doesn't go to Hawton BUF any more, I've been checking.'

Mart said, ‘But that means nought, for he could be a member in Newcastle. Do we know if he's still
hand in glove with Millie and Heine? I hope he isn't, but right now, I bloody well hope he is.'

‘No matter what I said, Bridie still shouldn't have turned him away; she's not the world's policeman.' Aub's tone was weary.

Jack toed the sand as they all leaned back now against the wooden wall of the building. ‘She was protecting us and hitting out at the same time, like most Forbes or Bramptons are prone to do.'

Charlie stuck his hands in his pockets and whistled slightly in the pause that followed, then said, ‘Aye, I can see that, quite clear, I can. It's just like the bleedin' Forbes and Bramptons, so I think you should all get birch twigs and give yourselves a good whipping.'

Aub laughed quietly, watching Clive use his knees to back Marigold slowly and calmly. She'd come on well, especially since Bridie had been back. He sighed and muttered, ‘I do think that Bridie is less impulsive and probably wouldn't send your lad off with a flea in his ear now. She's seventeen, and seems to have changed, and who wouldn't after her rather frequent falls from grace. The thing is, Jacko, I admire her, damn it, just as, in a strange way, I admire Tim's courage in being open in support of his politics.' Well, Aub pondered, someone had to say something good about Tim.

Marigold was trotting forward now with a steady stride, one that moved her body very little. ‘She'll be perfect for the injured,' Aub said.

Jack nodded, preoccupied, and for a while there was total silence between the four men.

Mart repeated, ‘So, Jacko, what can we do to help?'

Clive had dismounted and was walking towards them. Aub searched in his pockets for the carrots he always carried. ‘She's looking right canny,' Charlie said, as Marigold whickered and took the carrot, huffing her warm breath into his hand.

‘Aye,' Clive said. ‘Your Bridie's done a right good job on her. Best lass out, she is, and always has been, and I reckon we're right proud of her, all of
us
lot, anyway, and that's all I want to say. '

There was a challenge in his voice as he stared at each of them in turn. They levered themselves off the wall, and almost saluted as he passed on by, and then they grinned at one another. ‘Well, that's it then,' Mart laughed.

‘It is indeed,' agreed Jack. ‘Now I've a son to see about a number of things.'

Jack drove the Austin into Newcastle that evening. Gracie had said that she would not come, because someone had to stay outside the centre of the conflagration. ‘The boy needs a harbour unconnected with this particular discussion.'

When she had said that, he knew how badly hurt she'd been by the thought of her son striking a girl, even if it was in a melee. He parked in the next street and walked to Tim's building, looking up at his window. It was dark, but it was only nine, so of course a youngster would be out.

But did he live here still? He hadn't even tried to find out; he hadn't reached out his hand after he thought Tim had not come when Prancer died. What sort of a father did that make him? He noticed that the building next to Tim's block had been changed into flats. It had been a warehouse before, surely. He knew he was prevaricating, and opened the door into the main entrance of Tim's building.

He checked the mail in the hallway. There was an envelope addressed to Tim, with a German stamp. He held it up, peering at the date. Ten days ago. It was Millie's handwriting, and he dropped it, wanting
to wash his hands. Ten days? Was Tim away? A young woman in a headscarf came through the front door, pressed the light switch, and headed up the stairs. He called after her, ‘Does Tim Forbes still live here?'

She called back without stopping, ‘Tim Forbes changed his name to Tim Smith, and now he's Tim Forbes again. Daft, I call it. Yes, he's still here, but he'll be in late, he always is.'

The light went out. She called down, ‘Press the light switch, would you, man? It's on a timer; we've got a mean old devil of a landlord.'

He did, and followed her. His son had changed his name to that of his father, Roger, but then back again. He felt a surge of hope. The light went out on the second floor. Tim's bedsit was at the top. He clambered on up to the fourth floor. He sat outside, on the floor, twisting his cap, waiting in the dark. At eleven thirty the light came on, and he heard steps on the stairs. They sounded like his son's. The light cut out after thirty seconds.

Jack stood, reached out and flicked the switch. The light came on, as Tim almost reached the landing. He blinked, rubbed a hand across his face, his cap on the back of his head. Jack could smell the booze and stale sweat on him even from here. Tim was looking at the next step, and then the next, and hadn't seen him. Jack stayed silent, not wanting him to run, wanting him within arms' length so he could grab him if need be.

At the head of the stairs, Tim fumbled in his pocket. He staggered towards his door, bringing out a clutch of keys. He looked up. Jack reached out, and Tim flinched away. The lights went out, and Tim stumbled against the wall. Jack grabbed him, and his son fought him off. ‘No, get away.' It was more a sob of terror than a shout.

Jack lunged for the switch. In the light he said, ‘It's me, it's your da.' It was too late, Tim was stumbling towards the stairs. ‘Wait, son.' Jack went after him, snatching the keys from his hand, holding him close, in a bear hug. Still Tim fought. Jack almost dragged him to the door, then looked for a key that would fit. He opened it, and hauled in his son, kicking the door shut, the stale stench making him cough. They were plunged into darkness. Tim tore himself away. There was the sound of a chair or something crashing over. Jack found the light switch by the door, and flicked it on.

The bed was unmade, the linen was filthy, the small sink full of dirty dishes. On the draining board were half-eaten meals, with cigarettes stubbed out in the remains. Tim slumped onto his bed. Jack dragged across the wicker chair he and Grace had brought the day they had helped him move in.

He placed it in front of his son, but after a moment, he moved to sit next to him, taking him into his arms again. ‘It's your da, bonny lad. It's only me. What's happened to you?'

There was no answer. They sat in silence and
gradually Jack felt Tim's body begin to shudder, and as it grew worse he held Tim tighter, and tighter. ‘It's your da. I'm here. I was always here, I always will be.'

Tim began sobbing, great hoarse cries, and Jack rocked him. ‘Oh, my boy, what's happened to you?'

At last the crying stopped, and Tim straightened, digging in his pocket. ‘Let me go, Da. I need a handkerchief, and I can't breathe, man.' He was trying to laugh, but it was a creaky sound, as though it was strange to him. Jack dragged out his own handkerchief, pristine white, and handed it to him. ‘I didn't know you'd come to help with Prancer. Bridie's only just told us. She didn't want us hurt. I should—'

Tim smiled, stuffing the handkerchief in his pocket. ‘Bridie, God bless her, she's an army all on her own. She was right to look after you, it's what I would have done, should have done. I'll wash the handkerchief and send it to you, as I expect I'm not welcome.'

‘You're always welcome.' Jack said nothing about the punch Tim had dealt Bridie, but waited. His son was exhausted, thin, unshaven; how had he held down his job? Or had he? What the hell had happened? Was it Millie? God, he would swing for her.

Then it all came out: his belief in fascism as a way to get the country on its feet, the increasing anti-Semitism in Germany and at the Hawton
meetings which he had totally ignored, feeling perhaps that all collateral damage would be rectified when things were sorted. ‘But that's a bloody excuse, Da. I just didn't give it a moment's thought, man. What the hell's wrong with me?'

He drove on, telling of his last time in Berlin, the beatings, the cell, Otto's death, his fear, no, his terror. At last his realisation of the nature of a state with no democracy, the absence of a legal presence, the evil of it all, which was why he no longer considered himself a fascist. Finally he said, ‘It's the nightmares. So damned silly. If I go to sleep I dream, so I don't want to sleep. I stay awake, and instead I hear and smell it. I'm so bloody tired, and all the time I need a drink. It's the only thing that blunts it. I'm on a warning at work, and I don't blame them.'

Jack waited a moment, and then said, ‘I had those, after the war. Lots of us did; they ease and then end, in the main, if you talk to someone and are patient. I was beaten, as a prisoner, and locked up in a cell in a salt mine. That is what I remember most about being a prisoner: the terror of being alone, the worry about my men, because if I still fought against the enemy then me marras suffered penalties too. That's something I never discovered the answer to . . .' He drifted off into his memories, which was a place he preferred not to be, and knew that tonight he would dream about it again. ‘And there was no law, not really, in a bloody enemy salt mine, or any other of their mines. So I know exactly what you mean.'

Tim looked at him now. ‘I thought you would.'

Jack said, ‘You have a letter downstairs from your mother?' It was a question. Somewhere a clock was ticking, or was it a tap dripping? He looked around. It was the clock on the mantelpiece, next to a photograph taken when Tim was ten, with Bridie and James. There was another, of Tim with Gracie and Jack, another of Tim with Mart, Jack, Charlie and Aub after a day at the races. There was not one of Millie, or Heine.

‘Mam is my mother.' Tim was picking at the skin around his thumbnail, a nail that was dirty. Well, they all were. Jack placed his hand on his son's, and held it, as he had done when he was a child. He placed his other around it. ‘You're right, son, and she always will be.'

Jack felt a growing relief. Then his son explained about the earlier need to find the letter which Millie had said was forged, and the stolen silver. He added that, of course, the family probably knew that Bridie had found him searching, and had tried to help.

Jack shook his head. ‘No, she said nothing. You asked her not to, I reckon?'

He saw his son's eyes fill with tears, which he brushed away. For a moment, neither said anything and Jack pictured his niece, so like her mam, so rock solid, so formidable, but vulnerable.

A memory came to him from that terrible day when his son had hurled abuse at him in the club then stormed out: amongst all the ranting, there had
been something about the theft of the silver and a forged letter. Now it all made sense. He said, ‘I certainly remember about the stolen silver. Lord Brampton reported it to the police, and then set his private detectives on it. They harassed your grandparents until your Uncle Aub put a stop to it.'

‘I know she lied to me, because the silver is there, in her vitrine. They need the letter so she can marry Heine, or so she says. But it's probably something to do with his job. I'm never going back, Da. I don't trust them, either of them. They were so angry last time, and there's just something about people who take apartments from others, who wade through lives . . .' He trailed off and shuddered. ‘There's an evil . . .' He gave up.